On Loving God - Couverture souple

Of Clairvaux, St Bernard

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 1908388145 ISBN 13 : 9781908388148

Editeur : Aziloth Books, 2011

Synopsis

In this 11th century text, St Bernard of Clairvaux, Doctor of the Church, gives the reader his insights and advice on Love, describing the four separate kinds of love that seekers experience on their path to Loving God: self-love, selfish love, loving God objectified, and loving one's self in God. This desire for Deity, the Saint asserts, is both a duty, because "He loved us first...miserable sinners, with a love so great and free", and a delight, as God bestows upon those who attain to the fourth stage of Love the blessed state of the Heavenly Fatherland, free from pain, sorrow and despair. St. Bernard's poetic medieval prose is surprisingly accessible, full of intriguing imagery, flashes of humor, and deep wisdom.

A propos du livre

Présentation de l'éditeur

On loving God. How much God deserves love from man in recognition of His gifts, both material and spiritual: and how these gifts should be cherished without neglect of the Giver. Those who admit the truth of what I have said know, I am sure, why we are bound to love God. But if unbelievers will not grant it, their ingratitude is at once confounded by His innumerable benefits, lavished on our race, and plainly discerned by the senses. Who is it that gives food to all flesh, light to every eye, air to all that breathe? It would be foolish to begin a catalogue, since I have just called them innumerable: but I name, as notable instances, food, sunlight and air; not because they are God’s best gifts, but because they are essential to bodily life. Man must seek in his own higher nature for the highest gifts; and these are dignity, wisdom and virtue. By dignity I mean free-will, whereby he not only excels all other earthly creatures, but has dominion over them. Wisdom is the power whereby he recognizes this dignity, and perceives also that it is no accomplishment of his own. And virtue impels man to seek eagerly for Him who is man’s Source, and to lay fast hold on Him when He has been found. Now, these three best gifts have each a twofold character. Dignity appears not only as the prerogative of human nature, but also as the cause of that fear and dread of man which is upon every beast of the earth. Wisdom perceives this distinction, but owns that though in us, it is, like all good qualities, not of us. And lastly, virtue moves us to search eagerly for an Author, and, when we have found Him, teaches us to cling to Him yet more eagerly. Consider too that dignity without wisdom is nothing worth; and wisdom is harmful without virtue, as this argument following shows: There is no glory in having a gift without knowing it. But to know only that you have it, without knowing that it is not of yourself that you have it, means self-glorying, but no true glory in God. And so the apostle says to men in such cases, ‘What hast thou that thou didst not receive? Now, if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory as if thou hadst not received it? (I Cor. 4.7). He asks, Why dost thou glory? But goes on, as if thou hadst not received it, showing that the guilt is not in glorying over a possession, but in glorying as though it had not been received. And rightly such glorying is called vain-glory, since it has not the solid foundation of truth. The apostle shows how to discern the true glory from the false, when he says, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord, that is, in the Truth, since our Lord is Truth (I Cor. 1.31; John 14.6).

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: Aziloth Books
• Date d'édition: 2011
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 1908388145
• ISBN 13: 9781908388148
• Reliure: Broché
• Nombre de pages: 86
• Coordonnées du fabricant: non disponible
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