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For two reasons we have said that, although visions
and locutions which come from God are true, and in
themselves are always certain, they are not always so
with respect to ourselves. One reason is the
defective way in which we understand them; and the
other, the variety of their causes.
In the first place, it is clear that they are not
always as they seem, nor do they turn out as they
appear to our manner of thinking. The reason for this
is that, since God is vast and boundless, He is wont,
in His prophecies, locutions and revelations, to
employ ways, concepts and methods of seeing things
which differ greatly from such purpose and method as
can normally be understood by ourselves; and these
are the truer and the more certain the less they seem
so to us. This we constantly see in the Scriptures.
To many of the ancients many prophecies and locutions
of God came not to pass as they expected, because
they understood them after their own manner, in the
wrong way, and quite literally. This will be clearly
seen in these passages.
2. In Genesis, God said to Abraham, when He had
brought him to the land of the Chanaanites: Tibi dabo
terram hanc.[346] Which signifies, I will give thee
this land. And when He had said it to him many times,
and Abraham was by now very Domine, unde scire
possum, quod possessurus sim eam? That old, and He
had never given it to him, though He had said this to
him, Abraham answered God once again and said: Lord,
whereby or by what sign am I to know that I am to
possess it?
Then God revealed to him that he was not to
possess it in person, but that his sons would do so
after four hundred years; and Abraham then understood
the promise, which in itself was most true; for, in
giving it to his sons for love of him, God was giving
it to himself. And thus Abraham was deceived by the
way in which he himself had understood the prophecy.
If he had then acted according to his own
understanding of it, those that saw him die without
its having been given to him might have erred
greatly; for they were not to see the time of its
fulfilment. And, as they had heard him say that God
would give it to him, they would have been confounded
and would have believed it to have been false.
3. Likewise to his grandson Jacob, when Joseph his
son brought him to Egypt because of the famine in
Chanaan, and when he was on the road, God appeared
and said: Jacob, Jacob, noli timere, descende in
Aegiptum, quia in gentem magnam faciam te ibi. Ego
descendam tecum illuc. . . . Et inde adducam te
revertentem.[347] Which signifies: Jacob, fear not;
go down into Egypt, and I will go down there with
thee; and, when thou goest forth thence again, I will
bring thee out and guide thee.
This promise, as it would seem according to our
own manner of understanding, was not fulfilled, for,
as we know, the good old man Jacob died in Egypt and
never left it alive. The word of God was to be
fulfilled in his children, whom He brought out thence
after many years, being Himself their guide upon the
way. It is clear that anyone who had known of this
promise made by God to Jacob would have considered it
certain that Jacob, even as he had gone to Egypt
alive, in his own person, by the command and favour
of God, would of a certainty leave it, alive and in
his own person, in the same form and manner as he
went there, since God had promised him a favourable
return; and such a one would have been deceived, and
would have marvelled greatly, when he saw him die in
Egypt, and the promise, in the sense in which he
understood it, remain unfulfilled. And thus, while
the words of God are in themselves most true, it is
possible to be greatly mistaken with regard to them.
4. In the Judges, again, we read that, when all
the tribes of Israel had come together to make war
against the tribe of Benjamin, in order to punish a
certain evil to which that tribe had been consenting,
they were so certain of victory because God had
appointed them a captain for the war, that, when
twenty-two thousand of their men were conquered and
slain, they marvelled very greatly; and, going into
the presence of God, they wept all that day, knowing
not the cause of the fall, since they had understood
that the victory was to be theirs.
And, when they enquired of God if they should give
battle again or no, He answered that they should go
and fight against them. This time they considered
victory to be theirs already, and went out with great
boldness, and were conquered again the second time,
with the loss of eighteen thousand of their men.
Thereat they were greatly confused, and knew not what
to do, seeing that God had commanded them to fight
and yet each time they were vanquished, though they
were superior to their enemies in number and
strength, for the men of Benjamin were no more than
twenty-five thousand and seven hundred and they were
four hundred thousand.
And in this way they were mistaken in their manner
of understanding the words of God. His words were not
deceptive, for He had not told them that they would
conquer, but that they should fight; for by these
defeats God wished to chastise a certain neglect and
presumption of theirs, and thus to humble them. But,
when in the end He answered that they would conquer,
it was so, although they conquered only after the
greatest stratagem and toil.[348]
5. In this way, and in many other ways, souls are
oftentimes deceived with respect to locutions and
revelations that come from God, because they
interpret them according to their apparent sense[349]
and literally; whereas, as has already been
explained, the principal intention of God in giving
these things is to express and convey the spirit that
is contained in them, which is difficult to
understand. And the spirit is much more pregnant in
meaning than the letter, and is very extraordinary,
and goes far beyond its limits.
And thus, he that clings to the letter, or to a
locution or to the form or figure of a vision, which
can be apprehended, will not fail to go far astray,
and will forthwith fall into great confusion and
error, because he has guided himself by sense
according to these visions, and not allowed the
spirit to work in detachment from sense. Littera enim
occidit, spiritus autem vivificat,[350] as Saint Paul
says. That is: The letter killeth and the spirit
giveth life.
Wherefore in this matter of sense the letter must
be set aside, and the soul must remain in darkness,
in faith, which is the spirit, and this cannot be
comprehended by sense.
6. For which cause, many of the children of
Israel, because they took the sayings and prophecies
of the prophets according to the strict letter, and
these were not fulfilled as they expected, came to
make little account of them and believed them not; so
much so, that there grew up a common saying among
them -- almost a proverb, indeed -- which turned
prophets into ridicule.
Of this Isaias complains, speaking and exclaiming
in the manner following: Quem docebit Dominus
scientiam? et quem intelligere faciet auditum?
ablactatos a lacte, avulsos ab uberibus. Quia manda
remanda, manda remanda, expecta reexpecta, expecta
reexpecta, modicum ibi, modicum ibi. In loquela enim
labii, et lingua altera loquetur ad populum istum.[351]
This signifies: To whom shall God teach knowledge?
And whom shall He make to understand His word and
prophecy? Only them that are already weaned from the
milk and drawn away from the breasts. For all say
(that is, concerning the prophecies): Promise and
promise again; wait and wait again; wait and wait
again;[352] a little there, a little there; for in
the words of His lips and in another tongue will He
speak to this people.
Here Isaias shows quite clearly that these people
were turning prophecies into ridicule, and that it
was in mockery that they repeated this proverb: 'Wait
and then wait again.' They meant that the prophecies
were never fulfilled for them, for they were wedded
to the letter, which is the milk of infants, and to
their own sense, which is the breasts, both of which
contradict the greatness of spiritual knowledge.
Wherefore he says: To whom shall He teach the
wisdom of His prophecies? And whom shall He make to
understand His doctrine, save them that are already
weaned from the milk of the letter and from the
breasts of their own senses? For this reason these
people understand it not, save according to this milk
of the husk and letter, and these breasts of their
own sense, since they say: Promise and promise again;
wait and wait again, etc. For it is in the doctrine
of the mouth of God, and not in their own doctrine,
and it is in another tongue than their own, that God
shall speak to them.
7. And thus, in interpreting prophecy, we have not
to consider our own sense and language, knowing that
the language of God is very different from ours, and
that it is spiritual language, very far removed from
our understanding and exceedingly difficult. So much
so is it that even Jeremias, though a prophet of God,
when he sees that the significance of the words of
God is so different from the sense commonly
attributed to them by men, is himself deceived by
them and defends the people, saying: Heu, heu, heu,
Domine Deus, ergone decipisti populum istum et
Jerusalem, dicens: Pax erit vobis; et ecce pervenit
gladius usque ad animam?[353] Which signifies: Ah,
ah, ah, Lord God, hast Thou perchance deceived this
people and Jerusalem, saying, 'Peace will come upon
you,' and seest Thou here that the sword reacheth
unto their soul?
For the peace that God promised them was that
which was to be made between God and man by means of
the Messiah Whom He was to send them, whereas they
understood it of temporal peace; and therefore, when
they suffered wars and trials, they thought that God
was deceiving them, because there befell them the
contrary of that which they expected.
And thus they said, as Jeremias says likewise:
Exspectavimus pacem, et non erat bonum.[354] That is:
We have looked for peace and there is no boon of
peace. And thus it was impossible for them not to be
deceived, since they took the prophecy merely in its
literal sense.
For who would fail to fall into confusion and to
go astray if he confined himself to a literal
interpretation of that prophecy which David spake
concerning Christ, in the seventy-first Psalm, and of
all that he says therein, where he says: Et
dominabitur a mari usque ad mare; et a flumine usque
ad terminos orbis terrarum.[355] That is: He shall
have dominion from one sea even to the other sea, and
from the river even unto the ends of the earth.
And likewise in that which he says in the same
place: Liberabit pauperem a potente, et pauperem, cui
non erat adjutor.[356] Which signifies: He shall
deliver the poor man from the power of the mighty,
and the poor man that had no helper. But later it
became known that Christ was born[357] in a low state
and lived in poverty and died in misery; not only had
He no dominion over the earth, in a temporal sense,
while He lived, but He was subject to lowly people,
until He died under the power of Pontius Pilate.
And not only did He not deliver poor men --
namely, His disciples -- from the hands of the
mighty, in a temporal sense, but He allowed them to
be slain and persecuted for His name's sake.
8. The fact is that these prophecies concerning
Christ had to be understood spiritually, in which
sense they were entirely true. For Christ was not
only Lord of earth alone, but likewise of Heaven,
since He was God; and the poor who were to follow Him
He was not only to redeem and free from the power of
the devil, that mighty one against whom they had no
helper, but also to make heirs of the Kingdom of
Heaven.
And thus God was speaking, in the most important
sense, of Christ, and of the reward of His
followers,[358] which was an eternal kingdom and
eternal liberty; and they understood this, after
their own manner, in a secondary sense, of which God
takes small account, namely that of temporal dominion
and temporal liberty, which in God's eyes is neither
kingdom nor liberty at all.
Wherefore, being blinded by the insufficiency of
the letter, and not understanding its spirit and
truth, they took the life of their God and Lord, even
as Saint Paul said in these words: Qui enim
habitabant Jerusalem, et principes ejus, hunc
ignorantes et voces prophetarum, quae per omne
Sabbatum leguntur, judicantes impleverunt.[359] Which
signifies: They that dwelt in Jerusalem, and her
rulers, not knowing Who He was, nor understanding the
sayings of the prophets, which are read every Sabbath
day, have fulfilled them by judging Him.
9. And to such a point did they carry this
inability to understand the sayings of God as it
behoved them, that even His own disciples, who had
gone about with Him, were deceived, as were those two
who, after His death, were going to the village of
Emmaus, sad and disconsolate, saying: Nos autem
sperabamus quod ipse esset redempturus Israel.[360]
We hoped that it was He that should have redeemed
Israel.
They, too, understood that this dominion and
redemption were to be temporal; but Christ our
Redeemer, appearing to them, reproved them as foolish
and heavy and gross of heart as to their belief in
the things that the prophets had spoken.[361] And,
even when He was going to Heaven, some of them were
still in that state of grossness of heart, and asked
Him, saying: Domine, si in tempore hoc restitues
Regnum Israel.[362] That is: Lord, tell us if Thou
wilt restore at this time the kingdom of Israel.
The Holy Spirit causes many things to be said
which bear another sense than that which men
understand; as can be seen in that which he caused to
be said by Caiphas concerning Christ: that is was
meet that one man should die lest all the people
should perish.[363] This he said not of his own
accord; and he said it and understood it in one
sense, and the Holy Spirit in another.
10. From this it is clear that, although sayings
and revelations may be of God, we cannot always be
sure of their meaning; for we can very easily be
greatly deceived by them because of our manner of
understanding them. For they are all an abyss and a
depth of the spirit, and to try to limit them to what
we can understand concerning them, and to what our
sense can apprehend, is nothing but to attempt to
grasp the air, and to grasp some particle in it that
the hand touches: the air disappears and nothing
remains.
11. The spiritual teacher must therefore strive
that the spirituality of his disciple be not cramped
by attempts to interpret all supernatural
apprehensions, which are no more than spiritual
particles, lest he come to retain naught but these,
and have no spirituality at all.
But let the teacher wean his disciple from all
visions and locutions, and impress upon him the
necessity of dwelling in the liberty and darkness of
faith, wherein are received spiritual liberty and
abundance, and consequently the wisdom and
understanding necessary to interpret sayings of God.
For it is impossible for a man, if he be not
spiritual, to judge of the things of God or
understand them in a reasonable way, and he is not
spiritual when he judges them according to sense; and
thus, although they come to him beneath the disguise
of sense, he understands them not.
This Saint Paul well expresses in these words:
Animalis autem homo non percipit ea quoe sunt
spiritus Dei: stultitia enim est illi, et non potest
intelligere: quia de spiritualibus examinatur.
Spiritualis autem judicat omnia.[364] Which
signifies: The animal man perceives not the things
which are of the Spirit of God, for unto him they are
foolishness and he cannot understand them because
they are spiritual; but he that is spiritual judges
all things. By the animal man is here meant one that
uses sense alone; by the spiritual man, one that is
not bound or guided by sense.
Wherefore it is temerity to presume to have
intercourse with God by way of a supernatural
apprehension effected by sense, or to allow anyone
else to do so.
12. And that this may be the better understood let
us here set down a few examples. Let us suppose that
a holy man is greatly afflicted because his enemies
persecute him, and that God answers him, saying: I
will deliver thee from all thine enemies. This
prophecy may be very true, yet, notwithstanding, his
enemies may succeed in prevailing, and he may die at
their hands.
And so if a man should understand this after a
temporal manner he would be deceived; for God might
be speaking of the true and principal liberty and
victory, which is salvation, whereby the soul is
delivered, free and made victorious[365] over all its
enemies, and much more truly so and in a higher sense
than if it were delivered from them here below.
And thus, this prophecy was much more true and
comprehensive than the man could understand if he
interpreted it only with respect to this life; for,
when God speaks, His words are always to be taken in
the sense which is most important and profitable,
whereas man, according to his own way and purpose,
may understand the less important sense, and thus may
be deceived.
This we see in that prophecy which David makes
concerning Christ in the second Psalm saying: Reges
eos in virga ferrea, et tamquam vas figuli confringes
eos.[366] That is: Thou shalt rule all the people
with a rod of iron and thou shalt dash them in pieces
like a vessel of clay. Herein God speaks of the
principal and perfect dominion, which is eternal
dominion; and it was in this sense that it was
fulfilled, and not in the less important sense, which
was temporal, and which was not fulfilled in Christ
during any part of His temporal life.
13. Let us take another example. A soul has great
desires to be a martyr. It may happen that God
answers him, saying: Thou shalt be a martyr. This
will give him inwardly great comfort and confidence
that he is to be martyred; yet it may come to pass
that he dies not the death of a martyr, and
notwithstanding this the promise may be true.
Why, then, is it not fulfilled literally?
Because it will be fulfilled, and is capable of being
fulfilled, according to the most important and
essential sense of that saying -- namely, in that God
will have given that soul the love and the reward
which belong essentially to a martyr; and thus in
truth He gives to the soul that which it formally
desired and that which He promised it. For the formal
desire of the soul was, not that particular manner of
death, but to do God a martyr's service, and to show
its love for Him as a martyr does.
For that manner of death is of no worth in itself
without this love, the which love and the showing
forth thereof and the reward belonging to the martyr
may be given to it more perfectly by other means. So
that, though it may not die like a martyr, the soul
is well satisfied that it has been given that which
it desired. For, when they are born of living love,
such desires, and others like them, although they be
not fulfilled in the way wherein they are described
and understood, are fulfilled in another and a better
way, and in a way which honours God more greatly than
that which they might have asked.
Wherefore David says: Desiderium pauperum
exaudivit Dominus.[367] That is: The Lord has granted
the poor their desire. And in the Proverbs Divine
Wisdom says: Desiderium suum justis dabitur.[368]
'The just shall be given their desire.' Hence, then,
since we see that many holy men have desired many
particular things for God's sake, and that in this
life their desires have not been granted them, it is
a matter of faith that, as their desires were just
and true, they have been fulfilled for them perfectly
in the next life. Since this is truth, it would also
be truth for God to promise it to them in this life,
saying to them: Your desire shall be fulfilled; and
for it not to be fulfilled in the way which they
expected.
14. In this and other ways, the words and visions
of God may be true and sure and yet we may be
deceived by them, through being unable to interpret
them in a high and important sense, which is the
sense and purpose wherein God intends them. And thus
the best and surest course is to train souls in
prudence so that they flee from these supernatural
things, by accustoming them, as we have said, to
purity of spirit in dark faith, which is the means of
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