Quod verum Sabbatum ac spirituale in charitate.
The Soul's Longing for the True Sabbath
The soul, groaning under sin and worldly oppression, cries out in humble hope for even the smallest taste of God's hidden sweetness, which is revealed only to those who love Him.
Now what sort of sabbath is this? Let the Jew consider — if indeed that wretched little man, groaning under the burden of sins, bound fast in the nets of his passions, who has certainly tasted nothing, or very little, of this sweetness, could say anything about it at all. Oh, if only I were given some small rest from Pharaoh's tax collectors — even half an hour in the silence of this sabbath to let my soul recover — then truly I would fall asleep in peace, and rest in my sleep alongside kings and nobles who build wastelands for themselves and fill their houses with silver!✦ But where does such hope come to the wretched? Let me seek that sabbath — let me seek it! — so that you might hear the desire of this poor man, Lord; and having led me out at last from the pit of misery and the mud of its dregs, grant me to learn, even from the tiniest drop of experience, how great the abundance of your sweetness is, which you have hidden from those who fear you (Psalm✦✦ xxx), because you reveal yourself only to those who love you.✦
True Rest Is Found in Love Alone
Those who love God find in Him the true sabbath of the mind — rest, tranquility, and peace — in contrast to the Jew's merely carnal observance based on Genesis 2:2.
For those who love you rest in you, and there is true rest, true tranquility, true peace, the true sabbath of the mind. But you, Jew — where is your sabbath? Because God rested, you say, on the seventh day from all his works (Gen.✦
Against a Carnal Reading of the Sabbath
The author disputes the Jewish appeal to Genesis, arguing that if God rested on the seventh day, He must have been active — not resting — during the six, and that the command to rest means stillness, not restless activity.
1). What then? Did God not rest in the preceding six? No indeed, you say — in six days God made heaven and earth, and on the seventh He rested. From this, then, you are commanded to rest — to rest, I say — not to leap about.1
The Spiritual Sabbath: Feasting in the Love of Christ
If the Jew could see that Jesus is God, unbelief would lift and the soul would enter God's house in exultation, preferring the memory of Christ's breasts above wine and rejoicing in the Lord with Habakkuk's own words.
Oh, if you knew how to rest, and could see that Jesus Himself is God — once the darkness of unbelief were lifted, with your face unveiled in love, you would perceive the true Sabbath rest. Nor would you now so eagerly desire the fleshly feasts of your carnal sabbath — you who have entered the place of the wonderful tabernacle, even to the house of God, in the voice of exultation and praise, the sound of one feasting — you would burst forth in that song with rejoicing: We will exult and rejoice in you, mindful of your breasts above wine (Cant.23 1). And taking up that word of Habakkuk to crown your joy: But I will rejoice in the Lord, and I will exult in God, my Jesus (Habac.4 3).
Read the original Latin
Jam quale hoc sabbatum, advertat Judaeus; si tamen vilis homuncio gemens sub sarcina peccatorum, vinculatus retibus passionum, qui certe nihil, aut perparum hujus dulcedinis degustavit, hinc aliquid loqui potuerit. O, si daretur mihi vel modica requies ab exactoribus Pharaonis, ut liceret animam meam dimidia saltem hora in hujus silentio Sabbati repausare, profecto in pace in idipsum dormiens silerem, et somno meo requiescerem cum regibus et consulibus, qui aedificant sibi solitudines, et replent domos suas argento! Sed unde misero tanta spes? Quaeram, quaeram sabbatum illud; si forte desiderium pauperis audias, Domine; et eductum aliquando de lacu miseriae et luto faecis, dones vel stillulae alicujus experientia discere, quam magna multitudo dulcedinis tuae, quam abscondisti timentibus te (Psal. xxx), quia non revelas, nisi diligentibus te. Qui enim diligunt te, requiescunt in te: et ibi vera requies, vera tranquillitas, vera pax, verum mentis sabbatum. Tibi autem, Judaee, unde sabbatum? Quia requievit, inquis, Deus die septimo ab omnibus operibus suis (Gen.
1). Quid ergo? in praecedentibus sex non requievit? Imo, inquis, sex diebus fecit Deus coelum et terram, septimo requievit. Hinc ergo praecipitur tibi vacare, vacare, inquam, non saltare. O, si scires vacare, et videre quoniam Jesus ipse est Deus, sublato certe mox infidelitatis obscuro, revelata facie in charitate perfectum cerneres sabbatismum, nec magnopere jam carnales carnalis tui sabbati epulas affectares, qui ingressus locum tabernaculi admirabilis usque ad domum Dei, in voce exsultationis et confessionis sonus epulantis, in illud canticum gratulabundus erumperes: Exsultabimus et laetabimur in te, memores uberum tuorum super vinum (Cant. 1). Sed et illud Habacuc in cumulum tuae jucunditatis assumens: Ego autem in Domino gaudebo; et exsultabo in Deo Jesu meo (Habac.
iii).
Scripture echoes
- ↩Ps.4.9 — In peace I will both lie down and sleep, for you, LORD, alone make me dwell in safety.
- ↩Ps.31.20 — How abundant is your goodness, which you have stored up for those who fear you, which you have worked for those who take refuge in you, before the children of man.
- ↩Ps.40.3;Lam.3.53 — He lifted me out of the roaring pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps firm. Lam.3.53 — They have silenced my life in the pit and cast a stone over me.
- ↩John.14.21 — The one who has my commandments and keeps them is the one who loves me. And the one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and will reveal myself to him.
- ↩Gen.2.2 — And God finished on the seventh day His work that He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work that He had done.
Notes
- 1 ↩Vacare rendered 'to rest' rather than 'to be idle' or 'to be free,' following the sabbath-rest context. Saltare rendered 'to leap about' to capture the contrast with genuine spiritual rest.
- 2 ↩Charitate rendered 'love' (charity/love) per lexeme policy; the ablative in charitate suggests the means or sphere — 'in love' or 'in charity' — through which the unveiled face perceives the Sabbath rest.
- 3 ↩The embedded quotation 'Exsultabimus et laetabimur in te, memores uberum tuorum super vinum' is attributed to Canticles (Song of Songs). The allusion to 'tabernaculi admirabilis usque ad domum Dei' and 'voce exsultationis et confessionis' echoes Psalm 41:5 (Vulgate) / Psalm 42:4 (Hebrew). Final resolution deferred to tx-08 Moses stage.
- 4 ↩The embedded quotation 'Ego autem in Domino gaudebo; et exsultabo in Deo Jesu meo' is attributed to Habakkuk. The addition of 'Jesu' to the divine name is a christological adaptation of the prophetic text. Final verse identification deferred to tx-08 Moses stage.
Speculum caritatis (The Mirror of Charity) companion
Reorder one love at a time, daily
Use the study map with the free Chosen Portion app's daily readings to work through Aelred at a sustainable pace.
Aelred wrote the Mirror as a rule for daily interior discipline in community, and Chosen Portion carries that discipline forward as a short ordered reading each day.
- All 3 books and 102 chapters mapped into 4 weekly themes with page-level pointers
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- 16 discussion questions ready for personal journaling or a 4-session small group