Rekindling Hildegard’s Inheritance: viriditas and ariditas in Times of Ecological Crisis

In this article I (re)turn to 12th-century mystic Hildegard of Bingen and explore how her ideas about viriditas, the life-giving force that permeates all life, are still vital in these times of ecological crisis and can, perhaps, nurse us back to (planetary) health. I argue that, following Hildegard, this crisis can be understood as both a physical and a spiritual crisis that is characterized by the spread of ariditas, a desert-like, life-exhausting force. I zoom in on the importance of permeability in her thought, that of the female (pregnant) body in particular, and tend to how and why this opens us up to an uncanny ecological awareness—being permeable is both vital to viriditas and a danger to it, with life-exhausting forces like PFAS roaming (our) environments as well as (our) bodies. Finally, I explain why we should be mindful when putting our faith in regenerative nature and instead “listen carefully to deserts.”