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Chapter 17Ansl.1.17

ORATIO XVII. AD CHRISTUM. Cum ardenti desiderio solum Christum amandi.

The Soul's First Cry to Christ

The soul calls upon Christ with burning desire, confesses its unworthiness, and overflows with tender names of love.

Jesus, our redemption, love and desire, God from God, be present to me, your servant. I call upon you; to you I cry out with a great cry, with my whole heart. I call you into my soul; enter into it, and join it to yourself, so that you may possess it without wrinkle and without spot.✦1 For a pure dwelling is owed to the most pure Lord. Sanctify me, therefore — your vessel, which you have made: empty out what is wicked, fill it with grace, and keep it full, so that I may be made a temple worthy of your dwelling, here and forever. Sweetest, most kind, most loving, dearest, most powerful, most desired, most precious, most lovable, most beautiful — you are sweeter than honey, whiter than milk and snow, more pleasant than nectar, more precious than gems and gold, and dearer to me than all the riches and honors of the lands.✦ What am I saying? My God, my only hope — how great is your mercy? What am I saying? O happy sweetness, O secure sweetness!

The Inadequacy of Human Praise

The soul laments that its words fall short of the angelic praise Christ deserves, yet longs to pour itself out wholly in His honour.

What am I even saying, when I talk like this? I say what I can, but I don't say what I should. If only I could speak as those choirs of angels singing their hymns!2 Oh, how gladly I would pour myself out completely in your praise! Oh, how devoutly I would sing those heavenly melodies to the praise and glory of your name, tirelessly, in the midst of the Church!

The Duty to Praise and the Supremacy of Divine Love

The soul resolves that silence about God is woe, confesses its inability to praise worthily, and declares that Christ is dearer than earth or heaven.

But since I can't do things like that, should I just stay silent? Woe to those who are silent about you — you who loose the mouths of the mute and make the tongues of infants eloquent.✦ How terrible for those who stay silent about you, since they themselves are eloquently mute when they fail to speak your praises. Who can worthily praise you, O ineffable power and wisdom of the Father? And since I find no words by which I can adequately set you forth, O almighty and all-knowing Word, I will say for now what I can, until you command me to come to you, where I may say what is fitting for you and what is required of me. And so I humbly ask that you look not only at what I'm saying now, but at what I long to say. For I deeply long to speak of you what is needful and fitting, because praise is owed to you, a hymn is owed to you, and all honor is due to you. You know, therefore, O God, knower of hidden things, that not only are you dearer to me than the earth and all that is in it, but even more welcome to me than heaven itself and all that is in it — for I love you above heaven and earth and everything else in them. Indeed, unless it is for the love of your name, whatever is transitory is surely not to be loved at all.✦

The Desire for Unceasing Contemplation

The soul asks to love Christ ever more, to meditate on Him without ceasing, and to be led at last to the beatific vision.

I love you, my God, with great love, and I want to love you even more. Grant that I may always love you as much as I want to, and as much as I ought to; and that you alone may be the whole focus of my intention and the whole substance of my meditation. May I meditate on you through the days without stopping; may I perceive you through the sleep of night; may my spirit address you, may my mind converse with you. May my heart be illuminated by the light of your holy vision so that, with you as my ruler and you as my guide, I may walk from strength to strength, and at last may I see you, the God of gods, in Zion — now indeed through a mirror in an enigma, but then face to face, where I may know you just as I am also known.✦✦3 Blessed are the pure in heart, for they themselves will see God.✦ Blessed are those who dwell in your house, Lord; they will praise you forever and ever.✦

A Living Sacrifice of Compunction and Love

The soul begs God to soften its stony heart, make it a living sacrifice, detach it from the world, and fill it with the honeyed fragrance and living water of divine love.

I ask you, therefore, Lord, through all your mercies — by which we have been freed from eternal death — soften my hard and stony heart, my rocky and iron heart, by your most sacred and powerful anointing, and make me, through the fire of compunction, become a living sacrifice before you at every hour.✦✦45 Grant that I may always have a contrite and humbled heart in your sight, with an abundance of tears.✦6 Grant that I may be utterly extinguished from this world by desire for you, and forget the things that pass away — because of the greatness of fear and love for you — to such a degree that I neither mourn nor rejoice over temporal things, nor fear anything temporal, nor love it, nor be corrupted by flatteries, nor shaken by adversities.78 And because your delight is as strong as death, let it — I beg you — absorb my mind from all things under heaven: the fiery and honey-flowing force of your love, so that I may cling to you alone, and be fed by the memory of your sweetness alone.✦91011 Let it descend, Lord — let it descend, I pray — let it descend into my heart: your most sweet fragrance; let your honey-flowing love enter in.✦12 Let the wonderful and unspeakable fragrance of your taste come to me — which may stir up eternal desires within me — and from my heart may it produce veins of leaping water, into eternal life.✦✦13

The Bridegroom's Love and the Peace of God

The soul marvels that worldly people pursue fleeting things more zealously than servants love their redeeming God, contrasts anxious worldly love with the sweet rest of divine love, and finds its eternal resting place in God.

You are immense, Lord, and so you must be loved and praised without limit by those you have redeemed with your precious blood. O most kind lover of humanity, most merciful Lord, and most just judge, to whom the Father has given all judgment, you discern by the wisest judgment of your justice that this is right and just: that the children of this world, of night and darkness, should love and seek with greater desire, energy, and zeal perishing riches and fleeting honors than we, your servants, love you, our God, through whom we have been made and redeemed. For if one person loves another with such great affection that they can barely endure being apart; if a bride is joined to her bridegroom with such burning intensity of heart that, because of the greatness of her love, she can find no rest in any pleasure, bearing the absence of her beloved not without great sorrow — with what love, with what zeal, with that fire of soul to which you have betrothed yourself in faith and mercy, ought she to love you, the true God and most beautiful bridegroom, who have loved and saved us in this way, who have done so many, so great, and such things for us? For although these weak things have their own pleasures and their own loves, they do not delight in the same way as you, our God. For in you the just person delights, because your love is sweet and brings rest; for the hearts you possess you fill with sweetness, with gentleness, and with peace. On the other hand, the love of the world and of the flesh is anxious and troubled, and it does not allow the souls it enters to rest; for it always agitates them with suspicions and disturbances and with various fears. You, then, are the delight of the upright, and rightly so; for in you there is a strong and unshakable peace, and a life free from all disturbance. Whoever enters into you, good Lord, enters into the joy of their Lord, and will fear no more, but will find themselves in the best place in the finest state, saying: This is my resting place forever and ever; here I will dwell, for I have chosen it.

The Lord as Shepherd and Pasture

The soul rests in the assurance that the Lord rules and provides, quoting the opening of Psalm 22.

And this: The Lord rules me, and I will lack nothing; in a place of pasture there he has placed me.✦

The Unquenchable Flame and the Final Petition

The soul begs for an unquenchable love that burns like a flame, pursues Christ freed from fleshly desire, distinguishes holy from adulterous love, and concludes with a final plea for mercy through Mary and the saints.

Sweet Christ, good Jesus, I beg you: fill my heart always with your unquenchable love, with the constant remembrance of you — so that like a burning flame I may be wholly aflame in the sweetness of your love, a love that even many waters could never extinguish in me.✦14 Make me, sweetest Lord, love you, and by your longing set down the weight of all my fleshly desires and the heaviest burden of earthly cravings that assail and oppress my wretched soul — so that, freed from all that, I may run swiftly after you in the fragrance of your perfumes, until I am effectively satisfied by the vision of your beauty, and with you as my guide may at last be worthy to arrive.✦15 For there are two kinds of love: one good, the other evil; one sweet, the other bitter — and they cannot both dwell together in a single heart. And so if anyone loves something besides you, your love, O God, is not in him — that love of sweetness, that sweetness of love: a love that torments not but delights; a love that remains pure and chaste forever and ever; a love that you always burn with and are never extinguished.16 Sweet Christ, good Jesus, O love, my God, set me wholly ablaze with your fire, your love, your tenderness and sweetness, your gladness and exultation, your delight and your longing — which is holy and good, chaste and pure, peaceful and secure — so that, wholly filled with the sweetness of your love, wholly kindled with the flame of your charity, I may love you, my God, with my whole heart and with every depth of my inmost being, holding you in my heart, on my lips, and always before my eyes wherever I am, so that no place in me remains open to adulterous loves.✦✦17 Hear me, my God — hear, O light of my eyes — hear what I ask; and grant what I may ask, so that you will hear me.✦18 Merciful and most compassionate Lord, do not be inexorable toward me because of my sins, but because of your goodness receive the prayers of your servant, and grant me the fulfillment of my petition and my desire — through the intercession, prayer, and advocacy of the glorious Virgin, your Mother Mary, my Lady, and all your saints.19 Amen.

Read the original Latin

Jesu nostra redemptio, amor et desiderium, Deus de Deo, adesto mihi famulo tuo. Te invoco, ad te clamo clamore magno in toto corde meo. Te invoco in animam meam, intra in eam, et coapta eam tibi, ut possideas eam sine ruga et sine macula. Mundissimo namque Domino munda debetur habitatio. Sanctifica ergo me vas tuum quod fecisti, de malitia evacua, imple de gratia, et plenum conserva, ita ut dignum habitationis tuae efficiar templum hic et in perpetuum. Dulcissime, benignissime, amantissime, charissime, potentissime, desideratissime, pretiosissime, amabilissime, pulcherrime, tu melle dulcior, lacte et nive candidior, nectare suavior, gemmis et auro pretiosior, cunctisque terrarum divitiis et honoribus mihi charior. Quid dico, Deus meus, una spes mea tam grandis misericordia tua? Quid dico, dulcedo felix et secura?

Quid dico, dum talia dico? Dico quod valeo, sed non dico quod debeo. Utinam possem talia dicere, qualia illi hymnidici angelorum chori! O quam libenter me in tuis laudibus totum effunderem! O quam devotissime illa coelestis melodiae cantica ad laudem et gloriam nominis tui in medio Ecclesiae infatigabilis perorarem!

Sed quia talia non possum, nunquid tacebo? Vae tacentibus de te, qui ora mutorum resolvis, et linguas infantium facis disertas. Vae tacentibus de te, quoniam ipsi loquaces muti sunt, cum non tuas laudes dicunt. Quis digne te laudare potest, o ineffabilis virtus et sapientia Patris? Et quoniam nulla invenio verba quibus te sufficienter valeam explicare, cunctipotens et omniscium Verbum, dicam interim quod valeo, donec jubeas me venire ad te, ubi possim dicere quod te decet, et me oportet. Et ideo suppliciter rogo ut non respicias tantum ad id quod modo dico, sed ad id quod dicere opto. Cupio enim desiderio magno de te eloqui quod oportet et decet, quia te decet laus, te decet hymnus, tibique debetur omnis honor. Scis ergo, occultorum cognitor Deus, quoniam non solum terra, et omnibus quae in ea sunt, tu mihi charior es; sed etiam ipso coelo et omnibus quae in eo sunt tu mihi acceptabilior es: diligo enim te super coelum et terram, et caetera omnia quae in eis sunt; imo nisi amore nominis tui quae transitoria sunt, procul dubio amanda non sunt.

Amo te, Deus meus, amore magno, magisque te amare cupio. Da mihi ut amem te semper quantum volo, et quantum debeo; ut tu solus sis tota intentio mea, et omnis meditatio mea. Te mediter per dies sine cessatione, te sentiam per soporem in nocte, te alloquatur spiritus meus, tecum fabuletur mens mea. Lumine sanctae visionis tuae illustretur cor meum, ut, te rectore, te duce ambulem de virtute in virtutem, tandemque videam te Deum deorum in Sion, nunc quidem per speculum in aenigmate, tunc autem facie ad faciem, ubi cognoscam te, sicut et cognitus sum. Beati mundo corde, quoniam ipsi Deum videbunt. Beati qui habitant in domo tua, Domine, in saecula saeculorum laudabunt te.

Rogo itaque te, Domine, per omnes miserationes tuas, quibus de morte aeterna liberati sumus, mollifica cor meum durum et lapideum, saxeum et ferreum, tua sacratissima et potenti unctione, et fac me per ignem compunctionis coram te omni hora hostiam vivam fieri. Fac me in tuo conspectu cor contritum et humiliatum semper habere, cum lacrymarum abundantia. Fac me ex tuo desiderio huic mundo funditus exstingui, et transeuntium rerum oblivisci prae magnitudine timoris et amoris tui, usque adeo ut de temporalibus nec lugeam, nec gaudeam, nec metuam aliquid temporale nec diligam, nec blandis corrumpar, nec adversis concutiar. Et quia tua valida est ut mors ditectio, absorbeat, quaeso, mentem meam ab omnibus quae sub coelo sunt, ignita et melliflua vis amoris tui, ut tibi soli inhaeream, solaque tuae suavitatis memoria pascar. Descendat, Domine, descendat, precor, descendat in cor meum odor tuus suavissimus, ingrediatur amor tuus mellifluus. Veniat mihi tui saporis mira et inenarrabilis fragrantia, quae sempiternas in me suscitet concupiscentias, et ex corde meo producat venas salientis aquae in vitam aeternam.

Immensus es, Domine, et ideo sine mensura debes amari et laudari ab iis quos tuo pretioso sanguine redemisti. Amator hominum benignissime, clementissime Domine, et aequissime judex, cui omne judicium dedit Pater, sapientissimo tuae aequitatis judicio discernis hoc rectum et justum esse, ut filii hujus saeculi, noctis et tenebrarum, praestantiori desiderio, virtute atque studio diligant et quaerant perituras divitias et fugitivos honores quam nos servi tui diligamus te Deum nostrum, per quem facti et redempti sumus. Si enim homo hominem tanta diligit dilectione, ut alter alterum vix patiatur abesse; si sponsa sponso tanto conglutinatur mentis ardore ut prae magnitudine amoris nulla perfrui valeat requie, chari sui absentiam non sine magno moerore ferens, qua ergo dilectione, quo studio, quo fervore anima, quam desponsasti tibi fide et miserationibus, debet diligere te verum Deum, et pulcherrimum sponsum, qui nos sic amasti et salvasti, qui pro nobis tot, tanta et talia fecisti? Quanquam autem haec infirma habeant suas delectationes, suosque amores, non tamen tali modo delectant, sicut tu, Deus noster. In te enim delectatur justus, quia amor tui suavis est et quietus; nam pectora quae possides, dulcedine et suavitate et tranquillitate reples. Econtra amor saeculi et carnis anxius est et perturbatus, animas certe quas ingreditur, quietas non patitur; semper enim suspicionibus et perturbationibus, variisque timoribus sollicitat eas. Tu itaque es delectatio rectorum, et merito; quies enim valida est apud te et imperturbabilis vita. Qui intrat in te, bone Domine, intrat in gaudium Domini sui, et non timebit amplius, sed habebit se optime in optimo loco, dicens: Haec requies mea in saeculum saeculi: hic habitabo, quoniam elegi eam.

Et illud: Dominus regit me et nihil mihi deerit: in loco pascuae ibi me collocavit.

Dulcis Christe, bone Jesu, reple semper, quaeso, cor meum inexstinguibili dilectione tua, continua recordatione tua; adeo ut sicut flamma urens totus ardeam in tui amoris dulcedine, quem et aquae multae in me nunquam possint exstinguere. Fac me, dulcissime Domine, amare te, et desiderio tuo deponere pondus omnium carnalium desideriorum et terrenarum concupiscentiarum gravissimam sarcinam, quae impugnant et aggravant miseram animam meam: ut post te expedite in odorem unguentorum tuorum currens, usque ad tuae pulchritudinis visionem efficaciter satiandus, quantocius te quoque duce merear pervenire. Duo enim amores, alter bonus, alter malus; alter dulcis, alter amarus, non se simul in uno capiunt pectore. Et ideo si quis praeter te aliud diligit, non est charitas tua, Deus, in eo, amor dulcedinis, et dulcedo amoris, amor non crucians, sed delectans; amor sincere et caste permanens in saeculum saeculi; amor qui semper ardes, nunquam exstingueris. Dulcis Christe, bone Jesu, charitas, Deus meus, accende me totum igne tuo, amore tuo, suavitate et dulcedine tua, jucunditate et exsultatione tua, voluptate et concupiscentia tua, quae sancta est et bona, casta et munda, tranquilla est et secura; ut totus dulcedine amoris tui plenus, totus flamma charitatis tuae succensus diligam te Deum meum ex toto corde meo, totisque medullis praecordiorum meorum, habens te in corde, in ore, et prae oculis meis semper et ubique, ita ut nullus pateat in me locus adulterinis amoribus. Audi, Deus meus, audi, lumen oculorum meorum, audi quae peto; et da quae petam, ut audias me. Pie et misericordissime Domine, ne efficiaris mihi inexorabilis propter peccata mea, sed propter bonitatem tuam suscipe preces servi tui, et da mihi effectum petitionis meae et desiderii mei intercedente, et orante, et impetrante gloriosa virgine genitrice tua Maria, domina mea, cum omnibus sanctis tuis. Amen.

Scripture echoes

  1. ↩Eph.5.27 — so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, so that she might be holy and blameless.
  2. ↩Song.5.1;Ps.19.10;Ps.119.103 — I have come into my garden, my sister, my bride; I have gathered my myrrh with my spice; I have eaten my honeycomb with my honey; I have drunk my wine with my milk. Eat, friends; drink, and be drunk with love. Ps.19.10 — The fear of the LORD is pure, standing forever; the judgments of the LORD are true, righteous altogether. Ps.119.103 — How sweet are your words to my palate, more than honey to my mouth!
  3. ↩Isa.35.6;Matt.11.5 — Then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute shall sing for joy; for waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert. Matt.11.5 — the blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, and the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.
  4. ↩1Cor.4.5 — Therefore do not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes, who will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness and reveal the purposes of the hearts; and then each one's praise will come from God.
  5. ↩1Cor.13.12 — For now we see in a mirror, dimly; but then face to face. Now I know in part; but then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.
  6. ↩Ps.84.8 — They go from strength to strength; each one appears before God in Zion.
  7. ↩Matt.5.8 — Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
  8. ↩Ps.84.5 — Blessed are those who dwell in your house; they are ever praising you. Selah.
  9. ↩Rom.12.1 — Therefore I urge you, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable worship.
  10. ↩Ezek.36.26 — And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh.
  11. ↩Ps.51.17 — Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise.
  12. ↩Song.8.6 — Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm; for love is strong as death, passion is fierce as Sheol. Its flashes are flashes of fire, a flame of Yah.
  13. ↩Song.1.3 — The fragrance of your oils is good; your name is poured oil; therefore young women love you.
  14. ↩John.4.14 — but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never thirst forever; rather, the water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life
  15. ↩John.7.38 — The one who believes in me, just as the Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within him.
  16. ↩Ps.22.1-Ps.22.2 — For the Director. Upon the Doe of the Dawn. A Psalm of David. Ps.22.2 — My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Far from my salvation are the words of my groaning.
  17. ↩Song.8.7 — Many waters cannot quench love, and rivers cannot sweep it away. If a man were to give all the wealth of his house for love, it would be utterly despised.
  18. ↩Song.1.3-Song.1.4 — The fragrance of your oils is good; your name is poured oil; therefore young women love you. Song.1.4 — Draw me after you—let us run together! The king has brought me into his chambers. We will rejoice and be glad in you; we will remember your love more than wine. The upright love you.
  19. ↩Deut.6.5 — And you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.
  20. ↩Ps.103.1 — Of David. Bless the LORD, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name.
  21. ↩Ps.13.4 — Look at me, answer me, O LORD my God; give light to my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death.

Notes

  1. 1 ↩coapta is a rare/coined verb; rendered as 'join' to convey uniting the soul to Christ.
  2. 2 ↩hymnidici is a rare term; rendered as 'hymn-singing' following the candidate gloss. The sense is that of angelic choirs whose whole praise consists in singing hymns to God.
  3. 3 ↩Candidate Pauline allusions (1 Cor 13:12) preserved as candidates for tx-08 Moses resolution.
  4. 4 ↩mollifica rendered 'soften' rather than 'make soft' to preserve the imperative force and devotional register.
  5. 5 ↩The fourfold description of the heart (hard, stony, rocky, iron) is preserved as a deliberate rhetorical intensification.
  6. 6 ↩cum rendered 'with' rather than 'when' to preserve the instrumental sense of accompanying tears rather than a temporal clause.
  7. 7 ↩exstingui rendered 'extinguished' in the sense of being consumed or absorbed out of the world — a mystical death to worldly attachment.
  8. 8 ↩prae rendered 'because of' to convey the causal force of being overwhelmed by the magnitude of divine fear and love.
  9. 9 ↩ditectio (rare word) rendered 'delight' following the gloss; the comparison 'as strong as death' preserves the Song of Songs allusion.
  10. 10 ↩vis rendered 'force' to capture the overwhelming power of divine love.
  11. 11 ↩pascar rendered 'be fed' — a passive subjunctive expressing nourishment through memory.
  12. 12 ↩The triple repetition of descendat is preserved as a deliberate devotional intensification, not reduced for style.
  13. 13 ↩venas salientis aquae rendered 'veins of leaping water' — the participle salientis (leaping/springing) is preserved to echo the living-water imagery.
  14. 14 ↩The phrase 'aquae multae' (many waters) echoes Song of Songs 8:7 and possibly Psalm 124:4–5, reinforcing the image of love that no trial can quench.
  15. 15 ↩The phrase 'in odorem unguentorum tuorum currens' (running in the fragrance of your perfumes) draws on Song of Songs 1:3–4, a bridal image here applied to the soul's pursuit of Christ.
  16. 16 ↩The phrase 'in saeculum saeculi' (forever and ever) is a standard biblical eternity formula. The closing 'amor qui semper ardes, nunquam exstingueris' is addressed directly to Christ as love itself.
  17. 17 ↩The phrase 'ex toto corde meo, totisque medullis praecordiorum meorum' (with my whole heart and every depth of my inmost being) echoes the language of the Shema (Deut 6:5) and Psalm 103:1. 'Adulterinis amoribus' (adulterous loves) frames disordered attachment as spiritual infidelity.
  18. 18 ↩'Lumen oculorum meorum' (light of my eyes) is a biblical phrase (Ps 13:4, Ps 37:10 in the Vulgate numbering) used as a vocative address to God.
  19. 19 ↩The prayer shifts from direct petition to Marian and saintly intercession, a characteristic move in late medieval private devotion. 'Inexorabilis' (inexorable/unyielding) is a strong term for divine judgment withheld.

Orationes sive Meditationes — Collection for Princess Adeliza of Normandy companion

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