The Beguines were lay religious women in the 12th and 13th centuries. They were devoted to living apostolic lives according to the scriptures, vowing to stay chaste and often live in voluntary poverty. The movement began in the Low Countries and quickly spread throughout Europe. Originally, like many of the heresies in the medieval period, there was nothing wrong with the movement. They held the same theological and canonical as the Orthodox Church, but like we’ve seen in the past, the issue came with the churches authority and the lay peoples obedience.

The movement attracted women of all stages of life at the beginning, and as the years went by and the Beguines spread, more women of low social standing found it to be their home. They strove to adhere to the scriptures, and used the sisters of Lazarus in the gospels as their model. In the gospel story Jesus goes to Martha and Mary’s house to eat dinner with them. Martha is bustling around the house preparing food and cleaning, while Mary is sitting at Jesus’ feet listening to what he has to say. In the biblical story, Mary is doing the right thing by listening to Jesus and Martha is preoccupied with the worries of accommodating her guest. The Beguines take the role of Martha and are adamant about fulfilling their duties as religious laywomen. There are no real examples of apostolic women in the New Testament, so it is hard to say what scriptures directly influenced their idea of being chaste, obedient, Christians living an apostolic lifestyle. It is likely they took the example of the men and just applied it to their own life.

Another common theme within the Beguine movement is mysticism. This is where Marguerite Poret comes in. There isn’t much information about her early life, but based on her book “Mirror of Simple Souls” she was clearly a well-educated woman. Her ideas in this book caused a lot of controversy in the Beguine movement and are essentially what sparked the clergy and Pope to oust the lay religious women movement.

In the book, Marguerite talks about the seven states of the Soul on its journey back to its rightful place. It is very platonic in nature and somewhat supported by verses in scripture. The first state is when the soul is touched by grace and stripped of sin. After this, the soul is free. In the second state the soul renounces earthly monetary things like riches, delights, and honors. The third state requires the soul to be filled with love, and this love then inspires nothing but good works. The fourth state is where most mystics stop, as the soul is united with God, but she continues into the fifth state. In this step the soul has to die to herself, no longer claiming self or human will. At step number six the soul seems to become one with God, where God no longer sees the human in the soul, but sees himself. The final state brings everlasting glory through love to the soul.

Marguerite highlights that the soul no longer needs grace, so therefore is no longer bound by rules and virtues. Essentially, if one has reached this mystical stage they are no longer bound by the rules and statutes in the Bible or the sacraments and rituals required by the church. This extreme interpretation of Marguerites text worried the Church, and in 1310 she was executed by Dominican William of Paris. Not condemned by a belief in two gods or an unbelief of the divinity of Jesus, but claimed a heretic because she was a woman who the church feared would turn people away from the authority of the clergy and render them disobedient, stripping them of the power and rule they had acquired.