CAPUT XI. Quando oriatur vel ordinetur amor
The Birth of Divine Friendship
The soul begins to experience God's familiar visits and is drawn from fear to ardent love, forming a bond of friendship.
From then on, a certain familiarity begins to form between God and the soul, and a friendship is sealed, because the soul feels itself visited by him more often, and from his coming it is not only already comforted but sometimes even filled with an ineffable joy. This bonding of friendship (unless I'm mistaken) Leah had already sensed, when after Levi was born she proclaimed with great exultation: "Now my husband will be joined to me."✦ The true bridegroom of the soul is God, whom we truly join to ourselves when we cling to him through true love. Indeed, then he joins us to himself, when through certain interior exchanges he kindles us to his love and binds us more tightly.1 For what heart is so hard and so iron-like that divine kindness does not soften it by its presence, and does not draw it by its sweetness?2 So it happens that the one the soul had first grown used to fearing greatly, it later begins to love ardently.
Love Born from Hope
Just as sorrow follows fear, love is born after hope grows, and this love is symbolized by Judah, the fourth son of Jacob.
You already see, I think, that just as after fear grows day by day, sorrow necessarily arises, so too after hope is born and advances through daily growth, love is born. This, then, is that son of Jacob who is born in the fourth place, and is named in Scripture Judah, that is, 'confessing.'✦3
The Meaning of Judah's Name
The name Judah means 'confessing,' and true confession is praise arising from chaste love, a voice of exultation known uniquely by Judah.
If we look for the meaning of his name, we'll find it readily enough. For we know that everyone loves what he approves, and the more he loves it, the more fully he approves it. And what is it to approve, if not to praise? That—yes, that—is true praise; that is pure confession: what rises from chaste love, what proceeds from the wonder of praise.4 Do you want to know more clearly what the voice of exultation and confession is—the voice Judah alone knows, or knows more excellently than all the rest?
Read the original Latin
Incipit extunc quaedam familiaritas inter Deum et animam fieri, et amicitia confoederari, eo quod haec se sentiat ab illo saepius visitari, et ex ejus adventu non tantum jam consolari, imo aliquoties quodam ineffabili gaudio repleri. Hanc amicitiae confoederationem (nisi fallor) Lia praesenserat, quando jam nato Levi cum magna exsultatione proclamabat: Nunc copulabitur mihi vir meus. Verus animae sponsus Deus est, quem tunc veraciter nobis copulamus, quando ei per verum amorem inhaeremus. Imo vero tunc sibi nos ille connectit, quando nos quibusdam interius commerciis ad suum amorem accendit, et arctius astringit. Quod est enim cor tam durum et tam ferreum, quod divina pietas sua praesentia non emolliat, et sua dulcedine non alliciat? Unde fit ut quem prius consueverat multum formidare, incipiat postmodum ardenter amare. Vides jam, ut arbitror, quod quemadmodum post crescentem quotidie timorem, necessario subortus est dolor, sic utique post spem natam, et per quotidiana incrementa proficientem nascitur amor. Hic itaque est ille filiorum Jacob, qui quarto loco nascitur, et Judas, id est confitens, in Scriptura nominatur.
Cujus nominis, si rationem quaerimus, citius inveniemus. Scimus namque quia quisque quod approbat, hoc amat, et quo plus amat, tanto amplius approbat. Et quid est approbare, nisi laudare? Illa, illa utique est vera laudatio, illa est pura confessio, quae ex casta dilectione surgit, quae ex laudis admiratione procedit. Vultis nosse apertius quae sit vox exsultationis et confessionis quae novit Judas solus, vel caeteris omnibus excellentius?
Scripture echoes
- ↩Gen.29.34 — She conceived again and bore a son and said, "Now this time my husband will be joined to me, because I have borne him three sons." Therefore his name was called Levi.
- ↩Gen.29.35 — And she conceived again and bore a son, and said, "This time I will praise the LORD." Therefore she called his name Judah. And she stopped bearing.
Notes
- 1 ↩interius commerciis: rendered as 'interior exchanges' (mystical dealings/communications between God and the soul), not commercial trade.
- 2 ↩divina pietas: rendered as 'divine kindness' (tender mercy/loving pity of God), not human piety.
- 3 ↩confitens: etymology of Judah (praise/confession); here 'confessing' as praise and acknowledgment of God, not merely admission of sin—cf. Leah's 'Nunc confitebor Domino' (Gen 29:35).
- 4 ↩Here confessio is praise-confession (Judah as confitens), parallel to true laudatio, not sacramental confession of sin.
Benjamin Minor (The Twelve Patriarchs / Preparation of the Mind for Contemplation) companion
A daily portion of stillness
Chosen Portion delivers one short contemplative reading and a guided moment of silence each day — the ascent, one step at a time.
Chosen Portion is the paced doorway into this collection: it portions the dense mystical treatises into one daily reading plus guided silence, exactly as the 14-day plan teaches.
- Daily bite-sized excerpts from the contemplative classics, never a wall of text
- A built-in timed stillness practice that grows from 2 minutes to 10
- Gentle progression through the tradition — the app remembers where you are on the ascent