{ "meta": { "schema_version": "1.2", "endpoint": "/api/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/index.json" }, "work": { "slug": "mechthild-flowing-light", "name": "The Flowing Light of the Godhead — Books I-VII (complete)", "stream": "greco-christian", "epoch_reflected": "greco-latin", "epoch_written": "greco-latin", "form": "mystical visions + lyric prose", "tradition": "Christian mysticism (Beguine)", "author": "Mechthild von Magdeburg", "year_approx": 1260, "note": "Mechthild von Magdeburg (c. 1207–1282), the Beguine visionary whose *Das fließende Licht der Gottheit* is the first vernacular mystical work in German. Book I (46 chapters: dialogues of the Soul, Love, and the Queen; the nine choirs; the Mary-suckling chapter; the soul's dance with the Bridegroom). Book II (26 chapters: the four rays from the Trinity, the Mass-vision of John the Baptist, the two golden chalices, Sister Hiltegund's seven crowns, the three-heavens schema, the saints' litany, the garden of joy). Book III (24 chapters: the cosmological vision of the nine choirs and Lucifer's breach, Mary's potential sinlessness, the Trinity's council on creation, the soul's 30-part passion, 70,000 souls freed from purgatory, the five prophets, the three-part hell-vision). Book IV (28 chapters: Mechthild's most autobiographical chapter on her first vision at twelve and thirty-one years of grace, the two angels and two devils, the Maiden of Christendom on the stone of Christ, the dark-night chapter with Pain as chamberlain, the spiritual person as the bestiary animal, Saint Dominic and Brother Heinrich's death, Saint John the Evangelist's incorrupt body, the apocalyptic vision of the new preachers in white-and-red with Enoch and Elijah confronting Antichrist). Book V (35 chapters: the seventy men risen with Christ at Easter, the second textual-genesis passage with Master Heinrich, the Annunciation and Nativity narrative with Satan's panic at the Star, the seven sons of the Father with Dominic and Francis as the youngest, the Trinity singing to itself, Mechthild's foreseen death, the threefold blood with Saint Peter Martyr of Verona — dating the passage to between 1253 and Mechthild's death). Book VI (43 chapters: the long counsel-to-prelates opening on Prior/Prioress/Prelate conduct, the eschatological return and martyrdom of Enoch and Elijah, Christ's soul soaring in the Trinity and Mary's office of intercession, the threefold place where God speaks with the soul, the Trinity-as-orb pre-creation *clote* image that anticipates Cusa's *De Docta Ignorantia*, the soul's farewell to ten things at death, the long death-prayer of intercession, the closing chapter explicitly attributing authorship). Book VII (65 chapters in Morel's Alemannic recension: the crown-of-Christ vision at the Last Judgment, the body-pain register from old age and blindness at Helfta, the doctrinal warning against the heresy of those who would 'draw themselves into the eternal Godhead and abandon the Manhood', the long Love-and-her-maidens allegory at the house of exile, the 'I was X with them' Passion-litany paralleling Christ's Passion clause-by-clause, the twofold paradise of Enoch and Elijah, the Christmas vision, the great procession of Lady Wisdom / Truth / Humility / Mildness / Strength / Justice / Mercy, the beggar's prayer, and the closing body/soul dialogue on how God adorns the soul with pain — closing with *Explicit liber*). Project translation from the Alemannic recension preserved in MS Einsiedeln 277 (late 14th c.) as transcribed by Pius Gallus Morel (1869). The only complete modern English translations (Menzies 1953, Tobin 1997) are copyrighted; see [/about/translations/](/about/translations/).", "books_slug": null, "books_slugs": [ "mechthild--flowing-light-book-1--project-en", "mechthild--flowing-light-book-2--project-en", "mechthild--flowing-light-book-3--project-en", "mechthild--flowing-light-book-4--project-en", "mechthild--flowing-light-book-5--project-en", "mechthild--flowing-light-book-6--project-en", "mechthild--flowing-light-book-7--project-en" ], "has_project_translation": true, "steiner_loci": [] }, "parents": [ { "slug": "beguine-mystics", "name": "Beguine Mystics", "url": "/sources/beguine-mystics/" } ], "translation": { "title": null, "author": null, "source": null }, "chapters": [ { "num": 1, "slug": "vol-1-01-flowing-light-book-1", "title": "Book I", "words": 8519, "url": "/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/vol-1-01-flowing-light-book-1/", "api": "/api/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/vol-1-01-flowing-light-book-1.json", "project_translation": true }, { "num": 2, "slug": "vol-2-01-flowing-light-book-2", "title": "Book II", "words": 11256, "url": "/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/vol-2-01-flowing-light-book-2/", "api": "/api/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/vol-2-01-flowing-light-book-2.json", "project_translation": true }, { "num": 3, "slug": "vol-3-01-flowing-light-book-3", "title": "Book III", "words": 13770, "url": "/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/vol-3-01-flowing-light-book-3/", "api": "/api/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/vol-3-01-flowing-light-book-3.json", "project_translation": true }, { "num": 4, "slug": "vol-4-01-flowing-light-book-4", "title": "Book IV", "words": 15503, "url": "/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/vol-4-01-flowing-light-book-4/", "api": "/api/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/vol-4-01-flowing-light-book-4.json", "project_translation": true }, { "num": 5, "slug": "vol-5-01-flowing-light-book-5", "title": "Book V", "words": 15275, "url": "/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/vol-5-01-flowing-light-book-5/", "api": "/api/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/vol-5-01-flowing-light-book-5.json", "project_translation": true }, { "num": 6, "slug": "vol-6-01-flowing-light-book-6", "title": "Book VI", "words": 15785, "url": "/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/vol-6-01-flowing-light-book-6/", "api": "/api/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/vol-6-01-flowing-light-book-6.json", "project_translation": true }, { "num": 7, "slug": "vol-7-01-flowing-light-book-7", "title": "Book VII", "words": 22026, "url": "/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/vol-7-01-flowing-light-book-7/", "api": "/api/sources/beguine-mystics/mechthild-flowing-light/vol-7-01-flowing-light-book-7.json", "project_translation": true } ] }