Christ and the loving soul

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The poem " Christ and the loving soul " is a poem based on a picture sheet . The origins of the illustrated sheet go back to the first half of the 14th century; it later became an extensive text of over 2000 verses, a "monastic teaching poem", perhaps written for a Beguine in the Lake Constance area.

poem

In the Christian faith, mysticism is the form of piety that can lead the believer to a direct vision of God, to union with God ( unio mystica ). The "loving soul" stands for the believer who, as the "loving soul", is the (female) bride of the heavenly (male) bridegroom Jesus Christ . “Christ and the loving soul” now describes the allegorical dialogue between bride and groom. In the first part of the book, the secular, dominant marriage with the subordination of women to men plays an essential role. The second part of the illustrated “arc of images” looks different: instead of subordination and overriding, instead of female passivity (also in the sense of suffering), instead of alienation of the spouse, it is now the woman or the soul that actively demands a decision in favor Christ falls: "I would rather cling to you. / I want you, dear lord, now allain." Togetherness and erotic privacy create the unio mystica in the turning away of the lovers from the outside world : "Dear, I and you are all ain, / Alsus hosts us two. "

St. Georgen manuscript No. 89

One of the few medieval manuscripts containing the poem is Codex St. Georgen No. 89 , which comes from the Georgskloster in Villingen and is now in the Badische Landesbibliothek in Karlsruhe. The manuscript contains the “Poem of Christ and the minnenden Seele ”(fol. 1r) and the edification“ Christ with the seven shops ”(fol. 80v). On the reverse of folio 99 there are feather samples . The paper manuscript is 14.50 cm high, 10.70 cm wide and was created around the middle of the 15th century (or after 1430). The two texts, written in the Alemannic-Swabian dialect, contain a series of colored images, such as the one on folio 1 recto, on which a later hand from the second half of the 15th century wrote the title "The minnende Seele (and the angels)" . The handwriting is written in black ink, the initials are red, a red leather cover protects the pages. A fragment of a processional from the 14th century was found on the inside of the front cover, and a part of a German parchment certificate from the 15th century on the inside of the back cover.

Manuscript Mainz No. 46

A parchment fragment of the main code, also in a different version in the Badische Landesbibliothek in Karlsruhe as Codex Donaueschingen 106, consists of 8 pages separated from it. It is in the holdings of the Martinus Library in Mainz as Hs 46. The fragment comes from the collection of Goethe's confidante Fritz Schlosser (1780–1851) and, together with the Karlsruhe General Codex, is dated to before 1497 and was written for the Augustinians -Chorfrauenstift Inzigkofen determined.

Web links

literature

  • R. Banz: Christ and the loving soul. Investigations and texts. (= Germanische Abhandlungen, Vol. 29), Breslau 1908
  • M. Buhlmann: The medieval manuscripts of the Villingen monastery St. Georgen (= Vertex Alemanniae, issue 27), St. Georgen 2007, pp. 29–32
  • The German literature of the Middle Ages. Author Lexicon , ed. v. K. Ruh et al., 11 vol., Berlin / New York 1978-2004, vol. 1, col. 1235ff
  • HE Keller: From conjugal privation to erotic privacy? On the allegory of the gender relationship in “Christ and the minnating soul.” In: G. Melville, P. von Moos, P. (Ed.): The public and private in the premodern. (= Norm and Structure, Vol. 10), Cologne-Weimar-Wien 1998, pp. 461–498
  • W. Williams-Krapp: Bilderbogen-Mystik. To "Christ and loving soul". With edition of the Mainz tradition , in: Editions of tradition and studies on German literature of the Middle Ages. Festschrift Kurt Ruh , Tübingen 1989, pp. 350–364
  • Helmut Hinkel (ed.): With dance and violin playing. The Mainz miniatures from "Christ and the loving soul" . Mainz / Würzburg 2013, ISBN 978-3-934450-58-5 / ISBN 978-3-429-03677-5 .
  • Amy Gebauer, 'Christ and the loving soul'. An Analysis of Circulation, Text, and Iconography (Imagines Medii Aevi 26), Wiesbaden 2010