The roots
of lectio divina lie back in the earliest days of the
Christian church, especially in the teaching of the desert fathers
and mothers and in the Benedictine tradition. The classic
description of lectio was written sometime later, though, by a
Carthusian prior called Guigo II who lived in the French Alps during
the twelfth century. He writes about his thinking in a simple,
unaffected way:
One
day when I was busy working with my hands I began to think about
our spiritual work, and all at once four stages in spiritual
exercise came into my mind: reading (lectio), meditating
(meditatio), prayer (oratio) and contemplation (contemplatio)
. . . Reading is the careful study of the Scriptures,
concentrating all one’s powers on it. Meditation is the busy
application of the mind to seek with the help of one’s own
reason for knowledge of inner truth. Prayer is the heart’s
devoted turning to God to drive away evil and obtain what is
good. Contemplation is when the mind is in some sort lifted up
to God and held above itself, so that it tastes the joys of
everlasting sweetness (Scala Claustralium, chapter II).
Guigo is
describing a way of reading Scripture which is quite different to
the approach many of us have learned. This is not a “study” of
Scripture, an attempt to draw out from the Bible eternal principles
which we then teach others or apply in our own lives—coming to the
Bible as though it were a user’s manual for the Christian life.
Guigo assumes that, when Paul writes that “all Scripture is
God-breathed” (2 Tim. 3:16), he is speaking less about issues of
truth and infallibility, and more about the infusion of divine life
itself into the text. So, when practicing lectio, we do not
come looking for doctrines to be learned—we come looking for a
Presence to be encountered. The Bible is not so much the stone
tablets recording the law, as it is the burning bush from which God
speaks . . . here and now.
Lectio
divina begins, of course, with reading. A careful, attentive,
prayerful, and open-hearted reading of the Bible. This takes time.
We cannot read Scripture the way we read the New York Times
or an article on Wikipedia. The Bible is not susceptible to
skimming, to summarizing, to speed-reading; there is a fundamental
difference between Google and the gospel. Scripture is deep, rich,
complex, and multi-layered. It speaks through nuances and details.
It yields its fruit slowly and gently. This means we need to find
the right environment to practice lectio with prayerful
attention. We can, of course, read the Bible anywhere: on a train,
in a mall, over a coffee in Starbucks. But some places are more
conducive to lectio than others; a good length of time spent reading
in uninterrupted quiet is essential. For some, that is hard to
achieve. Try not to fret about this: take what time you can, where
you can. A good half hour once a week is better than a frantic five
minutes every day.
Reading
leads to meditation (meditatio). Christians of past
generations had a very rich idea of what the inspiration of
Scripture might mean: for them, it meant that the consistent
character and purposes of God were reflected in every part of the
Bible, so each passage of the Bible spoke to all other passages. We
see this in Paul’s letters: the lives of Sarah and Hagar are figures
of the two covenants (Gal. 4:12); the Hebrews drank water from the
rock, and that rock was really Christ (1 Cor. 10:4); the veil over
the glory of Moses’ face is the veil over the hearts of those who do
not receive Christ (2 Cor. 3:15). Meditation is the process of slow
reflection on Scripture that allows these perpetual echoes to be
heard, so that over time the various voices and stories of the Bible
integrate into the one great narrative of God and creation. By
reflecting on Scripture, we allow the Spirit to speak through the
words of the many human authors; we take inspiration
seriously.
After
meditation comes prayer, oratio. But this is not the place to
lay down the Bible and take up our intercession lists. When we speak
of prayer in the process of lectio, we are speaking of
allowing the text to draw us beyond the page into the Presence. As
we listen for the voice of the Spirit in Scripture, so we respond to
the Spirit present within us. We transform our reading into
conversation, sharing with God our responses to the text, the
concerns it raises, the memories it provokes, the people it reminds
us about. In turn, we listen for God’s direct and present voice
replying, bringing the text alive in our current experience. We
allow the living and active word to speak into our lives, to
challenge and provoke us, to comfort and console us.
And
finally we come to rest in contemplation—perhaps the least
understood movement in lectio divina. We often use the word
“contemplation” to mean thinking; perhaps, then, contemplation is
yet more reflecting on the words of the passage? No. In the
Christian tradition, contemplatio is becoming still in the
presence of God, neither speaking nor necessarily being spoken to,
but simply waiting attentively and lovingly on God. Think of the way
old friends can allow conversation to drift into companionable
silence. When our relationship is deep and rich enough, we do not
need to talk all the time: it is enough just to be together. This is
contemplatio. We have allowed Scripture not only to increase
our knowledge of God, but also to entice us into deeper relationship
with God.
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Rediscovering Centeredness
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
 |
| ©Andris Piebalgs |
Dreamstime.co |
M. Scott Rogers discovered his
centredness when reading Henri Nouwen's
The Genesee Diary.
I started a journal to pair
with reading this book. It’s the first such journal I have
consistently written in. What strikes me, is the fact that
journaling is too a lost practice among many Christians. Which
has prompted me to find the reason for disappearance of these
disciplines. The only answer I can find is the trend to become
more free-spirited in our religious pursuits, trading what
benefits us for what feels better, what is more enticing. The
idea of prolong stretches of silence in a church service equates
to the unexpected interruption of a blockbuster movie at the
theater. We leave, we check out.
Moments of
silence, of stillness offer us the opportunity to reflect, to
consider, to digest what we’ve seen, heard, and emotionally
felt. Instead we
tend towards the side of annoyance, disparaged by the halt in
“entertainment” which what so many evangelical churches have
become. I know they, the pastors and church staff, mean well.
Still, how can I really implement anything they teach if I don’t
quiet myself long enough to hear the expressed and implied
meaning of the message?
read
more
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Discipleship
