De gradibus humilitatis et superbiae
The Seraphim's Veil: Humility and the Limits of Curiosity
The seraphim, by veiling the mysteries of heaven, teach the proud to accept their limits and refrain from shameless curiosity about divine secrets.
The seraphim, you see, with some of their wings of contemplation fly from the throne to the footstool and from the footstool back to the throne, while with others they veil the head and feet of the Lord. I believe they are placed there for this purpose: that just as the sinful man is barred from entering paradise by the cherubim, so too by the seraphim a limit is set on his curiosity — so that you no longer probe the secrets of heaven more shamelessly than wisely, and do not presume to know the mysteries of the Church here on earth, but content yourself only with the hearts of the proud, who neither deign to live on earth like other men nor, like the angels, fly up to heaven.✦✦12 Although their head in heaven and their feet on earth are hidden from you, still you are permitted to see something in between — but only to envy it: while you hang suspended in midair, you behold the angels descending through you and ascending, but what they hear in the heavens or announce to the earth, you simply do not know.
Read the original Latin
Seraphim namque aliis quidem alis suae contemplationis de throno ad scabellum, de scabello ad thronum volantia, aliis caput Domini pedesque velantia, ad hoc ibi posita puto, ut sicut peccanti homini paradisi per Cherubim prohibetur ingressus, ita et per Seraphim suae curiositate modus imponatur, quatenus nec caeli iam magis impudenter quam prudenter arcana rimeris, nec Ecclesiae mysteria cognoscas in terris, sed solis contentus sis cordibus superborum, qui nec in terra esse dignantur sicut ceteri hominum, nec sicut angeli volant ad caelum.
Licet vero et caput in caelo, et pedes in terra a te abscondantur, quiddam tamen tibi medium videndum ad invidendum dumtaxat permittitur, dum suspensus in aere, descendentes quidem per te et ascendentes angelos intueris, sed quid vel audiant in caelis, vel nuntient terris, penitus nescis.
Scripture echoes
- ↩Gen.3.24 — So he drove out the man, and he settled east of the Garden of Eden the cherubim, and the flaming sword that turns every way, to guard the way to the tree of life.
- ↩Isa.6.2 — Seraphim were standing above him; each one had six wings: with two each covered his face, with two each covered his feet, and with two each would fly.
Notes
- 1 ↩The ut clause (ut … imponatur) is ambiguous between purpose and result; the sicut…ita correlative frame favors a purpose reading, which has been adopted here.
- 2 ↩Curiositate rendered as 'curiosity' carries a negative sense here — an illicit prying into divine matters — not the neutral English sense of mere inquisitiveness.
De gradibus humilitatis et superbiae (On the Steps of Humility and Pride) companion
Humility is climbed one day at a time
Take the next step each morning with a free daily devotional in Chosen Portion.
Bernard frames humility as a ladder climbed by small repeated acts; Chosen Portion turns that into practice with one daily devotional step at a time.
- A daily 10-minute portion focused on one virtue at a time
- Re-take the 12-step self-check monthly and see real movement
- Historic texts like Bernard's, one readable portion per day