mystical marriage

MECHTHILD OF MAGDEBURG AND MIRABAI OF MERTA:

THE EXPERIENCE OF THE “MYSTICAL MARRIAGE”

Religion 34.480AProfessor John Dourley

Margaret GouinStudent no. 071160

April 10, 2000

Mechthild and Mirabai: Mystical Marriage Page 1Margaret Gouin—student no. 071160 Religion 34.480A

Introduction

“Mysticism belongs to the core of all religion”—or at least so states the

Encyclopedia of Religion.1 Whether or not one agrees with that

statement, there is no doubt that mysticism has been studied in depth

in a broad spectrum of religions, particularly since the advent of the

science of psychology. Many books have been written on the

phenomenon of mysticism, quite apart from works recording,

translating or analysing the experiences of mystics across the ages and

cultures.

This paper will examine the lives and writings of Mechthild, a Beguine

and later a Cistercian monastic in Germany in the 13th century, and

Mirabai, a Rajput princess of north-western India in the 16th century,

with respect to only one aspect of the mystical experience—that usually

known in the West as “mystical marriage” or “mystical union”, and

found in Hinduism within the context of bhakti (devotion). Both the

Western and the Eastern aspects of the phenomenon will be described

briefly (a detailed treatment is beyond the scope of this paper). Short

biographies of Mechthild and Mirabai will situate them in their time and

culture; then the writings of these women will be compared and

contrasted to see if any useful conclusions may be drawn.

1 Louis Dupré, “Mysticism”, The Encyclopedia of Religion, ed. Mircea Eliade (New York: MacMillan Publishing Company, 1987) 247.


In this paper, the term “mystical marriage” will be used in preference to

“mystical union”. Both are understood to refer to a direct transformative

experience by a person of the union of his or her essential being (or

soul) with the divine.2 However, the metaphor of “mystical marriage”

more accurately reflects the kind of relationship found in the writings of

both Mechthild and Mirabai—obviously experienced as a marriage

between the human devotee (as bride) and the divine (as bridegroom),

and expressed in poignant and sometimes frankly erotic language.

Don Cupitt has pointed out that there are a number of advantages to

using the metaphor of an erotic/sexual relationship:

It is psychologically seductive, joining flesh and spirit, and bringing all sorts of agreeable sexual feelings into play in the religious sphere. In sex we move from initial feelings of doubt, strangeness, unease, and fear to a joyful and happy climax, so that writing sexual union is a good way of writing oneself out of religious estrangement and dread, and into religious happiness and fulfilment.3

However, he also points out disadvantages. For one thing, “[s]exual

mysticism … rewrites God as finite”,4 to get around the problem of how

a mortal and finite human person can relate to an immortal and infinite

deity.5 Furthermore, the ultimate effect may be to turn sex into religion,

2 Useful descriptions of the experience may be found in Ileana Marcoulesco, “Mystical Union”, The Encyclopedia of Religion (supra, note 1) 239-45, and in Pierre Adnès, “Mariage spirituel”, Dictionnaire de spiritualité ascétique et mystique, doctrine et histoire, ed. M. Viller et al. (Paris: Beauchesne, 1980), col. 388-408.

3 Don Cupitt, Mysticism after Modernity (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers Ltd., 1998) 116.

4 Cupitt 117.

5 This is generally more of a problem for monotheisms than for polytheistic religions. In this respect, it is an advantage of Christianity that it has an incarnated God in its Trinity: the Christian mystic is thereby licensed, so to speak, to envisage God as a human being.


which creates a religious problem, since “[s]exual happiness remains

touched by anxiety. It can be lost: it will be, for death will part all

lovers.”6

Yet the theme of loss does not deny the greater theme of ardent love.

For just as separation haunts earthly lovers, so it also grieves the lovers

of the divine, who frequently find themselves apart from their

bridegroom. This theme will recur again and again for both Mechthild

and Mirabai.

Moreover, the use of erotic language and imagery should not be seen

merely as a way of arriving at a warm and happy feeling. The erotic is

profoundly powerful, particularly in the context of women’s writing. The

noted Black feminist poet Audre Lorde writes of the erotic as “a

considered source of power and information with [women’s] lives.”7 She

continues:

[O]nce we begin to feel deeply all the aspects of our lives, we begin to demand from ourselves and from our life-pursuits that they feel in accordance with that joy which we know ourselves to be capable of. Our erotic knowledge empowers us, becomes a lens through which we scrutinize all aspects of our existence, forcing us to evaluate those aspects honestly in terms of their relative meaning within our lives. And this is a grave responsibility, projected from within each of us, not to settle for the convenient, the shoddy, the conventionally expected, nor the merely safe.8

6 Cupitt 117.

7 Audre Lorde, “Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power.” Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches by Audre Lorde (Freedom, CA: The Crossing Press, 1984) 53.8 Lorde 57.


Certainly both Mechthild and Mirabai demanded from their lives that

they be lived in accordance with their deepest feelings, their complete

and utter devotion to their god; and equally certainly both of them

would never have settled for “the convenient, the shoddy, the

conventionally expected, nor the merely safe.” Both of them demanded

freedom to follow their ecstatic vision—whether that freedom were to be

found in the quiet corridors of a beguinage or the dusty roads of India;

both of them wrote that longing for freedom into their poems and songs;

and perhaps it is that very freedom that makes their words echo so

profoundly in our ears now, centuries after the singers are dust.

For women … poetry is not a luxury. It is a vital necessity of our existence. It forms the quality of the light within which we predicate our hopes and dreams toward survival and change …The white fathers told us: I think, therefore I am. The Black mother within each of us—the poet—whispers in our dreams: I feel, therefore I can be free. Poetry coins the language to express and charter this revolutionary demand, the implementation of that freedom.9

The “Mystical Marriage” in the Christian Tradition

The application of the marriage metaphor to a mystical experience in

Christianity goes back to Origen (185-254 CE), who saw in the Song of

Songs of the Old Testament an allegory of the union between the soul

and God.10 Some modern scholarship denies any allegorical meaning to

9 Audre Lorde, “Poetry is Not a Luxury” in Lorde, Sister Outsider, op. cit., 37-38.10 Adnès col. 391.


the Song of Songs; 11 it has also been suggested, with some plausibility,

that so far from drawing their imagery of union with the divine from the

Song, mystics are attracted to the Song because it reflects (ex post facto,

as it were) their experience of the divine.12 Of course, a very simple

explanation also suggests itself:

There are several excellent reasons why the mystics almost inevitably make use of the language of human love in describing the joy of the love of God. The first and simplest is this: that they have no other language to use … the mystic must make use of expressions drawn from earthly love to describe his experience, or give up the attempt of describing it at all. It is the only way he has of even suggesting to the non-mystical what he has felt.13

Whatever the reasons, this allegorical interpretation remained in favour

with Christian writers down the ages, but seems to have been

particularly prominent during the Middle Ages—perhaps because of the

popularity of the literature of “courtly love” (nurtured by the

troubadours in France and the Minnesingers in Germany), which

flourished in the society of the time.

11 “Nothing indicates that a key is needed for decoding the Song or that anything should be read into it other than the natural meaning of the text: it is a collection of songs celebrating the loyal and mutual love that leads to marriage.” “Introduction to the Song of Songs” (The New Jerusalem Bible. New York: Doubleday, 1985) 1028.

12 “It has been said that the constant use of [bridal] imagery by Christian mystics of the mediaeval period is traceable to the popularity of the Song of Songs, regarded as an allegory of the spiritual life. I think that the truth lies rather in the opposite statement: namely, that the mystic loved the Song of Songs because he there saw reflected, as in a mirror, the most secret experiences of his soul.” Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism: A Study in the Nature and Development of Man’s Spiritual Consciousness, 12th ed. (London: Methuen & Co. Ltd., 1930) 137.

13 James Pratt (The Religious Consciousness), quoted in Underhill 138.


The medieval English (or Scottish) mystic, Richard of St. Victor,

provides “perhaps the most daring and detailed application of the

symbolism of marriage to the adventures of the spirit of man.”14 He sees

four stages in the path toward union with God: betrothal, marriage,

wedlock, and the fruitfulness of the soul. In betrothal, the soul longs for

God; God comes in response to that longing. This is the time of

courtship, of wild declarations of passion; and the burning desire of the

soul leads her onward to the second stage, marriage. “She [the soul] is

now confirmed in the mystic life; the irrevocable marriage vows are

made between her spirit and her God.”15 But although she can see her

God, she cannot yet enter into union with him. That occurs in the third

stage, wedlock (“married life”), where the soul passes into God and is

transfigured, caught up in God. It is in the fourth stage that Richard

departs from many other mystical writers, who usually consider the

third, unitive stage to be the ultimate.

[Richard] saw clearly that the union of the soul with its Source could not be a barren ecstasy. That was to mistake a means for an end; and to frustrate the whole intention of life, which is, on all levels, fruitful and creative. Therefore he says that in the fourth degree, the Bride who has been so greatly honoured, caught up to such unspeakable delight, sinks her own will and ‘is humiliated below herself.’ She accepts the pains and duties in the place of the raptures of love; and becomes a source, a ‘parent’ of fresh spiritual life.16

14 Underhill 139. I am indebted to Underhill (139-40) for this insight, as I was not able to locate Richard’s text to study his presentation directly.

15 Underhill 139.16 Underhill 140.


The bride, in fact, becomes a “mother” or mediator of divine grace in the

world. Underhill saw this “parenthood” as involving return to work in

the world previous abandoned; however, it may also be a spiritual

parenthood exercised by teaching, writing or otherwise providing a

spiritual example.17

The Bhakti Path of Devotion in Hinduism

In the Bhagavad Gita (the “song of the lord”), Krishna, the eighth

incarnation of the god Vishnu, explains to the prince Arjuna the three

paths by which a person may reach liberation from the endlessly

recurring cycle of birth, death and rebirth. These are the way of action

(karma yoga; “yoga” means “discipline”), performing the right action

unselfishly, without hope of praise or fear of blame; the way of

knowledge (jnana yoga), studying the sacred scriptures in order to

attain true knowledge of the nature of all that is, which leads to

transformative wisdom; and the way of devotion (bhakti yoga).18

17 It must also be asked here whether Richard of St. Victor was using the idea of “fruition” in a manner akin to Mechthild’s use of the concept in III 9, where the Holy Spirit complains that the Trinity no longer wishes to go on in its splendid and divine stasis, “not bearing fruit.” The Father replies, “We shall become fruitful so that we shall be loved in return, and so that our glory in some small way shall be recognized.” The term “fruition” derives from the Latin frui, meaning (among other things) “to bring to completion.” Mechthild seems to be suggesting that divinity needs humanity for its completion, and love only begins when divinity has intercourse with humanity. Applying Mechthild’s concept of fruition to the understanding of Richard’s four stages, we may arrive at a cycle which has no end: God, longing for fruitfulness, inspires in the human soul a passionate love which draws the soul to God; they are eventually united, and then this “new” God (augmented by the soul united with him in the third stage) must once again move outwards toward another human soul—and so the dance of love begins again.18 Vasuda Narayanan, “The Hindu Tradition” in World Religions, Eastern Traditions, ed. Willard G. Oxtoby (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1996) 38-42. This entire article is a useful introduction to Hinduism.


The way of devotion is emphasised in the Bhagavad Gita as the most

perfect way to rid oneself of negative karma and attain liberation.

Krishna says to Arjuna:

Arjuna, the lord residesin the heart of all creatures …

With your whole being, Arjuna,take refuge in him alone—from his grace you will attainthe eternal place that is peace. …

Keep your mind on me,be my devotee, sacrificing, bow to me—you will come to me, I promise,for you are dear to me.

Relinquishing all sacred duties to me,make me your only refuge;do not grieve,for I shall free you from all evils.19

Furthermore, the way of devotion is clearly a way that does not depend

on or even respect rank and caste:

I am impartial to all creatures,and no one is hateful or dear to me;but men devoted to me are in me,and I am within them.

If he is devoted solely to me,even a violent criminalmust be deemed a man of virtue,for his resolve is right.

His spirit quickens to sacred duty,and he finds eternal peace;Arjuna, know that no onedevoted to me is lost.

19 The Bhagavad Gita: Krishna’s Counsel in Time of War, trans. Barbara Stoller Miller (New York: Bantam Books, 1986) 151-52.


If they rely on me, Arjuna,women, commoners, men of low rank,even men born in the womb of evil,reach the highest way.20

The Bhagavad Gita was written circa 200 BCE.

It was the Bhagavad-Gita that set in motion the transformation of Hinduism from a mystical technique based on the ascetic virtues of renunciation and self-forgetfulness into the impassioned religion of self-abandonment to God… From the tenth century on all that is most vital in Hinduism manifests itself in the form of bhakti.21

The bhakti movement in fact had its beginnings in southern India

(Tamil country) around the 6th century CE. Groups of poet-saints

travelled from temple to temple, singing the praises of their deity. Their

poems were written in the vernacular, and are still considered by their

devotees to be on the same level as the sacred Hindu scriptures, the

Vedas.

Twelve canonised devotees of Vishnu were known as the Alvars.22 Some

of their passionate, tender poetry was translated from Tamil to Sanskrit,

in a classical work called the Bhagavata Purana, which carried

southern bhakti to the north in the 11th century.

20 The Bhagavad Gita 87.21 R. C. Zaehner, Hinduism (London: Oxford University Press, 1966) 134.

22 The one woman among the twelve, Antal (“she who rules”), who lived in the 8th

century CE, refused to get married to a human husband, and went through a form of marriage to the god Vishnu. Her poetry is still recited, sung and broadcast over the radio in southern India on a regular basis. Narayanan 66-67.


The Bhagavata Purana tells many stories of Krishna. One of the most

famous and well-known is the tale of the youth Krishna and the gopis

(girls who herd cows). Krishna, although wholly divine, was raised in a

pastoral community by human parents. As a youth, he would play his

flute and charm the gopis to leave their homes and husbands to dance

wildly and make passionate love with him in the forest at night. Of all

the gopis, his favourite was Radha, and the story of the love of Krishna

and Radha eventually became the subject of the Gita Govinda (“song of

the protector of cows”), considered by many to be the finest epic poem

ever written in Sanskrit.

The gopis’ love for the youthful Krishna became the symbol of the love of the soul for God, and this self-abandonment to the divine became central to the cult of Krishna. … It was … his love of the gopis and their love for him that gave the cult of Krishna its special flavour: God is in love with the soul, and the soul with God. In this divine love-affair God is necessarily the male, the soul the female: God takes the initiative and the soul must passively wait for the divine embrace. The Krishna of the Bhagavata Purana is … a lover, the handsome and wayward shepherd-boy who beguiles the soul with the sweet strains of his flute.23

Typically, devotees would gather for the kirtan, singing devotional songs

(in the vernacular) to the accompaniment of music and dance. It was an

emotional experience designed to bring the devotee into a state of

ecstasy, in which the s/he felt her/himself to be in direct personal

contact with the divine.

23 Zaehner 127.


Perhaps one of the leading figures of bhakti in 16th century northern

India was the Bengali ecstatic Caitanya (his religious name, Krishna-

Caitanya, literally means “he whose consciousness is Krishna”). He was

passionately devoted to Krishna and his adulterous gopi lover, Radha;

he saw himself as Radha, submitting to the embrace of his beloved lord.

He saw Krishna as the repository of divine grace, the one who could

liberate his devotees from all sin. One of his favourite forms of devotion

was to chant the divine name of Krishna over and over.24 There is no

doubt that the sect founded by Caitanya was known to Mirabai.

It is important to note that the followers of Caitanya emphatically

denied the desirability of union of the soul with Krishna. For them,

such a union would destroy the possibility of devotion, the cornerstone

of their religiosity, since for devotion there must be the lover and the

beloved, subject and object, two separate and distinct entities. The 19th-

century saint Ramakrishna described the relationship as “I want to

taste sugar, not become sugar.”25

24 Caitanya’s heritage can be found in the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON)—the “Hare Krishna movement”—which was established in New York in 1966 by a follower of the sect founded by Caitanya. See their website at http://www.iskcon.org/. Narayanan 73-75; Zaehner 144-45.

25 Thomas J. Hopkins, “Hindu Views of Death and Afterlife”. Death and Afterlife: Perspectives of World Religions, ed. Hiroshi Obayashi (Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers, 1992) 152.

http://www.iskcon.org/


Mechthild:

Details about Mechthild’s life are few.26 It is likely that she was born

around 1208 or 1210 CE. She was probably from a noble family. It is

obvious from her writing that she received education in the vernacular

and that she was familiar with the literary forms of the day, including

the literature of courtly love. She had her first visions (“greetings”) of

God at the age of twelve; in 1230, she left her family to become a

member of the Beguine community at Magdeburg, in order to live for

God alone.26a Beguines were lay women who lived together in communal

houses, under voluntary vows of poverty and chastity, centring their

lives on religious devotion and supported by gifts and their own work.

The intention of the communities was to live according to the ideas of

early (“apostolic”) Christianity.

The Beguine community at Magdeburg was under the spiritual

guidance of Dominicans. By 1250, Mechthild had confided her visions

to her confessor, Heinrich of Halle, who fortunately recognised in her a

truly inspired mystic. Apparently at his instigation, Mechthild began to

write down her visions.27 In the period from 1250 to 1260, she wrote the

26 The following account of Mechthild’s life is drawn from the Catholic Encyclopedia, 1911 edition (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/), the Dictionnaire de Spiritualité ascétique et mystique, doctrine et histoire, M. Viller, S.J., et al., ed. (Paris: Beauchesne, 1980) and Frank Tobin’s “Introduction” to Mechthild of Magdeburg, The Flowing Light of the Godhead, Frank Tobin, trans. (New York: Paulist Press, 1998).26a Mechthild herself describes her early years in IV 2.

27 Tobin suggests that given “the evident joy with which Mechthild often writes, one is certainly justified in questioning whether her confessor’s command was crucial to her decision to write.” However, he goes on to note that “[s]ecuring her confessor’s approval … would certainly be a prudent thing to do if she was to claim that the book

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen


first five books of her only work, called (at the order of God), “Light of

My divinity, flowing into all hearts that live without guile” (usually

abbreviated to The Flowing Light of the Godhead). Between 1260 and

1270, she completed the sixth book.

Some time around 1270, Mechthild became a nun in the Cistercian

monastery of Helfta, at that time also home to St. Mechtilde of

Hackeborn and St. Gertrude the Great. It has been suggested that she

took refuge there from the ill-will stirred up by her recurring and

unabashed attacks on corruption in the clergy and established

church.28 The monastery of Helfta was famous for the learning of its

nuns, and it appears that Mechthild felt somewhat overwhelmed by

this. Although there is no doubt that she was well educated in the

vernacular, there is doubt whether she knew Latin; in part of Book VII

of The Flowing Light, written at Helfta, she refers to herself as

“uneducated”.29 However, it also seems likely from the same reference

that she was much esteemed by her more learned sisters. She died at

Helfta; the date is uncertain, and may be either around 1282 or around

1294.

‘comes from God and does not have its origins in human thought’ (IV 2).” “Introduction” 26.

28 Schmidt, Margot, “Mechtilde de Magdebourg” in the Dictionnaire de Spiritualité, vol. 10, col. 877-885, at col. 878.

29 Mechthild VII 21.


Mirabai

Mirabai (also known as “Mira Bai” or simply “Mira”) has become a

popular figure in India in recent years. However, information about her

life is difficult to come by; Indian sources are not readily available in the

West, and Western sources are few and far between. The following

biography of Mira is derived from four works: three Indian (Behari, Krul

and Mukta)30 and one Western (Schelling).31

It is generally agreed that Mirabai lived approximately 1498 to 1550.

The first mention of Mirabai is in the Bhaktamal (“Garland of

Devotees”), a hagiography written by Nabhadas circa 1600 CE. The

entry is only fourteen lines long, but provides a remarkable summary.

The emphasis is on Mirabai’s fearlessness in refusing to be deterred

from worshipping her beloved Lord Krishna. In 1712 CE, Priyadas (a

follower of Caitanya, an ecstatic devotee of Krishna) wrote a

commentary on the Bhaktamal which further develops the figure of

Mirabai by recounting many stories which had grown up around her

30 Bankey Behari, Bhakta Mira (Bombay: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, 1971); Shreeprakash Krul, trans., The Devotional Poems of Mirabai (Calcutta: Writers Workshop Publications, 1973); Parita Mukta, Upholding the Common Life, The Community of Mirabai (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1997).

31 Andrew Schelling, trans., For Love of the Dark One, Songs of Mirabai, rev. ed. (Prescott, AZ: Holm Press, 1998).


legend.32 Little, if anything, was written about Mirabai after Priyadas’

commentary until around the middle of the 20th century.

The generally accepted biography of Mirabai may be loosely summarised

as follows. She was born to the ruling family in the city of Merta, in the

region of Rajasthan. From an early age she was devoted to the god

Krishna, who she worshipped in the form of a small statute. Also from

an early age, it would appear that she considered herself to be actually

married to Krishna.33 However, the family arranged a marriage for

Mirabai with the son of the ruler of a neighbouring clan, the Sisodiyas.

The Sisodiyas were, by all accounts, proud, arrogant and aggressive,

and intransigently opposed to the Moslems who had invaded and

conquered much of India. Mirabai refused to consummate the marriage

with her husband, on the grounds that she was already married (to

Krishna), and refused to adopt the religion of her husband’s family (as

tradition demanded). Not surprisingly, in a society where women prided

themselves on complete submission to their husbands, and where

husbands expected such submission as their due, Mira’s attitude

provoked anger and resentment from her in-laws. It seems likely that

32 These works are covered in more detail in John Stratton Hawley, “Morality Beyond Morality in the Lives of Three Hindu Saints” in Saints and Virtues, ed. John Stratton Hawley (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987) 52-72, especially 55-59, which includes a translation of the complete entry about Mirabai from the Bhaktamal. Mukta also comments on these accounts, 19-23.

33 Stories recounted by both Behari and Schelling recount that while still a small child, she pestered her mother to know who her bridegroom would be (a daughter of a feudal lord would know, even at an early age, that she was going to be married off to someone). Her mother pointed to the image of Krishna the child was always playing with, and said, “He will be your husband.” Apparently Mira took this literally.


her husband died (probably in battle) fairly soon after the wedding, and

her father-in-law thereafter. She was left dependent on her mother-in-

law and brother-in-law (the new ruler), both of whom hated her

intensely.34

Once widowed, Mira continued in her devotion to Krishna, which now

began to take the form of public singing and dancing in honour of her

god. She would leave the palace to mingle with sadhus (wandering holy

men) and low-caste devotees at local temples. Although it was not

unusual at that time for a widow to go to a temple to live the life of a

devotee (bhakta), Mira’s in-laws apparently did not want to let go of her.

Legend suggests that there were three attempts to assassinate her, all

of which are mentioned in her songs.35

Not surprisingly, after the attempts on her life, Mira fled the Sisodiya

territory and became a vagabond, wandering the forests and roads of

north-western India, singing and dancing in praise of her beloved

Shyam. By approximately her fiftieth year, she arrived at the coastal 34 Behari, Schelling and Mukta all agree approximately on this chain of events. However, Krul—in his admittedly abbreviated biography of Mira—presents a somewhat different story. He states that Mira’s mother died when she was four or five; she was raised first by her grandfather and then, after his death, by an uncle, in an atmosphere of security and love. Her husband died after some seven years of married life—and Krul does not suggest theirs was anything but a normal marriage—followed within the next five years by her father and father-in-law. Krul suggests that Mira turned to bhakti. because of these losses: “Denied the love and affection of her parents after their untimely deaths, she found some love and security only to lose this over again in the chain of deaths of her loved ones. It is no wonder that she found the material world transitory and fleeting and was pulled to the spiritual realm.” (12) He agrees, however, that after her father-in-law’s death, her brother-in-law, the new ruler, was violently opposed to Mira’s adoption of the bhakti path.

35 See for example Krul 32.


city of Dwarka in the region of Gujarat, and took up residence at a

temple dedicated to Krishna. The Sisodiya clan had recently suffered a

serious of major military defeats, and rumour said it was because of

their mistreatment of Mirabai, who by now was recognised by many as

a living saint. The Sisodiyas sent envoys to bring Mira home, apparently

more in the interests of good public relations with their subjects than

from any real sense of repentance. The envoys threatened to starve

themselves to death unless Mira returned with them, knowing she

would not take on the responsibility of causing their deaths. She asked

for, and was granted, one last night to spend in the temple with her

god. The temple was locked to make sure she couldn’t escape; but in

the morning, when the temple was opened, there was no sign of her—

only her hair and her robe could be found, draped over the feet of the

statue of Krishna.36

Writings about Mirabai often seem to partake more of hagiography than

history, and are frequently influenced by the use to which the author

wishes to put Mirabai-as-symbol—submissive Hindu wife, isolated

romantic poet, social revolutionary, feminist, and so on. One of the

most influential re-workings of Mirabai’s life was by Mohandas Gandhi,

36 There are four theories of what happened to Mirabai, none of them substantiated. Behari presents a romantic version that is first found in Priyadas’ commentary on the Bhaktamal and which has some popular currency in modern India: one day Mira, surrounded by devotees and in ecstasy, was absorbed into the heart of the Krishna image and disappeared forever—an assumption into divinity, as it were. No mention is made of the Sisodiyas or of any envoys attempting to take her back to her clan (Behari 80-81). Three other theories—that she committed suicide, that she was murdered at the command of her in-laws, or that she somehow escaped from the temple and fled back to the forest—are discussed in some detail by Mukta (225-31).


who appropriated Mirabai as the model of the submissive wife and

widow. The fact that this reading is totally at variance with the

rebellious tone of Mira’s verses did not seem to deter him.37 This image

of Mirabai as the ideal middle-class dutiful Hindu wife persists in India

today, where most recently Mirabai is being co-opted by the Hindutva

(Indian nationalist) movement, along the lines of Gandhi’s revisionist

interpretation.38

Mechthild and Mirabai: A Comparison

How to compare a woman of thirteenth-century Germany with a woman

of sixteenth century India? The cultural differences alone are sharp;

nonetheless, a surprising number of similarities may be found.

Social Context

First of all, Mechthild and Mirabai belonged to societies which shared a

similar structure. In India, the caste system dictated (and still dictates)

a strict division between Brahmins (the priestly, and highest caste),

followed by warriors (the nobles), then merchants and farmers, and at

37 Mukta devotes a whole chapter to Gandhi’s treatment of Mirabai, which she tellingly entitles “A Nation Cleaved: The Song Betrayed.” Mukta 182-200.

38 Mukta, plates IX, XIII and XV. Behari’s account of Mirabai’s life is very much in the mould of Mira-the-sweet-doe-eyed-obedient-submissive-loving-wife. A popular cartoon version of Mirabai’s life, available on the Internet from an organisation called “Free India”, is along the same lines: http://freeindia.org/ack/Mirabai/.

http://freeindia.org/ack/Mirabai/


the bottom of the ladder, servants and labourers.39 The greatest

religious and social power lay with the Brahmins; they were the only

caste allowed to teach the Vedas (the sacred scriptures) and perform

religious rituals. The warriors (nobles) were the ruling class; like the

lower merchants and farmers, they were allowed to learn the Vedas but

could not teach them. The servants and labourers were not even

allowed to learn the sacred scriptures. Caste boundaries were (and to a

large extent remain) extremely rigid; to marry outside of (or otherwise

abandon) one’s caste was to be thrown out of society altogether, into the

“classless class” of out-castes, with no rights whatsoever.

The feudal society into which Mechthild was born had a very similar

structure, although it was not formalised in a written law as the Hindu

caste system was. At the top of the heap was the Holy Roman Catholic

Church. Innocent III, at the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215, had

claimed absolute spiritual and temporal power for the Papacy. Learning

was in the hands of the Church. The nobles formed a ruling warrior

caste that controlled the most valuable commodity of the time—land.

Next in line was the relatively new but growing merchant class

(including craftsmen). And at the bottom, the serfs made up a pool of

landless, powerless labour.

39 A detailed discussion of the caste system is found in Narayanan 50-54.


In effect, the social structure under which Mechthild lived was much

like that of Mirabai, and similar rules and restrictions would have

applied to them both, as daughters of the warrior/noble/ruling class in

a feudal society. Both had at least some learning, and were literate in

the vernacular if not in the sacred language (Latin or Sanskrit).40 Both

would have been expected to contract eligible marriages which would be

advantageous for their families in terms of money and power. Both lived

in societies where a woman’s value was that of a chattel that must be

disposed of in the most profitable way possible, and where the idea that

a woman should have any kind of life, apart from service to her parents

and then to her husband, simply did not exist.

A critical difference in the organisation of society was the availability to

Mechthild of several forms of communal religious living which simply

did not exist in Mirabai’s world. When Mechthild wanted to live for God

alone, she could remove herself to the beguinage of Magdeburg (there is

no record of whether or not her family objected to her doing so); Mirabai

had no such option. For a woman of her caste and clan, marriage—an

arranged marriage—was the only possibility. There is no monastic

structure in Hinduism, for either men or women. The religious life is

lived as a wandering holy man (sadhu) or renunciate (samnyasi), and is

for the most part only available to men; there are some women

samnyasinis but only very few. 41 To embark on such a religious life, one 40 The felicity of style found in the writing of both women suggests they were not merely literate, but accomplished and fluent.41 A useful source of definitions for Hindu terminology and concepts is Klaus K. Klostermaier, A Concise Encyclopedia of Hinduism (Oxford: Oneworld Publications,


must renounce one’s family, clan and caste; instead of taking vows, one

stages one’s own funeral. Although renunciates of either sex may take

up residence in or beside a temple, there is no concept of an organised

physical structure where women, in particular, may go to live the

religious life under permanent vows and thereby avoid marriage.

Thus while Mechthild could seek refuge with the Beguines and later

with the Cistercian nuns, Mirabai had to participate in an arranged

marriage. Her first real chance for freedom came when she was

widowed.42 The possibility existed that a widow could leave her family

home to live at a temple, spending what remained of her life in service

to the god of the temple and her/his devotees. But as noted above,

Mirabai had incurred the wrath of her mother-in-law and her brother-

in-law (the new ruler), probably both by her refusal to commit ritual

suicide (sati) following her husband’s death (as was customary for

women of her rank) and by her association with men (sadhus and

devotees); without their permission it was impossible for her to take this

course.43

1998).

42 The lot of a widow in Mirabai’s time, and to some extent still today, was grim. A widow, particularly if childless, had virtually no rights and was completely dependent on her in-laws. It was considered extremely improper for a widow to remarry, and if she did, the ceremony took place at the dead of night because of its shamefulness (Mukta 145-47; Narayanan 110-12). In Mira’s time, clan and caste, the approved behaviour for a widow was to immolate herself on her husband’s funeral pyre (sati) so that she would die with the status of married woman rather than that of widow. It is said that just prior to Mira’s death, 13,000 Sisodiya women immolated themselves on one pyre following their husbands’ death in battle (Schelling xxiii).

43 See David Kinsley, “Devotion as an Alternative to Marriage in the Lives of Some Hindu Women Devotees”, Journal of Asian and African Studies 15.1-2 (1980) 88.


The Nature of Their Work

Both Mechthild and Mirabai wrote; but their style of writing is in some

ways very different. In the analysis of their work, moreover, we are

much hindered by the fact that so little of Mirabai’s writing remains, as

compared to Mechthild’s output.

Although Mechthild only produced one work, The Flowing Light of the

Godhead, it is substantial and covers a period of some thirty or forty

years. It has been preserved in chronological sequence, and modern

scholars are relatively certain that the text discovered in 1861, from

which modern translations derive, is very close to the original as it came

from Mechthild’s pen.44 Mechthild availed herself of a rich variety of

literary styles, both poetry and prose;44a also, her subject-matter ranges

from the most intimate and delicate descriptions of her relationship

with God, to theological discussion, to denunciations of “false” clerics

and religious, to instructions on the proper conduct of religious life.

Finally, although it appears that portions of the work may have been in

public circulation during Mechthild’s lifetime,45 and that the complete 44 Books I-VI were translated into Latin by some Dominicans of Halle shortly after her death. A secular priest, Heinrich of Nördlingen, obtained a copy of the complete work in the vernacular (Middle Low German), sometime around 1345. However, the work eventually sank out of sight (possibly because it was written in German and not Latin, which limited its circulation) until a copy was rediscovered in 1861. Schmidt, cols. 878-79.

44a Tobin 10.

45 In II 26, Mechthild notes: “I was warned against writing this book./People said:/If one did not watch out,/It could be burned.”


book was in fairly general circulation among Dominican convents in the

area of South Germany in the 14th century,46 it is not likely that she

intended it for publication. She wrote at the command of God, either for

her own fulfilment or by order of her confessor, not for public edification

—although some of her comments on religious life may have been

meant to be shared with her fellow-members in the community in which

she lived.

By contrast, we have only a few hundred compositions by Mirabai, some

of them only a few lines long. The oldest purported manuscripts of her

works (allegedly dated 1585 and 1670) have not been made available to

scholars for study, and the earliest published collections of Mira’s

verses date from the 1920s. All are bhajans (Hindu devotional songs),

and they have been preserved by the oral memory of the bhajniks

(singers of bhajans).47 As bhajans, they were intended for public

performance, often at kirtans, the singing of devotional songs by a

group. Undoubtedly they have changed to some degree in the course of

oral transmission; it is more than likely that some of these verses are

the work of other authors.48

46 Schmidt, col. 883. There is some evidence that Meister Eckhart was familiar not only with Mechthild’s story (from the Beguines he knew), but also with her writings. See Frank Tobin, “Mechthild of Magdeburg and Meister Eckhart, Points of Coincidence” in B. McGinn, ed., Meister Eckhart and the Beguine Mystics (New York: The Continuum Publishing Company, 1994) 44-61 at 46.47 For a more detailed technical discussion of the structure of Mira’s songs, see Krul 9 and Pandey 59-65.

48 Mukta 32-33. Schelling (xxvii) suggests that over five thousand songs circulate under Mira’s name in India, of which probably only three or four hundred are authentic. The leading Indian collection of Mira’s songs (Mira Bai ki Padavali, ed. Parashuram Chaturvedi, 1949) sets the number of authentic Mira compositions at


Moreover, there is no kind of chronological order apparent in the songs,

and the effort to distil historical data from them is fraught with peril.49

Unlike Mechthild, Mirabai hardly ever concerned herself with

theological issues; her entire focus is her relationship with Krishna, to

whom she refers by a number of epithets drawn from stories about him,

such as Govinda (“keeper of cows”), Mohan (“depriving of consciousness,

bewildering, confusing, infatuating”), Hari (“one who destroys sin”), and

especially Giridhar or Girdhar (“lifter of mountains”) and Shyam (“dark

one”).50 Although she occasionally rails against the ruling class who

hindered her or the “religious” people who sought to limit her, she is

really only concerned with her passionate, desperate search for her

Dark Lord. Many efforts have been made to portray her as a social

revolutionary, and it is clear from her verse that she was no respecter of

clan or caste or person, but it has already been noted that this was

typical of the bhakti movement. It is also possible that Mira’s attitude

was not so much socio-political fervour on behalf of the oppressed as it

was simply a reflection of her determination that nothing should be

allowed to hinder her in pursuing her devotion—a freedom which she

expected to be made available to others as well.

around two hundred.

49 Mukta 25-27.

50 These definitions are from the Glossary in Krul 75-85.


The Content of Their Work

It is impossible to compare the content of Mechthild’s and Mirabai’s

work in every aspect since, as noted above, Mechthild’s work as we

know it covers a much broader spectrum that Mirabai’s. What will be

compared here are aspects of the mystical marriage experience as

depicted by the two women. Because the content of Mirabai’s work is

limited, comparisons for the most part will be drawn from Mechthild

only in relation to those aspects of the mystical relationship which

appear in Mirabai’s songs.

It should be noted, first, that there are a number of differences of

expression between the two. For one thing, Mechthild frequently refers

to herself in the third person (“a person”, “a soul”); although she also

uses the first person singular, she almost never refers to herself by

name. Mirabai uses either the first person singular pronoun or her

name “Mira”. The latter is a convention of the bhajan form in which

Mirabai wrote.51

Also, Mechthild frequently has conversations with God, and reports

back on them; Mira never does. She speaks to Krishna as to an absent

person. He never speaks to her. In Mechthild’s conversations, God often

51 “[T]her name of the composer of the poem is always given at the end of the song. This … not only supplements the personal element of the poems but also helps establish a close relationship between the devotee and God.” Krul 9.


reveals a longing for and even need for her;52 we have no such sense

from Mira’s absent Lord.

Finally, Mechthild’s dialogues with her God are frequently laced with

theological considerations and meditations on the Trinity, Heaven and

Hell, sinfulness and grace, and other Christian concepts. In Mirabai’s

writing, theology of any kind is virtually absent. Occasionally, she

addresses the theme of liberation from the cycle of death and rebirth;

even then, it is suffused with her divine passion:

Chant, my heart, the name of the godWhose feet are like the lotus.Remember—Whatever you see on earthOr in the skyIs destined to pass away.What good are pilgrimages, fasts, philosophies?Take no pride in the body;For it will return to dust.The world is a game of chessWhich ends at the close of day.What good to wear saffron robes,To renounce your home for devotion?Unless you have learnt the meaning,The total meaning of “union”,The noose of rebirth will tightenAround your neck again.I, a weak woman, your slave,Pray to you with my palms joined,“Cut away my bonds”My lord, my Girdhar Nagar.53

52 See for example Mechthild II 25, III 2, III 5.

53 Krul 74.


The great uniting factor between Mechthild and Mirabai is their

passionate devotion to their God. It is to this that they consecrated their

lives, in despite of all worldly ties and strictures.

An important characteristic of this passion for God is that it irrevocably prevents us from falling back into an all too vapid and tame existence. The passion for God powerfully pushes aside all merely worldly concerns in order to appropriate our entire vitality and our life, in all its aspects, for itself. What thereby occurs is that we become separated and detached from all that is familiar, so that we might give ourself over with total commitment to the demands of what is eternal.54

Mechthild makes this clear in the very first chapter of The Flowing Light.

In a conversation between Love (divine love) and “the Queen” (her soul),

she points out to Love that she has caused Mechthild to lose all worldly

goods and possessions, her childhood, youth, friends and relatives, her

worldly home, honour and riches, even health. But the compensation

far outweighs the sacrifice, and the reward is no less than God:

“Lady Love, you are a robber; for this … shall you make reparation.”“Mistress and Queen, then take me.”“Lady Love, now you have recompensed me a hundredfold on earth.”“Mistress and Queen, in addition you may demand God and all his kingdom.”55

Mirabai similarly gives all for love:

Girdhar is my Lord—no one else.No one else. I have looked around the whole world.I have forsaken my brother, my family, my friends.

54 Margot Schmidt, “Preface”, in Mechthild of Magdeburg, The Flowing Light of the Godhead (New York: Paulist Press, 1998) xxv.

55 Mechthild I 1.


Sitting with the sadhusI cared nothing for social norms.I rejoiced at the sight of the holy,I mourned at the sight of the world. …I am in love—Let the world take its course.56

Mira believed she was a reincarnation of a gopi who played with the

young Krishna in the forests of Vrindavan;57 like a gopi, she was

prepared to leave everything to follow the sound of his flute. She

frequently refers to the fact that her love for Krishna has grown over

many lifetimes of devotion. In one song, and in one song only, she

recounts a dream in which she marries Krishna, saying that it was a

reward for sustaining her love through many rebirths:

In my dream, sister,the Lord of the Downtrodden wed me.Deities danced in attendance,fifty-six million,the Dark One was groom in my dream.In my dream were arched marriage gateways,a clasping of hands, sister.In a dreamthe Lord of the Downtroddenmarried Mira and took her to bed.Good fortune from previous birthscomes to fruit.58

This is not just “one-way” relationship; both Mechthild and Mirabai also

feel they have some claim on their lords. Both of them, when persecuted

56 Krul 35.

57 “I myself in a previous birth/was a cow-herding girl/at Gokul.” Schelling 43.

58 Schelling 48. Krul (38) translates the last two lines as “Mira won Girdhar—/The reward for her ancient love.”


for their devotion, point out that it is their lord’s honour that is at stake,

not their own:

Mechthild: Mirabai:

I was warned against writing this book.People said:If one did not watch out,It could be burned. …I bowed to my Lover and said: “Alas, Lord,Now I am saddened all because of your honor.If I am going to receive no comfort from you now,Then you led me astray,Because you are the one who told me to write it.59

Take my armand keep to your promise!They call you the refugeless refuge,they call youredeemer of outcasts.Caught in a riptidein the sea of becomingwithout your support I’m a shipwreck!You reveal yourself age after ageand free the beggarfrom her affliction.Dark One, Mira is clutching your feet, at stake is your honor!60

But love is not easy, even with a divine lover—perhaps especially with a

divine lover. From time to time, both Mirabai and Mechthild refer to

their love as a fetter, chain or bond, although this is not necessarily

meant negatively.

Mechthild: Mirabai:

Whoever becomes entangled in longing such as this must forever hang blessedly fettered in God.61

My heart is deeply enfettered in His love.62

And for both of them, love brings pain, of which the divine lover is both

the cause and the remedy:

59 Mechthild II 26.


Mechthild: Mirabai:

Chosen Lover, I long for youYou take and give me many a heartache.I have from you, besides, invisible suffering.If you, Lord, command,I shall be freed from myself.63

I am maddened with love—Nobody knows my agony.Only the wounded one who nurses a firein his heart, knows the pain of his suffering. …I wander tormented from door to doorIn search of a doctor—But I find none.My pain will vanishOnly when my healer is Shyam.64

Frequently, this suffering is the pain of separation.

If mysticism implies union of the soul with God, then we must recognize that for Mechthild, … love’s union consists as much or more in the yearning the lovers feel and express for each other as in fulfillment and oneness achieved. For the mystical beloved on earth, separation is as essential to love as union.65

It is not possible for a human being to dwell constantly in the presence

of the divine, at least in the course of an earthly life. For both Mechthild

and Mirabai, the divine lover is frequently absent, and the pain of that

absence is intensified the greater love grows.

60 Schelling 40.

61 Mechthild III 3.

62 Behari 98.

63 Mechthild I 46.

64 Krul 60.

65 Tobin, “Introduction” 14. Surely the same could be said of Mirabai.


Mechthild: Mirabai:

I seek you with my thoughtsAs a maiden secretly does her lover.I shall fall terribly sick from this,For I am bound to you.The bond is stronger than I am,Thus I cannot become free of love.I cry out to you in great longing,A lonely voice;I hope for your coming with heavy heart,I cannot rest, I am on fire,Unquenchable in your burning love.66

Beloved,Come and show me yourself,I cannot live without you.As the lotus is lifeless without waterAnd the night without the moon,So am I without you.My nights are restless.Separation is eating my heart. …Beloved,Come and cool my fire.Come and my pain will vanish. …Through many births,Mira has been completely devoted to you.She is in love with you.67

Ultimately, perfect union with the Beloved beckons, the final and most

desired goal. Towards this, Mechthild and Mirabai look with longing and

love:

Mechthild: Mirabai:

You shine into my soulLike the sun against gold.When I may rest in you, Lord,My joy is rich. …If you were to love me more intensely,I would certainly pass awayTo where I could love you as I wish unceasingly.Now I have sung to youAnd yet to no avail.Were you to sing to me,I would have to succeed.68

Don’t goDon’t goDon’t go, my Lord.I fall at your feet, your slave.Unique is the path of love and devotion,Lead the way there, my God.With incense and sandalwood,I will build my funeral pyre:Fire it with your own hands.When I am utterly consumed,Smear your body with my ashes.Merge my flame with your fire.69

66 Mechthild II 25.

67 Krul 53. Mirabai’s songs, in particular, dwell on the aspect of separation; this is a traditional theme of Indian love poetry, known as virah (“pain of separation”). See Pandey 66 and 72.

68 Mechthild II 5.


In the end, as in the beginning, there is only love; and this love is the

only reason for being and the only song to be sung. Across time and

space, regardless of different cultures and different concepts of divinity,

Mirabai and Mechthild touch hands, for of them both what finally must

be said is only that:

She lovesAnd keeps on lovingAnd she does not know how to do otherwise.70

69 Krul 45. As has been noted, some forms of bhakti (notably Chaitanya’s) rejected the idea of the soul’s union with God. It has been suggested (Pandey 66) that Mira never thought that the soul should be absorbed into the supreme being. But I can see no other reading for the last line of this song.

70 Mechthild I 10.


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