“For God Distinguishes the People of Earth as in Heaven”: Hildegard of Bingen’s Social Ideas
Sabina Flanagan
Despite the massive increase in scholarship dealing with various aspects of work Hildegard Bingen over last decade, her social ideas have been comparatively neglected. This is not surprising since made few direct pronouncements on relations and when she did, most famously letter to Tenxwind Andernach, appears be defending an elitist notion hereditary privilege against more egalitarian views correspondent. paper seeks identify describe Hildegard’s by examining indirect statements subject comparing notions about division society those contemporaries. The idea that thought was predicated a strict between free unfree, par‐ticularly non‐free nobility ( Edelfrei ministeriales ), classification peculiar twelfth‐century Germany, examined light these findings. I argue are complicated than reading would suggest understanding allows for nuanced view It also suggested reflect real grasp power operating world around practice is, turn, founded upon this understanding.
Journal of Religious History