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

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form of human misery, save sin, that he might learn mercy for his human brothers and sisters in their shared miseria. Quoting the immediate sequel to the present passage, “Because he himself has suffered and been tempted, he is able to help those who are tempted,” (Heb 2:18), Bernard concludes: I do not see how these words can be better interpreted except to say that he has willed to suffer and to be tempted, and to share in all human miseries, save sin, and so be made like his brothers in all things, that he might learn by experience how to have mercy and compassion on those who likewise suffer and are tempted. 335 In other words, just as all human beings learn mercy for their fellows by first recognizing the truth of their own miseria and then learning to see and feel compassion for that very same miseria in the hearts of their neighbors, so the Word will humble himself to take up and experience human miseria, though not human sin, that he too might ascend these first two steps of Truth. In this sense, the Word’s Incarnate life may be seen as a journey of self-knowledge, humility, compassion which parallels and models the true way of ascent his fallen creatures must undertake if they are to attain the heights for which they yearn. Yet, Bernard’s solution still leaves him with the question of how the divine Person of the Word can credibly be said to suffer, to learn, and to grow in humility and compassion. According to yet another passage from Hebrews, “We do not have a High Priest who is unable to have compassion on our infirmities. For he has been tempted in every way that we are, but without sin” (Heb 4:15). Granted that this passage speaks of the divine Person of the Word, how is he able to suffer our infirmities and so be tempted as we are? 335 Hum 8 (III, 22): “In quibus verbis quid melius intelligi possit non video, nisi quod ideo pati ac tentari, omnibus que ABSQUE PECCATO, humanis voluit communicare miseriis - quod est PER OMNIA FRATRIBUS SIMILARI -, ut similiter passis ac tentatis misereri ac compati ipso disceret experimento.” 221
To resolve this question, Bernard returns to the single-subject, incarnational Christology he provides in his sixtieth sermon De Diversis. In the tradition of Athanasius, Bernard articulates this Christology through a reading of the Christological “hymn” from the second chapter of Paul’s Letter to the Philippians. According to Bernard’s reading, the hymn’s account of Christ’s descent and ascent refers to various phases of the Word’s Incarnate life. Prior to his Incarnation, that is, prior to his assumption of human nature, the divine person of the Word existed solely in forma Dei, that is, solely in his divine nature. Consequently, he was incapable of human suffering, lacked any experience of human misery, and therefore remained unable to learn mercy by experience in the way humans do. Though the Word certainly knew mercy in a divine way according to his divine nature, he did not know mercy in a human way according to human experience. Yet, when, in time and without loss to himself as fully divine, the Word humbled himself to assume the forma servi, that is, to take up and express our human nature in addition to the divine nature he possessed and continues to possess from all eternity, he became capable of something of which he was not capable before, namely to suffer our misery and so learn mercy for us by human experience. For in assuming an integral human nature into the unity of his Person, the fully divine Word assumed to himself an integral, human body and soul, in and through which he could now experience the full range of human sufferings apart from sin. Paraphrasing Paul’s hymn, Bernard writes: The blessed God, the blessed Son of God, in that impassible form in which he did not think equality with God something to be grasped, before he emptied himself to take the form of a servant, did not know mercy and obedience by experience because he had no experience of misery or subjection. He knew them indeed by his own [divine] nature, but not by [our human] experience. Yet, 222
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MY BELOVED IS MINE AND I AM HIS: SE
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MY BELOVED IS MINE AND I AM HIS: SE
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To my Father, James U. DeFrancis, S
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Christ as the Model of Self-Knowled
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esearch: John Cavadini, Cyril O’R
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self-knowledge is the indispensible
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For Bernard, then, humble self-know
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likeness of charity. Within the Cis
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When Gilson asserted that by self-k
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Bernard, Sommerfeldt continues, hum
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a “false image” of himself. 26
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some newfound and joyous moment of
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ecognize that same sinfulness in hi
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foundations of man’s return to Go
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the descent of humility begins the
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saving work of Jesus Christ in the
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the humility, obedience, and love C
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Of particular importance to Bernard
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and second, “what it is like in i
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In his ground-breaking study of med
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direct links between the two. 52 It
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swells in one’s heart that it mov
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pride as “the desire for a perver
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The knowledge of self and God in th
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mercy until you renew all that is i
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CHAPTER 1: THE SCOPE OF BERNARD’S
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Prior to its first conversion, Bern
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Origen, Bernard here and elsewhere
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of God, they will grow ever more un
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and love as she is loved, and the B
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In the interim or “meanwhile” o
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Why do you judge yourself worthy to
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For Bernard, the lesson to be drawn
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warning and why should it compel he
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worldly things her flesh and senses
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aspired to seize a kind of parody o
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thousands of evils upon our entire
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edemptive work is suitably adapted
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emains forever, this grass too rema
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graciously condescending to assume
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Thus the abbot resolves his spiritu
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of self-knowledge enabled self-dece
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humbles himself will be exalted”
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Church, enabling scholars to instru
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Through this unflinching self-exami
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soon tempers my bitter vision of my
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edeem him, sanctify him, and offer
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As observed above, in the second ha
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modeled and effected by the Word-ma
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Ignorance of self breeds pride when
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consideration of others and their a
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consideration of his treatise as a
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symmetry between these two parts an
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Though this discrepancy at first ap
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self, God, and neighbor. Since it i
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estored in this divine likeness as
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eturn to his suffering brothers and
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much more should the monk not exalt
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for your brother’s misery and not
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sinful weakness and nothing of thei
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Finally, we should note that Bernar
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journey to which the monk will comm
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and judge others or to see how they
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condemned. Lifting his eyes in humi
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will contrary to both the law of Go
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in him by her obedience to his will
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contempt not only for herself and h
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his rule over the reprobate he woul
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in misery rather than to be subject
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descending these early steps of pri
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pleases them and avoid what makes t
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knows.” 201 Should the topic of c
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Here abbot Bernard figures the prou
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ut believe in his inmost heart that
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Asserting Self-Will Against Superio
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As so often in his narrative of the
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who he is, everyone judges him, and
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monk’s descent into this deepest
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God in heaven. He will acknowledge
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Consumed by this self-centered love
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their hearts. Hence Bernard’s fre
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done…by whoever would walk in the
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In recognizing the two distinct mom
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experience, lamenting how he has ma
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inward movement in the soul. In any
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share with them in that divine merc
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Operating inwardly within this judg
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the Truth in his own nature? Matter
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arguing from both allusions in text
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Page 181 and 182: (Is 46:8). For Bernard, this first
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Page 189 and 190: Reason’s rebuke is powerful, and
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Page 207 and 208: Conclusion Having considered three
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Page 219 and 220: The foregoing elements of Bernard
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Page 233 and 234: You see, therefore, that Christ is
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Page 249 and 250: and humbled by God, so that there w
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Page 267 and 268: perhaps she means, “My Beloved in
Page 269 and 270: To such a soul, the abbot continues
Page 271 and 272: gradually assuming the figure of Ch
Page 273 and 274: to judge themselves in Truth, and s
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Page 277 and 278: love of himself in the glory of div
Page 279 and 280: I. Works of Bernard of Clairvaux BI
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------. Sermo 29A. Edited by C. Lam
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Courcelle, Pierre. Connais-toi toi-
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------. “Le premier traité authe
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