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

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not approached this mercy, he would not have attracted us to himself, and if he had not attracted us to himself, he would not have extracted us from our misery.” 340 Here Bernard hints briefly at a theme that will later assume a crucial significance in his doctrine; namely, his theology of the carnal love of Christ. In willing to learn and grow by experience in genuine human humility and compassion, Christ has not only made himself the model and source of fallen human beings’ ascent to Truth, but has also made himself “attractive” to the very human beings he has come to deliver from their misery. As we saw in Chapter 1, Bernard believes that in consequence of their false ascent by pride, human beings have descended into a predominantly carnal condition. That is, fallen human beings are largely given over to a strongly emotional love of sensible, fleshly things. Consequently, Christ has assumed a fleshly, sensible form that by the mysteries of his incarnate life, and most especially his Passion, he might so move the hearts of fallen human beings as to win their emotive, carnal love to himself. For Bernard, however, Christ’s descent to win the carnal love of fallen human beings is only the first step in a pedagogy of the affections intended to recall human hearts to their originally intended goal, the vision of Christ according to the Spirit. Christ accomplishes this pedagogy by his Resurrection and Ascension into glory, which is, in effect, his ascent to the third step of Truth. By the glorification of his sensible, earthly flesh in his Resurrection and his Ascension in this glorified flesh into heaven, Christ draws and transforms his disciples’ carnal, emotive love into a strong and spiritual love which longs to glimpse Christ the Truth in his own nature, in his divinity and according 340 Hum 12 (III, 26): “Attamen si illa, quae miseriam nescit, misericordia non praecessisset, ad hanc, cuius miseria mater est, non accessisset. Si non accessisset, non attraxisset; si non attraxisset, non extraxisset.” 225
to the Spirit, by contemplation in this life and direct vision in the next. This explains why Bernard concludes his account of the three steps of Truth with a reflection on Christ’s Ascension. Whereas fallen human beings must be rapt to the third step of Truth, the contemplative vision of God in his own nature, Christ alone ascends of his own will to his rightful place in glory that he might be, as Bernard puts it in De Diversis 60, both the way for those traveling and the homeland for those who have arrived. Citing Luke’s account of the Ascension from Acts, Bernard writes, “‘A cloud received him from their sight.’ (Acts 1:9)… It received him from the carnal eyes of his disciples. Before they knew him according to the flesh, but now they would know him so no more.” 341 Christ therefore descended not only that he might ascend the first two steps of Truth, but also the third as well. Thus Bernard’s careful reflection on the doctrine of Christ’s Person has enabled him to reach a profound spiritual insight: through his Incarnate life, the divine Person of the Word has undertaken a journey of self-knowledge through which he truly learns humility and compassionate charity in a genuinely human way. Consequently, the Word Incarnate is able by his descent and ascent in the flesh to serve as both the model and the source of these virtues for his followers as they undertake their own ascent of self- knowledge according to his example. To better understand how Bernard conceives of Christ as both the model and the source respectively of the individual soul’s journey of self-knowledge, we will now turn to his Sermones per annum and his Letter 190 against the errors of Peter Abelard. 341 Hum 23 (III, 34): “SUSCEPIT EUM NUBES AB OCUL<strong>IS</strong> EORUM….suscepit eum ab oculis carnalibus discipulorum, qui etsi Christum noverant secundum carnem, sed ultra iam non noscerent.” 226
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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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upon the “stage” of the soul an
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(Is 46:8). For Bernard, this first
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Page 185 and 186: consolations afforded it by the lif
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Page 189 and 190: Reason’s rebuke is powerful, and
Page 191 and 192: In this vision, reason is permitted
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Page 199 and 200: The Self-Awareness of the Bride in
Page 201 and 202: When the brightness of this beauty
Page 203 and 204: For Bernard, then, the soul that ha
Page 205 and 206: figure of this Ecclesia-Sponsa. On
Page 207 and 208: Conclusion Having considered three
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Page 211 and 212: CHAPTER 4: SELF-KNOWLEDGE AND THE M
Page 213 and 214: Christ’s incarnate, crucified, an
Page 215 and 216: indeed to the entirety of his theol
Page 217 and 218: significant individual expressions
Page 219 and 220: The foregoing elements of Bernard
Page 221 and 222: descended and ascended and showed u
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Page 227 and 228: excursus has been labeled a “digr
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Page 231 and 232: To resolve this question, Bernard r
Page 233: You see, therefore, that Christ is
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Page 241 and 242: conformed to him. Then, through the
Page 243 and 244: Modeling this laudabilis curiositas
Page 245 and 246: The theme of Word’s example of vo
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Page 249 and 250: and humbled by God, so that there w
Page 251 and 252: as essential elements of the Word I
Page 253 and 254: led astray. Their amor carnalis Chr
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Page 259 and 260: death to bring about a real, inward
Page 261 and 262: sins,” “justification,” and
Page 263 and 264: these life-giving virtues, we must
Page 265 and 266: precisely through, a careful approp
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
Page 275 and 276: ejoice with those who rejoice and w
Page 277 and 278: love of himself in the glory of div
Page 279 and 280: I. Works of Bernard of Clairvaux BI
Page 281 and 282: ------. Sermo 29A. Edited by C. Lam
Page 283 and 284: Courcelle, Pierre. Connais-toi toi-
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------. “Le premier traité authe
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