Margery Kempe, a Strong and Righteous Woman

Margery Kempe is a woman whose devotion to Christianity and love for God has exceeded all her other desires in her life. In the text, various themes come out portraying her overwhelming desire to please God. Sexual desire is brought out strongly in these two chapters. Margery feels that lechery is an abomination to her faith, to an extent that she feels that they should exercise chastity with her husband. Margery tries to counsel her husband to practice celibacy. However, she still obeys her husband and allows him her body with much sorrow afterwards for she says “she obeyed wyth greet weeping” (Margery 261). In the end, her husbands joins her by making a vow to chastity.

Her love for God is very remarkable. Margery wakes up in the middle of the night to listen to a beautiful melody that made her feel like she was in heaven. She then weeps and sobs in her prayers. Margery feels sin fills “the wretchyd world” (Margery 248) and pursues holiness. She even goes ahead to continuously fast and pray from two in the morning to “al the aftrnoon”(Margery 276).

Temptation is a problem that Margery has to face in her pursuit of holiness. Once again, lust comes out as the most difficult one. Margery meets so much trouble driving her to believe that “God had forsakyn hir” (Margery 331). Afterwards, she feels that her consent to sin (sexual lust) deserves no mercy since she consented. However, even in her troubles, the Grace of the Lord still increases her temptations.

The writer, Margery Kempe lived between the years 1373-1438. Her biography was published at the end of her years. In it, Margery shows her strong devotion to her faith, which is quite remarkable. She prayed in deep sorrow while weeping as she felt she was a sinner, referring to herself as “this creatur” (Margery 301). Men poured scorn on her saying she was a hypocrite but this did not make her faith wan. This portrays her admirable quality of a strong woman who could not be deterred from what she believed in.

Reference

Margery Kempe. (1996). Chapters 1 & 2. In L. Staley (Eds.), The Book of Margery Kempe          (pp. 241-364) Rochester: Robinsons Library Digital Projects.