To the medieval
Christian the transparent envelope of air enclosing the earth was
the home not only of birds but also of demons, spirits which might
be evil (acolytes of the fallen angel Lucifer), neutral or good.
Round the orbit of the moon air gave way to ether in which six
other planets – Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter and
Saturn in that order - also circled. Angels, too, moved through the
ether. In the region beyond it, also wheeling, lay the stellatum,
the dimension of the stars and galaxies whose relative stations
were constant, unlike the planets. The furthermost element, the
primum mobile, a total void but rotating like the others, was the
last frontier of time and space.
Outside space and
time, entirely surrounding the whole system, lay the empyrean,
infinite and eternal, the domain of God, the origin of all being.
He presided here with Jesus and the Holy Spirit, accompanied by
Mary, Queen of Heaven, and a celestial hierarchy of Cherubim,
Seraphim and Thrones, Virtues, Dominions and Powers,
Principalities, Archangels and Angels. Men could not observe them
during the day because their eyes were dazzled by the strength of
the sunlight, while at night they were dimmed when the sun passed
behind the earth, whose shadow was cast like a cone of inky
darkness up into the firmament. Throughout the upper reaches of the
sky the sun's pervading light shone to the continuous and heavenly
music of the spheres, expressing their love of their creator, just
as their rotation manifested their unceasing effort to approach him
more closely.
Looking up at any
time of day or night every monk could therefore visualise a
'revelry of insatiable love' in which they had a vital role to
play, for one of the fundamentals of the universe was its unity;
every component related to every other in a logical and harmonious
pattern. However man's place was pivotal; created when God breathed
life into dust, every human soul since had been fetched from heaven
at birth and might return there after death. Like stones, plants
and animals, men and women were of the earth, but unlike them
though in common with the angels and God, they possessed reason.
They therefore had a responsibility for their fellow
creatures.
The paramount figure
in this scheme of creation was of course God. He was not precisely
the god of the gospels for the Roman church had adopted a triune
Godhead, defined in 'The Apostles Creed' as a trinity comprising
God the Father, his son Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit - Jesus
being conceived by the Holy Spirit of Mary, a virgin. The apostles
might have been puzzled by this definition of God, particularly as
Jesus, who may have regarded himself as performing an unprecedented
mission on earth, perhaps referred to himself as 'the son of man',
never as the son of God.