Libro Segundo — Capítulo 3
The Necessity of Total Purgation
The soul must undergo a thorough purgation of both sensory and spiritual parts, as the roots of sensory disorder are deeply seated in the spirit.
A note on what follows 1. So then, these spiritual people are already advanced by the time they have spent feeding the senses with sweet communications, so that the sensory part—drawn and delighted by the spiritual delight that flowed to it from the spirit—might be joined and fitted into one with the spirit, each partaking in its own way of the same spiritual food from the same dish of one single person and subject, so that they, in some way joined and brought into harmony as one, may together be ready to endure the harsh and hard purgation of the spirit that awaits them.1 For in it these two parts of the soul—the spiritual and the sensory—must be thoroughly purged, because one is never well purged without the other, since the purgation that truly works for the sense is when the purgation of the spirit begins in earnest. It follows that the night of the sense we’ve discussed can and should more properly be called a kind of reformation and bridling of the appetite than a purgation. The reason is that all the imperfections and disorders of the sensory part have their strength and root in the spirit, where all good and bad habits are seated. Until these are purged, the rebellions and warped leanings of the sense cannot be fully cleansed.2
Strength for the Second Night
The initial reformation of the senses provides the necessary strength for the soul to endure the more intense and demanding purgation of the spirit.
2. That is why, in this following night, both parts are purged together. This is why it was necessary to have gone through the reforming of the first night and the calm that followed it: so that the senses, joined with the spirit, might be purged to some degree and endure this with greater strength. A purging this intense and difficult requires such readiness; without the weakness of the lower part having first been reformed and having gained strength in God through the sweet and savory dealings it later had with him, nature would have lacked the strength and readiness to endure it.
Stripping the Old Self for Union
God strips the soul of its childish spiritual attachments and sensory comforts to prepare it for the divine union of love.
3. Therefore, because for these advanced souls the dealings and operations they still have with God are still very low and very natural—because the gold of the spirit has not yet been purified and illuminated—they still understand God as little children do, and they still know and feel God as little children do, as Saint Paul says (1 Cor. 13:11)—because they have not yet reached perfection, which is the union of the soul with God. Through that union they then, as grown men and women, work great things in their spirit, their works and faculties already more divine than human, as will be said later. Wanting to strip them in fact of this old self and clothe them with the new—which, according to God, is created in the newness of understanding, as the Apostle says (Col.3 He strips their faculties, affections, and senses—spiritual as well as sensory, exterior as well as interior—leaving the understanding in darkness, the will dried out, the memory empty, and the soul's affections in extreme affliction, bitterness, and distress. He deprives the soul of the feeling and delight it used to take in spiritual goods, so that this deprivation may serve as one of the principles required in the spirit if the spiritual form is to be introduced and united within it—that is, the union of love.4
The Dark Contemplation
The Lord accomplishes this purification through dark contemplation, which is the primary focus of the soul's journey.
The Lord accomplishes all of this in her through a pure and dark contemplation, as the soul makes clear in the first song. Although that song is presented with the first night of the sense in mind, the soul understands it primarily as referring to this second night of the spirit, because that night is the principal part of the soul's purification.5 And so, for this purpose, we'll set it out and explain it here once more.
Read the original Latin
Anotación para lo que se sigue
1. Estando ya, pues, estos espirituales ya aprovechados, por el tiempo que han pasado cebando los sentidos con dulces comunicaciones, para que así atraída y saboreada del espiritual gusto la parte sensitiva, que del espíritu le manaba, se aunase y acomodase en uno con el espíritu, comiendo cada uno en su manera de un mismo manjar espiritual en un mismo plato de un solo supuesto y sujeto, para que así ellos, en alguna manera juntos y conformes en uno, juntos estén dispuestos para sufrir la áspera y dura purgación del espíritu que les espera. Porque en ella se han de purgar cumplidamente estas dos partes del alma, espiritual y sensitiva, porque la una nunca se purga bien sin la otra, porque la purgación válida para el sentido es cuando de propósito comienza la del espíritu. De donde la noche que habemos dicho del sentido, más se puede y debe llamar cierta reformación y enfrenamiento del apetito que purgación. La causa es porque todas las imperfecciones y desórdenes de la parte sensitiva tienen su fuerza y raíz en el espíritu, donde se sujetan todos los hábitos buenos y malos, y así, hasta que éstos se purgan, las rebeliones y siniestros del sentido no se pueden bien purgar.
2. De donde en esta noche que se sigue se purgan entrambas partes juntas, que éste es el fin porque convenía haber pasado por la reformación de la primera noche y la bonanza que de ello salió, para que, aunado con el espíritu el sentido, en cierta manera se purgue y padezca aquí con más fortaleza, porque para tan fuerte y dura purga es menester (disposición) tan grande; que, sin haber reformádose antes la flaqueza de la parte inferior y cobrado fortaleza en Dios por el dulce y sabroso trato que con él después tuvo, ni tuviera fuerza ni disposición el natural para sufrirla.
3. Por tanto, porque estos aprovechados todavía el trato y operaciones que tienen con Dios son muy bajas y muy naturales, a causa de no tener purificado e ilustrado el oro del espíritu; por lo cual todavía entienden de Dios como pequeñuelos, y saben y sienten de Dios como pequeñuelos, según dice san Pablo (1 Cor. 13, 11), por no haber llegado a la perfección, que es la unión del alma con Dios; por la cual unión ya, como grandes, obran grandezas en su espíritu, siendo ya sus obras y potencias más divinas que humanas, como después se dirá. Queriendo Dios desnudarlos de hecho de este viejo hombre y vestirlos del nuevo, que según Dios es criado en la novedad del sentido, que dice el Apóstol (Cl. 3, 10), desnúdales las potencias y afecciones y sentidos, así espirituales como sensitivos, así exteriores como interiores, dejando a ocuras el entendimiento, y la voluntad a secas, y vacía la memoria, y las afecciones del alma en suma aflicción, amargura y aprieto, privándola del sentido y gusto que antes sentía de los bienes espirituales, para que esta privación sea uno de los principios que se requiere en el espíritu para que se introduzca y una en él la forma espiritual del espíritu, que es la unión de amor.
Todo lo cual obra el Señor en ella por medio de una pura y oscura contemplación, como el alma lo da a entender por la primera canción. La cual, aunque está declarada al propósito de la primera noche del sentido, principalmente la entiende el alma por esta segunda del espíritu, por ser la principal parte de la purificación del alma. Y así, a este propósito la pondremos y declararemos aquí otra vez.
Notes
- 1 ↩Spanish «supuesto y sujeto» is scholastic: one single suppositum/subject (one person as the metaphysical seat of both sense and spirit).
- 2 ↩«siniestros» rendered as «warped leanings» (crooked/ill-bent tendencies of sense), not merely «misfortunes».
- 3 ↩Spanish 'novedad del sentido' follows Juan's biblical phrasing for Col 3:10; rendered as 'newness of understanding' (sense/mind), not physical sense-perception.
- 4 ↩Source reading 'a ocuras' treated as 'a oscuras' ('in darkness'); almost certainly a scribal/typographic error.
- 5 ↩"noche del sentido" / "noche del espíritu" kept as "night of the sense" / "night of the spirit" to preserve San Juan's technical sense–spirit contrast rather than flattening to ordinary "senses."
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