E06658: Aldhelm, in his prose On Virginity, concludes his list of exemplary virgins with the ultimately non-virginal Old Testament figures *Joseph (patriarch, S00277), *David (king of Israel, S00269), *Samson (judge of the Israelites, S02496), *Abel (second son of Adam, S02497), *Melchizedek (king and priest of Salem, S01783), and *Judith (S02498). Written in Latin in southern Britain, for the nuns at the monastery at Barking (south-east Britain), c. 675/686.

Aldhelm, prose On Virginity, 53-7

LIII. Sed quid mirum, iam rudi coruscante gratia, postquam virgo virginem sancto puerperio peperit, cuius principatus super umeros esse perhibetur, si ecclesia virginibus redundet, sicut caelum sideribus resplendet, cum etiam castissimum Ioseph legalia veterum volumina immensis praeconiorum laudibus celebrent? Quem ab ingruenti multiformium calamitatum discrimine [...] quamdiu purae virginitatis comes et lenocinantis prostibuli contemptor extiterat, illaesum divina tutela protexit [...]

[...] David quoque opinatissimus regum sub ipso pubertatis tirocinio illibata virginitate praeditus antequam copula matrimonii et conubii nexu nodaretur, nonne argutis fibrarum fidibus liniphaticum mitigabat et impensa sospitatis gratia freneticum curavit dira procul tetrorum d explosa spirituum vesania? [...]

[... ] Samson ille Nazareus ab ipsa gracillima cunabulorum aetatula Domino septenis crinibus sacer, antequam fraudulentis Dalilae complexibus caperetur et perfidi pelicatus stupro enerviter deceptus illecebrosis lenocinii nexibus nodaretur, nondum ferro dempta cincinnorum caesarie quantis miraculorum signis et virtutum rumoribus omni saeculo usque ad id tempus inexpertis effulsisse devulgatur! [...]

LIV. IGITVR sicut supra retulimus, per Hieremiam et Danielem ceteros que eiusdem propositi consortes et florentis pudicitiae sodales futura incarnati verbi virginitas misticis sacramentorum obumbrationibus figurabatur, ita per Abel insontem mitis innocentia et passio, per Melchisedech vero supernae potestatis pontificium et caelestis infulae flaminium praesignabatur [...]

LVII. IVDITH, filia Merari, post obitum Manasse sumpto viduitatis theristro et spreto sponsali e peplo blanda procorum lenocinia contempnens, nondum resultantibus apostolicae salpicis clangoribus: Dico innuptis et viduis: bonum est illis, si sic permanserint , quasi candens lilium pia castitate florescens atque a publicis conspectibus delitescens in cenaculi solario pudica conversabatur [...]


'LIII. But what wonder is it, when the new grace is now gleaming forth [i.e. the New Testament], after the Virgin bore a virgin in holy childbirth, on whose shoulders the government is said to be [cf. Is. 9:6], if the Church should abound in virgins as the sky shines with stars, when the books of the Old Law also honour the chaste JOSEPH with immense paeans of praise? For as long as he was a companion of pure virginity and a despiser of the enticing bawdy-house, divine protection guarded him unharmed from the menacing danger of multifarious calamities [...]

As for DAVID also, the most illustrious of kings, endowed with a stainless virginity in the boyhood of his youth before he was tied by the bond of matrimony and the shackle of marriage, did he not soothe the frenzied (Saul) with his clear musical strings and cure the (same) madman by bestowing the gift of health, driving far off the dread fury of black spirits? [...]

SAMSON the Nazarene, who from the very tender age of the cradle was sacred to the Lord because of his seven hairs – before he was caught in the fraudulent embraces of Dalila and, weakly deceived by the debauchery of this treacherous concubinage, was entangled in the the seductive chains of her allurements – while the mane of his tresses had not yet been shorn by a knife, with what great miraculous signs never experienced in any age up to that time is he said to have shone forth!

Although, I say, each of these patriarchs was most pleasing to the heavenly majesty for as long as he consumed the air of the atmosphere and the breath of life, nonetheless, after their joining in carnal union, the glory of their virtues slackened and became less.

LIV. Therefore, just as we mentioned earlier, just as the future virginity of the incarnate Word was prefigured in the mystical foreshadowings of a mystery through Jeremiah and Daniel and other associates in the same resolve and companions of flourishing chastity, so through the guileless ABEL gentle innocence and suffering, and through MELCHESIDECH the episcopal authority of heavenly power and the sacerdotal office of the divine priesthood are prefigured [...]

LVII. JUDITH, the daughter of Merari, scorned the flattering allurements of suitors after the death of Manasses, taking up the weeds of widowhood and rejecting a wedding-dress – and (this at a time) when clarion-calls of the apostolic trumpet had not yet put out the call: 'But I say to the unmarried and to the widows; it is good for them if they so continue' [I Cor. 7:8]. Flowering like a bright lily in her devout chastity and hiding from the public gaze she lived a pure life in an upstairs solar [...]'

Text: Ehwald 1919, 310-17. Translation: Lapidge and Herren 1979, 121-7.