childhood, along the lines of the purveyors of apocryphal lore, Aelred urges his reader to gain an experiential sort of knowledge of Christ through personal prayer and to proceed from there to a more contemplative level of spirituality. Although he modestly refrains from claiming that the book stems from the inner workings of his own interior life, his biographer Walter Daniel asserted that Aelred’s De Jesu puero duodenni came “out of the library of his heart.”78 Thus, in this treatise Aelred presumably shared his own experience in approaching divine mysteries. In short, in addressing the desire of his addressee Ivo for deeper knowledge about the Christ Child, Aelred does not disseminate secrets he gleaned from reading esoteric books, such as those containing apocryphal childhood narratives, which had such an allure for medieval audiences. Instead, Aelred offers imaginative and rhetorical prompts that will propel his reader along the course toward a greater intimacy with Christ through prayer and meditation.
The Christ Child in Aelred’s De institutione inclusarum
In the 1160s, Aelred wrote the De institutione inclusarum, at the request of his sister, a recluse, in order to provide her, and other women drawn to the anchoritic way of life, with appropriate guidance and inspiration.79 Significantly, only a relatively small proportion of this epistolary treatise deals with the Christ Child: a passage on Jesus’ infancy that occurs within the section of the text that focuses retrospectively on the life of Christ. The majority of Aelred’s letter is aimed at explaining why one should be a recluse and, more importantly, how to be a good one. Aelred’s underlying premise, with which he assumes his reader agrees, is that a female recluse, as a bride of Christ, exists in a state of expectation; having died to the world, she preserves her virginity in this life for her bridegroom, with whom she will finally be united in heaven. At the beginning of the treatise, Aelred tells his sister that one of the main reasons that people in the past have chosen the solitary life is so that they might “enjoy greater freedom in expressing … ardent longing for Christ’s embrace.”80 Like other women, she has prudently enclosed herself in a cell, having little contact with other human beings. Yet she has not simply assumed a defensive posture; her goal of union with Christ is lofty. At different points in the treatise, Aelred invites the recluse to embrace Christ in her imagination and thus experience a foretaste of heavenly bliss.
Besides seeking to inspire and encourage his reader, Aelred recommends ways for her to avoid spiritual dangers. To fortify herself against the devil’s attack, the recluse should “never cease to ponder for whose bridal chamber she is being embellished, for whose embraces she is being prepared.” The sensuality of such imagery is presumably not at odds with the communal nature of heaven, for Aelred also tells the recluse to envision Mary leading the dance of the virginal brides of Christ.81 Approaching the issue of spiritual safeguarding more concretely, Aelred advises the recluse on how she should decorate her cell so as to avoid vanity; by sticking to the bare essentials, she will conform her lifestyle to that of her heavenly spouse, “who became poor although he was rich and chose for himself a poor mother, a poor family, a poor little house also and the squalor (vilitas) of the manger.”82 The recluse ought to recall Christ’s sacrifice as well as his childhood. By having a crucifix on the altar, specifically a representation of Jesus with outstretched arms, she will undoubtedly be reminded of his love for her.83 On the whole, Aelred emphasizes the idea that Christ is the recluse’s spouse, even as he employs the image of Jesus as mother, specifically by prompting the recluse to imagine a maternal Christ nursing her with his naked breasts.84
It is in Part Three of the epistolary treatise that Aelred focuses on the life of Christ in a brief and basically linear fashion. Aelred does not simply summarize the course of Jesus’ life but serves as a virtual tour guide, imaginatively leading the reader from one place to another in the Holy Land—locations once graced by Christ’s presence. Imaginatively entering into Jesus’ life, the recluse is to carry out the actions that Aelred recommends as a sort of stage director, at times telling her to pause, and at other times rushing her on to the next site, in order to commemorate another event. Marsha Dutton, seeking to distinguish between the two Aelredian works under discussion, says that the treatise addressed to Ivo urges imitation of Christ, whereas that addressed to his sister fosters a participatory experience of Christ, through the reader’s envisioning of herself as a companion of Jesus and also of Mary.85 In my view, though these texts may be said to have different emphases, in reality they overlap a good deal. For example, the reader of the De Jesu puero duodenni is, like the reader of the De institutione inclusarum, encouraged to imagine what it would have been like to experience the presence of the Christ Child, as well as his absence. Admittedly, however, the treatise for Ivo centers on a metaphorical finding of the boy Jesus in the Temple as the ultimate goal of one’s spiritual journey, which in its various stages imitates Christ’s physical development. The focus of the De institutione inclusarum, in contrast, is on the literal details of Jesus’ childhood and the latter part of his life; Aelred’s sister is instructed to enter into the drama of Christ’s earthly life and have an imaginatively tactile experience of him, rather than ponder how her life metaphorically parallels that of Christ. The point of such meditations, Aelred states, is to increase the recluse’s love of God by providing a foretaste of Jesus’ sweetness through imagined intimacy with his historical person.86
Although Aelred does not write extensively about the early life of Jesus in Part Three of the De institutione inclusarum, the relevant contents of this section are worth considering here, mainly because of their connection to details found in later medieval devotional works, some of which are discussed below. Assuming that the recluse habitually engages in the reading of Scripture, Aelred recommends that she ponder the writings of the prophets, along with Mary, who was similarly engaged in her room before the arrival of the archangel Gabriel. This view of the Virgin as reading at the moment of the Annunciation differs from what we find in the influential Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew, where Mary is said to have been engaged in textile work.87 Preferring a more contemplative Mary or at least one who uses books to enrich her prayer life, Aelred tells the recluse to imagine what “great sweetness” and fire of love Mary must have experienced upon becoming pregnant with the Lord; she is to focus on “the Virgin, whom she has resolved to imitate, and her son, to whom she is wed.”88 Aelred tells his reader to follow Mary to her cousin Elizabeth’s home and focus her gaze on the wombs of the two pregnant women, “in which the salvation of the whole world takes its origin.” He reminds the recluse that even as a fetus, Jesus was her spouse, telling her to “embrace your Bridegroom” in Mary’s womb and Jesus’ “friend” in the womb of Elizabeth.89 As we have already seen, medieval theologians commonly spoke of the Christ Child as a spouse. In addition, medieval Christians often envisioned Jesus as a homunculus while in the womb (that is, as a perfectly formed, yet diminutive human).90 Building upon Luke 1:41, which notes that John the Baptist leapt in the womb of his mother when she was greeted by the pregnant Mary, Aelred further endows the fetal John with personality by making him seem on friendly terms with his cousin. Making no mention of Joseph, Aelred tells the recluse to be present with Mary at the Nativity—to observe her child with joy. Urged to become even further engaged in this domestic event, so to speak, the reader is to “embrace him in that sweet crib, let love overcome your reluctance, affection drive out fear. Put your lips on those most sacred feet, kiss them again and again”91—a piece of advice recycled in later devotional texts. Aelred clearly views imaginary contact with Christ’s feet as a way to gain access to him and to experience a foretaste of future intimacy with the divine bridegroom. Later on, along similar lines, he tells the reader to visualize Mary Magdalene kissing Jesus’ feet.92 The fear he automatically assumes his reader will feel when she is told to kiss the Infant’s feet may stem from her presumed sense of awe as well as her reserve, an inclination Aelred considers inappropriate in Christ’s bride. Even the otherwise bold housewife-turned-holy-woman Margery Kempe, who flourished in the early fifteenth century, felt some reserve toward Christ (though mostly because of her sense of inferiority stemming from her status as a wife). Hence when she swaddles him in a vision, she does so very gently.93 Yet the Lord mystically assured Margery on another occasion, saying: “thu mayst boldly, whan thu
