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English: Eibingen Abbey, Germany,
founded in 1165 by Hildegard von Bingen.
Deutsch: Benediktinerinnenkloster Eibingen.
Photo: 8 October 2006.
Source: Own work.
Author: Moguntiner.
(Wikimedia Commons)
Saint Hildegard of Bingen, O.S.B. [Order of Saint Benedict (Latin name: Ordo Sancti Benedicti)] (German: Hildegard von Bingen; Latin: Hildegardis Bingensis) (1098 – 1179), also known as Saint Hildegard, and Sibyl of the Rhine, was a German writer, composer, philosopher, Christian Mystic, Benedictine Abbess, Visionary, and Polymath.
Elected a Magistra by her fellow Nuns, in 1136, she founded the Monasteries of Rupertsberg, in 1150, and Eibingen, in 1165. One of her works as a composer, the Ordo Virtutum, is an early example of Liturgical drama and arguably the oldest surviving Morality Play.
She wrote theological, botanical and medicinal texts, as well as letters, Liturgical songs, and poems, while supervising miniature illuminations in the Rupertsberg manuscript of her first work, Scivias.
Although the history of her formal recognition as a Saint is complicated, she has been recognised as a Saint by parts of the Roman Catholic Church for centuries. On 7 October 2012, Pope Benedict XVI named her a Doctor of the Church.
Hildegard von Bingen.
Voice of the Living Light.
Available on YouTube at
The original Community was founded in 1165 by Hildegard von Bingen. It was dissolved at the beginning of the 19th-Century during the secularisation of this part of Germany.
The present Community was established by Charles, 6th Prince of Löwenstein-Wertheim-Rosenberg, in 1904, and re-settled from Saint Gabriel's Abbey, Bertholdstein. The Nunnery belongs to the Beuronese Congregation within the Benedictine Confederation.
English: Interior of Eibingen Abbey, Germany.
Deutsch: Abtei St. Hildegard in Eibingen,
Ortsteil von Rüdesheim am Rhein.
Innenansicht der Abteikirche.
Photo: 29 May 2012.
Source: Own work.
Author: Haffitt.
(Wikimedia Commons)
In 1988, the Sisters founded Marienrode Priory, at Hildesheim, which became independent of Eibingen Abbey in 1998.
The Nuns work in the vineyard and in the craft workshops, besides undertaking the traditional duties of hospitality. They can be heard (but not seen) singing their regular Services. The Abbey is a Rhine Gorge World Heritage Site.
Deutsch: Abtei St. Hildegard oberhalb von Eibingen
(Ortsteil von Rüdesheim am Rhein).
Innenansicht der Abteikirche: Altarraum.
English: Interior of Eibingen Abbey,
Rüdesheim am Rhein, Germany.
Français: Abbaye Sainte-Hildegarde d'Eibingen,
Rüdesheim am Rhein, Allemagne.
Photo: 20 November 2012.
Source: Own work.
Author: Pedelecs.
(Wikimedia Commons)
Hildegard explained that she saw all things in the Light of God through the five senses; sight, hearing, taste, smell, and touch. She was hesitant to share her visions, confiding only to Jutta, who in turn told Volmar, Hildegard's tutor and, later, secretary. Throughout her life, she continued to have many visions, and in 1141, at the age of forty-two, Hildegard received a vision she believed to be an instruction from God, to "write down that which you see and hear." Still hesitant to record her visions, Hildegard became physically ill. The illustrations recorded in the book of Scivias were visions that Hildegard experienced, causing her great suffering and tribulations. In her first theological text, Scivias ("Know the Ways"), Hildegard describes her struggle within:
Hildegard's Vita was begun by Godfrey of Disibodenberg, under Hildegard's supervision. It was between November 1147 and February 1148, at the Synod in Trier, that Pope Eugenus heard about Hildegard’s writings. It was from this that she received Papal approval to document her visions as revelations from the Holy Spirit giving her instant credence.
Before Hildegard’s death, a problem arose with the Clergy of Mainz. A man buried in Rupertsburg had died after Excommunication from the Church. Therefore, the Clergy wanted to remove his body from the Sacred Ground. Hildegard did not accept this idea, replying that it was a sin and that the man had been reconciled to the Church at the time of his death.
On 17 September 1179, when Hildegard died, her Sisters claimed they saw two streams of light appear in the skies and cross over the room where she was dying.
But, I, though I saw and heard these things, refused to write for a long time, through doubt and bad opinion and the diversity of human words, not with stubbornness, but in the exercise of humility, until, laid low by the scourge of God, I fell upon a bed of sickness; then, compelled at last by many illnesses, and by the witness of a certain noble maiden of good conduct [the Nun Richardis von Stade] and of that man whom I had secretly sought and found, as mentioned above, I set my hand to the writing.
While I was doing it, I sensed, as I mentioned before, the deep profundity of scriptural exposition; and, raising myself from illness by the strength I received, I brought this work to a close – though just barely – in ten years. (...) And I spoke and wrote these things not by the invention of my heart or that of any other person, but as by the secret Mysteries of God I heard and received them in the heavenly places. And again I heard a voice from Heaven saying to me, 'Cry out therefore, and write thus!'
Deutsch: Kloster Eibingen Abteikirche Sankt Hildegard.
English: The Abbey Church of Saint Hildegard, Eibingen, Germany.
Photo: 8 October 2006.
Source: Own work.
Author: Moguntiner.
(Wikimedia Commons)
Before Hildegard’s death, a problem arose with the Clergy of Mainz. A man buried in Rupertsburg had died after Excommunication from the Church. Therefore, the Clergy wanted to remove his body from the Sacred Ground. Hildegard did not accept this idea, replying that it was a sin and that the man had been reconciled to the Church at the time of his death.
On 17 September 1179, when Hildegard died, her Sisters claimed they saw two streams of light appear in the skies and cross over the room where she was dying.
