Seminar: “A Different Visitation Mystery: Introducing Fourteenth Century Accounts of the Virgin Mary on Mount Carmel”
Fr. Simon Mary (LMS Candidate, PIMS)
In their defense of a special relationship between the Carmelite Order and the Virgin Mary, fourteenth century Carmelite authors recounted a visitation altogether different from the first chapter of Luke’s gospel: a corporeal visit of Mary during her earthly life to the hermits dwelling on Mount Carmel. Existent accounts of this tradition include the Speculum Fratrum Ordinis Beatae Mariae de Monte Carmelo of Jean de Cheminot († 1342 or 1350), John Baconthorpe’s (†ca. 1348) Laus Religionis Carmelitanae, Jean de Venette’s (†ca. 1368) Chronicon Ordinis Carmelitarum, and the Dialogus inter Directorem et Detractorem of John of Hildesheim († 1375). The manuscripts and the historical context in which each text emerges will be presented at this seminar.
Textual commonalities and divergences, and this visitation’s purported effects upon Mary’s life, will be introduced to connote the importance attached by the aforesaid Carmelites—each in his own locale and true to his intended purpose and genre—to Mary’s sojourn to the Mountain of Carmel. As will be seen, the evolution of this mysterious and even angelic visit developed not only as regards life timing, but also Mary’s companions and manner of visiting. The biblical, apocryphal, and historical supports employed will be preliminarily identified.
Additionally, active and larger research questions will be raised surrounding the fourteenth century Carmelite use of legend to advance the notion of Carmelite identity and counter perceived competition from other mendicant orders. Larger questions of this visitation’s influence upon the visual arts and liturgy will be asked together with its enduring influence upon later Carmelite and Marian spirituality.
Image: “Virgin and Child on Mount Carmel,” in The Taymouth Hours (14th century), The British Library, Yates Thompson, MS. 13, f. 194