The Cloud of Unknowing by James Walsh

Author:James Walsh [Walsh, James]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780809123322
Amazon: 0809123320
Barnesnoble: 0809123320
Published: 2014-08-09T16:51:57+00:00

TH E CLOUD OF U N K NOWING

watch, no matter how early you nse, no matter how hard your bed, no matter how rough your hairshirt; 109 yes and if it were lawful to do so, as it is not, even were you to put out your eyes, cut out your tongue from your mouth, stop up your ears and nose, though you were to cut away your private parts 1 1 0 and cause your body all the pain that you could think of; all this would be of no avail at all to you. The impulse and tendency to sin would still be in you.

Yes, and more than this. No matter how much you were to weep and sorrow for your si ns, or for the passion of Christ, or be ever so mi ndful of the joys of heaven, what would it profit you?1 1 1 Certainly it would be of great good, great help, great gai n and great grace. But i n comparison with that blind impulse of love, there is little it can or may do. This, without all those other things, is Mary’s best part. Without it they profit little or nothing. Not • on ly does it destroy the root and ground of sin, as far as that i.s possible here below, 1 1 2

but i t also acquires the virtues. 1 �3 For when i t i s truly implanted, all the virtues will be perfectly and delicately implanted, experienced and contai ned i n it, without a ny mixture 109. ME: “were thou never so scharp.”

1 1 0. Cf. Matthew 1 9: 1 2, which, according to tradition, Origen took literally.

I l l . Cf. I Corinthians 1 3 :3.

1 1 2 . The author in this chapter is speaking of active and passive purification in the contemplative ascent, where the purgative and i lluminative ways coalesce.

It is a Dionysian principle that the purpose of purification is illumination; but Thomas Gallus adds, “purification is more powerfully effected by longing love”

(per mspirium amoris). Active purification is precisely this “constant endeavour” to cooperate with the contemplative graces (we are to remember that the soul begins to undertake the exercise only when she is assured in faith that she is called to contemplation), which cleanse by i llumination; and this is passive purification: “The effort itself separates the soul from its contraries; once separated, it is purified from its own proper darkness, and restored to the pristine purity and innocence.” Thus the root and ground of sin is destroyed. Cf. also De Balma: “The purgative way purifies by means of sorrow, frequent contrition, and tears. But purification through the ascent of ardent love is much more efficacious.”

1 1 3 . De Balma: “The divine wisdom disposes the soul to receive the gifts

… whereby faith is established, hope corroborated, charity is enflamed; the mind is shaped by fortitude, perfected by temperance, and acquires justice.”

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