Silence and Obedience in the Educational Project of the Catalan nun Juliana Morell (1594-1653)

This article analyzes the projection as Dominican nun of the Catalan Juliana Morell, as well as her thought, and educational discourse within the framework of the recatholizing offensive in France at the beginning of the 17th century after the death of Henry IV. From the documentation of the National Library of France and the Municipal Library and the Library Ceccano of Avignon the works and the correspondence of this personage, who was child prodigy and later prioress in the convent of Sainte-Praxède in Avignon, are examined. In particular, her ideas about education, silence, and obedience are underlined within the framework of conventual discipline. The influence of Jesuit pragmatism (De la Puente and Rodríguez), her distancing from alumbradismo and quietism, her vindication of humility and mortification, and the exaltation of the intellectual union with God, far away from Baroque sensory experiences, is clearly evident.