Essay Questions

How does Revelations of Divine Love fit the classification of Christian mysticism?

Christian mysticism is a particular branch of Christian theology that deals with transcendent experiences. It is Christian, so it by definition concerns theology dealing with God as an omnipotent Father, Jesus as his fully-God yet fully-man Son, and the Holy Spirit as the ethereal third person of the Trinity dwelling inside every Christian. Revelations of Divine Love is clearly a Christian text: it makes extensive use of the figures of God and Jesus, especially the latter in terms of visual imagery. All of Julian's "Revelations" concern the nature of some divine Person, and the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus are major themes permeating the work.

Christian mysticism, more specifically, deals with transcendent experiences that usually involve some kind of contact with God. Love is often stressed as a major element of Christian mysticism, often at the expense of other truths and characteristics of God. Both of these elements are present in Revelations of Divine Love, especially in Julian's direct revelatory visions, which are quintessentially mystical.

Explain the metaphor of the hazelnut Julian uses in Chapter V.

In Chapter V, the second part of the relation of Julian's first revelation, she describes a vision in which God shows her a hazelnut. When she wonders at its meaning, it is revealed to her: "it is all that is made." This hazelnut represents the whole of God's creation, contained in a small three-dimensional object. She realizes that it exists as long as God loves it, because (1) he created it, (2) he loves it, and (3) he keeps it. That little hazelnut represents the way God looks at the whole of his physical creation, demonstrating the immense power of God and the intentional intricacy of the world he has made and those who inhabit it. It is also helpful, as Julian points out, for humans to realize how small creation actually is in order to not consider it unduly important.