Who Is Julian of Norwich

Julian of Norwich (c. 1343–c. 1416) was an English anchoress and Christian mystic who is widely regarded as one of the greatest spiritual writers in the English language and the first woman known to have written a book in English. Almost nothing is known of her life outside her own account: on May 13, 1373, at the age of thirty, while suffering from a severe illness she believed to be fatal, Julian experienced a series of sixteen vivid mystical visions (showings) centered on the Passion of Christ, the nature of divine love, and the meaning of sin and suffering. She recovered from her illness and spent the next two decades meditating on the meaning of what she had seen, eventually producing two versions of her text: a shorter account written soon after the experience and a much longer, theologically sophisticated version known as the Revelations of Divine Love (or Showings).

Julian chose to live as an anchoress—walled into a small cell attached to the Church of St. Julian in Norwich (from which she likely took her name), where she spent the remainder of her life in prayer, contemplation, and spiritual counsel. Her cell had a window opening to the church (for Mass) and another to the street (through which she offered guidance to visitors). Her theology is remarkable for its radical emphasis on divine love, its insistence that God's nature contains no wrath, its exploration of Christ as "Mother," and its famous assurance—"All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well"—offered in the face of a world devastated by plague, war, and social upheaval (she lived through the Black Death, the Peasants' Revolt, and the Great Schism). Julian's work was largely unknown for centuries but has been recovered in the modern era as one of the most theologically original and emotionally profound texts in the Western contemplative tradition, influencing figures from T.S. Eliot to Thomas Merton to Rowan Williams.

Core Concepts

1. "All shall be well": divine love as the ultimate ground of reality
   • Julian's most famous teaching—and the one she wrestled with most intensely—is the assurance that despite the overwhelming evidence of suffering, sin, and evil in the world, the final reality is love, and all things will ultimately be brought to good. She was honest about the difficulty: she could not see how this could be true, only that it had been shown to her as certain. This is not naïve optimism but a hard-won theological claim held in tension with clear-eyed awareness of human suffering. (Wikipedia)
2. God as Mother: the maternal dimension of the divine
   • Julian developed one of the most sustained explorations of divine motherhood in Christian theology, describing Christ as "our Mother" who labors in giving birth to the soul, feeds us with his own body (the Eucharist), and nurtures us through the process of spiritual growth. This is not metaphor tacked onto conventional theology; it is a systematic reworking of Trinitarian theology in which motherhood is integral to the divine nature.
3. Sin as "behovely" (necessary) but not the final word
   • Julian was shown that sin has no ultimate substance—it is not a thing but an absence, a wound, a falling. She uses the Middle English word "behovely" to describe it: sin is somehow necessary or fitting in the divine plan—not because God wills evil, but because the process of falling and being raised up is the very mechanism through which the soul comes to know the depth of divine love. This is a nuanced position that avoids both moral laxity and punitive theology.
4. The "hazelnut" vision: the fragility and belovedness of creation
   • In one of her showings, Julian saw something small, round, and fragile—"the size of a hazelnut"—lying in her hand, and understood it to be "all that is made." She was struck by its smallness and vulnerability, and asked how it could survive. The answer: "It lasts, and ever shall last, because God loves it." This image—the entire created world as a tiny, beloved thing held in the palm of God—has become one of the most recognized passages in English spiritual literature.

Essential Writings

• Revelations of Divine Love (trans. Elizabeth Spearing, Penguin Classics)
  • The standard accessible translation of Julian's long text: her sixteen showings and the decades of theological reflection that followed. Spearing's translation preserves the warmth and directness of Julian's voice while making the Middle English accessible to modern readers.
  • Best use: the essential text. Read it slowly—a chapter at a time, as contemplative practice rather than theology to be mastered.
• Showings (trans. Edmund Colledge and James Walsh, Classics of Western Spirituality)
  • The most scholarly English translation, including both the short and long texts with extensive introduction and notes. Colledge and Walsh situate Julian within the broader context of medieval mysticism and provide detailed commentary on her theological innovations.
  • Best use: for serious students who want both texts and the full scholarly apparatus—the introduction alone is an excellent education in medieval contemplative theology.
• Julian of Norwich: Mystic and Theologian (Grace Jantzen)
  • A landmark feminist theological study that takes Julian seriously as a systematic thinker—not just a visionary but a theologian whose ideas about divine love, motherhood, and the nature of evil represent a genuine alternative to the dominant Western Christian tradition of sin and punishment.
  • Best use: for readers who want to understand why Julian matters theologically—not just devotionally—and who appreciate feminist and philosophical engagement with mystical texts.