The Souls of Purgatory: The Spiritual Diary of a Seventeenth-Century Afro-Peruvian Mystic, Ursula de Jesús (review)

This book centers on the life of Ursula de Jesús, a woman of African descent who lived in Lima, the capital of the Peruvian viceroyalty, during the first half of the seventeenth century. At the time, men and women of African descent, either slave or free, constituted the majority of the city’s population. In spite of their number, they have left few personal testimonies. Although Ursula’s experience was not unique in a city and at a time that produced the first Spanish American saints and several mystics, it is exceptional that a woman of her background left a diary in which she related her spiritual journey. Historian Nancy van Deusen has made a laudable effort in writing an informed introductory study, and translating and editing a rich and difficult manuscript.

Ursula lived several years as a donada (religious servant) in Lima’s convent of St. Clare. Her condition as slave notwithstanding, her confessors advised her thoughts and mystical visions were worth recording, therefore this piece is to a great extent an oral text, an aspect that enhances its interest and value for historians and scholars in other disciplines. The book is divided into three parts. Part 1 offers an introduction to Ursula as an individual and explains the environment in which the diary was composed. Part 2 contains the English translation of the diary, and part 3 contains a selection of passages from the diary in Spanish. In the introduction, van Deusen describes Lima as well as its institutions and activities as Ursula could have experienced them throughout different stages in her life. Although a slave, Ursula chose to live in the convent, as she was convinced that her mission was to act as intercessor for the souls that were in purgatory awaiting their passage to heaven. She dedicated her prayers, hard work, and sacrifices to that endeavor. Through a detailed examination of Ursula’s diary, van Deusen furnishes a well-documented discussion of the meaning of purgatory—a central and not always well-understood aspect of Catholic belief and religious practice at the time—demonstrating how knowledgeable women such as Ursula reflected the religious ideas and traditions that had evolved in Europe, especially about the hereafter and salvation, since long before the Counter-Reformation. The observations of how Ursula lived the reality of racism in her everyday life and rebelled against it are quite perceptive, showing how women like Ursula dealt with the inconsistencies between the strict hierarchies and prejudices that ruled colonial society and a religion that preached that souls were equal and salvation was for all. Preachers addressing the Indian inhabitants of Lima and Indians themselves grappled with this question. Although van Deusen has well examined the connections between Ursula’s religious ideas and those of European and Mexican mystics, the side of the story related to local issues awaits further exploration.