Threefold Illumination: A Nun’s Prayer After Communion

The spiritual quest for three-fold illumination -- knowledge of self; knowledge of God’s love; and knowledge of (and surrender to) God’s will -- is mapped out in the most ornate of the Thalbach Prayerbooks, ÖNB Cod. 11750, at the very end of a long mass prayer cycle. This prayer is seated firmly within a Franciscan orbit with its characteristic affective spirituality, reflective of late 16th-century habits of thought. The text is staunchly Catholic in perspective, for it assumes a very concrete Eucharistic theology: grace is mediated through the sacrament itself (durch krafft dis Sacraments), not just through prayer. Here we see a Catholic woman at the conclusion of a Catholic liturgy, participating in deeply rooted and very specifically Catholic devotional practices.We are anchored here to faith.

The prayer starts with a kind of self-abasement which may read as uncomfortable to modern eyes. The abnegations pile up: wickedness, vileness, worthlessness, ingratitude, insult, shame: through such self-knowledge (!) she asks to come to humility, repentance, and sorrow for my sins. Seeing the bad in order to correct her faults is strategic, a spiritual confession that moves toward the relief of forgiveness. This is classic penitential piety shaping belief and practice in practical, implementable ways. Yet for our modern eyes, the absence of positive self-knowledge is a gap here; this first illumination only tangentially touches on love and forgiveness, making it harder for the passage to resonate with in a more self-affirming age.

The second illumination focuses on love (liebe), used five times in as many lines, matching it with her heart, which must be enlightened, wounded, filled, and then come to thirst. Thus, God’s love toward “us” becomes her love towards God, loved “at all times, in all things, and above all things.” This is lyricism at its finest, repetitiveness deployed as a metaphor of spiritual growth on a properly chosen model. Very Franciscan, and with echoes of Thomas à Kempis or pseudo-Bonaventure in its patternings:

O God, my Lord, I beg you once again through your tender mercy, enlighten my heart to recognize and love your goodness and love for us. I beg you, wound my heart with the purest, most faithful, and fervent love towards us, O sweet Jesus, fill my heart with your most perfect, fervent, and unquenchable love, so that I may always thirst for you with all my heart, and that I may love you at all times, in all things, and above all things.

The enlightened heart, then, comes to fulfill the third illumination: self-denial and self-surrender, a self-rededication to the monastic calling from which she prays. She wants strengthened the scope of her devotion to encompass “all the actions and powers” of both body and soul. By moving from abnegation through love to action, she is transforming herself here at this moment, repurposing her spirit to accomplish God’s ends.

The sacrament, then, has accomplished its function. It does not merely forgive sin; it illuminates the mind, reshapes the affections, and reorders the will toward God’s action, serving as an agent of interior transformation. In this brief prayer we see how sacramental devotion worked in practice: not as a single moment of absolution, but as an ongoing process of spiritual formation rooted in Franciscan ideals of humility, love, and surrender.

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“O Ewiger liebhabender barmhertziger Gott erleucht mein hertz,” Thalbach Prayerbook, ÖNB Cod. 11750, fol. 47v-48v, Transcription and Translation CC-BY-NC Cynthia J. Cyrus

Du magſt auch bitten vmb dreifaltige erleichtung/ dz dir ſolche / durch krafft dis Sacraments mitgetailt werde.

[3-line initial] O Ewiger liebhabender barmhertziger Gott erleucht mein hertz/ Dz ich meīn aigne bossheit ſchnödigkeit nichtigkeith vnnd vndanckbarkeit moͤg erkennen/ also dz ich ab ſolchem ein geburenden mÿsfallenn hab • Laß mich erkennen. O Guettiger Jeſu wie ich ſo gar nichts bin noch kan, vnd dz ich mich ſelbs veracht. Gib mir aüch, dz ich von hertzen von der Welt beger uerarcht zu werdenn, dz ich wünsch diemüettig zu sein: vnd vnbild vnd schmach zu leiden mich erfrewe. Eya du mein guettigſter herr Jhesu, geůſin mich ware erkantnus meiner ſelbſt auch volkomne demůott, rew vnd laid v̈ber meine begangne Sünnd.

O Gott mein herr ich bitte dich abermals durch dem Jimierliche barmhertzigkeit erleüchte mein hertz dem guettigkeit vnnd liebe gegen vns zu erkennen vnd zu lieben Jch bitte verwunde mein hertz mit keuschister getrewester vnd inbrünstiger liebe gegen vns O ſueſſer Jeſu, erfulle mein hertz mit deiner volkomesten, inbrünstigen vnd vnauſloͤſchkichen liebe / damit mich allzeit vongantzem hertzenn nach dür dürste, vnd dz ich dich ieder zeit in allem vnd vber alles liebe /

O Guettigster Jhesu, mein Gott vnnd alles in allem / Ich bitte dich / erleicht mein hertz/ deinen wolgefallen zu erkennen, zu lieben vnd volbrüngen. Gib mir vollkomesten erlaugnüng vnd aufergebüng meiner ſelbſt / darmit ich mich, selbs aüff Alle weiSS uerlaSS / aus mir gehe / vnd mich auffer gebe zuallem deinē wolgefallenn, Gib mir / dz ich mich ganz vnd gar deiner für ſehüng vertrawe / alle ding von deiner Hannd mit dancksagung annemmen vnd in allem dich lob vnd benedeÿe. Verschaffe O guettiger Gott/dz ich all mein leben alle zeit alles thunvnnd krefften meiner leibs vnd meiner Seelen und alles wz ich bin vnd vermag zu deinem lob Lieb vnd wolgefallen darraiche vnnd dargebe, Amen.

You may also ask for threefold illumination, that this may be imparted to you through the power of this sacrament.

O eternal, loving, merciful God, enlighten my heart, that I may recognize my own wickedness, vileness, worthlessness, and ingratitude, so that I may have a proper displeasure at it. Let me recognize, O good Jesus, how completely I am nothing and can do nothing, and that I may hold myself in contempt. Grant me also that I may wholeheartedly desire to be despised by the world, that I may wish to be humble, and that I may rejoice in suffering insult and shame. O my most gracious Lord Jesus, grant me true knowledge of myself, also perfect humility, repentance, and sorrow for my sins.

O God, my Lord, I beg you once again through your tender mercy, enlighten my heart to recognize and love your goodness and love for us. I beg you, wound my heart with the purest, most faithful, and fervent love towards us, O sweet Jesus, fill my heart with your most perfect, fervent, and unquenchable love, so that I may always thirst for you with all my heart, and that I may love you at all times, in all things, and above all things.

O most gracious Jesus, my God and all in all, I beg you, enlighten my heart to recognize, love, and carry out your good pleasure. Grant me perfect self-denial and self-surrender, so that I may completely abandon myself in every way, go out of myself, and surrender myself to all your good pleasure. Grant me that I may completely trust in your providence, receiving all things from your Hand; Receive all things from your hand with thanksgiving, and praise and bless you in all things. Grant, O gracious God, that all my life, at all times, I may dedicate and offer all the actions and powers of my body and soul, and all that I am and can do, to your praise, honor, and good pleasure. Amen.

Practicing Death: The “Seven Last Words” at Thalbach

The back-end of the Thalbach prayerbook (ÖNB Cod. 11750, 56v-60r) provides an early modern devotional adaptation of the “Seven Last Words” (Sieben Worte Christi am Kreuz), transformed into a death-bed meditation cycle. This is a localized, pastoralized, and affectively expanded version of a common text-type, rather than a “standard” translation of a single printed source. They all start from the biblical sequence (Luke, John, Matthew) but are freely paraphrased and expanded.

The tradition itself was extremely widespread. As a genre, the Seven Last Words meditation typos predates the Reformation and survives confessionalization pretty well intact, growing and adapting to local belief and its needs. The genre draws on at least three major late medieval/early modern currents. Like much of the Passion meditation literature in general, it promotes imaginative participation in a visually re-enacted passion scene, along with the attached emotional identification and afirst-person response that sees oneself as part of that broader narrative. It fits in too with other ars moriendi texts, in that it emphasizes a readiness for death along with a renunciation of “zeitliche” things. The penitent soul submits to God will, echoing--through an act of will--the Passion as a model (“into your hands I commend myself”). And, it fits with its late 16^th century ethos, a time when structured death prayers and affective piety intermingled as a way of coaching the devout toward a particular kind of religiosity.

The Thalbach version—copied as an addition to the manuscript in a dubious scribal hand and bearing several signs of amateur copying (from letter forms to transcription errors)—is interesting for several reasons. (I give a provisional transcription of the Seventh Word at the end of this post for those interested.)

BIBLICAL ALLUSION: It is typical of post-1500 vernacular adaptations of this sort, in that it boasts a kind of biblical in-fill with a number of loose biblical quotations shaping its language and approach. For instance, the text integrates not just passion narrative, but scriptural allusion. For example, the end of the fifth word brings in the deer of Psalm 42:

• darumb durstet mein Seel nach dir, dem Leben: unnd Gleich wie ein Zürsche eilet, Zu den Wasser brunen, Also Blomiget mein Seel nach dir, das du sie trenkhe mit dem siirssen kranckh de mer ewigen khlarheit, vnd sie behrtest vor dem hellischen durß in Ewigkheit, Amen

• therefore my soul thirsts for you, the living word, and just as a deer hastens to the water springs, so my soul longs for you, that you may quench its thirst with the sweet drink of your eternal clarity, and preserve it from the hellish thirst in eternity. Amen.

• (Psalm 42, NIV: As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God. 2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? 3 My tears have been my food day and night, while people say to me all day long, “Where is your God?”)

This text lives in a world shaped by the Psalm’s echo, a strong framing for affective contemplation. Such biblical saturation suggests a deeply grounded reader, someone who could “get” the allusions without citation or further prompting. To my eye, that speaks to Thalbach educational practices; sisters of whatever level were expected to know their psalter intimately.

FIRST PERSON FRAMING ON THE DEATHBED: The text, divided into seven parts, with each part on its own page-or-two, serves as a bit of a how-to guide to walk you through the final hours of life. That process demands a kind of penitential self-examination, common to early modern Catholicism. There is a strong first-person presence in this version of the Seven Last Words, and that is shaped around the actual act of dying, not just a meditation-on-death.

Death is a consistent presence: “meines Todts… Sterben… mein Leiden… meiner Seele… bereit zu sterben” (my death... dying... my suffering... my soul... ready to die). In case the text itself wasn’t a good enough pointer (and it clearly is), the rubric tells us so: den Sterbenden mensch Trostlich (Comforting the dying person). This is devotional literature aimed at actual dying, not general piety.

INTERIORITY: Almost every section moves quickly into a confessional self-assessment: As a sinner, a poor sinner, I recognize my sins, she posits repeated. This is commission, the things she has done that are wrong, but also omission: “ich … wenig guets gethan, darumb ich billich ewige Straffe (I have done little good, therefore I deserve eternal punishment.)

We are seeing here an individualistic interiorization of the need for forgiveness, not a communal experience of death. There’s no collective voice, and no institutional framing. We don’t have the sisters coming to the sound of the clapper; this is death as an act of self identity through a direct encounter, God to soul. It has a lot of parallels with the shift in how Bregenz memoria were constructed, to be honest, but that’s for another (and extensive) bit of writing.

SOCIAL ETHICS OF DYING: She may be considering her interior spiritual needs, but those needs are also manifest as the things she has done to others while in the world. In the Second Word, for instance, she ask forgiveness:

die ich beleidige, zu sünden verursacht habe (whom I have offended, and caused to sin)

So death is framed as a moment of social repair, not only private salvation.

MY TAKE-AWAY:

For me, this modest, messy text is a reminder of why these prayerbooks matter so much. Its theology is not expressed in polished argument, but in repetition, hesitation, and emotional insistence. It shows how the sisters were taught to inhabit their own deaths in advance—through scripture, through penitence, through acts of reconciliation. Read alongside Thalbach’s commemorative practices and memorial networks, it suggests that preparation for death was not only something done for others, but something carefully cultivated within the self. This small addition thus opens a window onto the inner work of memoria: the quiet, disciplined labor of learning how to die well.

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DAS SIBENT WORT / THE SEVENTH WORD:

What follows is a provisional transcription and translation of the Seventh Word, offered to illustrate the tone and structure of the text rather than as a definitive edition. I have lightly normalized the German: vnnd = und, dir außgangen = dir ausgegangen; schopffung = Schöpfung, and so on.

60r das sibent wort Herr Gott vnnd Vatter, Ich bin von die außgangen, durch die schopf: fung in dise welt, Nun aber muß in alles was zeitlich ist, Er lasse vnnd widr zu die komen in dem ewigs reich, denn es nachet die Stundt, vnd ist kost auß mit meinem ellenden vergenkhlich Leben, Doch bin vnuerzogt, den mene seeligkheit stehet in deiner handt, darein ich dir auch mein Armen seel treulich wil be- folchen haben Vnd bin berait zu Sterben, Darumb Laß mich dir aller Liebster vatter, Zu aller Zeit beuolchen sein, vnd wie ich dir utrån, er weckh nich wid om Inngste, tag, mit denen Ausser wollen dich ewigkhlich zu Loben

The Seventh Word Lord God and Father, I have come forth from you through creation into this world. Now, however, I must leave behind everything that is temporal and return to you in the eternal kingdom. For the hour draws near, and my wretched, perishable life is soon at an end. Yet I am not afraid, for my salvation rests in your hand, into which I faithfully commend my poor soul. And I am ready to die. Therefore, let me, most beloved Father, remain entrusted to you at all times. And just as I place my trust in you, do not raise me up again on the Last Day among those who are rejected, but among those who are chosen to praise you eternally.

Happy January from the Teutsch Römisch Breuier (1535): Of Calendars, Convent Books, and the Lives They Touched

It is the first day of the second quarter of the 21st Century, and thus a time for a fresh new start. I’ll begin here with a bit of material from a sixteenth century print – an interesting one for my current chapter-segment. This is the top of the January entry from its calendar:

Top of January Calendar entry with poem & images (pouring from pitcher, taking medicine [?]; roasting on a spit on the hearth)

Multimedia, sixteenth-century style, right? Pictures and poetry, and calendar instructions, and the start of the daily list of feasts and saints. So many things to look at! 

Take the short ditty that starts our page-reading:

Im Jenner man nit lassen soll. Warin feucht speyss die thut dir wol. Auff warm bad magstu haben acht. Meyd artzney ob du magst

In January, one shouldn't let things run unchecked. Warm food will do you good. Be careful with hot baths. Take medicine if you like.

Warm food, don’t take a chill, take two tablets and call me if that hangover doesn’t get better: it’s like your mom is welcoming you into the new year. Well, greetings to us all from this new century-quartile; I’m sure we all have wishes for how it will turn out. May the good ones come true!

The Teutsch Römisch Breuier of 1535

And now a bit about the book itself:

I found myself down an interesting rabbit hole as I was expanding a discussion in my current chapter. As it happens, I was curious about the circulation of memorial prayers (well, the chapter does need finishing), which took me on a brief excursus to the realm of early print. For vernacular-centric tertiary sisters of the period, there are an awful lot of liturgy-adjacent books to choose from.

This particular book interested me because the Teutsch Römisch Breuier is the first translation of the Roman Rite to circulate in regions central to my work. It is also, delightfully, a nuntastic find: the title makes explicit that it is aimed at monastic women (Klosterfrawen). Also, as the title promises, it provides a gute verteütschung, a good German translation—not only of the liturgical texts themselves, but also of the rubrics that govern their use. 

In other words, it is a practical book for navigating liturgical life in the generation immediately before the edicts of the Council of Trent, when many convents were compelled to return to exclusive use of the Latin rite.

Title page of Teutsch Römisch Breuier in red and black

It's a lovely and quite informative long-format title:

Teutsch Römisch Breuier vast nutzlich vnd trostlich: Nämlich den klosterfrawen, die nach dem lateinischen Römischen breuier, als die clarisserin vn[d] ander, jre tagzeit bezalen: Auch der priesterschafft weltlich vnd ordenßleüt, die Römisch breuier brauchen, so yetlicher ding der Collecte[n], Capitel, Responsen, Antiphen, vn[d] der gleich, gute verteütschung auch zu[m] gotswort dienstlich, begerte[n] … Augsburg: Alexander Weyssenhorn [=Weissenhorn], 1535. VD16 B 8092.

German Roman Breviary, very useful and comforting: Namely for the monastic women who recite their daily prayers according to the Latin Roman Breviary, such as the Poor Clares and others; also for the secular and regular clergy who use the Roman Breviary, as it contains good German translations of all matters relating to the collect, chapters, responses, antiphons, and the like, which is also useful for the service of God's word

Not only is the content of interest, so are the copies themselves. You see, both surviving copies reflect the target audience: monastic sisters! First, a bibliographic orientation:

BRIEF BIBLIOGRAPHY FOR THE TEUTSCH RÖMISCH BREUIER (1535): Here is the VD16 entry. (VD16 is the standardized census of all known sixteenth-century printed works produced in the German-speaking lands. VERY handy when you life at the edge of the early printing world). And the two surviving exemplars are München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek -- 4 Liturg. 123 d (Munich exemplar) Regensburg, Staatliche Bibliothek -- 999 IE/4Liturg.18 (Regensburg exemplar)

The Munich exemplar comes from a sister of the Pütrichhaus, Susanna Gartnerin, as she says on the flyleaf:

Das pryfier [= brevier] Jst gewessen S susa / anna gartnerin jn der pitterich / reyehaus got der almachtig / pegnadt Jr hie vnd thort / ewigklich amen

This breviery belonged to Susanna Gärtner in Pitterich Regelhaus, may God Almighty bless her here and there forever, amen.

Susanna Gartnerin is an interesting case; she was a scribe and book owner (Kramer Scriptores), served the convent as librarian, and eventually became “Oberin” of the tertiary house. So she was both book- owning and book-loving, and hereby provisioned with a vernacular breviary that she could use and follow. Not a bad model for our happiest of New Years!

The Regensburg copy also was passed from sister to “mit sch[wester]” – I only wish I knew of which convent! A chain of ownership unfolds in the flyleaf area:

We actually have two different inscriptions here. The first: 

Anno 1538 an sant Mathias tag hat mir mein / lieber brueder Hanns Langawi disen brevier geschickt

In the year 1538, on St. Matthias's Day, my / dear brother Hanns Langawi sent me this breviary.

And then, with a change of ink:

Jryet [=Ihr gehört?] der Barbara Sedlmaierin hatt / mirs mein liebe mit sch Richila ^obsinerin^ im Jar / 1590 den 7 Junius geschencken gott / geb mir vnd alle den Jenigen ge / nadt die es Brauche vnd eines des / ander vmb gottes wile darbey ge / denokhe mit ainen pn nr / und Ave

It belongs to Barbara Sedlmaier, and was given to me by my beloved co-sister [mitschwester] Richila Obsinerin in the year 1590 on June 7th. May God grant grace to me and to all those who use it, and may we remember one another for God’s sake with a Pater Noster and an Ave [Maria].

What we’re getting here is a chain of ownership, common to convent books. The brother of one of the sisters sent this book when it was just three years old in 1538 – practically new! -- and it passed first to Richila, and then to Barbara by 1590.

Hanns Langawi > Sister X > Richila [Richildis] Obsinerin > Barbara Sedlmaier

And along the way, how many prayers were offered, and how many different Januaries did those convent women look at the January calendar and think about the meat roasting on a spit by the fire?

Happy New Year!

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RESOURCES

• Sigrid Krämer, Scriptores possessoresque codicum medii aevi (database, Augsburg: ERV, 2003–2025).
• VD16 entry: https://gateway-bayern.de/VD16+B+8092