I. Introduction: The Fulfillment of the Ascetic Ideal
Margery Kempe visited the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, where she experienced profound spiritual moments, including intense weeping at Calvary, a key site within the complex, marking a pivotal point in her mystical journey and devotion to Christ’s Passion. She toured various significant holy sites within and around Jerusalem, but the Sepulchre was central to her transformative pilgrimage.
Book 1, Chapter 28 of The Book of Margery Kempe chronicles the pinnacle of the medieval lay devotional life: the pilgrimage to Jerusalem. For Margery, this journey—undertaken after significant struggle, including the negotiation of a celibate life with her husband and the clearing of debts—is the teleological climax of her spiritual quest. It is not simply a travelogue entry, but the scene of her most radical spiritual transformation, where her nascent “gift of tears” is formally bestowed by Christ, transitioning her from a striving penitent to a divinely validated mystic.
II. The Journey and the Encounter with Jerusalem
A. The Physical and Spiritual Landscape
The chapter begins by emphasizing the sheer difficulty of the journey—Margery had to arrange her passage from Venice separately, having been rejected by her original English companions. This initial isolation prefigures the solitary nature of the spiritual experience to follow.
The Sight of the City: Upon seeing Jerusalem, Margery’s reaction is intensely visceral: she “was so ravished with the sweetness and the grace that our Lord put in her soul, she could not contain herself, but cried out full loud.”
Contrasting Realities: Her prayer at this moment explicitly frames the journey: she thanks God for allowing her to see the “earthly city of Jerusalem” and asks for the grace to see the “blissful city of Jerusalem above, the city of heaven.” This establishes the dual function of the pilgrimage: the physical sites are merely anchors for ecstatic, internalized contemplation.
B. The Affective Piety and the Imaginative Vision
Margery’s devotion aligns perfectly with the late medieval spiritual movement known as Devotio Moderna (Modern Devotion) and the rise of Affective Piety. This practice encouraged emotional identification with the suffering of Christ.
The Imago (Image) of the Passion: Inside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Margery is led by the Franciscan friars to the Mount of Calvary (the site of the Crucifixion). The text explicitly states that she saw the Passion not as a historical event, but as if it were happening “in the city of her soul” and “before her bodily face.”
Sensory and Bodily Empathy: This imaginative vision is so potent that it shatters her physical control. She is so overcome by compassion (shared suffering with Christ and the Virgin Mary) that she “fell down because she might not stand or kneel, but writhed and wrestled with her body, spreading her arms abroad, and cried with a loud voice as though her heart should have burst asunder.” This is a profound, physical mimicry of the Crucifixion itself.
III. The Theophanic Bestowal of the Gift of Tears
The central theological claim of the chapter is the direct confirmation of her weeping as a divine gift (donum lacrimarum), placing her in the tradition of respected female mystics like St. Bridget of Sweden.
Divine Sanction: Amidst her outburst, Christ speaks to her, confirming the spiritual merit of her tears: “I have given you these tears for a singular and special gift.” He assures her that her crying is acceptable and promises that this intense, physical weeping will be a permanent condition: “you shall have them from this day forth until the end of your life.”
Function as Intercession: The tears are not just for her own repentance or sorrow, but are given an intercessory function. Margery is told her tears will lead to the salvation of “many hundred thousand souls.” This elevates her status from a simple devotee to a powerful agent of divine mercy, reinforcing her public mission.
The “Welle of Teerys” (Well of Tears): This phrase becomes a leitmotif in the Book, signifying a continuous, uncontrollable fountain of grief and joy, marking her as permanently touched by the divine.
The “Gift of Tears” (donum lacrimarum) in The Book of Margery Kempe refers to an uncontrollable and intense fit of loud weeping, sobbing, and sometimes physical thrashing that Margery experienced, which she believed was a direct, divine favor from God.
She understood these tears to be a sign of spiritual grace and a way for her to:
1. Share in the Passion (suffering) of Christ.
2. Express her intense devotion and connection to the divine.
However, her boisterous and public weeping was often viewed by others as hysteria, fanaticism, or a sign of heresy, causing her to be mocked and persecuted.
IV. Conflict, Censure, and Justification
The reaction of Margery’s companions and the general public serves to highlight the radical nature of her spiritual experience versus the constraints of conventional piety.
Social Repulsion: Her fellow pilgrims and the local Franciscans are “greatly displeased with her… and greatly ashamed of her.” Her ecstatic behavior—loud, feminine, and disruptive—was viewed as scandalous, possibly demonic, or simply bad manners.
Margery’s Defense: Margery later uses a crucial point of justification: she argues that if people accept and sympathize with a person weeping and crying for a lost earthly friend or relative, why should they censure her for crying for her Savior, Lord, and God? This rhetorical move powerfully asserts the supreme reality of her spiritual experience over the triviality of earthly attachment.
The Heresy Question: In the socio-political climate of early 15th-century England, such uncontrolled, public piety, especially from an unlearned laywoman, was viewed with suspicion. Margery’s defense of her gift as being directly from Christ is a delicate balancing act, protecting her from charges of Lollardy or heresy by appealing to direct divine authority, a high-risk strategy only validated by the text itself.
V. Conclusion: The Making of the Mystical Self
Chapter 28 is the crucible where Margery Kempe’s self-identity as “this creature” (a term emphasizing her creaturely status as a vessel of God) is forged. By enduring the social humiliation and physical agony of her crying, she receives her mystical mandate.
The Jerusalem pilgrimage thus functions as an apotheosis (the elevation to divine status) in her narrative. It seals the authority of her individual, female, unmediated experience, ensuring that her life from this point forward will be one defined by public display, divine communication, and relentless, agonizing spiritual overflow. Her weeping is the permanent, corporeal evidence of her mystical union and the core tension that drives the rest of her remarkable autobiography.
Aman Pal
Literatureman