Julian of Norwich Critical Essay | Critical Essay by Maria R. Lichtmann

Critical Essay by Maria R. Lichtmann

SOURCE: "'God fulfylled my bodye': Body, Self, and God in Julian of Norwich" in Gender and Text in the Later Middle Ages, edited by Jane Chance, University Press of Florida, 1990, pp. 263-78.

In the following essay, Lichtmann discerns in Julian's writings radical notions of sensuality and the feminine in divinity; she concludes that Julian "offers us … a theology of the body."

Sometime after she received a series of sixteen "showings" or revelations during the course of a nearly fatal illness, Julian of Norwich became an anchoress, walling herself up in a cell attached to a church in Norwich, England. In such a state of isolation, Julian would seem an odd choice for a visionary with special insight into the nature of the self, of God, and especially of reality. Yet, with her emphasis on neglected aspects of these psychological, theological, and ontological realms, Julian offers us a new,...
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