Eerste deel — B. Een gheestelijc leven
The Three Marks of the Spiritual Life
The author introduces the three essential pillars of an interior spiritual life and calls the reader to self-examination.
A spiritual life. Of three points that make an interior spiritual person.1 Furthermore, this good person is to become an interior spiritual person; for that, three other points still belong. The first point is having a heart free from images.2 The second point is spiritual freedom in one's desires.3 The third point is experiencing an inward union with God.4 Now, anyone who thinks they are spiritual should examine themselves.
Imagelessness and Detachment
True spiritual life requires a heart free from disordered attachments and images, finding rest only in the possession of God.
So, anyone who wants a heart free of images must not possess anything with love, nor cling to anyone with a willing attachment, or keep company with them in that way.5 For all companionship and all love that is not purely for the honor of God leaves images on the human heart, because it is not born of God but of the flesh.✦ For this reason, if a person is to become spiritual, he must renounce every fleshly love, cling to God alone with desire and with love, and so possess Him.6 With that, all image-filledness and all disordered love of creatures is driven out.7 And in possessing God with love, the person becomes imageless within, for God is a spirit whom no one can truly form an image of.✦ However, in spiritual practice, a person should take up good images, such as our Lord's suffering and all those things that can stir him to greater devotion. But in possessing God, the person must sink into a bare imagelessness that is God.8 And this is the first point and the foundation of a spiritual life.
Interior Freedom and Union
The spiritual life is perfected through interior freedom and the constant, renewing cycle of union with God.
The second point is interior freedom: that is, that a person can lift themselves up to God, free of images and unhindered in every interior practice—specifically in thanksgiving and praise, in acts of reverence, in devout prayers, in intimate love, and in everything that can stir delight and love through the help of God's grace and an inward earnestness toward every spiritual exercise.910 Through these interior practices one reaches the third point: that one feels a spiritual union with God. So, anyone who has an imageless, free ascent to God in their interior practices, and intends nothing but the honor of God, must taste the goodness of God and feel a true union with God from within.11 In this union, an interior spiritual life is perfected; for out of this union, desire is constantly touched and awakened to new interior works. While it is working, the spirit rises into a new uniting, so that work and union are always being renewed. This renewing in working and in uniting—that is a spiritual life.
The Synthesis of Virtue and Spirit
The author concludes by distinguishing between moral goodness and spiritual depth, emphasizing that both are necessary for the soul.
And so you can see how a person is good through moral virtues with right intention, and how he can become spiritual through interior virtue and union with God. And without these points he can be neither good nor spiritual.
Read the original Latin
een gheestelic leven. Van drien punten die enen ynnighen gheesteliken mensche maken. Voert-meer sal dese goede mensche werden een innich gheestelijc mensche, daer-toe behoren noch drie ander poente. Dat eerste poent dat es onverbeeltheit van herten. Dat ander poent dat es gheestelijcke vriheit inder begherten. Dat derde poent dat es inwindighe eeninghe te ghevoelen met gode.
Nu merke yeghewelc hem selven dien dunct dat hi gheestelijc es.
Soe wie onverbeelt wilt zijn van herten, hine mach gheen dinc met liefden besitten, noch ane niemene met willigher gheneichtheit cleven ochte wandelen. Want alle wandelinghe ende alle liefde die puerlijc omme die eere gods niet en es, die verbeelt des menschen herte, want si en es ute gode niet gheboren maer ute den vleesche. Ende hieromme, sal de mensche geestelijc werden, soe moet hi alre vleeschelijcker liefden vertiën, ende ane gode alleene met loste ende met liefden cleven, ende hem alsoe besitten. Ende daer-mede wert verdreven alle verbeeltheit ende alle ongheordineerde liefde ten creatueren. Ende inden besittene gode met liefden soe wert die mensche van binnen onghebeelt: want god es een gheest die niemen eyghenlijc verbeelden en can. Maer inder oefeninghen sal de mensche goede beelden vore-nemen, alse dat doghen ons heren, ende alle die dinghe diene verwecken moghen te meere devociën. Maer inden besittene gode so moet de mensche vallen op eene blote onghebeeltheit die god es.
Ende dit es dat eerste poent ende dat fondament in eenen gheestelijcken levene.
Dat ander poent dat es inwindighe vriheit, dat es dat hem die mensche onverbeelt ende onghehendert verheffen mach te gode in alre inwindigher oefeninghen, dat es: in dancke ende in love, in weerdicheden, in devoten ghebeden, in innigher liefden, ende in allen den dinghen die lost ende liefde werken can overmids hulpe der graciën gods ende inwindighe ernst tot alre gheestelijcker oefeninghen.
Overmids dese inwindighe oefeninghe ghereictmen dat derde poent, dat es datmen ghevoelt eene gheestelijcke eeninghe met gode. Soe wie dan heeft in sijnre inwendigher oefeninghen eenen onverbeelden vriën opganc tot sinen gode, ende niet en meynt dan die eere gods, hi moet ghesmaken der goetheit gods, ende hi moet van binnen ghewarighe eeninghe met gode gevoelen. Ende in deser eeninghen wert volmaect een inwindich gheestelijc leven: want ute deser eeninghen wert die begherte altoes van nuwes gherenen ende verwect tot nuwen inwindighen wercken, ende al werkende es de gheest opgaende in een nuwe vereeninghen: ende aldus vernuwet werc ende eeninghe altoes. Ende dit vernuwen in werkene ende in eeninghen, dat es een gheestelijc leven.
Ende aldus moechdi proeven, hoe de mensche goet es overmids sedelijcke duechden met rechter meyninghen, ende hoe hi gheestelijc werden mach overmids inwindighe duechde ende eeninghe met gode. Ende sonder dese poente en mach hi noch goet noch gheestelijc sijn.
Scripture echoes
Notes
- 1 ↩Middle Dutch ynnighen/innich (here ynnighen) is Ruusbroec’s technical term for the interior, recollected person; rendered as “interior,” not merely “sincere” or “devout.”
- 2 ↩onverbeeltheit is a technical Ruusbroec term for the heart free of formed mental images and representations (not blank mindlessness). Common scholarly renderings: imagelessness, bareness of images.
- 3 ↩ander here continues the enumeration and means “second,” not merely “other.” begherten covers desire/appetite; singular “desire” keeps the interior faculty in view.
- 4 ↩inwindighe eeninghe te ghevoelen: experiential inward oneness/union with God; ghevoelen is felt experience, not mere conceptual assent.
- 5 ↩onverbeelt van herten: Ruusbroec's technical term for a heart free of creaturely images/forms; rendered here as 'a heart free of images' to keep the verbeelden-family consistent across the section.
- 6 ↩loste: appetite/desire/delight; rendered as 'desire' in a positive spiritual sense, paired with love (liefden).
- 7 ↩verbeeltheit: the heart's being filled or stamped with creaturely images; rendered 'image-filledness' to stay close to the technical noun and parallel verbeelt/onverbeelt.
- 8 ↩blote onghebeeltheit: Ruusbroec's bare/naked imagelessness; kept as technical mystical diction rather than paraphrased into generic emptiness.
- 9 ↩Middle Dutch onverbeelt is Ruusbroec's technical term for an imageless, form-free ascent (not merely 'unimagined'); rendered here as 'free of images' to keep the mystical sense without archaic diction.
- 10 ↩weerdicheden may mean acts of reverence/worship or ascriptions of God's worth; 'acts of reverence' preserves the devotional list sense.
- 11 ↩onverbeelden: Ruusbroec technical term for practice free of mental images/representations; rendered 'imageless' (not 'unimagined'). ghewarighe: true/genuine (waarachtige), not merely 'aware'.
The Sparkling Stone (Vanden blinkenden steen) 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