Sophronius of Jerusalem - theology through people and places

Anastasius the Sinaite (see my earlier post) came a generation or so after Sophronius of Jerusalem, who played an important role in the debates leading up to the Sixth Ecumenical Council (Constantinople III).

Born in Damascus in around 560, Sophronius was a monk, ascetic, hagiopgrapher, poet, philosopher and theologian.

Having succeeded St Modestus as Patriarch of Jerusale, he was primate of that church from 634 until 638, when he died after guiding his flock through a two year siege of Jerusalem by the Moslems.

By the time of Sophronius, the Church had already condemned:

(a) the Nestorian heresy (which taught that the fact that Christ possessed divine and human natures meant, in effect, that he was a human person united by means of a kind of moral union to the divine person of the Son),

(b) the Monophysite heresy (which taught that the fact that Christ was a single undivided person - the Son of God incarnate - meant, in effect, that he possessed only a divine nature, and that his humanity was somehow swallowed up in his divinity).

In the late sixth/early seventh century, a subtler version of the Monophysite heresy emerged. The more evolved form of this was Monothelitism, which taught that Christ had just one (divine) will, and which was condemned at Constantinople III.

Monothelitism was itself a development from Monergenism, which taught that there was just one (divine) operation or activity (Latin: operatio) in Christ - or, in Greek (the language in which the debate was for the most part conducted), one divine energy (energeia - a term which carries a good deal more theological weight than the Latin equivalent).

The role of Sophronius in this ongoing dispute was to defend the orthodox Catholic faith at a time when both the Pope and the Patriarch of Constantinople were initially unable to see the dangers inherent in this new and more refined variant of Monophystitism.

A definitive explanation of the true doctrine of the two energies and the two wills was to be developed a little later by Maximus the Confessor and the Sixthe Ecumenical Council.

As a preacher, Sophronius seems to have had a gift for seeing and reflecting on Christ's work of redemption through the eyes of those who encountered him.

The following is an extract from a homily on Christ's presentation in the Jerusalem Temple - a location of great significance for Sophronius - (a longer version of which is available on the Mystagogy blog of J. Sanidopoulos):

Let us be shining ourselves as we go together to meet and to receive with the aged Simeon the light whose brilliance is eternal.

Rejoicing with Simeon, let us sing a hymn of thanksgiving to God, the Father of the light, who sent the true light to dispel the darkness and to give us all a share in his splendor.

Through Simeon’s eyes we too have seen the salvation of God which he prepared for all the nations and revealed as the glory of the new Israel, which is ourselves.

As Simeon was released from the bonds of this life when he had seen Christ, so we too were at once freed from our old state of sinfulness.

By faith we, too embraced, Christ, the salvation of God the Father, as he came to us from Bethlehem.

Gentiles before, we have now become the people of God.

Our eyes have seen God incarnate, and because we have seen him present among us and have mentally received him into our arms, we are called the new Israel.

Sophronius appears also to have possessed a gift for seeing and reflecting on Christ's work of redemption in the light of the physical geography of the City of Jerusalem. In one of his poetic works, the twentieth of his Anacreonta, he writes:

[...] Let me walk thy pavements
and go inside the Anastasis,
where the King of All rose again,
trampling down the power of death.

[...] Through the divine sanctuary
I will penetrate the divine Tomb,
and with deep reverence
will venerate that Rock.

[...] And prostrate I will venerate
the Navel-point of the earth, that divine Rock
in which was fixed the wood
which undid the curse of the tree.

How great thy glory,
noble Rock, in which was fixed
the Cross, the Redemption of mankind!

[...] And let me go rejoicing
to the splendid sanctuary, the place
where the noble Empress Helena
found the divine Wood;

and go up,
my heart overcome with awe,
and see the Upper Room,
the Reed, the Sponge, and the Lance.

Then may I gaze down
upon the fresh beauty of the Basilica
where choirs of monks
sing nightly songs of worship.

Extracted from a much longer extract, translated by John Wilkinson (Jerusalem Pilgrims before the Crusades, 1977).

Feast of St Andrew - Aquinas on today's Epistle

Today's Epistle (for the feast of St Andrew, is Romans 10:9-18). Verse 10 reads "For man believes with his heart and so is justified, and he confesses with his lips and so is saved".

In his Commentary on Romans, St Thomas Aquinas explains the three ways in which we confess Christ with our lips:

First, the confession of one’s own iniquity: “I said: ‘I will confess my transgressions to the Lord’“ (Ps 32:5), which is the confession of the repentant.

The second is that by which a man confesses the goodness of God mercifully bestowing His benefits: “Sing to the Lord a new song, for he has done marvelous things (Ps 98:11) and this is the confession of one giving thanks.

The third is the confession of divine truth: “Every one who confesses me before men, I will also confess before my Father who is in heaven” (Mt 10:32) and this is the confession of the believer, about which the Apostle is now speaking.

Commentary on Romans, ch. 10, lect, 3, n. 832.

Anastasius the Sinaite - what is the mark of a true Christian?

Anastasius the Sinaite (d. 686) was a priest and abbot of Mount Sinai.

He was one of the great exponents of the theology of guardian angels. According to the short biography on the Orthodox Church in America website

St Anastasius taught that God gives each Christian an angel to care for him throughout his life.

However, we can drive our Guardian Angel away by our sins, just as bees are driven away by smoke.

While the demons work to deprive us of the heavenly Kingdom, the holy angels guide us to do good.

Therefore, only the most foolish individuals would drive away their Guardian Angel from themselves.

In his Answers to Questions St Anastasius addressed the question "what is the mark of a true Christian?":

A Christian is a veritable dwelling place of Christ, held together by good works and pious beliefs.

True faith, without works is dead, as are works without faith...wherefore the Lord says:

If a man loves Me, he will keep My words, and My Father will love Him, and We will come unto him and make Our home with him (John 14:23).

Correct belief and good works may not Do we not learn from this that the house of the soul is built through correct belief and good works, and thus God dwells within us. I will dwell in them, He says, and walk in them (II Cor. 6:16)....

Will not the devil then know whether or not the Master of the house, Christ, is inside your mind?

Fuller extract here at OCIC.

Aquinas on today's Epistle (1st Sunday of Advent)

Today's Epistle (Romans 12:11-14) reads (in the public domain Douay-Rheims version):

And that knowing the season; that it is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed. The night is passed, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armour of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day: not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and impurities, not in contention and envy: But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh in its concupiscences.

St Thomas explains the words the night is passed, and the day is at hand (v. 12) as follows:

The import is that the entire time of the present life is compared to night on account of the darkness of ignorance with which the present life is encumbered.

“We are swallowed up in darkness” (Jb 33:4). Isaiah says of this night: “My soul yearns for thee in the night” (26:9).

But the state of future happiness is compared to day on account of God’s splendor with which the saints are enlightened: “the sun shall be no more your light by day, nor for brightness shall the moon give light to you by night, but he Lord will be your everlasting light” (Is 60:19).

Continued here on my "sources" blog, "Enlarging the Heart".

Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary

November 21st would normally be the memorial day of the Presentation of Our Lady in the Temple. Orthodox Portal has the following explanation of the iconography of the feast (including an image of the icon) taken from The Meaning of Icons by Leonid Ouspensky and Vladimir Lossky.

The mystery of this feast of the Theotokos, which can be compared to the Dormition, leads us into the very treasure house of the Church’s Holy Tradition.

The Church breaks the silence of the Scriptures and shows us the incomprehensible ways of providence, which prepare the receptacle of the Word, “the Mother foreknown before the ages,” “preached by the Prophets,” and now introduced into the Holy of Holies, like a hidden Treasure of the Glory of God.”

The theme of the temple is developed in the liturgy and iconography of the Presentation. It is the temple rebuilt by Zorobabel, less glorious than that of Solomon.

The rabbinical tradition tells us: ‘Five things which were in the first temple were no longer in the second.

They were: The Fire from on high, the Oil of anointment, the Ark (Second Maccabees 2), the Holy Spirit (Ezekiel 10:18), the Urirn and the Thummim.’

The Holy Spirit abandons the Temple, to speak by the Prophets. But He will confer on the temple of the law a glory not to be compared with that of the old covenant, by introducing into the Holy of Holies the Virgin who is to give birth to ‘Jesus, made an high priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek’ (Hebrews 6:20).

He who welcomes the Holy Virgin, the priest Zacharias, the father of the Forerunner, reunites in his person the two traditions—priestly and prophetic.

If he allows the Virgin to go in behind the second veil, which is contrary to the Law, it is because he sees in her the new Ark of the covenant, “the Living Ark of God.”

“The Angels were astonished to see the Virgin enter the Holy of Holies”: the Divine plan of the Incarnation remains incomprehensible “to the principalities and powers in heavenly places,” which will be known only through the Church “the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hidden in God” (Ephesians 3: 9-10).

It is the secret preparation of the humanity of Christ: In the temple of Jerusalem the chosen Virgin will prepare herself to become later “the Temple of His body,” that which will be destroyed and in three days raised up.

The Meaning of Icons. Ouspensky and Lossky, St Vladimir's Seminary Press,U.S.; 2nd Revised edition edition [May 1983] pp. 153-154.

More from St Mark the Ascetic

More from Mark the Ascetic (see previous post), taken from his On Those who Think They Are Made Righteous by Works: Two Hundred Twenty Six Texts.

Unless a man acquires, through the grace of Christ, knowledge of the truth and fear of God, he is gravely wounded not only by the passions but also by the things that happen to him.

When you want to resolve a complex problem, seek God’s will in the matter, and you will find a constructive solution.

When something accords with God’s will, all creation aids it. But when God rejects something, creation too opposes it.

He who opposes unpleasant events opposes the command of God unwittingly. But when someone accepts them with real knowledge, he ‘waits patiently for the Lord’ (Ps 27:14).

When tested by some trial you should try to find out not why or through whom it came, but only how to endure it gratefully, without distress or rancor.

[...] If it is not easy to find anyone conforming to God’s will who has not been put to the test, we ought to thank God for everything that happens to us.

Text from G.E.H. Palmer, Philip Sherrard, and Kallistos Ware (trans. and eds.) The Philokalia: The Complete Text, vol. I (Faber & Faber, London & Boston: 1979), pp. 125- 146.

Mark the Ascetic - "if you wish to gain victory over the passions"

Mark the Ascetic (also known as Mark the Hermit, Mark the Monk) was, as the Catholic Encyclopedia laconically puts it, "a theologian and ascetic writer of some importance in the fifth century".

According to the Prologue from Ohrid (entry for March 5th)

Mark was an ascetic and miracle-worker. In his fortieth year he was tonsured a monk by his teacher St. John Chrysostom.

Mark then spent sixty more years in the wilderness of Nitria in fasting, prayer and writing many spiritual works concerning the salvation of souls.

He knew the entire Holy Scriptures by heart. He was very merciful and kind. He wept much for the misfortunes which had befallen all of God's creation.

On one occasion, while crying, he prayed to God for a blind puppy of a hyena and the puppy received its sight. In thanksgiving the mother of the hyena brought him a sheepskin. The saint forbade the hyena in the future to kill any more sheep of poor people.

He received Communion at the hands of the angels.

St Mark's advice on prayer and asceticism is is practical and striking. The following example is quoted on the Word in the Desert blog (an excellent resource for Patristic theology and spirituality):

If you wish to gain victory over the passions, enter within yourself through prayer and God's help.

Then descend into the depths of your heart and there track down these three powerful giants — forgetfulness, laziness, and ignorance.

It is these three who uphold the ranks of our spiritual adversaries: supported by these three, all the other passions, returning to the heart, act, live, and gain strength in self-indulgent and uninstructed souls.

But if by means of great attention and persistence of mind, and with help from above, you find those evil giants that are unbeknown to many, you will easily drive them away with the weapons of righteousness — with the remembrance of what is good, with the eagerness that spurs the soul to salvation, and with knowledge from heaven.

Sacramentality of Scripture

One of the most striking passages in Verbum Domini (PDF version here, HTML version here) is the following extract from Paragraph 56.

Drawing on St Jerome (the doctor of biblical interpretation par excellence), Pope Benedict discusses the "sacramentality" of Scripture, and the presence of Christ in Scripture (particularly within a liturgical context) which he presents as analogous with, but not equivalent to, the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist:

At the heart of the sacramentality of the word of God is the mystery of the Incarnation itself: "the Word became flesh" (Jn 1:14), the reality of the revealed mystery is offered to us in the "flesh" of the Son.

[...] The sacramentality of the word can thus be understood by analogy with the real presence of Christ under the appearances of the consecrated bread and wine.

By approaching the altar and partaking in the Eucharistic banquet we truly share in the body and blood of Christ.

The proclamation of God's word at the celebration entails an acknowledgment that Christ himself is present, that he speaks to us, and that he wishes to be heard.

Saint Jerome speaks of the way we ought to approach both the Eucharist and the word of God:

We are reading the sacred Scriptures. For me, the Gospel is the Body of Christ; for me, the holy Scriptures are his teaching.

And when he says: "whoever does not eat my flesh and drink my blood" (Jn 6:53), even though these words can also be understood of the [Eucharistic] Mystery, Christ's body and blood are really the word of Scripture, God's teaching.

When we approach the [Eucharistic] Mystery, if a crumb falls to the ground we are troubled.

Yet when we are listening to the word of God, and God's Word and Christ’s flesh and blood are being poured into our ears yet we pay no heed, what great peril should we not feel? (In Psalmum 147: CCL 78, 337-338.).

Christ, truly present under the species of bread and wine, is analogously present in the word proclaimed in the liturgy.

Verbum Domini 56.

Verbum Domini - scripture and prayer

As one would expect from the most patristic-minded of popes, Pope Benedict's recent Apostolic Exhortation, Verbum Domini, is steeped in the wisdom of the Church Fathers.

In the following extract he discusses the connection between scripture and prayer - the connection that lies at the heart of lectio divina - with reference to St Augustine and Origen (who isn't technically a Father, but whose approach to interpreting the scriptures shaped the entire patristic and early mediaeval exgetical tradition).

The Council [Vatican 2]...sought to reappropriate the great patristic tradition which had always recommended approaching the Scripture in dialogue with God.

As Saint Augustine puts it: “Your prayer is the word you speak to God. When you read the Bible, God speaks to you; when you pray, you speak to God ”.

Origen, one of the great masters of this way of reading the Bible, maintains that understanding Scripture demands, even more than study, closeness to Christ and prayer.

Origen was convinced, in fact, that the best way to know God is through love, and that there can be no authentic scientia Christi [knowledge of Christ] apart from growth in his love.

In his Letter to Gregory, the great Alexandrian theologian gave this advice:

“Devote yourself to the lectio of the divine Scriptures; apply yourself to this with perseverance.

Do your reading with the intent of believing in and pleasing God.

If during the lectio you encounter a closed door, knock and it will be opened to you by that guardian of whom Jesus said, ‘The gatekeeper will open it for him’.

By applying yourself in this way to lectio divina, search diligently and with unshakable trust in God for the meaning of the divine Scriptures, which is hidden in great fullness within.

You ought not, however, to be satisfied merely with knocking and seeking: to understand the things of God, what is absolutely necessary is oratio.

For this reason, the Saviour told us not only: ‘Seek and you will find’, also added, ‘Ask and you shall receive’ ”.

Verbum Domini 86;
quoting AUGUSTINE, Enarrationes in Psalmos, 85, 7: PL 37, 1086;
ORIGEN, Epistola ad Gregorium, 3: PG 11, 92.

Verbum Domini

Michael Barber at The Sacred Page reports the release of a new Apostolic Exhortation (i.e. one step down from an Encycliucal, though still part of the ordinary magisterium) on Scripture, Verbum Domini which follows on from the Synod on Scripture held in 2008.

Michael Barber provides some historical context which serves to underline the significance of the document:

For some perspective, the last major papal document on Scripture was Divino afflante Spiritu, which was released by Pius XII in 1943. Before that the two other major papal documents on Scripture were Leo XIII's landmark Providentissimus Deus (1893) and Benedict XV's, Spiritus Paraclitus(1920). All three of those documents were encyclicals. Again, today's new document is not.

So, today's document is an important milestone -it is the first major papal document on Scripture in 57 years! The last magisterial document which really dealt with Scripture in an extensive way was Dei Verbum (1965), which is one of the documents of the Second Vatican Council. So the last magisterial document treating Scripture extensively is 45 years old!

It will be worth keeping an eye on The Sacred Page for further analysis and reflections.

Elizabeth, Caesarius, Leo...

Monday's memorial was that of Bl Elizabeth of the Trinity. Elizabeth frequently meditated on the meaning of her own name - "house of God" - which led her deeper and deeper into the mystery of indwelling of the Trinity in her heart.

Tuesday's feast was that of the dedication of the Lateran basilica. In the old Breviary, the Mattins and Lauds hymns focused on the two key themes:

(1) Christians are stones whom Christ builds up into the living Temple of which he is the cornerstone; and (2) this Temple - the Temple of the New Jerusalem described in the Book of Revelation which comes down from heaven - is where heaven and earth, divine and human, are united.

In the modern Divine Office (or Liturgy of the Hours), the Patristic reading was taken from a sermon by St Caesarius of Arles, and spoke of the souls of believers as Temples in which Christ dwells.

Today's memorial is that of St Leo the Great, and the Patristic Reading in the LotH draws these various threads together, exploring the themes of (1) Christians as living stones in the true Temple; (2) Christians as Temples of God - "spiritual houses" - in their own right; (3) Christians as exercising a royal priesthood in virtue of their membership of Christ's mystical body (Christ being King and Priest, and also the living Temple in whom divine and human natures are united in a single Person).

The apostle Peter says in these words: And you are built up as living stones into spiritual houses, a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices which are acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

And again: But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people set apart.

For all, regenerated in Christ, are made kings by the sign of the cross; they are consecrated priests by the oil of the Holy Spirit, so that beyond the special service of our ministry as priests, all spiritual and mature Christians know that they are a royal race and are sharers in the office of the priesthood.

For what is more king-like than to find yourself ruler over your body after having surrendered your soul to God? And what is more priestly than to promise the Lord a pure conscience and to offer him in love unblemished victims on the altar of one’s heart?

One of the many wonderful aspects of the liturgical year is the way in which it offers up these connections...

Hymns to St Leo the Great

Troparion (Tone 3)

You were the Church's instrument

in strengthening the teaching of true doctrine;

you shone forth from the West like a sun dispelling the errors of the heretics.

Righteous Leo, entreat Christ God to grant us His great mercy.

Troparion (Tone 8)

O Champion of Orthodoxy, and teacher of holiness,

The enlightenment of the universe and the inspired glory of true believers.

O most wise Father Leo, your teachings are as music of the Holy Spirit for us!

Pray that Christ our God may save our souls!

Kontakion (Tone 3)

Seated upon the throne of the priesthood, glorious Leo,

you shut the mouths of the spiritual lions.

With divinely inspired teachings of the honored Trinity,

you shed the light of the knowledge of God up-on your flock.

Therefore, you are glorified as a divine initiate of the grace of God.

From Wikipedia.

Elizabeth of the Trinity

Today (November 8th) is the memorial of Bl Elizabeth of the Trinity (1880-1906) - a Carmelite nun of Dijon in France whose life overlapped with that of St Thérèse of Lisieux.

Elizabeth's notebooks bear witness to her profound interiorization of scripture - theologia in the true Greek sense of the term (as opposed to the modern academic sense) - and of the writings of (among others) St John of the Cross and Bl Jan van Ruusbroec (John Ruysbroeck).

In honour of Bl Elizabeth's memorial, Fr Mark has written a lovely introduction to her thought and mission at Vultus Christi.

At louange de sa gloire ("to the praise of His glory" being Elizabeth's spiritual motto), OCDsister, who is a gifted translator, offers a translation of one of Elizabeth's prayer-poems.

Sister Helena's Praise of Glory is an excellent resource for information and reflections relating to Elizabeth.

Over the last year or so I've posted up a number of extracts from her writings and sayings at Enlarging the Heart, including her famous prayer Oh my God, Trinity whom I adore.

There is a short summary of her life in English here at the wonderful Élisabeth de la Trinité website, most of which is in French.

The site's resources include meditations on the mysteries of the Rosary and on the Stations of the Cross (both in French).

Reading the Old Testament

The following is taken from a sermon on the Lenten fast by Russian Orthodox Bishop (now Metropolitan) Hilarion Alfeyev reproduced by Dom David Bird OSB at Monks and Mermaids.

Israel's story, according to Metropolitan Hilarion, is "a chronicle of our own soul, our falls and risings, our sins and repentance".

The Bible is not only the history of the Israeli people, but also a chronicle of a human soul, the soul that fell and rose before God’s face, that sinned and repented.

If we look at the life of the people mentioned in the Bible we can see that each of them is shown not as much as a historical personage, not as much as a personality who performed some deed, but more as a person standing in the face of the living God.

The person's historical services, as well as other achievements, get secondary importance; what remains is a more important issue, that is whether the person stayed faithful to God or not.

If we read the Bible from this viewpoint, we can see that much of what is being said about ancient just people and sinners is nothing but a chronicle of our own soul, our falls and risings, our sins and repentance.

[...] The story of Jonah is the story of many thousands and millions of people who have been commissioned by God to do something and who have tried to flee from God's face when they failed it.

Has it never happened to us that we've refused to perform God’s will and tried to hide from Him? Have we never found ourselves in the abyss of Godlessness and abandonment, like Jonah in the 'belly of the fish'?

Haven't we tried to call to God from this abyss when we finally realized there was nowhere to run away from Him?

In the psalms by David, another hero from the Old Testament mentioned in the Great canon, we read, 'Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?

If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.

If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast' (Psalm 139, 7-10).

It is true that God is everywhere, and there is nowhere one can hide from His face.

God is present even in places where we do not think him to be. He is always facing us, even if we think that He has turned His face away.

God never turns away from a man, but men turn away from God, this is the essence of human tragedy....

God is always within, but we find ourselves without; God is always near us, but we are often away from Him.

It is not God who sends a man into 'the belly of the fish', but the man himself tries to flee, boards a ship, gets caught in a storm, and then finds himself in the deep of Godlessness.

And then from this profoundness, from this abyss they would call to God, and God would come to their rescue.

The Fathers on perfection and imperfection

St John Climacus on patience and persistence:

Do not be surprised that you fall every day; do not give up, but stand your ground courageously. And assuredly, the angel who guards you will honour your patience.

St Mark the Ascetic on the quest for perfection:

Do not seek the perfection of the law in human virtues, for it is not found perfect in them. Its perfection is hidden in the Cross of Christ.

St Martin of Braga on spiritual victories:

Behold, this is the true and the Christian humility. In this you will be able to achieve victory over every vice, by attributing to God rather than to yourself the fact that you have won.

Quotations from the Balamand Monastery website.

Benedict XVI - "let us allow ourselves to be enlightened and cleansed"

Pope Benedict's most recent general audience catechesis deals with Marguerite d'Oingt, a thirteenth-century Carthusian prioress and mystic (whose writings are among the earliest known examples of Provencal French).

Benedict noted that

Marguerite viewed life as a path of perfection leading to complete configuration to Christ, above all in the contemplation of his saving passion.

She imagined the Lord's life, his words and his actions, as a Book which he hold out to us, a Book to be studied and imprinted on our hearts and lives, until the day we read it from within, in the contemplation of the Blessed Trinity.

The conclusion to the main address was striking:

We have heard that Marguerite considered the Lord as a book, she fixed her gaze on the Lord, she considered him a mirror in which her own conscience also appeared.

And from this mirror light entered her soul: She allowed the word to come in, the life of Christ in her own being and thus she was transformed; her conscience was enlightened, she found...light and was cleansed.

It is precisely this that we also need: to let the words, life and light of Christ enter our conscience so that it is enlightened, understands what is true and good and what is wrong; may our conscience be enlightened and cleansed.

Rubbish is not only on different streets of the world. There is rubbish also in our consciences and in our souls.

Only the light of the Lord, his strength and his love is what cleanses us, purifies us, showing us the right path.

Therefore, let us follow holy Marguerite in this look toward Jesus. Let us read the book of his life, let us allow ourselves to be enlightened and cleansed, to learn the true life.

Hermeneutics of the desert (and Nicholas Nickleby)

Another short extract (the previous one here) from a translation of a talk by Dom David Bird OSB given in Rome in 1995 and entitled Lectio Divina as school of prayer among the Fathers of the Desert. The full version (highly recommended) can be read here on his Monks and Mermaids blog.

According to the modern method of lectio divina, one should read slowly and stop at a verse long enough for it to nourish the heart or the spirit, if not the emotions, and pass to the following verse when the feelings have cooled or when the attention is lost.

The first monks, for their part, stayed with a verse as long as they had not put it into practice.

Someone comes to abba Pambo asking him to teach him a psalm. Pambo begins to teach him psalm 38: but hardly has he pronounced the first verse: "I said: 'I will be watchful of my ways, for fear I should sin with my tongue?..." the brother does not wish to hear any more.

He tells Pambo, "this verse is enough for me; please God I may have the strength to learn it and put it into practice". Nineteen years later he was still trying....

Likewise, someone asked abba Abraham, who was an excellent scribe as well as a man of prayer, to copy psalm 33.

He copied only verse 15: "Turn away from evil and do good; seek after peace and pursue it", saying to the brother: "Put this into practice first, and then I will write the rest..."

The Bible, for the Fathers, is not something that one knows with the intellect, or even with the heart, as we like to say these days, (often enough, however, confusing the biblical concept of heart with a notion of "heart" more recent and somewhat sentimental).

For the Fathers, one knows the bible by assimilating it to the point of translating it into life. All other knowledge that does not lead to this is useless.

(While reading the above I was irresistibly reminded of the following passage from Nicholas Nickleby; the hermeneutics of the desert requires the touch of an Abba Pambo rather than that of a Wackford Squeers...)

‘This is the first class in English spelling and philosophy, Nickleby,’ said Squeers, beckoning Nicholas to stand beside him. ‘We’ll get up a Latin one, and hand that over to you. Now, then, where’s the first boy?’

‘Please, sir, he’s cleaning the back-parlour window,’ said the temporary head of the philosophical class.

‘So he is, to be sure,’ rejoined Squeers. ‘We go upon the practical mode of teaching, Nickleby; the regular education system. C-l-e-a-n, clean, verb active, to make bright, to scour. W-i-n, win, d-e-r, der, winder, a casement. When the boy knows this out of book, he goes and does it....That’s our system, Nickleby: what do you think of it?’

‘It’s very useful one, at any rate,’ answered Nicholas.

Aquinas - "be renewed in the spirit of your minds"

One of the choices for today's first reading at the Office of Readings in the Divine Office (aka Liturgy of the Hours) is 2 Corinthians 4:16-5.10.

St Thomas Aquinas offers a particularly rich commentary on this section of 2 Corinthians, a portion of which (on verse 16 - though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed every day) I have posted at Enlarging the Heart.

The way in which Aquinas weaves a tapestry out of scriptural quotations in order to produce an exegesis which is both thoroughly Patristic and thoroughly Thomist provides good material for a lectio of the passage:

"Our old self was crucified with him" (Rom. 6:6);
"Rottenness enters into my bones" (Hab. 3:16);
"What is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away" (Heb. 8:13);
"Be renewed in the spirit of your minds" (Eph. 4:23);
"Your youth is renewed like the eagle's" (Ps. 103:5);
"Ascending in his heart" (Ps. 84:7, Vulgate).

Full text here.