"Mother Of Love": Spiritual Maternity In The Works Of Jane Lead (1624-1704)

This chapter examines the significance and nature of maternity and maternal imagery in the life and writings of the seventeenth-century visionary and mystic, Jane Lead. First, it considers how she was perceived as a mother among her followers in the London Philadelphian Society and then examines her relationship with her own spiritual mother, Wisdom or Sophia, to show how in Lead’s visionary world Sophia’s procreative abilities provided hope for a future spiritual generation represented by the second coming of an androgynous Adam. The most significant mother figure in the Christian faith is Mary. Although Lead was clearly Protestant, some of her thoughts were informed by ideas developed in the first centuries after Christ around the figure of Mary. This elucidates some of Lead’s religious beliefs surrounding the figures of the Virgin Mary and the Virgin Wisdom to show that they were inextricably linked. Keywords: christian faith; Jane Lead; London Philadelphian Society; Mary; seventeenth-century; spiritual maternity; Wisdom