HEAVENLY BRIDEGROOMS
By Theodore Schroeder
and Ida C.
The Sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all that they chose.
Genesis 6:2.
Explanatory Note. In the course of my studies on the erotogenesis of religion I became interested in the life work and mental characteristics of one Ida C., a woman who committed suicide in her forty-fifth year. I first heard of her after her death, but it seemed to me that a psychologic study of her would yield rich materials as a contribution to the psychology of religion. Consequently, I bestirred myself to secure information, both biographical and auto-biographical. Among the materials gathered was her life long correspondence with friends, a number of published essays written by her, some scraps of manuscripts, and two completed but unpublished book manuscripts. This material will later constitute the subject of my analysis. Ida C was for a number of years a college teacher and for a long time associated with various kinds of free-thinking heretics. She was never married. In due time she became the victim of erotic hallucinations to which she gave a "spiritual" interpretation. Later, when her conduct brought her to the verge of incarceration in a jail or in an asylum, she endeavored frankly to meet the issue of her own insanity. The resultant investigation to her mind seemed a complete vindication, not only of her sanity, but also, of the objective reality and spirituality of her erotic experiences. This vindication she reduced to writing. The manuscript is now in my possession. It seems to me under the circumstances of this case and the future studies which I am going to make, partly from other papers of the same author, that this is too valuable a document to be mutilated by editing. Furthermore, others should be given equal opportunity with myself in the interpretation of this material. The manuscript had been revised by its author and in a number of places it was quite impossible to decipher the pen-interlineations, or replace words destroyed by the tearing of the manuscript through frequent handling before it came into my possession. At such places a word may be occasionally omitted or a connection
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