Definition of Contemplation: What it is not and what it is

[nuntym]

• JMJ +

Affirmative and negative approaches to God are not in conflict with each other or mutually opposed; rather, they are mutually supportive. One is typically brought to the negative way through the affirmative. For this, one need only look to St. John of the Cross - the master of the via negativa - who wrote some of the most affirmative language we might find.

The distinction is that when contemplation proceeds to it’s infused forms … then, by definition, affirmative ways yield to the negative. In this type of contemplation, God is not grasped by our concepts of Him … He is tasted by an experiential encounter which transcends all “images, forms or ideas” of Him.

Using this language, “images, forms and ideas” are the stuff of the affirmative way. Necessary and worthy in their own right.

To illustrate further, using language from the catechism:

The “loving conversation between friends” can be a type of contemplation of the affirmative way. The “I look at Him and He looks at me,” on the other hand, is a type of contemplation that tends toward the negative. And both examples are contemplation in the acquired form … the affirmative leading to the quasi-negative … which then proceeds to the true negative of infused contemplation, God willing.

There is a “flow” to all this that is very difficult to put into words.

Dave

I do wonder if infused contemplation is just of a “truly negative” nature, because I do remember all the times I had infused contemplation they were of a “super-positive” nature.

The most extreme actually for me was the first time it happened to me, and it was something totally unexpected and unmerited. It was almost ten years ago when I was kneeling in my room, feeling down about my inability to rise from my habitual sins and languor. I was praying in front of the crucifix hanging at the wall, and I asked God, “Lord, I want to give up to be good, why should I strive when I am always failing? Let me at least feel how much you love me.”

Suddenly a torrent of love went in me. It was so intense, the feeling of how much I was loved, that it felt like liquid ecstatic joy was being poured into me and it was about to drown me, and it felt like I was in that state for many minutes and I was pleading, “Lord, enough! Please, enough Lord, I am going to die!” And just like that, it stopped. I truly still have no idea how long that ecstasy lasted, for it never occurred to me to look at any clock then. I do remember I was crying after all of that. And for days after that I was very good with all of my dealings and prayers, but the zeal subsided. But the memory persists until now, and it is that memory that still drives me on to strive to love God no matter how many times I fail.

The subsequent infused contemplations that I experienced were very few and very far in between (years in fact, although the last ones were just months ago) and of much less intensity, but each and every time were super-affirmations of the mercy and love of God for us all that I have learned over the years.

 

[JimR-OCDS]

Infused Contemplation is Supernatural.

In fact, St Teresa never uses the term, “Contemplation,” but “Supernatural Prayer.”

Her writings were primarily on the level of infused Contemplation.

The theologians over the centuries have debated the terms, and still do.

The one constant is that contemplation is an experience the individual has with God, and the experience is unique to them and commonalities are merely reduced with terms in an attempt to explain them.

It’s why St Teresa herself wrote that unless the reader has experienced what she is writing about, it will probably not make much sense.

Jim

 

[Vouthon]

It’s why St Teresa herself wrote that unless the reader has experienced what she is writing about, it will probably not make much sense.

Jim

Yes Jim

Its also why Blessed Jan van Ruysbroeck said the following:

“…Behold! by each of these images, I show forth to God-seeing men their being and their exercise, but none else can understand them. For the contemplative life cannot be taught. But where the Eternal Truth reveals Itself within the spirit all that is needful is taught and learnt…”

***- Blessed Jan van Ruysbroeck (1293 – 1381), The Sparkling Stone ***

 

[nuntym]

• JMJ +

Infused Contemplation is Supernatural.

In fact, St Teresa never uses the term, “Contemplation,” but “Supernatural Prayer.”

Her writings were primarily on the level of infused Contemplation.

The theologians over the centuries have debated the terms, and still do.

The one constant is that contemplation is an experience the individual has with God, and the experience is unique to them and commonalities are merely reduced with terms in an attempt to explain them.

It’s why St Teresa herself wrote that unless the reader has experienced what she is writing about, it will probably not make much sense.

Jim

So maybe that’s the answer to the OP, at least when it comes to infused contemplation. Infused contemplation is supernatural, and what it is is when you experience it, and what it is not for you is how others experience it.

You know, that brings me back to our previous disagreements before about all of this: maybe I was interpreting your and others’ description of contemplation according to how I experienced it and came to it, and vice versa…or maybe it was just me.

Man, I feel so :banghead::banghead::banghead::banghead:

 

[Vouthon]

• JMJ +I do wonder if infused contemplation is just of a “truly negative” nature, because I do remember all the times I had infused contemplation they were of a “super-positive” nature.

I think that infused contemplation must be thought of as apophatic or else something very significant regarding it goes amiss. To have an intuitive consciousness of the immediate Presence of God in prayer, without any intermediaries, is to be in the presence of something beyond our powers of cognition but not our capability to know through our love and ardent will. Recall how St. Paul told us that love alone never “ends”. Reason has a limit. Love does not.

Cataphatic prayer has a special and essential place. It can truly realize or affirm that God is and that something about God can be known through creation or revelation. It cannot touch the inmost reality of God, however, since human reason cannot attain something above itself.

There must then come a time when God dispenses with our reasoning faculties altogether and takes us where conditioned thought-processes cannot but where our love and our will subservient to Him can.

There are other forms of contemplation besides the apophatic but all of them have in common a certain passivity and docility of faculties in the Presence of God that ultimately tends towards an experience beyond form, image and idea even where it does not directly lead to it, since God is beyond form, image and idea.

 

[DBT]

Man, I feel so :banghead::banghead::banghead::banghead:

Well this is something we can all relate to sometimes

When I get to this point, I like to step back and look in wonder at the incredible diversity of mystical expression the Church has given us. Even in Carmel, there are members who are drawn to St. John … others to St. Teresa … and still others to St. Therese of Liseaux, Bl Elizabeth of the Trinity, Brother Lawrence or a host of others. It is perfectly alright to gravitate toward those mystics and writers that speak to us most clearly … and not force teachings and/or styles that don’t come naturally to us. Ironically, each speak of the same realities … but they do it in very different ways based on their own personal experience of things.

Bottom-line: there are many flowers in the field … so we should use the teachings that most directly help us grow in our relationship with Christ. A daisy is a daisy … a rose a rose. Yet they’re both flowers through and through.

Dave

 

[nuntym]

• JMJ +

I think that infused contemplation must be thought of as apophatic or else something very significant regarding it goes amiss. To have an intuitive consciousness of the immediate Presence of God in prayer, without any intermediaries, is to be in the presence of something beyond our powers of cognition but not our capability to know through our love and ardent will. Recall how St. Paul told us that love alone never “ends”. Reason has a limit. Love does not.

Cataphatic prayer has a special and essential place. It can truly realize or affirm that God is and that something about God can be known through creation or revelation. It cannot touch the inmost reality of God, however, since human reason cannot attain something above itself.

There must then come a time when God dispenses with our reasoning faculties altogether and takes us where conditioned thought-processes cannot but where our love and our will subservient to Him can.

There are other forms of contemplation besides the apophatic but all of them have in common a certain passivity and docility of faculties in the Presence of God that ultimately tends towards an experience beyond form, image and idea even where it does not directly lead to it, since God is beyond form, image and idea.

Actually I mean “cataphatic prayer” that goes so beyond what reason has affirmed that it goes into the “apophatic”. This is what I mean by “super-positive”. In fact, the traditional teaching of apophatic prayer is not that God is dark, but that the Light of God is so bright that it blinds us when we get near.

As I said, in my experience, infused contemplation just “super-affirms” the reasoning of faith that at its most extreme I thought I was going to die.

But if you are saying of “apophatic” to mean that we cannot will it, then you are right, all the moments of infused contemplation in my experience were unmerited and unexpected.

And in here, I can see what Jim is saying that in infused contemplation, language starts to break down.

 

[DBT]

There must then come a time when God dispenses with our reasoning faculties altogether and takes us where conditioned thought-processes cannot but where our love and our will subservient to Him can.

Yes, this is the essence of the infused … thank you!

 

[Vouthon]

Bl Elizabeth of the Trinity

I have a true soft spot for Blessed Elizabeth of the Trinity

She is the one person I ask for intercession above all. We have a shared love for Bl. Jan van Ruysbroeck (he was her favourite mystical writer)

I think it so lovely that a French Carmelite was so influenced by the writings of an Augustinian canon who wrote in Flemish Our faith is truly universal above language and geography!

 

[franklinstower]

• JMJ +
  Franklinstower, thank you for mentioning that book, I am very intrigued of it and I am considering to buy it.

I went to the Amazon website of the book and read the reviews there, and one of them intrigued me very much:

Of most importance to the Western mystical tradition is the concept of the via negativa, that God is best understood and contemplated in terms of what God is not, the negative attributes of God. What has been called the apophatic or negative theology of the Greeks has become integral to the Latin canon and is in fact fundamental to the mystical theology expounded in the writings of the master himself, St. John of the Cross. His description of the ascetical path of the soul toward God as a “dark night”–a permutation of the via negativa–has become one of the treasures of Western spiritual heritage.

Looking back from now, I hazard to guess that this is because I have been called to Marian spirituality, which focuses on the Incarnate Mystery of Jesus. This is a literally down-to-earth spirituality and that is almost diametrically opposite of via negativa, because it tries to find and understand God through His interaction with creation, most especially in the Incarnation of Jesus Christ. Thus, an incarnate spirituality (if there is such a term) sees God everywhere, but first by looking at and loving the mysteries of the life of Christ. St. Francis de Sales wrote about this in An Introduction to the Spiritual Life:

[T]hose who love God cannot cease thinking of Him, living for Him, longing after Him, speaking of Him, and fain would they grave the Holy Name of Jesus in the hearts of every living creature they behold.

And to such an outpour of love all creation bids us–nothing that He has made but is filled with the praise of God, and, as says S. Augustine, everything in the world speaks silently but clearly to the lovers of God of their love, exciting them to holy desires, whence gush forth aspirations and loving cries to God.

St. Gregory Nazianzen tells his flock, how, walking along the seashore, he watched the waves as they washed up shells and sea weeds, and all manner of small substances, which seemed, as it were, rejected by the sea, until a return wave would often wash part thereof back again; while the rocks remained firm and immoveable, let the waves beat against them never so fiercely. And then the Saint went on to reflect that feeble hearts let themselves be carried hither and thither by the varying waves of sorrow or consolation, as the case might be, like the shells upon the seashore, while those of a nobler mould abide firm and immoveable amid every storm;–whence he breaks out into David’s cry, “Lord, save me, for the waters are gone over my soul; deliver me from the great deep, all Thy waves and storms are gone over me;” for he was himself then in trouble by reason of the ungodly usurpation of his See by Maximus.

Numerous other examples of such are given in the source of the above quote: catholictreasury.info/books/devout_life/dev36.php

Now is this contemplation? Yes, according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

2715 Contemplation also turns its gaze on the mysteries of the life of Christ. Thus it learns the “interior knowledge of our Lord,” the more to love him and follow him.

Thus many saints, theologians, and even popes have maintained that the Rosary, with its meditations on the different events of Jesus and Mary’s life, is an eminently contemplative prayer.

Now what I am intrigued of is, if I am not mistaken, another spirituality that is not based on apophatic theology, which is the Oriental tradition. I am very intrigued indeed

I strongly recommend you get that book. It is considered to be one of the great works from the orthodox faith. However they are huge proponents of the negative way or apophaticism. I am neither Catholic nor from the Eastern Church so I feel like I am missing something in your understanding of apophaticism and in the way that it is applied in Catholicism. One of the main differences from Catholic to Eastern is that although both follow the path of negation-- for the Orthodox it is not a negative experience emotionally or mentally, it is an overwhelmingly positive one. Also in their focus on the trinity they place a heavier emphasis on the persons rather than on the nature of God and this leads to a more personal connection to the persons of the Trinity rather than what they term as the “God of the abyss” in western mysticism.

Another dimension of their spirituality that I think you will appreciate is the fully cosmic dimension of their mysticism. I also experience this and it is very important to me. For them they grow in the awareness of what they call the “Uncreated Energies” of God- they are not God but they are not of the created order either, they emanate off of God eternally and necessarily. Through participation in these energies one begins to experience the whole cosmos as increasingly penetrated by these spiritual forces and one experiences a kind of communion with the whole of the cosmos and all of life in it. This experience is normative for them as is transfiguration and miracles of healing.

This is particularly important for me because a very sacred and significant part of my mysticism happens to me through communion with nature-- nature for me is God expressing itself in a physical way-- it is God saying something. This is a very profound aspect of spirituality for me that I feel I would be in poverty if I did not have.

 

[franklinstower]

Continued

Another thing I liked about the eastern perspective is that it is more mystical than the west and I think that is better in every possible way. Vladimir Loskey said that no one has the right to be a theologian unless they are first a mystic. I may take some heat for saying this on this forum and I wont argue anyone for it-- but I do agree 100%.

Let me know if you would like to know more because I am so enjoying this talk.

 

[Vouthon]

Actually I mean “cataphatic prayer” that goes so beyond what reason has affirmed that it goes into the “apophatic”.

Since “cataphatic” is to affirm what God is, rather than what He is not, how can a cataphatic experience be ineffable and beyond human language to adequately describe? How thereby can it be above reason?

This is what I mean by “super-positive”. In fact, the traditional teaching of apophatic prayer is not that God is dark, but that the Light of God is so bright that it blinds us when we get near.

Amen. It blinds the eyes of our reason with His ineffable splendour, to paraphrase Ruysbroeck. Nevertheless “dark” and “light” are both poetic metaphors. The experience is ultimately and actually formless, bereft of visual images whether of darkness or light. God gives us what eyes have not seen, ears have not heard, hands have not touched and what has never arisen in the human heart. How do you describe what you can’t see, hear, touch or imagine? How does this fit with the affirmative way? I ask as a genuine question, not because I think you are wrong, but rather because I wish to understand the apparent paradox that I see.

Do you mean because it is “personal”? It is indeed a personal encounter with the Living God but does that make it any less apophatic?

But if you are saying of “apophatic” to mean that we cannot will it, then you are right, all the moments of infused contemplation in my experience were unmerited and unexpected.

Infused contemplation cannot be willed. We are fully agreed there God dispenses with our reasoning faculties, not us. However we must have the will to submit to the Divine Embrace, which is normally established in the earlier stages when we strive to conform our will to His. The “will” and our “love” go where our reason cannot.

 

[hazcompat]

14 The Kinds of Divine Union e. The Different Kinds of Union with God

We must remember here that John has distinguished three kinds of union with God. 1 By means of the first God dwells substantially in all created things and sustains their existence. By the second, we are to understand the indwelling of God in the soul through grace; by the third, the transforming union through perfect love that divinizes the soul.

Stein, Edith (2011-03-17). The Science of the Cross (The Collected Works of Edith Stein Vol. 6) (Kindle Locations 2919-2922). ICS Publications. Kindle Edition.

Peace

 

[franklinstower]

Have you been following the thread from the beginning? Prayer begins in heaven. God is perfect prayer. The differences or “types of prayer” reflect the capacity of the one who prays. (As an aside this has implications on how we perceive the praying of our enemy).

The thread has delineated between “infused” and “acquired” contemplative prayer. Lately we are chatting about the soul, and whether striving, depriving, or some level of effort/difficulty is essential. My point is neither sweetness or repugnance are of the essence of the Union.

We do not have to turn to God, If it is His Will, He Will put a hook in our nose and bring us back from the edge of the abyss. Even the very wicked can experience God. Think of Saul on the road to Damascus. As to categorizing? I think the Union comes first. The sweet and difficult are realities of the return journey. It is the only way one could articulate what is ultimately “unutterable”.

Peace

Yes, I have been following the thread-- there was something of the energy in your post that I really wanted you to elaborate on. I felt it could be useful to me and I thank you for elaborating.

And I think it speaks to a point I made a couple of posts ago about how we are coloring our experience with God through our beliefs about the path and how I think that *for some people *it is important to take as great a care as possible that we divorce ourselves from the moods and accounts of other mystics so that God can continue to provide infinite diversity of ways into union, and of ways to express the union we find.

Every single leaf, every single tree, every single cloud and all things in nature are endlessly unique and diverse and I think this is a reflection of Gods mind.

 

[Vouthon]

Also in their focus on the trinity they place a heavier emphasis on the persons rather than on the nature of God and this leads to a more personal connection to the persons of the Trinity rather than what they term as the “God of the abyss” in western mysticism.

I disagree I think that this is a common misconception about Western mysticism on the part of Orthodox Christians that has no bearing in reality, perhaps because they have read too much Meister Eckhart and taken him more literally than he desired. There are no mystics in the Orthodox tradition that I know of who are any more focused on a personal encounter with God than St. Bernard of Clairvaux. We find nothing of “abyss” imagery in him, rather we find the most beautiful fruition of biblical love imagery inspired by the Song of Songs, in which contemplation is framed as the Spiritual Marriage between the soul and her Divine Beloved.

The Catholic mystics hold the most supreme mystical experience to be the entrance of God’s creatures into the Blessed life of the Holy Trinity. We never lose sight of the Persons for some vague pantheistic “nature” focused approach.

 

[nuntym]

• JMJ +

Hmmm…well for starters, you do not need to choose between Eastern or Western Christianity, if you are so inclined, because there are Eastern Catholic Churches fully in communion with the Pope who have all the traditions of the Orthodox Churches but are in one Spirit with the whole Catholic Church.

Secondly, when it comes to the apophatic traditions of Western Christianity I have very rudimentary knowledge of it, as when I tried to apply it to my life I find that I cannot, so I went to the cataphatic tradition, which is actually substantial. However, as I mentioned above, cataphatic spirituality can lead to via negativa because God’s positive attributes so far surpasses our reasoning that we can get blinded in our minds the more we get closer to God.

Thirdly, I do not think that the Western Church is less mystic but that it is more diverse.

As for other points, I will refrain from commenting until I have read more

 

[Vouthon]

However, as I mentioned above, cataphatic spirituality can lead to via negativa because God’s positive attributes so far surpasses our reasoning that we can get blinded in our minds the more we get closer to God

I agree

 

[nuntym]

• JMJ +

How do you describe what you can’t see, hear, touch or imagine? How does this fit with the affirmative way? I ask as a genuine question, not because I think you are wrong, but rather because I wish to understand the apparent paradox that I see.

Do you mean because it is “personal”? It is indeed a personal encounter with the Living God but does that make it any less apophatic?

Argh, well I don’t know how to say it, but those experiences of mine affirm that God is Love, but in a way that is beyond my reasoning, because although I was experiencing His love for me, I just know that there is even something beyond what I was experiencing, and in God’s mercy He willed that He did not force any more on me or I would have died, but it does affirm my belief that God’s love and mercy is beyond understanding, imagining, and feeling, which I have known through faith and reason. Do you understand? Sorry, everything is just beyond words.

Infused contemplation cannot be willed. We are fully agreed there God dispenses with our reasoning faculties, not us. However we must have the will to submit to the Divine Embrace, which is normally established in the earlier stages when we strive to conform our will to His. The “will” and our “love” go where our reason cannot.

Agreed Although I would amend that our reason would point to the general direction where our will and love should go, but reason cannot go with them.

 

[franklinstower]

I disagree I think that this is a common misconception about Western mysticism on the part of Orthodox Christians that has no bearing in reality, perhaps because they have read too much Meister Eckhart and taken him more literally than he desired. There are no mystics in the Orthodox tradition that I know of who are any more focused on a personal encounter with God than St. Bernard of Clairvaux. We find nothing of “abyss” imagery in him, rather we find the most beautiful fruition of biblical love imagery inspired by the Song of Songs, in which contemplation is framed as the Spiritual Marriage between the soul and her Divine Beloved.

The Catholic mystics hold the most supreme mystical experience to be the entrance of God’s creatures into the Blessed life of the Holy Trinity. We never lose sight of the Persons for some vague pantheistic “nature” focused approach.

I believe you about not losing sight of the personal dimension and I don’t think the author was being unfair-- he was just stating that the different understanding of the trinity has led to a different flavor of mysticism. I think the differences are subtle but there.

In either case-- I have no intention of offending anyone by my posts I am just generally making the observation that the books we read, and the mystics we study are coloring our experience. I think that is important to recognize especially in systems that shy away from the use of techniques so that we can let God reveal itself to us.

 

[Vouthon]

franklinstower:
I believe you about not losing sight of the personal dimension and I don’t think the author was being unfair-- he was just stating that the different understanding of the trinity has led to a different flavor of mysticism. I think the differences are subtle but there.

**In either case-- I have no intention of offending anyone by my posts I am just generally making the observation that the books we read, and the mystics we study are coloring our experience. ** I think that is important to recognize especially in systems that shy away from the use of techniques so that we can let God reveal itself to us.

With the bolded, I don’t disagree. That is a worthy contribution to the thread. I am also not in the least offended I have studied Hesychasm, from Diadochos of Photike up to St. Gregory Palamas. It is the other “lung” and sister of Western mysticism. We stem from the same Holy Spirit and common sources, despite our differences.

I simply disagree. The argument usually (if I can recall) rests upon the filioque and our understanding of the Holy Spirit as the bond of love between the Father and the Son. The Orthodox claim that this de-personalizes the Spirit, which I consider to be theologically imprecise. There’s also the fact that we don’t have the Essence/energy distinction.