Tuesday, April 18, 2023

On the Cathars, by Hildegard of Bingen

In July of the present year, which is the one thousand one hundred and sixty-third of the Lord’s incarnation, I saw from afar, in the shadow of a true vision, under the altar that is before the eyes of God, and I also saw under the throne of God.

And I saw that the twenty-four elders, who sit around the throne, were moving the glassy sea, which is before the throne, and they said: Let us move the empty foundations of their mockery, those who want to place their injustice as justice, and let us move the sparks of their burning injustice, those who say they rule the people but do not, and let us move the variously filthy pipes of their ways and the gilded strings of their illusions and the divisions of divisions.

For the ancient lion roars, wanting to fly in the midst of the aforementioned sparks of burning injustice. But it will not be so. Let us call upon the Ancient One in whom all kinds of growing things and all creatures are numbered, and let us look upon the sword that appeared in the mouth of the speaker, and let us see in what number the two-pound loaves of wheat and barley are, and let us consider the trumpet that sounds before the first woe, and by the oath of these and by the power of him who sits on the throne, let us bind the neck of the ancient lion and restrain him with a bridle, so that he does not send the sea after the woman fleeing into the wilderness before the times and half a time and forty-two months.

For it has been twenty-three years and four months since the perverse deeds of men, which are breathed out from the mouth of the black beast, stirred up the four winds, four by four, through the angels of the corners into great ruin, as the same deeds ascended above them, so that in the east the change of filthy ways was breathed out, and in the west, blasphemy and forgetting God against his saints through the fame of the calf and the cultivation of idols, tormenting the holy sacrifice, and in the south, the filth of hateful vices, and in the north, the phylacteries of garments according to the twisted serpent, which were defiled with all the aforementioned evils that would later come upon them.

But there have been sixty years and twenty-four months since the ancient serpent began to deceive the peoples with the phylacteries of garments. Now, countless saints of God, who are under the altar, raise their voices, crying out that the bodily sprinkling of their ashes has been violated by the wickedness of the peoples. Hence, from their sound, the wind blows that now works miracles. But he who sits above the black horse sends forth the hissing of the opposing wind by wandering, but he will not prevail.

And again, the ancient dragon roars in wrath against the saints of God, raising itself on the wings of the winds, and says: What is this? That which these and the like of them have established, I will destroy. – And they answer him: Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand and weighed the heavens with the span of his hand? Who has held the earth’s mass with three fingers and balanced the mountains and hills in a scale? {Is. 40:12} For we are measured in the scale of God, in which we do all things through the fiery spark that shines before his face. But you have fire in your eye for burning and draw forth a flame from it almost to the place of your first constitution, and this you do against God and against the heavens and against all who are in heaven. But not yet. When God indeed weighed the heavens with a span, then the burning mountain will fall upon your neck, and all your strength will be utterly destroyed. But from the throne a new song will be given to us, and eyes that see all things and perceive them from every side. But you, in your voracious throat, do not yet have time to devour; therefore, by the throne of God and by all His garments, I adjure you to cease from this madness.

But you, peoples and nations, hear the Spirit of God speaking to you: The ancient serpent makes towers in the midst of you, namely with those who are like the Sadducees and those who call themselves Baal, but do not recognize the just God, so that the deceptive spirit sometimes appears to them like a spark, either black or turbid or clear and local, which quickly vanishes. And this is diabolical and deceptive, because the deceptive spirits sometimes make themselves like the four elements and all their powers, because they overcame the first man. But that which is from God, there is wisdom and prophecy in it, and an obscure manifestation in things that do not concern man, because God is incomprehensible. These men, of whom the devil makes towers in his ear, are like a crab that walks forwards and backwards, and like scorpions that sting you with their fiery tails in secret and cruelly kill you with the worst venom of unfaithfulness; whom the devil sometimes invades with certain divine precepts that seek his will, because they are made in the image of God; and he does this so that he can more easily deceive them later. They are also like certain large birds that scatter their own eggs. And they say, “Let us cast this away from us, for it is poisonous.” They are those who deny the first principles, namely that God created all things and commanded them to germinate and grow. They are those who deny the lordly principle, namely that before the ancient days He appeared, because the Word of God had to become man. They are worse than the Jews who have blind eyes for seeing the fiery form that now shines as a man in the holy divinity, but who will estimate themselves to be just after a long time, until God strikes them with the fiery scourge upon which they were considering.

They are also sulfuric mountains mixed with the most wicked beast that opens its mouth against God and against the heavens and against all who dwell in the heavens. And there are also the entrails of the same inconsistent beast that receives and spits out the worst filth, and they precede it, embracing the uncleanness and wickedness of all evils, through the path of the erring, as the prophets of the Lord prophesied in the way of salvation, showing Him with all the virtues of justice; whom the finger of God inspired and taught, just as the devil fills these with blasphemy, wickedness, and lies of all evils. For the ancient serpent, in the beginning of its fall, thought it had a key, but now it considers that this most wicked beast is its key, so that it may accomplish all its will with it; but in that beast, all its strength will be completely crushed.

Now you, people who have the purest faith, listen to the voice of him who was and is and is to come {Rev. 1:4}, saying to you: Listen to the words of the priests who hold and keep my justice, and in whose ears these words of mine will sound, and who will also speak these words to you in my name, and with their loud voices cast out the aforementioned unclean and profane people from among you, and torment them with harsh and hard words, and lead them completely to expulsion and flee them from unhappy caves and caverns, because they want to deceive you. And also do this so that you are not cursed by God and that peace does not flee from you, for masters and priests, kings, leaders, and people cannot be called before God while these criminals live among you, because your cities and towns will be destroyed and your property will be plundered because of them if they remain with you. Now praise be to God, who sits on the throne and looks into the abyss, and who holds all the heavens in his dominion. And the Spirit of God says: Whoever neglects to hear and understand these words and does not want to believe them, the sword of the word of God will kill him with great tribulation.

And soon in the same vision, I heard a rushing voice saying to me: Write down what you have seen and heard, and quickly transmit it to the priests of the Church who worship God with the purest faith, so that they may preach it to the people everywhere in their surroundings, so that they may guard against these diabolical arts, and not let them take root among them and perish. But I, a poor form, then languished for many days under illness, so that I could not stand fully on my feet until I had completed these writings.

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