Sunday, June 2, 2019

Prophets Interpreting their Visions at the Visionary Level: A Parallel Between Julian of Norwich and Joseph Smith & Sidney Rigdon


In her introduction to The Revelation of Divine Love from the 14th-century visionary Julian of Norwich, M.L. Del Mastro wrote the following about Julian’s interpretation of her visions:

While bodily sight was going on, Juliana was also experiencing spiritual insight as to the meaning and implications of what she was seeing. It is her account of what she saw with her eyes and of the words in her understanding—the alternative and sometimes simultaneous means by which the showings were conveyed to her—that keeps the chronological thread of narrative unbroken and provides a context for the spiritual insight and “unfolding” of truth which as the point of revelation. (The Revelation of Divine Love in sixteen showings made to Dame Julian of Norwich [trans. M.L. Del Mastro; Kent, U.K.: Burns and Oates, 1994], 45)

What was rather interesting to me when I read this was how Julian, in an ecstatic, visionary state, not only “saw” with her eyes one thing, as a visionary, she also expanded upon what she saw as part of the revelation. While I do not believe Julian of Norwich was a visionary from God, at the same time, it does show that those who experience visions, whether from God and/or as the result of an ecstatic experience, can, at a revelatory level, expanded upon the vision itself. Why is this interesting vis-à-vis LDS theology? It reminded me of Philo Dibble’s reminiscences of the reception of D&C 76, and how Joseph, in dialogue with Sidney Rigdon who also had the same experience, expanded upon, and interpreted, the vision they were having while they were experiencing it while also interacting with one another:

Joseph would, at intervals, say: “What do I see?” as one might say while looking out the window and beholding what all in the room could not see. Then he would relate what he had seen or what he was looking at. Then Sidney replied, “I see the same.” Presently Sidney would say “what do I see?” and would repeat what he had seen or was seeing, and Joseph would reply, “I see the same.”