A Companion to Hildegard of Bingen

80 constant j. mews
Disibodenberg, a 12th-century liturgical manuscript (Engelberg Ms. 103)
containing a wide range of original melodies, including an Easter play, has
been identifijied as a manuscript of St Disibod. Felix Heinzer’s discovery
that it records characteristic liturgical observances of the Hirsau reform
enables us to better appreciate the context of Hildegard’s fascination with
music. Monastic houses that emulated Hirsau were free to develop their
own practices within the framework of a common liturgical tradition.76
Many of the monastic communities with whom Hildegard had close contact
shared a common debt to Hirsau without being bound together by
any formal ecclesiastical structure.77 The absence of any overriding liturgical
rules made it quite possible for Hildegard, once she had moved to
Rupertsberg, to introduce her own melodies into the liturgy.
Hildegard’s widely copied commentary on the Rule of Benedict nicely
illustrates the way she interpreted a text whose observance was increasingly
contested in the 12th century. Whereas William of Hirsau never commented
on the Rule itself, but rather chose to adopt certain (but not all)
of the observances of Cluny, Hildegard’s commentary was concerned not
so much with specifijic monastic observances as with the spirit of the Rule.
Benedict’s mind “burned in the love of God” and was never deprived of
the Holy Spirit.78 His genius was to establish “the sharp key of teaching
neither too high, nor too low, but in the middle of the wheel, whether
strong or weak, so that each person could drink from his teaching according
to his capacity.”79 Whereas William of Hirsau had adapted the strict
76 I am indebted to Felix Heinzer of the Württembergische Landesbibliothek for alerting
me to the signifijicance of Engelberg Ms. 103. Ephrem Omlin argued that this manuscript
came from St Disibod in “Das ältere Engelberger Osterspiel und der cod. 103 der Stiftsbibliothek
Engelberg,” in Corolla Heremitana. Neue Beiträge zur Kunst und Geschichte Einsiedelns
und der Innerschweiz, ed. Alfred A. Schmid (Olten, 1964), pp. 101–26. Heinzer has
observed that its liturgical contents correspond fully with that of the Liber ordinarius of the
abbey of Rheinau, which, as he has shown, reproduces the liturgy of Hirsau, “Der Hirsauer
Liber Ordinarius,” Revue Bénédictine 102 (1992), 309–47, republished in Heinzer, Klosterreform,
pp. 185–223. See also Heinzer, “Klösterliche Netzwerke und kulturelle Identität—Die
Hirsauer Reform des 11./12. Jahrhunderts als Vorläufer spätmittelalterlicher Ordensstrukturen,”
in Heinzer, Klosterreform, pp. 168–84. William was himself remembered for having
reformed the practice of chant, Haimo, Vita Willihelmi, MGH SS 12: “Cantibus errorem
varium correxit ad artem,” p. 225.
77 Petrus Becker discusses these common links with particular reference to St Eucharius
in “Die hirsauische Erneuerung des St Euchariusklosters in Trier,” in Consuetudines
Monasticae. Eine Festgabe für Kassius Hallinger aus Anlass seines 70. Geburtstages, Studia
Anselmiana 85 (Rome, 1982), pp. 185–206.
78 De reg. Bened., p. 68.
79 Ibid., p. 68.