I thoroughly enjoy this CD collection of The Complete Hildegard von Bingen, performed by Stevie Wishart's Sinfonye. St. Hildegard (1098-1179) was a writer, composer, philosopher, mystic, visionary, and a medical writer and practitioner. She is a Doctor of the Catholic Church. Here is the English translation of the Latin lyrics in these beautiful works.
Sinfonye
Symphany of the Harmony of Celestial Revelations
The Complete Hildegard von Bingen
Volume One
1. Honey and Milk beneath Her Tongue
A dripping honeycomb was Ursula, virgin, who yearned to lie with God's lamb,
honey and milk beneath her tongue.
For she gathered around her a flock of virgins, a fruit-bearing orchard, a garden in bloom.
Rejoice, daughter of Zion, in the exalted dawn!
For she gathered around her a flock of virgins, a fruit-bearing orchard, a garden in bloom.
Glorify the Father, the Spirit and the Son.
She gathered around her a flock of virgins, a fruit-bearing orchard, a garden in bloom.
2. Ursula's Virgins
And therefore these girls were sustained by the supreme man,
bearing the standard of the royal child of virginal nature.
3. The Devil's Suggestion
O you who are illumined by the divine radiance, radiant Virgin Mary,
suffused with the Word of God,
whence your womb blossomed from the entrance of the Spirit of God,
who breathed upon you and, within you, sucked out what Eve bore away
in the breach of purity,
through the contagion contracted from the devil's suggestion.
You wondrously hid within you immaculate flesh through the divine reason,
when the Son of God blossomed in your womb,
holy divinity bringing him forth against the laws of flesh that Eve built,
coupled to integrity in the divine bosom.
4. Place of the Ancient Heart
O you angels who guard the peoples, whose form gleams in your face,
and O you archangels who receive the souls of the just,
and you virtues, powers, princedoms, dominations, and thrones,
who are counted in the secret number five,
and O you cherubim and seraphim, seal of the secrets of God:
Praise be to you,
who behold in the fountain the little place of the ancient heart.
For you see the inner strength of the Father, which breathes from his heart like a face.
Praise be to you,
who behold in the fountain the little place of the ancient heart.
5. Zeal of Divinity
The zeal of divinity, amid the highest praises,
gave a kiss of peace to the virgin Ursula with her flock before all peoples.
6. O Fiery Spirit
O fiery Spirit, praise be to you who play upon the timbrel and the lyre.
The minds of human beings are ablaze from you,
and the tabernacles of their souls contain their forces.
Thence the will ascends and bestows a savor on the soul,
and its lantern is desire.
The understanding calls to you with the sweetest sound,
and prepares buildings for you with reason,
which labors in golden works.
But you always hold a sword to cut off that which the noxious fruit
brings forth through the blackest murder,
When a mist covers the will
and desires among which the soul flies and circles everywhere.
But the mind is the bond of will and desire.
But when the spirit lifts itself up so that it wants to see the pupil of the Evil One
and the jawbone of wickedness,
you swiftly consume it in fire when you will.
But when reason falls prostrate through evil works,
you restrain and constrain and recall it as you wish,
through a flood of trials.
But when evil draws its sword against you,
you break it in its own heart,
as you did in the first lost angel when you cast the tower of his pride into hell.
And there you raised a second tower in publicans and sinners,
who confess their sins to you with their works.
Hence all creatures who have life from you, praise you,
for you are a most precious ointment for broken and fetid wounds,
when you convert them into the most precious gems.
Now deign to gather us all to yourself,
and direct us toward righteous paths. Amen.
7. Red River Falling
O redness of blood, you who flowed from that height that divinely touched:
you are a flower that the winter of the serpent's breath has never harmed.
8. O Boundless Church
O boundless Ecclesia, girded with divine arms and adorned with jacinth,
you are the fragrance of the wounds of nations and the city of sciences.
O, O, and you are anointed amid noble sound,
and you are a sparkling gem.
9. Living-light Angels
O most glorious living-light angels,
who beneath the divinity gaze on the divine eyes
in the mystical obscurity of all creation in ardent desires,
whence you can never be satiated:
O how glorious are those joys your form possesses,
which in you is untouched by all the wicked work
which first began in your companion, the lost angel,
who wished to fly above the hidden inner pinnacle of God,
hence he crookedly plunged into ruin,
but his fall furnished instruments by the counsel for the handiwork of God's finger.
10. The Clouds are Grieving
Our king is swift to receive the blood of innocents:
angels in concert chime their praise.
But for blood that was spilled the clouds are grieving.
In a grave dream the tyrant was choked for his malice.
But for blood that was spilled the clouds are grieving.
Glorify the Father, the Spirit and the Son.
But for blood that was spilled the clouds are grieving.
11. The First Woman
For God foreshadowed in the first woman
that woman should be nurtured by the protection of man.
12. From Their Homeland
And from their homeland and from other regions
monks and learned men were joined to them,
who kept them in virginal protection,
and who ministered to them in all things.
13. But the Devil Mocked
But the devil mocked it in his envy,
by which he left no work of God untouched.
14. Song to the Church
Now let the motherly heart of the Ecclesia rejoice,
because in supernal harmony her children are gathered into her bosom.
Hence, O shameful serpent, you are confounded,
because the ones your jealousy held in its maw
now gleam in the blood of God's Son,
and therefore praise be to you, King Most High.
Alleluia.
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Sinfonye
Aurora
The Complete Hildegard von Bingen
Volume Two
1. From Wherever They Came
From wherever they came they were welcomed
with the joy of celestial paradise
because in their spiritual life they appeared full of honor.
2. O Leafy Branch
O leafy branch, standing in your nobility as the dawn breaks.
Now rejoice and be happy
and make us weak ones free from bad habits
and stretch out your hand to raise us up.
3. O How Precious
O how precious is the virginity of this Virgin,
who has a closed door and whose womb holy divinity with his heat infused,
so that a flower bloomed in her.
And the Son of God from that secret place emerged like the dawn.
Thus the sweet seed, which is her Son,
through the closed door of her womb opened paradise.
And the son of God through the secret places of the same woman
emerged like the dawn.
4. Because It Was a Woman
Because a woman constructed death
a shining virgin has demolished it,
and so the supreme blessing is in womanly form beyond all creation,
because God became man in the most sweet and blessed Virgin.
5. Ave Maria
Hail Mary, O author of life, rebuilding salvation,
you who confounded death and crushed the serpent
towards whom Eve arose,
her neck raised puffed up with pride.
You crushed him when you conceived the Son of God from heaven:
Who was inspired by the Spirit of God.
O sweetest and most loving mother, hail,
you who gave birth from heaven for the good of the world:
Who was inspired by the Spirit of God.
Glory to the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Who was inspired by the Spirit of God.
6. Divine Love Abounds
Love abounds in all,
from the depths above the most exalted stars and most loving to all,
because she has given to the highest king the kiss of peace.
7. O Great Wonder
O what a great miracle it is that into a submissive female body
the King entered.
God did this because humility rises above all.
And O what great happiness is in that woman,
for the malice, that flowed from woman,
this woman then wiped away,
and built all the soft-scented virtues,
and adorned heaven more than she had previously troubled earth.
8. Hail, Noble One
Hail, noble one, glorious and untouched girl.
You are the pupil in the eye of chastity,
you are the model of sanctity, who pleased God.
For this heavenly infusion was in you,
because the heavenly Word put flesh into you.
You are the incandescent lily on which God gazed before all creation.
O most beautiful and sweetest, how greatly God was delighted in you
when the embrace of his own heat was placed in you
so that his Son would be breast-fed by you.
For your womb held joy
when all celestial music resounded from you,
for virgin you carried the Son of God,
when your chastity shone for God.
Your flesh held joy like grass on which dew falls
infused greenness on it,
so it was with you, O mother of all joy.
Now let all the Church glow with joy and resound in music
for the sweetest Virgin and praiseworthy Mary,
the bearer of God. Amen.
9. O Branch and Crown
O branch and crown of royal purple,
you who are clothed in armor.
Bursting into leaf you flowered
different from that which Adam robbed his sons.
Hail, hail, from your womb came a different life that Adam's sons were denied.
O flower, you did not spring from dew, nor from drops of rain,
nor did the air flow over you,
but the divine glow produced you on this most noble branch.
O branch, your flourishing God foresaw on the first day of his creation
And from his Word he made you the golden model, O praiseworthy virgin.
O how great in its strength is the side of a man,
from which God made the form of a woman,
which became the mirror of all his finery, and the embrace of all his creation.
Then the celestial organ sounded and all earth marveled, O praiseworthy Mary,
for God loved you greatly.
O how greatly we lament and mourn because sadness and crime
- through the serpent's counsel - flowed into woman.
For the very woman whom God placed as mother of all, ruined herself
with the wounds of ignorance
and great sorrow was brought on her kin.
But, O dawn, from your womb a new sun came out, which cleansed all Eve's crimes
and through you brought a greater blessing than all Eve's harm to mankind.
Therefore, O Savior, you who brought a new light to human kind:
collect the members of your Son, into celestial harmony.
10. So God Watered Them with Dew
So God watered them with dew, from which much fame grew,
so that all peoples from his honorable fame tasted as if it were food.
11. O Energy of Wisdom
O energy of Wisdom, you who circled circling,
comprehending all in one path that has life, having three wings,
of which one flies above and the other sweats on the earth
and the third flies all around.
Praise be to you, as you deserve, O wisdom.
12. O Sweetest Lover
O sweetest lover, O sweetest embracer, help us to keep our virginity.
We were born in dust, alas, alas, and in Adam's crime.
It is very hard to resist what tastes of the apple.
Raise us up Savior, Christ.
We desire ardently to follow you.
O how hard it is for us miserable ones
to imitate the immaculate and innocent King of Angels.
Yet we trust in you,
that you desire to seek the gem amid putridness.
Now we call you, bridegroom and consoler, who redeemed us on the cross.
In your blood we are coupled to you with the betrothal promise,
rejecting men and choosing you, Son of God.
O most beautiful form,
O most soothing fragrance of desirable delights,
always we sigh after you in tearful exile.
When may we see you and remain with you?
We are in the world and you in our mind,
and we embrace you in our heart as if we have you present.
You, mightiest lion ruptured the sky,
descending to the Virgin's chamber, and destroying death,
building life in the golden city.
Grant us companionship with her and to remain in you,
o sweetest bridegroom, who has taken us from the jaws of the devil,
who seduced our first parent.
13. While the Craft of God's Finger
While the craft of God's finger, formed in the image of God,
was created through mixed blood on account of the exile of Adam's fall,
the elements received joy in you, O praiseworthy Mary,
while heaven glowed and resounded with praise.
14. Holy Spirit
To the Holy Spirit honor be, who in the mind of Ursula the virgin,
a virginal flock like doves gathered.
So from her fatherland like Abraham she departed.
And for the sake of the lamb's embrace her betrothed man she left.
For this most chaste and golden army with virginal tresses crossed the sea.
O whoever heard such tales as those?
And for the sake of the lamb's embrace her betrothed man she left.
15. O Father of All
O Father of all and O King and people's Emperor, you who formed us in the rib
of the first mother, who built for us a great fall into affliction -
and we followed her through our own fault into exile,
associating ourselves with her sorrow.
O most noble Father, through supreme effort we run to you,
and through the most delectable and sweetest penance,
which comes to us through you, we sigh for you,
and after our sorrow we devoutly embrace you.
O most glorious and O most beautiful Christ, who is the resurrection of life,
we have relinquished ourselves for you the fertile lover of marriage,
and we acknowledge you in heavenly love
and in the virginal branch of your nativity,
and we are joined to you in another way than we were at first in the flesh.
Help us to persevere and rejoice with you and never be separated from you.
Sinfonye
O Nobilissima Viriditas
The Complete Hildegard von Bingen
Volume Three
1. O Blessed Infancy
O blessed infancy of the chosen Disibod which was so inspired by God
that later you exuded the most holy works amid marvels of God
like the sweetest fragrance of balsam.
2. A Dove Gazed In
A dove gazed in through a latticed window
where before its face a balm secreted from radiant Maximinus.
The heat of the sun kindled and shone in the darkness
from where a jewel sprang forth in the building of the temple of purest loving heart.
He the exalted tower constructed of cedar of Lebanon and cypress
is adorned with jacinth and onyx
a city excelling the crafts of other artisans.
He the swift stag ran to the spring of clearest water
flowing from the most powerful stone which irrigated with sweet aromas.
O Perfume-Makers who are in the softest greenness of the gardens of the King
climbing on high when the holy sacrifice was accomplished with the rams.
Among you dazzles this architect the wall of the temple
who longed for the wings of an eagle kissing nurturing Wisdom
in the glorious fertility of the Church.
O Maximinus
you are mountain and valley and in both you appear as a high building
where the ram departed with the elephant and Wisdom was in pleasure.
You are strong and sweet in ceremonies
and in the glowing of the altar
rising like the smoke of scents to the column of praise.
Where you intercede for the people
who stretch out towards the mirror of light whose praise is in the highest.
3. O Most Noble Greenness
O most noble greenness
you whose roots are in the sun
and who in luminous serenity shine in a wheel
that no earthly eminence comprehends.
You are encompassed in embraces of divine ministries.
You who redden like the dawn burning like the flame of the sun.
You are encompassed in embraces of divine ministries.
4. O Cohort of the Army
O cohort of the army of the flower of the branch without thorn
you are the sound of the whole globe
encompassing regions of the insane banqueting with the swine
which you overthrew being imbued by the helper selling roots in the tents
of the complete work of the Father's Word.
You are also the noble kin of the Savior
entering the way of regeneration by water through the Lamb
who sent you as a sword among the most savage dogs
who destroyed their own glory with the works of their fingers
making that which is not man-made submit to their hands
in which they did not find Him.
5. O Greenest Branch
O greenest branch hail
you who came forth in the windy breeze of the questioning of saints.
When the time came that you blossomed in your branches
hail hail was to you as the heat of the sun secreted in you
like the scent of balsam.
For in you blossomed the beautiful flower that gave fragrance
to all aromas which had dried out.
And all these things appeared fulfilled in greenness.
And so the skies rained dew on the grass and the whole earth exalted
because her womb brought forth wheat
and because the birds of heaven built their nests in her.
Then a banquet was made for mankind
and a great joy among the banqueters
hence O sweet virgin
no joy ever lacked in you.
But Eve despised all these things.
Now then praise be to the Highest.
6. Today Opened
Today opened to us a closed door
that which the serpent suffocated in a woman
hence gleams in the dawn the flower of the Virgin Mary.
7. O Eucharius
O Eucharius in a happy path you walked
where you lived with the Son of God
touching him and seeing the miracles which he did.
You loved him perfectly when your companions were terrified
in that they were human and had no possibility of gazing fully on the good.
But you in the ardent love of absolute charity embraced him
when you gathered to yourself the sheaves of his commandments.
O Eucharius you were greatly blessed
when the word of God imbued you in the fire of the dove
where you were illuminated like the dawn
and so you built the foundation of the church.
And in your breast glows the daylight in which three tabernacles
stand above the marble column in the city of God.
Through your mouth Ecclesia savors old and new wine
namely the chalice of holiness.
But also through your teaching Ecclesia became persuasive
so that she cried out above the mountains
that the hills and the woods might bow and suck her breasts.
Now in your clear voice pray to the Son of God for this flock
that it may not desert the ceremonies of God
but be like a living sacrifice before God's altar.
8 and 9. O Successors of the Mightiest Lion
O successors of the mightiest lion between temple and altar
ruling in his ministry like the angels resound in praises
and assist the peoples with help
you are among them who do these things
always respecting the service of the Lamb.
10. O Boniface
O Boniface
the living light saw you resembling a wise man
you who sent the clear streams flowing out of God back to God
when you watered the greenness of the flowers
hence you are a friend of the living God and a lucent crystal
in the ardor for righteous ways in which you wisely ran.
11. O Mirror of the Dove
O mirror of the dove of most chaste beauty
you who looked into the mystical generosity in the purest well.
O wondrous flowering
you who never fell withering because the highest gardener sent you.
O sweetest quiet of the sun's embraces
you are the Lamb's special son
in the chosen friendship of the new generation.
12. O Prelate of the True City
O prelate of the true city
you who in the temple of the cornerstone ascending into heaven
were pushed flat down on earth for the sake of God.
You a pilgrim leaving the seed of the world
you longed to become an exile for the love of Christ.
O mountain of a hidden mind
you continually showed a beautiful face in the mirror of the dove.
You hid in a concealed place
intoxicated with the scent of flowers
through a lattice of saints glowing before God.
O summit in the keys of heaven
for a transparent life you sold the world this conflict gentle confessor
you have forever in the Lord.
For in your mind the living well with most radiant light
guided the clearest streams on the way to salvation.
You are a great tower before the altar of the highest God
and you overshadowed the summit of this tower with the stroke of aromas.
O Disibod in your light with exemplars of pure sound
you have built bodies of marvelous praise in two parts
through the Son of man.
You stand on high
not blushing before the living God
and you protect with verdant dew the ones who praise God with this voice.
O sweet life and O blessed perseverance
you built in this blessed Disibod a glorious light forever in celestial Jerusalem.
Now praise be to God
working like a man in the form of a beautiful tonsure.
And may the celestial citizens rejoice
about those who in this way imitate them.
13. O Marvelous Miracle
O marvelous miracle
that a hidden figure stood out steep on the noble stature
where the living height utters mysteries
hence O Disibod
you will arise in the end with the aid of a flower of all the branches of the world
as you first arose.
14. O You Fertile Roots
O you fertile roots with which the work of miracles
and not the work of crimes in a torrential course
of transparent shadow was planted
and O you ruminating fiery voice preceding a milestone
that overshadows the abyss.
Rejoice in your leader.
Rejoice in him whom did not see many on earth who called upon him ardently.
Rejoice in your leader.
15. Mathias a Saint by Grace
Mathias a saint by grace
a fighting man by victory
before the blood of the Lamb was not chosen
but he was drowsy in knowledge like a man not fully on his guard.
The gift of God aroused him
hence he rose for joy like a giant in his strength
because God foresaw him
like the man whom he formed from clay
when the first angel fell who denied God.
The man who saw election
alas alas he fell.
He had oxen and rams
but he turned his face away from them and abandoned them.
Hence he fell into a coalpit
and kissing his desires in his zeal exalted them like Olympus.
Then Mathias by the election of the divinity arose like a giant
for God set him in the place which the lost man refused
O miraculous miracle that was so resplendent in him.
For God foresaw him in his miracles
even though he did not yet have the merit of deeds
but the mystery of God had joy in him
which he did not have in his original plan.
O joy of joys that God acts in this way
while he bestows his grace on an unknowing person
so that the boy does not know where the great man is flying
whose wings God grants to the boy.
For God has a taste for the one who does not know himself
because his voice cries to God as Mathias did
who said O God my God you who created me
all my works are yours.
Now therefore let the whole church rejoice in Mathias
whom God like this elected in a cleft like a dove. Amen.
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