In the late thirteenth century, the convent of Helfta in Saxony, Germany was a center of female mysticism. This convent produced a number of well-known mystics in the latter part of the century, including Gertrud of Helfta and Mechtild of Hackeborn. The famous beguine mystic, Mechtild of Magdebourg, spent the latter years of her life in the convent at Helfta. This sort of mystical community of women was especially prevalent in Germany, and continued well into the fourteenth century.
Thirteenth-century mystics were beginning to express an interest in the suffering of Christ and also in bodily asceticism. They united with God through their suffering, both self-inflicted and natural. Illness and asceticism were not the result of a desire to sublimate the body and bodily desires, but rather to be one with Christ in his suffering. These women rejected moderation, seeking, as the Desert Fathers had sought, a deeper and more drastic observation of the ascetic practices, such as fasting, that were encouraged by the church.
They engaged in both food asceticism and other forms of self-mortification. Many were deeply concerned with food and eating, some even believing that they could survive on the Eucharist alone. Other women mystics were more concerned with overt, self-inflicted, physical manifestations of pain. Mechtild of Hackeborn, one of the mystics of Helfta, rolled in broken glass in imitation of Christ's suffering. Other women, like their male contemporaries, engaged in extreme and painful pantomimes of the Crucifixion. The desire to be one with Christ through pain and suffering is reflected in the mystical visions of many of these women.
While many of these thirteenth-century women had visions that were maternal or bridal in nature, in some instances the mystical labors of these women prefigured the intense visions of the suffering Christ which characterize fourteenth-century mysticism. Gertrud of Helfta's Herald of Divine Love includes a long passage of meditations on the Crucifixion and many passages that deal with Christ's wounds. In one vision, Christ appeared to Gertrud, scourged and crucified, during mass.
The writings of some thirteenth-century mystics combined bridal mysticism with an emphasis on the Crucifixion. Mechtild of Hackeborn, a contemporary of Gertrud, and a resident of the convent at Helfta, described Christ's cross as a marriage bed.
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