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CHAPTER 2

Detachment, Order, and Observance in Johannes Tauler and Heinrich Seuse

Der sang us dem grunde der gienge gar hoch [The song from the ground would rise high indeed].

—Johannes Tauler

The Dominican friars Heinrich Seuse (1295–1366) and Johannes Tauler (1300–1361) both served in the vicariate of Alsace within the province of Teutonia. Seuse’s writings, especially his Latin treatise the Horologium sapientiae, enjoyed an extraordinarily broad circulation, both complete and in excerpts. A fairly large number of extant manuscripts (fifteen) contain Seuse’s complete Exemplar, a compilation of four vernacular works: the Vita, the Little Book of Eternal Wisdom, the Little Book of Truth, and a collection of edited letters. In contrast, Tauler’s thought survives exclusively in German-language sermons, possibly recorded by but certainly distributed to the women to whom he preached.¹ Taken together, their works represent some of the main genres of spiritual writing received by late medieval Dominican women, including those that will concern us throughout this book: sermons, treatises, and exemplary lives.

Both Tauler’s sermons and Seuse’s devotional works were widely transmitted in female communities, especially within the Observance.² They are both strongly attested within the convent library of St. Katherine’s in Nürnberg, in part thanks to the labors of the librarian Kunigunde Niklas. Niklas had been a member of the convent prior to the 1428 Observant reform, and her activities on behalf of St. Katherine’s are attested from 1436 when she first becomes visible as a scribe. Niklas copied more than thirty manuscripts before her appointment as librarian in 1455.³ Among the works she copied for her convent was Seuse’s Exemplar, which she entered into her own library catalog under the signature J II.⁴ As librarian, Niklas was also responsible for developing the community’s cycle of table readings, edifying texts that were read aloud to the assembled sisters during a meal. Although she did not herself copy the manuscript she used, Niklas incorporated all eighty or so Tauler sermons in E V (Nürnberg, Stadtbibliothek, Cod. Cent. IV, 29) into the yearly schedule.⁵ Kunigunde Niklas thus single-handedly assured that Seuse’s Exemplar was available to her sisters and that they would regularly hear Tauler’s sermons.

Scholarship on the fourteenth-century vernacular writings of German Dominican friars often conceives of such literature as combatting the immediate and corporeal feminine spirituality of Dominican women by imposing a male rationality. In a statement representative of this position, Werner Williams-Krapp writes that Seuse worked to convince Dominican nuns that “wild hallucinations achieved through rigorous asceticism are not to be understood as the consummation of spiritual perfection.”⁶ In other words, Williams-Krapp paints a picture of rational and prudent friars working to rein in the delusional visions of women spurred by bodily excess. Although returning a measure of value to embodied female devotional practices has proven a useful corrective in certain contexts, simply turning the paradigm on its head does not correct the problem. As Ulrike Wiethaus has compellingly argued, feminist approaches that celebrate the bodiliness of female spirituality still essentialize women and their engagement with Christian tradition and practice.⁷ As I show in the following chapter, the visions of the sisterbooks represent carefully constructed mosaics of spiritual meaning: literary lessons which, far from being “wild hallucinations,” in fact often teach obedience and devotion to the Office. In this chapter I approach the writings of contemporary friars not as a corrective measure aimed at reining in the sisters, but as a contiguous element that lays the conceptual and practical groundwork for a broader construction of German Dominican spiritual practice and convent life, including the complex negotiation of female liturgical piety.

Treating Tauler and Seuse together reveals that, despite generic differences in their surviving works and different emphases in their patterns of thought, both friars present the Dominican forma vitae as a devotional and ascetic exercise that fosters spiritual life. Adapting the philosophy of the condemned Dominican teacher Meister Eckhart, Tauler and Seuse posit a “ground” of the soul in or through which the human mind accesses divine experience. Detaching oneself from the world in a state of Gelassenheit in order to prepare for this experience represents the ultimate goal of their spiritual programs. Nevertheless, both men reject ascetic exceptionalism and insist that spiritual perfection can only be attained through orderly practice or, better, through the practices of the order. By submitting oneself to the regulations of the Dominican order, one learns to let go of one’s own will in Gelassenheit, such that only the prayers of the Office remain as expressions of self rising from the ground of the soul. Tauler’s ideal expressions of piety prove different from Seuse’s, and Seuse’s again from those of the sisterbooks, yet these very differences reveal the spiritual productivity of life under the Dominican statutes.

The Ground and Gelassenheit

Gelassenheit and its partner concept, the ground, constitute key terms for both Tauler and Seuse, as for their Dominican predecessor Meister Eckhart, and these ideas govern their devotional and spiritual programs.⁸ Since their liturgical spirituality is both founded in and aims back toward the ground of the soul, I must address these concepts first, building their devotional programs from the ground up, so to speak. These terms govern how Tauler and Seuse conceive the human relationship to the divine and the effectiveness of human activity, including the Dominican forma vitae and the Office. Using the concept of the ground, Tauler and Seuse outline a schematic theological anthropology that explains in philosophical terms how and why observance of the order’s regulations brings one closer to God.

Indebted to Neo-Platonic notions of emanation, the ground represents the part of the human person that shares in the divine being as it pours itself out into creation.⁹ Seuse famously depicts this dependence or identity visually in a full-page illustration of the cycle of emanation and return found in the earliest manuscript witness of the Exemplar. The divine ground, represented as a dark double circle, rests at the top left of the image. From this point a red thread traces stages in Christ’s life allegorized in poetic couplets as a spiritual progression. At each stage, the thread draws through a small double disk in the center of the figure’s chest, echoing the divine ground from which the thread originates.¹⁰

Whereas Seuse uses the term grunt to designate divine mystery and avoids it when describing aspects of the human self,¹¹ Tauler employs the term primarily with regard to the human soul.¹² In Tauler’s sermons, the ground often spatially describes the location of the gemuete, which is only imprecisely translated as mind, since it designates the mind’s natural dependence upon and desire to return to God. Paul Wyser concludes that “dieses Streben ist eben doch das Gemüt selber, nicht nur eine Kraft: es ist der Menschengeist, der Seelengrund mit seiner Neigung zu sich selbst [this striving is the gemuete itself and not only a faculty: it is the human spirit, the ground of the soul with its inclination towards itself].”¹³ Bernard McGinn accordingly translates gemuete as “essential inclination” and defines the ground for Tauler as the “place” of God’s reflection in the human soul.¹⁴ Although McGinn’s translation is more accurate, it becomes unwieldy with frequent use. I will translate gemuete as “mind,” with acknowledgment of this term’s shortcomings.

Whether the ground represents the divine font itself or the place within the human soul where it may be sought, both Tauler and Seuse set access to the ground as the goal of contemplative practice. One may achieve this through a process of self-divestment which they both call Gelassenheit. Derived from the verb lassen, to leave or let go, Gelassenheit entails letting go of the world and worldly concerns in order to access the ground. Nevertheless, perfect contemplation neither entails nor permits quietism, but rather orients a person’s works to the will of God. As Amy Hollywood argues in her analysis of Eckhart’s sermon 86 on Mary and Martha, “the highest contemplation is compatible with, and in fact brings about, a state of heightened activity.”¹⁵ Virtuous practice is also an important component of spiritual perfection for both Tauler and Seuse, but unlike Eckhart, who offers no concrete prescriptions, the later friars promote specific devotional programs in order to foster Gelassenheit.¹⁶ As we shall see, the Dominican forma vitae represents a central component of their programs. However, since their understandings of the ground differ, their conceptions of Gelassenheit and the methods of achieving it differ, as well. Although both urge surrendering the will to God in Gelassenheit, Seuse prioritizes the path of suffering in imitation of Christ, whereas the Virgin Mary’s obedience proves more emblematic of Tauler’s approach.

Of the works included in Seuse’s Exemplar, the Vita and the Little Book of Truth contain the most extensive discussions of Gelassenheit.¹⁷ The Vita constitutes the life narrative and spiritual progression of an anonymous protagonist called simply “ein diener der ewigen wisheit [a Servant of Eternal Wisdom],”¹⁸ who nevertheless represents Seuse, if not with precise historical accuracy.¹⁹ The work is divided into two books, the first of which narrates the Servant’s own spiritual journey, while the second, beginning in chapter 33, recounts the path of his spiritual daughter, Elsbeth Stagel of the Töss convent, who is explicitly named.²⁰ Walter Blank has pointed out that these two books are each further divided into two sections. The first half of book one recounts Seuse’s path as a “beginner,” after which a conversion experience in chapter 19 allows him to advance to intermediate status on the path to perfection. At the beginning of the second book, Stagel is introduced, having already completed the path of the beginner. Seeking Seuse’s mentorship marks her transition to the intermediate step. The genre shift from life narrative to dialogical treatise in chapter 46 marks the moment of Stagel’s achievement of spiritual perfection, confirmed by Seuse in a vision after her death.²¹ In these later chapters, Seuse himself occasionally seems to taste this perfection as he continues to grow through his relationship with Stagel.

Throughout the Exemplar Seuse delights in playing with the word Gelassenheit in its various grammatical forms and realms of meaning. Whether in spite of or because of this, he does not represent Gelassenheit as something one could discursively or intellectually grasp, but rather, as Susanne Bernhardt argues, “als praktisches Wissen, das es nachzuvollziehen gilt [as practical knowledge that one must understand by doing].”²² For Seuse, Gelassenheit and its attendant practices link the philosophical-theological concept of the ground of the soul to the concerns of practical theology. Seuse does not rest at providing a theoretical description of the human soul, but further presents a devotional program, illustrated in the three stages of the Vita. Each of the three stages of spiritual progression entails particular exercises which gradually reveal new levels of meaning corresponding to new forms of imitatio Christi.

The first stage involves developing the appropriate attitude toward one’s own body. The Servant practices severe self-castigation in many ways similar to those used by Elsbeth von Oye, a sister from the convent of Oetenbach whose life is recounted in their sisterbook. For example, he explicitly compares himself to the tortured Christ while flagellating himself with a thorny scourge.²³ This practice, however, must be surpassed, because in choosing to inflict such discipline on himself, Seuse still follows his own will rather than God’s.²⁴ Similar to many accounts in the sisterbooks, the transition to the intermediate stage entails ceasing self-castigation in order to accept suffering inflicted by “wolfish people.”²⁵ Gelassenheit at this stage is understood in the sense of humility and patience or equanimity in the face of adversity, which Richard Kieckhefer has identified as one of the characteristic virtues of fourteenth-century holiness.²⁶ This advanced stage entails not literal imitation of Christ’s acts or suffering but creative imitation of his virtue in all events and experiences.²⁷

The final, highest stage of Gelassenheit paradoxically incorporates both the sense of trust in God, that is, leaving oneself in God’s hands, and that of abandonment, the feeling of having been left by God. Bernhardt demonstrates this multiplicity of the meanings of Gelassenheit and Seuse’s practical understanding in an analysis of Seuse’s lament over being accused of having impregnated a woman.²⁸ Noting that the term lassen-gelassen-gelassenheit permeates the passage, she shows that it is used even within the same sentence to mean both his abandonment by God and entrusting his troubles to God. In this semantically charged outcry, Seuse wears himself out and finally grasps true Gelassenheit when he stills himself, accepts his lot, and cites Christ: fiat voluntas tua.²⁹ As Bernhardt summarizes, “Gelassenheit wird semantisch entfaltet im Spektrum Gleichmut—Gottvertrauen—Gottverlassenheit sowie mit Geduld und natürlich mit Leiden in Beziehung gesetzt [Gelassenheit semantically unfolds along the spectrum: equanimity—trust in God—abandonment by God and is placed in relation to patience and, naturally, suffering].”³⁰ This coincidence of meanings must also be at work in the compressed statement in the Little Book of Eternal Wisdom: “Ein gelazenheit ob aller gelazenheit ist gelazen sin in gelazenheit [the greatest self-abnegation of all is being patient/humble/trusting when abandoned].”³¹ Imitation of Christ in Gelassenheit does not necessarily entail physical suffering, but rather the patient acceptance of the will of God in whatever suffering is sent.

Seuse offers a deeper discussion of Gelassenheit in the Little Book of Truth, which recounts a philosophical dialogue between a disciple and the personified figure of Truth as she coaches him in the true spiritual way.³² The work begins more or less at the same point as the conversion of the Servant in chapter 19 of the Vita. The disciple has long practiced the forms of asceticism common to beginners but knows that he is missing something, for he remains “ungeübt in sin selbs nehsten gelazenheit [unpracticed in his own innermost Gelassenheit].”³³ Gelassenheit, as Truth explains in Chapter 4, entails sich lassen, abnegation of the self.³⁴ However, Seuse intentionally softens Eckhart’s philosophy of essential unity in the ground whereby the soul loses or destroys its created nature in order to be “one only one” with God.³⁵ Truth clarifies that Gelassenheit does not entail total annihilation of the self and indistinct union with God.³⁶ On the contrary, each person has five kinds of “self,” and only the last is at issue. Each person possesses a being self, which stones also have; growing, which humans share with plants; feeling, which animals enjoy; human nature, which all humans share; and finally, individual personhood.³⁷ The middle three selves are identifiable as Aristotle’s nutritive, sensitive, and rational souls.³⁸ All of these selves are created but nevertheless do not prevent perception of God in the divine ground; only the characteristics of individual personhood obstruct Gelassenheit. Even so, Truth specifies that these traits must not be destroyed but simply given up or despised (ufgeben oder verahten).³⁹ Here as in the Vita, self-denial, defined as the recognition of one’s own powerlessness and the acceptance of suffering, allows one to un-become (entwerden) and unite with Christ in the divine ground. Truth summarizes, “dis gelassen sich wirt ein kristförmig ich [this gelassen self becomes an I according to Christ’s form].”⁴⁰ Abandoning one’s own identity, goals, aspirations, and practices produces a Christlike self through acceptance of God’s will in suffering.

Tauler’s understanding of Gelassenheit is similarly broad but often more abstract than Seuse’s. In her systematic analysis of Tauler’s use of Gelassenheit throughout the surviving sermons, Imke Früh notes that Tauler never explicitly defines Gelassenheit as Seuse does, so that the term comes to encompass a broad range of virtues, importantly including the monastic virtues of humility and obedience.⁴¹ Moreover, although Tauler does also endorse contemplation and imitation of Christ’s passion, suffering does not pervade his sermons as it does Seuse’s writings. When he does speak of it, Tauler tends quickly to abstract the concept of leiden from the experience of pain to a state of passivity. As Alois Haas explains, “Gotliden meint die Absenz allen menschlichen wúrkens … und damit die schrankenlose Offenheit und Empfänglichkeit für die von Gott gewirkte Einigung des Menschen mit Gott [suffering God entails the absence of all human work … and therefore the unbounded openness and receptivity for the union of the person with God, effected through God himself].”⁴² Früh also emphasizes passivity in Tauler’s conception of Gelassenheit, noting that “leaving oneself” constitutes “weniger eine aktive Handlung als vielmehr einen Übergang in die Passivität [less an active deed than a transition into passivity].”⁴³ This passivity is not a form of quietism but rather a receptivity to the workings of God, who can only enter an empty vessel. Achieving this state of receptivity (“reine Empfänglichkeit und Bestimmbarkeit” in Markus Enders’s words⁴⁴) by preparing the ground of the soul proves absolutely central to Tauler’s concept of Gelassenheit.

This concept of Gelassenheit as receptive passivity is worked out in a sermon for Christmas. Tauler explains that the three Masses celebrated on Christmas day honor three different ways in which Christ is born. First, the birth of the Son from the Father, second, the birth of Jesus from Mary, and third, the eternal birth of God in the soul should be commemorated over the course of the day. In explaining the first form of birth, Tauler draws on the Johannine association of Christ with the Word of God. Echoing the inward turn that he will argue the human soul must take, Tauler explains that God turned inward to the abyss (abgrund) of his own being and, in pure understanding of himself, spoke himself out as a Word, that is, Christ the Son. If one wishes to receive God in the soul, Tauler continues, one must be able to hear the speaking of this Word.

Wan wenne zwei súllent eins werden, so můs sich daz eine halten lidende und daz ander wúrckende; sol min ouge enpfohen die bilde in der want oder waz es sehen sol, so můs es an ime selber blos sin aller bilde, wan hette es ein einig bilde in ime einiger varwen, so gesehe es niemer kein varwe; oder hat daz ore ein getöne, so gehört es niemer enkein getöne; so welich ding enpfohen sol, das můs itel, lidig und wan sin.⁴⁵

For if two should become one, then the one must stay passive and the other active; if my eye is to receive the images on the wall or whatever it is supposed to see, it must in itself be pure of all images, since if it even had one image in it of whatever color, it would never see any color; or if the ear had a tone, it would never hear any tone; so anything that should be receptive must be empty, passive, and pure.

According to medieval Aristotelian theories of perception, sense impressions quite literally impressed the form of the object perceived into the soul’s cognitive faculty, causing that faculty momentarily to share the form of the perceived object. In order for this object impression to operate correctly, the faculty had to be itself formless and plastic, allowing it to receive foreign forms easily.⁴⁶

The natural receptivity of the soul’s faculties is both an advantage and a disadvantage. If one turns inward, the soul will easily be able to receive (or conceive) God, but the faculties too often are oriented outward toward things in the world. These outer things occupy the soul and obstruct God’s natural desire to pour himself out. “Und darumbe soltu swigen,” Tauler explains, “so mag dis wort diser geburt in dich sprechen und in dir gehört werden; aber sicher, wiltu sprechen, so můs er swigen [And for this reason, you should be silent: so that the Word of this birth should speak in you and be heard in you; but certainly, if you want to speak, he must be silent].”⁴⁷ The obstructive tones that may prevent an ear from hearing are here given a power that goes beyond inattention to full interruption. It is not merely that the soul cannot hear; unless silence is accomplished, God does not speak at all. In order passively to receive God’s will, one must empty the soul of the world. McGinn concludes that debating whether lidikeit in Tauler’s sermons should be translated as emptiness (Ledigkeit) or passivity (Leidendheit) argues a moot point: lidikeit represents a neologism that intentionally evokes both meanings.⁴⁸ Emptying out the soul prepares it for true passivity.

In order to undergird his association of Christmas with Gelassenheit with silence, Tauler cites Wisdom 18:14–15, signaling explicitly that the text serves as the Introit for Mass on the Sunday within the Octave of Christmas.⁴⁹ Because of its reference to the descent of the Word, the verse had long been used for the celebration of the Incarnation.⁵⁰ After translating the entirety of the Introit, Tauler expounds the mention of silence as the purification of the soul required for Gelassenheit.

Hievon sol man singen in dem nehsten sunnendage in dem anhebende der messen: dum medium silencium fieret, do daz mittel swigen wart und alle ding in dem höhsten swigende worent und die naht iren louf vollebroht hette, herre, do kam dine almehtige rede von dem kúniglichen stůle, das waz daz ewige wort von dem vetterlichen hertzen. In disem mittel swigende, in disem do alle ding sint in dem höhsten swigende und ein wor silencium ist, denne wurt man dis wort in der worheit hörende; wan sol Got sprechen, du můst swigen; sol Got ingon, alle ding müssent uzgon.⁵¹

One sings about this next Sunday at the beginning of Mass: dum medium silencium fieret, when the middle/medium was silent and all things were in the highest silence and the night had completed its course, Lord, your almighty speech came from the royal seat, that was the eternal word from the Fatherly heart. In this silent medium, in this where all things are in the highest silence and there is a true silencium, here one will hear the word in truth; since if God should speak, you must be still; if God should go in, all things must go out.

By using the Introit for an upcoming Mass to illustrate his point, Tauler prepares his audience to understand that feast in light of his spiritual philosophy. The Christmas season and its celebration of Mary’s passive role should lead one to reflect on one’s own submission to God’s will. However, identifying silence as the ethical concern of a liturgical text produces an interesting paradox. Tauler urges his audience to consider their own pursuit of Gelassenheit while singing the Divine Office. This contemplative performance results in a curious situation in which the singers ought to be striving for inner silence, while they are singing outwardly. Seuse, with his greater attention to the immediate liturgical contexts, deals with this paradox of passive performance more effectively than Tauler, who remains more interested in the theological significance of feasts than in the spiritual interpretation of individual texts.

Liturgical Piety in the Global and the Particular

Tauler and Seuse deal with liturgical context in very different ways, which are at least partly motivated by the difference in genre. As sermons, Tauler’s works were naturally embedded in the liturgical context during which they would have been delivered. Although it is rarely explicitly noted, this context can be recovered from his interpretations of the pericopes, scriptural passages which rotated with the liturgical calendar. Finally, the manuscripts which contain large collections of his sermons frequently organize them according to the liturgical cycle rather than thematically. In contrast, Seuse contextualizes his visions and experiences within the liturgy through citation of Latin Mass texts. Neither Seuse nor Tauler represents liturgical performance with anything like the frequency or vividness of the sisterbooks. Moreover, whereas the sisterbooks employ Office texts, Tauler and Seuse both rely more heavily on the Mass for inspiration. Both friars also share an anxiety over the disruptive behavior that experiencing divine insight during communal celebration can cause.

Aside from the scriptural readings for a particular day, Tauler cites liturgical material less frequently and less systematically than even his prominent forebear Meister Eckhart.⁵² Tauler rarely offers specific liturgical texts as devotional inspiration, and when he does, as in the sermon for Christmas, he casts his net more widely than the context of a particular feast. Indeed, Joachim Theisen admits to being initially disappointed by Tauler’s apparent disregard for “the liturgical microcontext of the Mass.”⁵³ Tauler does always explain the scriptural reading for the day, Theisen notes, but “läßt sich ansonsten jedoch nicht von den anderen Texten des Meßformulars leiten, sondern von den thematischen Vorgaben der liturgischen Zeit [otherwise is not directed by the other texts of the Mass formulary but rather by the thematic guidelines of the liturgical cycle].”⁵⁴ Thus in sermon Vetter 1, Tauler describes the three Masses for Christmas Day as three kinds of divine birth and even assigns spiritual meaning to the fact that one is sung in the dark, one at dawn, and one when it is light. Rather than dwelling on the specific texts for a specific Mass, Tauler invests the entire feast and all that pertains to its celebration with spiritual meaning.

This orientation is likely what made Tauler an attractive choice for table readings at St. Katherine’s in Nürnberg.⁵⁵ Divorced from the context of its original delivery during a Mass and relocated to the refectory or chapter, a focused explication of liturgical texts would no longer be as significant or as relevant. Devotional interpretation of the feast within the context of the liturgical year, however, would be eminently useful in orienting the audience in an informed, orderly performance of the liturgical duties of that season. Tauler’s sermons spiritualize the liturgy on a global scale, allegorizing large-scale practices such as the three Masses on Christmas Day. His interpretations prepare the audience especially for high times in the liturgical year, when the special feasts were celebrated with unique variations in the Rite. Tauler both provides theological explanations for these broader changes in liturgical practice and offers spiritual lessons which give the feasts personal import. However, Tauler is not sensitive to the devotional power of liturgical text within the context of its performance, something that inspires both Seuse and the women of the sisterbooks.

Liturgical performances certainly inspire many of Seuse’s visions, and he also uses liturgical citations to comment on or gloss visionary experience. Although most studies focus on the role of images and visual piety in Seuse’s devotional program,⁵⁶ Steven Rozenski has compellingly argued that “the auditory often occupies a place of privilege vis-à-vis the visual: music and voice are frequently treated as both more powerful and more trustworthy than images, visions, or texts.”⁵⁷ Rozenski points out not only that hearing something can incite a visionary experience for Seuse, but that within such visions he often imagines himself rapt outside his body to some insubstantial place of angelic performance, where he sings along or dances to the tune. Although the Servant often hears instrumental dance music, liturgical song appears just as often in visions of musical performance. In contrast to Tauler’s global interest in the devotional significance of liturgical feasts, Seuse uses particular liturgical texts as either inspirations for or explanations of visions which are often extracted from their context in the liturgical calendar.

Seuse’s liturgical visions share many of the characteristics and functions such narratives display in the sisterbooks, with two signal differences pertaining on the one hand, to the meaning they produce and on the other, to the time and location of their occurrence. As I will show in the following chapter, the sisterbooks deploy liturgical citations as part of complex visions which either explore theological concepts or perform a sister’s holiness by drawing her into association with a saint. Seuse prefers to use the genre of philosophical dialogue to tackle theological issues, but he does use liturgical visions to reflect on his own spiritual state or to communicate some devotional lesson. For example, Seuse recounts a curious nightmare in which he is selected as celebrant for Mass. Taking him by surprise, the choir sings an Introit of a Mass for martyrs.⁵⁸

Die senger hůben an die messe von den martrern: Multae tribulationes justorum etc., daz da sait von menigvaltigem lidene gotesfrúnden. Daz horte er ungern und heti es gern gewendet und sprach also: ‘wafen, wes töbent ir úns mit den martrern? War zů singent ir hút von den martrern, und es hút enkaines martrers tag ist, den wir begangen?’ Sú sahen in an und zögtan mit den vingern uf in und sprachen: ‘got der vindet sin martrer hút an disem tage, als er sú ie vand. Berait dich núwan dur zů und sing fúr dich!’⁵⁹

The singers began the Mass for Martyrs: Multae tribulationes justorum etc., which handles the multifarious suffering of the friends of God. He did not like hearing this and wanted to change it, so he said: “hey, why are you blasting away about the martyrs? What are you singing about martyrs for, when we are not celebrating any martyr’s feast?” They looked at him and pointed at him with their fingers and said: “God will find his martyr on this day as he ever found them. Prepare yourself for this alone and sing your own feast!”

Terrified by this prophecy, Seuse flips through the pages of the missal before him, seeking the feast of some confessor or anything else. When he sees that the missal contains nothing but martyrs, he resigns himself to his fate and accepts the suffering he knows will come. By singing a Mass for martyrs on his own behalf, Seuse interprets his own trials as martyrdom and assimilates the narrative of his own life to their hagiographic vitae. His self-castigation and his persecution at the hands of others are given both redemptive meaning and exemplary status through Seuse’s liturgical association with the Church’s martyrs.

As I will discuss in more depth in the following chapter, the sisterbooks also often deploy liturgical citations in order to reveal the spiritual state usually of a deceased sister. Seuse’s nightmare resembles in particular a dream granted to the Gotteszell sister Adelheit. She sees a recently deceased sister dressed in rich robes, emblazoned with liturgical passages from Offices for martyrs on the front and back: Qui vult venire post me and Qui mihi ministrat.⁶⁰ The similarity of the episodes brings important differences sharply into focus. First of all, Seuse may arrogate to himself the honor due a martyr even before he has earned it. Dominican sisters, in contrast, usually must wait until after death for confirmation of their spiritual state. This difference makes manifest some of the dynamics of gendered power which increasingly meant that the only holy woman was a dead woman.⁶¹ Second, Seuse and the sisters experience the liturgy in different ways and with different intensities and therefore draw on different liturgical texts for their visions. The friar Seuse hears an Introit for a Mass at which he himself is meant to preside. The Gotteszell sister appears with the written texts of two antiphons for Lauds, that is, excerpts from the hours. Seuse’s vision of a martyr’s Mass is representative of his liturgical citations on the whole. Befitting his status as a friar and priest, Seuse tends to cite from the Mass more often than from the hours, which constituted the sisters’ liturgical focus and their primary source for visionary material. Comparing Seuse’s dream with a similar vision from the sisterbooks reveals significant manifestations of gender difference in access to saintly status and in experience of the liturgy. Seuse’s status as a male Dominican allows him to celebrate his own blessedness more openly and orients his use of liturgical material toward Mass texts over the hours. Nevertheless, the way in which Seuse reconfigures liturgical context to create meaning within his visions corresponds to the literary methods of the sisterbooks.

Arnold Angenendt has identified a further difference between Seuse’s use of liturgical material and that of the sisterbooks. Whereas the visions of the sisterbooks are often inspired by a liturgical performance during which they occur, Angenendt notes that Seuse’s visions have a sacramental character, and reproduce or reimagine liturgical celebrations but are detached from the performance itself. “Die erzielte Wirkung geschieht letztlich unabhängig von fester liturgischer Form, von sakraler Zeit und geweihtem Ort [The intended effect in the end is accomplished independently from strict liturgical form, from sacred time and holy place].”⁶² Instead of seeing angels appear during the Sanctus or Mary in response to the Salve regina, Seuse tends to envision heavenly liturgical celebrations during private contemplation. For example, the Servant experiences a vision while meditating between the first two Masses on Christmas.

Des liehten morgens, do man daz frölich gesang von dem veterlichen glanz der ewigen wisheit solt singen ze messe: Lux fulgebit, do waz der diener des morgens in siner kapell in ein stilles rüwli siner ussren sinnen komen. Do waz im vor in einer gesicht, wie er wurdi gefüret in einen kor, da man mess sang.⁶³

On the morning when the joyful song about the paternal radiance of Eternal Wisdom, Lux fulgebit, should be sung at Mass, in the morning in his chapel the Servant came into a quiet silence of his outer senses. It appeared to him in a vision that he was led into a choir where Mass was being sung.

In meditating on the upcoming liturgical service, Seuse envisions celebrating it with an angelic choir that performs music of untold beauty. He sings the Sanctus along with them, but when the Benedictus qui venit begins, he is so overpowered by the beauty of the music that he can no longer stand and sinks to the floor. He comes to as his body hits the ground. Still entranced by the melody, Seuse approaches the altar while singing the angelic Benedictus to himself under his breath. Although Seuse attends a visionary Mass, in reality he is alone in the church and the second Christmas Mass has not yet begun. He sings a Sanctus with the angels but not with his fellow friars. Since he is alone during this experience, his fall and the noise he makes singing to himself do not disturb any communal liturgical celebration.

The fact that Seuse’s miraculous Mass and his uncontrollable response occur in between the communal celebrations on Christmas Day bears even greater significance than Angenendt ascribes to it. Namely, disruption of the communal liturgy by physical responses to divine experience proves a concern for both Tauler and Seuse. The majority of Seuse’s visions end because “der krank lip nit me moht erliden [his frail body could no longer endure it],”⁶⁴ and he makes an involuntary physical gesture; for example, he sinks to his knees or places a hand over his heart, interrupting his prayer practice.⁶⁵ Tauler also speaks of people who are “als úber gossen mit innerlicher fröide das der kranke licham die fröide nút enthalten enmag und bricht us mit eigener sunderlicher wise. Und tete er des nút, das blůt breche im lichte zů dem munde us [so overwhelmed by inner joy that the sick body cannot contain the joy and breaks out in strange ways. And if it did not, blood would probably pour out of the mouth].”⁶⁶ The overwhelming experience of divine joy results in actual physical pressure, which the body will purge in another way if it is not released through cries and wild laughter. Excessive spiritual experience overwhelms the soul and bursts out from the body in jubilation,⁶⁷ interrupting contemplative prayer or, worse, disrupting the communal liturgy.

These outbursts represent a correlative or even a consequence of the friars’ rejection of quietism. That is to say, if access to God in the ground of the soul leads to virtuous living, then any disorder in this process will necessarily result in disordered behavior and disruption of prayer practice. Although they disapprove of these uncontrolled expressions in principle, Tauler and Seuse both acknowledge them as an initial phase in the slow development of spiritual perfection; for Seuse, it provides “ein reizlicher vorlof [an enticing prelude],”⁶⁸ and for Tauler, it represents “der erste grat eins inwendigen tugentlichen lebens [the first degree of an inner virtuous life].”⁶⁹ This disorderly behavior is acceptable for beginners but must be overcome in order to advance in spiritual perfection. Moving beyond this preliminary stage and developing the proper modes of behavior requires discernment.

Order and Discernment

Although the spiritual programs laid out by Tauler and Seuse display different characters, both insist that there is a wrong and a right way to seek spiritual perfection. As Bernhardt and Früh note separately, the two Dominicans both urge true detachment, rechte Gelassenheit, but never use negative adjectives to qualify this mystical virtue. The opposite vices are named rather as false freedom, false passivity, or even Ungelassenheit.⁷⁰ In order to avoid the disorder of false freedom, one must tread a careful path between outer actions and inner contemplation. Both outer and inner devotions serve the pursuit of true Gelassenheit, provided they are performed in an orderly manner governed by discernment, bescheidenheit.

In the Middle Ages, bescheidenheit meant not modesty but rather prudence, discernment, or discretion. It is etymologically related to underscheidunge, which in Middle High German signifies not only difference itself but also the ability to perceive differences. Underscheidunge would become the technical term for discretio spirituum, discernment of spirits, that is, the ability to tell whether a vision came from God or from the devil.⁷¹ A vast literature on this subject would develop in the late fourteenth and the fifteenth century, but Tauler already uses the term unterscheid in discussing the discernment of spirits according to Paul in I Corinthians 12:10.⁷² Neither Tauler nor Seuse, however, restricts the term to this particular meaning, but instead they associate underscheidunge and bescheidenheit more broadly with order and orderliness as the preconditions for true Gelassenheit and avoidance of heresy.

Seuse frequently associates ordenunge with underscheid and ascribes central importance to these qualities. Indeed, the prologue to the Exemplar states that Seuse’s Vita provides instruction in precisely these virtues, because they are the most necessary but very often lacking. Without discernment and order, those who pursue mystical experience will go astray and become a danger to themselves. For this reason, the prologue tells us, “git es vil gůten underschaid warer und valscher vernúnftekeit und lert, wie man mit rehter ordenhafti zů der blossen warheit eins seligen volkomen lebens sol komen [it provides many good distinctions between true and false reasoning, and it teaches how one shall attain the pure truth of a blessed and perfect life through correct orderliness].”⁷³ The Servant’s life provides a narrative, practical example of how to achieve Gelassenheit through discernment (underschaid) and order (ordenhafti).

These virtues also determine Seuse’s mentorship of Elsbeth Stagel. In advising her to discontinue the ascetic practices she had taken up in imitation of the Desert Fathers and the Servant himself, he insists that prudence must govern ascetic zeal. “Gemeinlich ze sprechen so ist vil bessrer bescheiden strenkheit füren denn unbescheiden [In general, it is much better to pursue prudent than imprudent austerity].”⁷⁴ Such prudence is necessary because too quick an ascetic advance will result only in a relapse, “wan es geschiht dik, so man der natur ze vil unordenlich ab prichet, daz man ir och dur na ze vil můss unordenlich wider geben [for it often happens that if one withholds too much from one’s nature in a disorderly manner, one must afterwards disorderly give back too much, as well].”⁷⁵ Only order and prudence lead to sustainable ascetic practice. The extreme castigation the Servant himself had pursued is unsuited to Elsbeth, “wan es diner fröwlichen krankheit und wol geordneten nature nit zů gehöret [because it is not appropriate for your feminine illness and well-ordered nature].”⁷⁶ Whether or not one agrees with David Tinsley that it is Elsbeth’s frailty and not her gender that constitutes the first criterion,⁷⁷ the second point is clear. The self-castigation that the beginning Servant performs is meant to order his disordered nature. Imprudent asceticism can only bring Elsbeth’s well-ordered soul into disorder, and the Servant must direct her down a different, prudent path.

This purpose is restated in the final chapter of the Vita as Stagel sums up the instruction she has received through his mentorship. Chapters 46 through 53, which Blank identified as representing the final stage of spiritual perfection, contain a series of theological questions posed by Elsbeth and answered by the Servant. He only permits her to ask them in the first place, because “du ordenlich dur dú rehten mitel bist gezogen [you have come in an orderly manner through the right means].”⁷⁸ Once all her curiosity has been satisfied, the daughter exclaims at the conclusion of the book:

gelopt sie dú ewig warheit, daz ich von úweren wisen und leblichen worten so schon bewiset bin dez ersten beginnes eins anvahenden menschen, und der ordenlicher mitel midens und lidens und übens eins zůnemenden menschen, und mit gůtem underscheide in togenlicher wise der aller nehsten blossen warheit.⁷⁹

Praised be eternal Truth, that by your wise and vivid words I have been so well instructed about the first steps of a beginner, about the orderly means of renunciation, suffering, and the exercises of a progressing person, and, with good discernment, about the most perfect and bare truth in a mysterious way.

Stagel here sums up the didactic program of the Vita, emphasizing order as necessary for the path and discernment for the goal. Achievement of mystical perfection is a gradual process with various stages on the way—beginning, progressing, and perfect. Certain kinds of ascetic or devotional practices are appropriate for some levels of mystical achievement and not for others. True progression requires orderliness for the development of discernment, without which one cannot grasp the most hidden truth.

This final point is developed further in the Little Book of Truth, where underscheit also proves a structuring theme, in Susanne Köbele’s words the “intellectual center”⁸⁰ of the work. As Loris Sturlese has shown, this dialogue systematically takes up and defends the propositions that were condemned in Eckhart’s heresy trial.⁸¹ Seuse largely accomplishes this by qualifying the statements as true only according to human perception, not in essence. Susanne Köbele argues that the primary thrust of the Little Book of Truth is to limit Eckhart’s mystical-philosophical language, which operated analogically, by reintroducing difference (underscheit) and thus blocking the heretical movement toward indistinct union.⁸²

Köbele’s argument that underscheit drives the Little Book of Truth is corroborated by two further observations. Namely, the disciple defends this very principle by differentiating between different kinds of difference and stating that the object motivating the discussion of distinction is right order. Although most of the work recounts conversations in which Seuse as the “disciple” interrogates the allegorical figure of Truth, in one chapter Seuse himself is put to the test by a sentient image (ein vernúnftiges bilde) that identifies itself as the Nameless Wild One (daz namelos wilde). The dialogue begins when the disciple asks this figure, “wa lendet din bescheidenheit? [where does your discernment lead?]” and receives the answer, “in lediger friheit [to unencumbered freedom].”⁸³ To argue against the false freedom and misdirected bescheidenheit of this strange figure, the disciple differentiates between underscheit as good judgment or discernment, underschidunge as separation or disjuncture, and underscheidenheit as distinction between things that may be conjoined.⁸⁴ Body and soul are underscheiden, since they are not the same thing, but they cannot exist in underschidunge if the person is to be alive. This distinction between the two different kinds of distinction is important, because it also describes the relationship between the three persons of the Godhead. Furthermore, and most importantly for the disciple’s argument, the difference between underscheidenheit and underschidunge justifies how a human soul can be united with God but remain distinct. The heretical Nameless Wild One thinks that it becomes God in Gelassenheit. It does not possess the underscheit to see the difference between underschidunge and underscheidenheit.

Lack of discernment is the root of all problems for the Nameless Wild One, because without underscheit there can be no order, and disorder is the root of all evil. Reversing the relationship posited by Stagel, the disciple explains that “swem underscheides gebristet, dem gebristet ordenunge, und waz ane reht ordenunge ist, daz ist böse und gebreste [whoever lacks discernment, lacks order. And whatever is without correct order is evil and defective].”⁸⁵ The Nameless Wild One is not content with this and asks him how he defines order. The disciple responds, “ich heis daz ordenhaft, wenn alles daz, daz der sache zůgehörlich ist von innen ald von nút ussen underwegen blibet unangesehen in dem uswúrkenne [“orderly” is when everything that pertains to a matter, both interiorly and exteriorly, is not left out of consideration in carrying it out].”⁸⁶ Order is not merely a matter of spiritual rectitude or correct devotional disposition. Order is completed in well-considered action, indeed in the performance of duty: that is, everything that pertains (zugehörlich ist) to a given circumstance. Order thus provides an important counterargument both to the charge of quietism and to the Nameless Wild One, who had argued that his unencumbered freedom (ledige friheit) authorized following his own inclination (můtwillen).

Tauler does not pair order and discernment as consistently as Seuse does, but he does define prudence as the ability to regulate, that is, order, one’s own behavior.⁸⁷ In this vein, he mentions Bescheidenheit in several sermons as the crowning virtue or the highest faculty of the soul. For example, in a sermon on preparing for divine grace, Tauler wishes his audience to note “wie der heilige geist danne die obersten krefte zieret mit göttelichen tugenden, und wie dis mit der bescheidenheit sol als gericht und geordenieret werden [how the Holy Spirit decorates the highest faculties with divine virtues and how these should be regulated and ordered by prudence].”⁸⁸ In several sermons Tauler expresses similar positions on the role of prudence in ordering both inner and outer works. In sermon Vetter 60h, for example, he asserts that three virtues are absolutely indispensable for spiritual perfection: humility, love, and prudence. He goes so far as to claim that anything without prudence is neither good nor pleasing to God.⁸⁹ Just as the disciple explains to the Nameless Wild One that discernment orders one’s works and that disorder is evil, Tauler also exhorts his audience that prudence must order and govern virtuous practice.

Tauler takes up the issue of quietism and objections to outer works as well. In sermon Vetter 74 Tauler condemns those who believe that all outer works hinder spiritual perfection and that all inner contemplation advances it. Works of love are not inherently bad and distracting, but are only so if they become an end in themselves. Similarly, some are drawn astray by inner contemplation, because they stick to their devotional images “also der bere an dem honige [like a bear to honey].” Tauler counters that everything must be done in an orderly manner.

Nu us disen beden werken, usserlich und innerlich, ob sú mit ordenunge gewúrket sint, so wurt geborn daz edel luter gůt, die innerlich raste do man mit eime stillen swigende aller bilde und formen kummet in daz götliche vinsternisse, do man rastet und gebruchet mitime.⁹⁰

Now from these two works, outer and inner, if they are done in an orderly manner, is born the pure, noble good, the inner peace where one comes through a quiet silence of all images and forms into the divine darkness where one rests and delights with him.

Tauler links this inner silence with Gelassenheit and the birth of God in the soul by referring here as well to Dum medium silencium, insisting that all works, both inner and outer, should foster this noble silence.⁹¹ Ordered practice entrains a disposition of virtue that, far from obstructing or distracting, furthers the pursuit of Gelassenheit.

In another sermon, Tauler uses the image of the Body of the Church to argue that each person is ordained to certain kinds of work, which one should not neglect in favor of contemplation. He accuses his audience of laziness in an amusing metaphor: “Nu wellent ir echt ledig sin. Es kumet sere von tragheit: ieklichs wil ein ouge sin und wellent alle schouwen und nút wúrken [So you want to be truly empty. That mostly comes from laziness: everybody wants to be an eye and to see and not to work].”⁹² Against the objection that duties (amt) cannot be ordained by God, because God would not impose hindrances to mystical union, Tauler argues that his audience has mistaken the cause of their dissatisfaction. “Was dir disen unfriden machet, das entůnt nút die werk, nein nút, es tůt din unordenunge, die du hast in den werken [What is causing you this distress is not the works, no, it is the disorder that you have in the works].”⁹³ Order, however, is not miraculously obtained but must be developed through practice.⁹⁴ Tauler concludes the sermon by asserting that even the discernment of spirits (underscheit der geiste) is not a divine gift, but an ability developed through trial. Those who have been tested and tormented by spirits have learned to know which are evil.⁹⁵ Spiritual perfection, therefore, can only be attained through orderly works, both inner and outer. Far from hindering Gelassenheit, orderly works prepare the soul.

Order Within the Order

A closer look at Tauler’s use of ordenunge shows that he links orderliness, not only etymologically but also conceptually, to the Dominican order in particular and further to any religious order in general. As I have just established, ordenunge in external works is not simply something that results from divinely granted prudence or the achievement of Gelassenheit. Orderliness constitutes a set of difficult practices with manifold variations, all of which are meant to foster the internal order that culminates in Gelassenheit. The best place to practice order, Tauler assures, is in an order.

Dis meinent und diseme dienent alle die wisen und alle die werg und übungen die wir hant in unserm heilgen ordene, und alle andere ordenunge … das er in uns hochgezit mache und wir mit ime habent ein unbekumberten grunt, der nút inne enhabe denne Got luterlichen.⁹⁶

All the methods and all the works and practices that we have in our holy order and in all other orders intend and serve this … that He make a feast day in us and that we have with him an untroubled ground that has nothing in it but God alone.

In consonance with Tauler’s injunction not to wait for God to endow one with virtue, this passage concisely presents Tauler’s formulation of the usefulness of a Rule. Contrary to Zekorn’s dismissive statement that Tauler sees no value in the order’s precepts,⁹⁷ Tauler states explicitly here that one observes the order to prepare the ground of the soul for the divine feast. Hochgezit must not be mistranslated as “wedding,” since the term referred to any special liturgical feast. Although the connotation of bridal mysticism remains, the hochgezit is first and foremost a period of intensified liturgical activity. Fulfilling the obligations of the order produces an ordered ground, in which God himself can celebrate his own liturgy.

Heinrich Seuse also considers pursuance of the order’s statutes as one of the requisite tasks for the quickest path to Gelassenheit. In a letter to a spiritual daughter, perhaps also Stagel, Seuse claims that his own personal experience has led him to the conclusion that nothing better serves mystical fulfillment than renouncing all things. However, he qualifies this renunciation by describing what kinds of outer practices it entails.

Ich han nach miner wise vil gestudieret und vinde nút nehers, denne daz sich ein mensche wislich und ordenlich allen dingen, als verre er mag, entsage … und dar zů höret stille swigen und hoch betrahten, wenig wort und vil strenger werk … sinen orden strenklich halten.⁹⁸

I have studied much in my own way and find nothing quicker than that a person renounce all things wisely and in an orderly way, insofar as he is able … this includes silence and high contemplation, few words and much hard work … strictly observing one’s order.

We will see this celebration of strict observance of the order echoed in the sisterbooks. Although Seuse uses vocabulary associated with Gelassenheit and mystical un-becoming (that is, entsagen/renunciation and the quickest path), he also immediately reminds the reader that this mystical renunciation does not take the form of inactivity or quietism. Seuse encourages not only orderly renunciation but renunciation into an order, framing withdrawal from the world as enclosure in a convent.

The first aspect of regular life that Seuse highlights in this passage is the practice of silence. Spiritual silence served as a metaphor for Gelassenheit, but both Seuse and Tauler also hold that external silence produces internal mystical silence and urge their Dominican audience to observe the silence of the order. Both the Constitutions for friars and those for sisters devote an entire chapter to silence. Dominican men and women were obliged to remain silent at all times in the cloister, in the dormitory, in cells, in the refectory, and in oratories. Indeed, even outside of these areas, for the most part they required permission to speak at all.⁹⁹

In accord with the importance of silence to daily life in the order, Seuse devoted an entire chapter of his Vita to “the useful virtue, which is called silence.”¹⁰⁰ He happily claims that he never broke silence at table except once in thirty years. Tauler also encourages silence, while contextualizing it as an essential practice of the order.

Ich enheischen von úch kein grosse volkomenheit noch heilikeit, denne das ir minne habent zů úwerem heiligen orden, und die minnekliche gesetzde meinent ze haltende als verre als ir múgent, und úwer swigen gerne haltent uf allen den stetten do es gebotten ist, und aller meist ob dem tische und in dem kore.¹⁰¹

I expect no greater perfection or holiness from you than that you love your holy order and intend to observe its sweet statutes as far as you can. Gladly observe silence in all the places where it is commanded, particularly at table and in the choir.

Tauler repudiates supererogatory asceticism and encourages only strict observance, in which context silence is to be understood. Nevertheless, swigen and stillekeit also appear outside the context of the statutes, among lists of ideal virtues in Tauler’s sermons. For example, he attributes it to Christ and thereby assimilates silence into the project of imitatio Christi.¹⁰² The external practice required by the order thus has both symbolic and pragmatic value. In sum, observing silence outwardly fosters spiritual silence.

As with silence, prayer also must not become an end in itself, but rather serve the end of Gelassenheit. Indeed, for Tauler, true prayer may just as easily be experienced in silence as in speech, since he adopts the definition of prayer as ascent of the mind to God.¹⁰³ He describes this ascent with a metaphor of incense: burning incense represents outer prayer practices and the smoke is the mind ascending in true prayer, released from the kernel in which it had been trapped. Burning incense serves the sole purpose of releasing smoke, and similarly outer prayer practices serve no other purpose than releasing the mind.

Also ist ussewendig gebet nút me nútze denne also verre als es zů diser edelen andaht den menschen reisset, und dannan uzbrichet der edel rouch; wanne der denne uskummet, so la das gebet des mundes künliche varn.¹⁰⁴

Thus external prayer is only useful insofar as it draws the person to this noble contemplation, and from thence the noble smoke breaks out; when that comes out, so leave off the prayer of the mouth.

Prayer practices are useful because, but only insofar as, they create the proper disposition for “noble contemplation,” the ascent of the mind to God in Gelassenheit. Tauler therefore discourages the practice of reciting ever greater numbers of prayers, and repudiates the idea that prayers could “buy” spiritual effects. He may have had in mind visionary claims, such as the notion that reciting the psalter or Pater noster a certain number of times released an equivalent number of souls from purgatory. However, he also explicitly denigrates the practice of endowing memorial services.¹⁰⁵ The act of mouthing prayers earns nothing from God in a mercantile exchange but rather serves only to promote a contemplative disposition, which of itself constitutes “true” prayer. If one allows external prayer to become an end in itself or even approaches it as the means to any particular end, self-will infects the practice and precludes abandoning one’s will to God. For this reason, Tauler authorizes his audience to desist from reciting prayers if and when this practice begins to obstruct the empty Gelassenheit that fosters divine intimacy.

Tauler’s admonitions concerning external prayer, however, always introduce an important qualification that makes it clear he is referring only to paraliturgical or private contemplative practices that do not form part of the Divine Office according to the Dominican Rite. The person seeking Gelassenheit should desist from any prayers or works that interfere with devout contemplation, “usgenomen das gezit alleine die das schuldig sint von ordenunge der heiligen kilchen; ane das so los künlichen varn so was anders dich hindert an dem woren weselichen gebette [except only for the hours which are required by the order of the holy church; except for this, forget about anything else that hinders you in true and essential prayer].”¹⁰⁶ One should only recite supererogatory prayers to the extent that they aid devotion and should stop if they do not. The Office, however, is obligatory, and religious must cultivate true prayer as best they can while performing the prayers prescribed by the Church and their orders.

Tauler reassures his audience in another sermon that the Dominican Rite is already structured with this principle in mind.

Nu tůnt die pfaffen also in der vasten: so lesen wir so vil der salmen und vil wisen; ze ostern so slahen wir ab und lesen denne ein lange wile dri salmen, ein antiphone und ein collecte. Als hochgezit ist, so slahen wir ab unser frouwen zit und preces. Also, liebes kint, als das hochgezit mag gesin eines innerlichen keres, so slahe das uswendige künlich ab, ob es dich dises hindert.¹⁰⁷

Now the priests do this during Lent: we read so and so many of the psalms and many melodies. At Easter, we cut down on these and then read for a while three psalms, an antiphon, and a collect. During Eastertide we leave out the hours of the Virgin and the preces. Thus, dear child, so that you may have the Feast of an inward turn, wisely leave out the outward prayers if they hinder you.

Tauler was not the first to claim significance for the abbreviated Easter liturgy, as we shall see in Chapter 5 regarding the German translation of William Durandus’s Rationale divinorum officiorum. According to Tauler, the Dominicans incorporated extra time for contemplation into the cycle of their Rite by abridging the liturgy for the days when particular devotion is encouraged. For the Dominican women hearing or reading this sermon, reduction of the Eastertide liturgy is both a real requirement and an allegorical lesson. Just as the Dominican Rite relaxes liturgical obligations to celebrate the important feast, so too should all Dominicans relax external prayer practices to welcome the feast in the ground of the soul. Yet neither in the real Easter liturgy nor in its allegorized spiritual correlative are the obligations ever fully dissolved.

Canonical prayer and supererogatory prayer thus possess radically different status within Tauler’s model of spiritual practice. One should desist from “manig salter und vigilien gelesen und manig messe gelesen und gesungen und manig gros oppher geophert [many psalters and vigils read, many Masses read and sung, many great sacrifices made]”¹⁰⁸ if such distract from true contemplation. Liturgical prayer, however, not only remains obligatory regardless of devotional concentration but, to return to the principle of order, cannot obstruct Gelassenheit. Tauler reprimands those who would claim that observing the order draws them away from spiritual perfection. “Dunket dich das dich dise uswendigen werk hinderen, als kor gan und dienstliche werk der gehorsamkeit: liebes kint, die werk die enhinderent dich nút, sunder dine unordenunge in den werken die hinderent dich [It seems to you that you are hindered by outer works, such as going to choir and works of obedient service? Dear child, the works do not hinder you, but rather your disorder in the works hinders you].”¹⁰⁹ The Office, like all the practices of the order, is intended to order the spirit and thereby prepare the ground of the soul for Gelassenheit. If it seems to obstruct this aim, that does not indicate a flaw in the order but rather a greater disorder within the self.

Seuse similarly confirms that external prayer is worthwhile, but again only insofar as it promotes a devotional attitude and inspires inner pursuit of Gelassenheit. In the Little Book of Eternal Wisdom, for example, the Servant explicitly asks his divine interlocutor whether external praise is useful.

Herr, ist daz uzzer lob, daz man mit worten und gesange tůt, icht vúrderlich? Entwúrt der Ewigen Wisheit: Es ist wol vúrderlich, und sunderlich, als vil es den inren menschen gereizen mag, der vil dike da von gereizet wirt, und sunderlich an anvahenden menschen.¹¹⁰

Lord, is the external praise one renders in words and songs at all beneficial? Response of Eternal Wisdom: It is beneficial, especially insofar as it can urge on the inner person, which is often urged on by it, especially in the case of beginners.

Although a state of continual inner praise represents the spiritual goal, external prayers and songs are not detrimental. Instead such outward practices assist by inspiring the inner person, particularly in the beginning stages of one’s spiritual journey. Nevertheless, Eternal Wisdom does not say that external prayer is only useful for beginners, just that it is particularly useful for them. People at all stages of their spiritual progression may be incited to greater fervor by external praise, and there seems to be no point at which it should be abandoned. External prayer practices ought to ground and inspire spiritual fervor throughout one’s path.

The Song from the Ground

Among these inspiring prayer practices, the Divine Office holds pride of place. The second letter of Seuse’s Great Book of Letters addresses the virtues and behavior appropriate to a nun. Seuse opens the letter by praising enclosure and the abandonment of worldly love for love of Christ, but then proceeds to a series of more specific directives. Foreshadowing the visitation letters of Observant reformers, Seuse places devotion to the Office foremost among practices of the order that foster spiritual perfection.¹¹¹

Min kint, du solt dich flissen gemeiner haltung dines ordens, und vor allen dingen solt du dich flissen, daz du zitlich zů kor gangest und zúhteklich da standest mit ernst und mit andaht, und nút dicke us louffest; du solt dich selben negeln in den stůl, voll us ze stenne, und sunderlich die messe in der minne, als Cristus voll us stůnt an dem krútze. Du solt under dannen nit anders tůn, so du nit siech bist, denne daz ouch der covente tůt an singen und an lesen, daz du dinú zit denne mit sprechist, daz du dar nach deste lediger siest, noch kein ander langes gebet tůn, daz dich des singens möhte ierren.¹¹²

My child, you should be diligent in common observance of your order. Above all, you should endeavor to go to choir punctually and to stand there, well-behaved in seriousness and devotion, and not to run out all the time. You should nail yourself to your chair and endure it to the end, particularly the Mass, in contemplation of how Christ endured the cross to the end. Unless you are ill, you should do nothing other than what the convent does with regard to singing or reading. You should say your hours with [the rest of the convent] and be that much more free afterward. Do not do any other kind of long prayer that would draw you away from this singing.