MY BELOVED IS MINE AND I AM HIS: SELF-KNOWLEDGE IN THE ...

his rule over the reprobate he would, in a sense, rival the Most High, Satan could not,
Bernard adds, foresee his future fall and descent into misery apart from God. Resuming
his fictive dialogue, Bernard asks his subject, “I wonder, if in God’s foreknowledge you
foresaw your reign, why did you not also see your fall? If you did foresee it, what
madness led you to desire to rule in such misery?” 190
Bernard answers that Lucifer’s vision of his future was obscured or distorted by
his false knowledge of himself and his Creator. With the prospect of his future rule over
the proud gleaming in his mind’s eye, Satan’s amor propriae excellentiae swelled in his
heart and proposed for his belief the delusion that he could indeed rival the Son’s
lordship over all creation without fear of divine retribution. With his curious gaze
distracted from the consideration of himself in Truth and fixated on his coming kingdom,
he ceased to seek true self-knowledge and so neglected the truth of his created finitude
and consequent dependence on his Creator. Simultaneously, his ravenous desire for
superiority falsified his understanding of God, leading him to imagine that God as a god
of mercy but not justice who could not punish his presumption for fear of losing his own
divine goodness. Bernard writes:
It is more likely that you did not foresee your fall either
because…you presumed upon the goodness of God and therefore
said in your heart, “He will not care” (Ps 9:24)…or else because,
with the vision of your rule gleaming in your eye, the beam of
pride grew so great that you could not see your intervening fall. 191
190 Hum 36 (III, 44): “Sed miror, cum in praescientia Dei tuum praevideris principatum, cur non in
eadem praevidisti et praecipitium? Nam si praevidisti, quae insania fuit, ut cum tanta miseria cuperes
principari, ut malles misere praeesse, quam feliciter subesse?”
191 Hum 36 (III, 44): “Sed credibilius est, quod non praevidisti: aut propter illam causam, quam
superius dixi, quia Dei bonitatem attendens, dixisti in corde tuo: NON REQUIRET, propter quod, o impie,
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