ABSTRACT
Despite this declaration of defeat, the Beguine Mechthild of Magdeburg is one of the most engaging female mystical writers of the late Middle Ages. After more than seven hundred years, her writings, an often stunningly beautiful and always bold compendium of spiritual teachings, remain provocative and uncompromising. Some of her contemporaries would have agreed with this assessment, albeit critically. Mechthild notes that she is rejected by some like “filthy ooze” and writes that “I was warned against writing this book. People said: If one did not watch out, It could be burned” (II.26). Medieval Christians thought it difficult to access biblical knowledge and searched for trustworthy contemporary revelations to provide spiritual maps for the present and future. To the distress of some of her peers, Mechthild was certain that her writings were just that: a continuous stream-a flowing light-of divine revelations to supplement and extend the biblical canon into the present moment. No wonder then
that the scribes who copy her book were promised extraordinary rewards in heaven. According to divine decree, the written product of their labors is to be transcribed onto their clothes in heaven, so that “all these words shall appear written on their outermost garments, forever visible in my kingdom/ In heavenly shining gold above all their adornments” (II.26).
