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 English
mystic of the fourteenth century, author or recipient of the vision
contained in the book known as the "Sixteen Revelations of Divine Love". The
original form of her name appears to have been Julian. She was probably a
Benedictine nun, living as a recluse in an anchorage of which traces still
remain in the east part of the churchyard of St. Julian in Norwich, which
belonged to Carrow Priory. According to her book, this revelation was "shewed"
to her on 8 or 14 May (the readings differ), 1373, when she was thirty years
and a half old. This would refer her birth to the end of 1342. Her
statement, that "for twenty years after the time of this shewing, save three
months, I had teaching inwardly", proves that the book was not written
before 1393. An early fifteenth-century manuscript, recently purchased for
the British Museum from the Amherst library, states that she "yet is on
life, Anno Domini 1413". It is probable that this is the manuscript cited by
Francis Blomefield, the eigtheenth-century historian of Norfolk, and that a
misreading of the date led to the statement that she was still living in
1442. Attempts have been made to identify her with Lady Julian Lampet, the
anchoress of Carrow, references concerning legacies to whom occur in
documents from 1426 to 1478; but this is manifestly impossible. The
newly-discovered manuscript differs considerably from the complete version
hitherto known, of which it is a kind of condensation, lacking the beginning
and the end. Only three, much later, manuscripts of the fuller text are
known to exist. The earliest, in the Bibliothθque Nationale at Paris (from
which the book was first edited by Serenus de Cressy in 1670), dates from
the sixteenth century; the other two, both in the British Museum and not
independent of each other, belong to the seventeenth. The better of the
latter is evidently a copy of a much earlier original.
Whatever be their precise date, these "Revelations", or "Shewings", are the
most perfect fruit of later medieval mysticism in England. Juliana described
herself as a "simple creature unlettered" when she received them; but, in
the years that intervened between the vision and the composition of the
book, she evidently acquired some knowledge of theological phraseology, and
her work appears to show the influence of Walter Hilton, as well as
neo-Platonic analogies, the latter probably derived from the anonymous
author of the "Divine Cloud of Unknowing". There is one passage, concerning
the place in Christ's side for all mankind that shall be saved, which argues
an acquaintance with the letters of St. Catherine of Siena. The
psychological insight with which she describes her condition, distinguishing
the manner of her vision and recognizing when she has to deal with a mere
delusion, is worthy of St. Teresa. When seemingly at the point of death, in
the bodily sickness for which she had prayed in order to renew her spiritual
life, she passes into a trance while contemplating the crucifix, and has the
vision of Christ's suffering "in which all the shewings that follow be
grounded and joined".
The book is the record of twenty years' meditation upon that one experience;
for, "when the shewing, which is given for a time, is passed and hid, then
faith keepeth it by grace of the Holy Ghost unto our lives end". More than
fifteen years later, she received "in ghostly understanding" the
explanation, the key to all religious experience: "What? wouldest thou wit
thy Lord's meaning in this thing? Wit it well: Love was His meaning. Who
sheweth it thee? Love. Wherefore sheweth He it thee? For love. Hold thee
therein, thou shalt wit more in the same. But thou shalt never wit therein
other without end." With this illumination, the whole mystery of Redemption
and the purpose of human life become clear to her, and even the possibility
of sin and the existence of evil does not trouble her, but is made "a bliss
by love". This is the great deed, transcending our reason, that the Blessed
Trinity shall do at the last day: "Thou shalt see thyself that all manner of
thing shall be well." Like St. Catherine, Juliana has little of the dualism
of body and soul that is frequent in the mystics. God is in our "sensuality"
as well as in our "substance", and the body and the soul render mutual aid:
"Either of them take help of other till we be brought up into stature, as
kind worketh." Knowledge of God and knowledge of self are inseparable: we
may never come to the knowing of one without the knowing of the other. "God
is more nearer to us than our own soul", and "in falling and rising we are
ever preciously kept in one love." She lays special stress upon the
"homeliness" and "courtesy" of God's dealings with us, "for love maketh
might and wisdom full meek to us." With this we must correspond by a happy
confidence; "failing of comfort" is the "most mischief" into which the soul
can fall. In the Blessed Virgin the Lord would have all mankind see how they
are loved. Throughout her revelation Juliana submits herself to the
authority of the Church: "I yield me to our mother Holy Church, as a simple
child oweth."
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