The Letters Of Abelard And Heloise

“…through persecution my fame increased.”

Here, Abelard refers to his persecution at the hands of his first teachers. Because he refuted and challenged both William of Champeaux and Anselm of Laon, both teachers responded in kind and attacked Abelard. Anselm actually forbade him from lecturing on his subject any further, causing Abelard to return to Paris. He writes that Anselm was jealous, and that all his teachers’ attacks only added to his renown as a teacher and scholar.

“But success always puffs up fools with pride, and worldly security weakens the spirit’s resolution and easily destroys it through carnal temptations. I began to think myself the only philosopher in the world, with nothing to fear from anyone, and so I yielded to the lusts of the flesh.”

Abelard confesses that his success as a teacher and scholar in Paris went to his head and made him overly proud. This pride, along with feeling secure in his esteemed status, caused him to seek out other interests. This is when he began to ruminate on love and resolved to seduce Heloise.

“It is well known that the philosophers, and still more the Fathers, by which is meant those who have devoted themselves to the teachings of Holy Scripture, were especially glorified by their chastity. Since therefore I was wholly enslaved to pride and lechery, God’s grace provided a remedy for both these evils, though not one of my choosing…”

In this passage, Abelard foreshadows his castration as well as the burning of his treatise on the Trinity. He refers to his castration as a remedy for his lechery and indicates how far he had strayed from the chaste practices of philosophers and holy men. Despite the fact that he maintains that the burning of his book was unjust, here, he openly chastises himself for his pride and indicates that the destruction of his book may have been a sort of punishment.

“In looks she did not rank lowest, while in the extent of her learning she stood supreme. A gift for letters is so rare in women that it added greatly to her charm and had made her most renowned throughout the realm.”

In this passage, Abelard discusses how he went about choosing Heloise as the target for his seduction. He claims that he was attractive and could have had any woman that he wanted, but he chose Heloise for her immense intellect. His words confirm that Heloise was indeed a famed intellectual and a very learned young woman of high repute.

“What honour could she win, she protested, from a marriage which would dishonour me and humiliate us both?...Nature had created me for all mankind- it would be a sorry scandal if I should bind myself to a single woman and submit to such base servitude.”

Though Abelard arranged with Fulbert to marry Heloise, she vehemently rejected the idea, and this passage gives us a glimpse into why. Primarily, she believed that Abelard could no longer work as a philosopher and a theologian if he submitted to an ordinary and undignified life with a wife and children. Instead, she preferred to remain his friend and lover.

“All sorts of thoughts filled my mind–how brightly my reputation had shone, and now how easily in an evil moment it had been dimmed or rather completely blotted out; how just a judgment of God had struck me in the parts of the body with which I had sinned, and how just a reprisal had been taken by the very man I had myself betrayed.”

Abelard details his shock, misery, and disgust at his castration, noting that he felt like an abomination. Though he laments his reputation, he also admits that the punishment was just on numerous accounts. Throughout this letter, he talks of Fulbert’s treachery, but here he admits that he had betrayed him by seducing his niece. This is fitting foreshadowing for his entrance into a monastery, first for shelter, and then for spiritual purposes.

“In fact I used it as a hook, baited with a taste of philosophy, to draw my listeners towards the study of the true philosophy…”

Abelard notes that his fellow monks asked for his teaching and that he obliged. He reoriented himself to studying Scripture because it made the most sense as a monk, but he notes that he continued to study philosophy and use it in his lectures to illuminate the faith. This is precedent for the later accusation of heresy on the grounds of his application of secular learning to questions of faith. Abelard insists that students asked this of him and benefitted from it, because they could not believe if they did not understand.

“God is my witness that I never heard that an assembly of ecclesiastics had met without thinking this was convened to condemn me. I waited like one in terror of being struck by lightning to be brought before a council or synod and charged with heresy or profanity…”

Abelard details the fear and paranoia that followed his first trial and the burning of his treatise on the Trinity. He compares himself to St. Athanasius, who had been persecuted with similar cruelty in the past. This passage indicates that though he found refuge in his oratory, Abelard still feared condemnation and likely took the post of abbot of the remote St. Gildas to escape.

“The weaker sex needs the help of the stronger, so much so that the Apostle lays down that the man must always be over the woman, as her head, and as a sign of this he orders her always to have her head covered.”

Abelard refers to a commonly-held belief in medieval Europe that men were the stronger sex and that women were the weaker sex. In this instance, he takes his evidence from Christian doctrine and subordinates woman to man, making man the head. This motif of women as the weaker sex continues to appear through his correspondence with Heloise.

“…in your desire to heal his wounds you have dealt us fresh wounds of grief as well as re-opening the old. I beg you, then, as you set about tending the wounds which others have dealt, heal the wounds you have yourself inflicted.”

This is one of Heloise’s first criticisms of Abelard: that he has neglected both her and the Paraclete community. She chastises him for taking time to console a friend and, in doing so, making his community worry about him. She reminds Abelard that the Paraclete is his community and that he is responsible to them, especially given that they are a new community and one of women.

“God knows I never sought anything in you except yourself; I wanted simply you, nothing of yours.”

Heloise reiterates that it was never her wish to marry Abelard. She simply wanted him for himself and to satisfy his wishes. She notes that even her entry into a convent and her religious vows were done on his orders and in order to please him. Heloise states all of this to impress upon Abelard that he has a responsibility to her. She foreshadows her later admission that she feels like a hypocrite and cares for Abelard above God.

“Wholly guilty though I am, I am also, as you know, wholly innocent. It is not the deed but the intention of the doer which makes the crime, and justice should weigh not what was done but the spirit in which it is done. What my intention towards you has always been, you alone who have known it can judge. I submit all to your scrutiny, yield to your testimony in all things.”

In this passage, Heloise reinforces her complete devotion to Abelard. Rather than being ashamed of having fallen in love with him, Heloise does not express regret and claims innocence, intending to say that her love for him was genuine and well-intended. Her last sentence implies that her focus remains on Abelard, rather than on God.

“I wish I could think of some explanation which would excuse you and somehow cover up the way you hold me cheap.”

Heloise plainly states her suspicion that Abelard never felt love for her, only lust. She adds that others believe this as well and tries to explain the situation to herself. Because she cannot, she asks Abelard to be frank with her and explain why he has neglected her.

“I can expect no reward for this from God, for it is certain that I have done nothing as yet for love of him.”

Heloise notes here something she will expound on in her next letter: the distance she feels from God and the disconnect she feels with her profession. She reiterates that she entered a convent on Abelard’s wishes and continues to fixate on him, so she has done nothing pleasing to God and befitting of her profession.

“Nor do I believe that there is any place more fitting for Christian burial among the faithful than one amongst women dedicated to Christ. Women were concerned for the tomb of our Lord Jesus Christ, they came ahead and followed after…and there they were first reassured about his resurrection by the appearance of an angel and the words he spoke to them; later on they were found worthy both to taste the joy of his resurrection when he twice appeared to them, and also to touch him with their hands.”

Abelard writes on a subject that reappears at various points in his letters: the high esteem in which he holds pious women, particularly the holy women of the Paraclete. He may say this to honor Heloise and her nuns, but in general, it seems that he held women who devoted themselves to Christ in high honor, both in spite of and because he considered them the weaker sex.

“Of all wretched women I am the most wretched, and amongst the unhappy I am the unhappiest. The higher I was exalted when you preferred me to all other women, the greater my suffering over my own fall and yours, when equally I was flung down; for the higher the ascent, the heavier the fall.”

Heloise shares her great grief and distress and writes openly about how she has suffered after losing Abelard. She writes that she is deeply unhappy and bitter about what they suffered, especially given that they were punished after they attempted to make amends for their love affair. She dwells on the past and remains indignant.

“Men call me chaste; they do not know the hypocrite I am. They consider purity of the flesh a virtue, though virtue belongs not to the body but to the soul. I can win praise in the eyes of men but deserve none before God…”

Heloise admits that she feels like a hypocrite in her profession and feels distant from God because her love and desire for Abelard remains, and her mind is constantly on their history. She admits that she cannot repent for this and therefore feels like a fraud.

“At every stage of my life up to now, as God knows, I have feared to offend you rather than God, and tried to please you more than him. It was your command, not love of God, which made me take the veil.”

Heloise elaborates on her feelings of hypocrisy, noting that rather than thinking of and fearing God, her thoughts have always remained with Abelard. She repeats what she said in her first letter: that she took religious vows not out of genuine devotion, but out of her wish to please Abelard. Therefore, she continues to feel hopeless.

“I had thought that this bitterness of heart at what was so clear an act of divine mercy had long since disappeared. The more dangerous such bitterness is to you in wearing out body and soul alike, the more pitiful it is and distressing to me.”

Abelard refers to Heloise’s old and perpetual complaint against God, meaning his castration and their separation, and implores her to see it as a merciful blessing that freed them of their sins. He asks her to shed her bitterness if she truly wants to please him.

“I do not incur blame, I escape it. I deserve death and gain life. I am summoned and reprieved; I persist in crime and am pardoned against my will.”

Abelard reveals that he has come to view his castration as a just and merciful punishment and that the removal of his lust has enabled him to focus on improving himself and devoting himself fully to God. Unlike Heloise, he seems to have found some closure and moved on from the trauma, having found his calling as a philosopher monk.

“Come too, my inseparable companion, and join me in thanksgiving, you who were made my partner both in guilt and in grace...See then, how greatly the Lord was concerned for us, as if he were reserving us for some great ends, and was indignant or grieved because our knowledge of letters, the talents which he had entrusted to us, were not being used to glorify his name…”

Abelard invites Heloise to follow his lead and reconsider her bitterness and indignation. Rather than blaming God, she should see that he was merciful and concerned for them. He reminds Heloise that they are both learned individuals and that God desires that they use these gifts to glorify him, an attempt to bolster and remind her of their cause.

“Through lack and need of this it is the practice today for men and women alike to be received into monasteries to profess the same Rule, and the same yoke of monastic ordinance is laid on the weaker sex as on the stronger.”

Rather than discussing their personal history, Heloise turns to asking Abelard for instructions on how the Paraclete community of nuns should conduct themselves and their daily lives. She notes that the monastic ordinance that they live under, the Benedictine Rule, is written for men and unsuitable for women, the weaker sex, and asks Abelard to prescribe a rule for them.

“Finally, if the sisters have no understanding of Scripture, how will they be able to instruct each other by word, or even to explain and understand the Rule, or correct false citations from it?”

Abelard reveals his thoughts on the education of the nuns, emphasizing his firm belief that they must work on comprehension when studying Scripture rather than simply memorizing and reciting words. Just as he did as a teacher to the monks of St. Denis, he emphasizes that understanding is crucial to belief.