Sermon 62 on the Song of Songs — Bernard of Clairvaux
What It Is for the Faithful Soul to Dwell "in the Clefts of the Rock," and What "in the Hollows of the Wall." On Searching Out the Will of God Rather Than His Majesty. And Finally, on the Purity of Mind Necessary for Preaching the Truth.
1. "My dove in the clefts of the rock, in the hollows of the wall" (Song 2:14). Not only in the clefts of the rock does the dove find a safe refuge; she finds it also in the hollows of the wall. But if by the wall we understand not a heap of stones, but the communion of saints, let us see whether perhaps he has called the hollows of the wall the places, as it were left empty, of the angels who fell through pride: inasmuch as these are to be filled up from among men, as ruins to be repaired from living stones. Whence the apostle Peter says: "Coming to the living stone, you also as living stones are being built up into spiritual houses" (1 Pet 2:4-5). Nor do I think it beside the point, if we understand the guardianship of the angels to serve in the place of a wall in the vineyard of the Lord, which is the Church of the predestined, since Paul says: "Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth for service on behalf of those who are to inherit salvation?" (Heb 1:14), and the Prophet: "The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him" (Ps 33:8). And if this is agreeable, the sense will be that two things console the Church in the time and place of her pilgrimage: from the past indeed, the memory of the passion of Christ; and from the future, that she thinks and trusts she will be received into the lot of the saints. Both of these, as if having eyes before and behind, she gazes upon with insatiable desire; and each view is exceedingly welcome to her, each is a refuge for her from the tribulation of evils and sorrow. Full is the consolation, when she knows not only what is to be hoped for, but also on what ground this may be presumed. A joyful and not uncertain expectation, which has been confirmed by the death of Christ. Why should she tremble at the greatness of the reward, when she considers the worth of the price? How gladly does she visit in mind the clefts through which the price of the most sacred blood flowed for her! How gladly does she traverse the hollows and lodgings and mansions which are many and diverse in the house of the Father, in which she may place her children according to the diversity of the merits of each! And now indeed, since this alone is possible for the present, she rests in these by memory alone, already putting on in her mind the heavenly habitation which is from above. But there will come a time when she will fill up the ruins, when she will inhabit the hollows both in body and in mind; when the empty dwellings which the ancient inhabitants abandoned she will illuminate by the presence of her whole company, nor will any hollow appear any longer at all in the heavenly wall, thenceforth rejoicing in its happy perfection and integrity.
2. Or, if you prefer this more, we shall say that these hollows are not found by studious and pious minds, but made. In what way, you ask? By thought and ardent desire. For the pious wall yields to the desire of the soul, as a softer wall would yield; it yields to pure contemplation, it yields to frequent prayer. Indeed "the prayer of the righteous penetrates the heavens" (Ecclus 35:21). It will not, to be sure, cut through the spacious heights of this corporeal air, as if by some rowing of its wings like a flying bird, nor will it pierce through the solid and lofty summit of the firmament itself like a sharp sword: but there are heavens that are holy, living, rational, who "declare the glory of God," who with a certain favorable piety willingly incline themselves to our prayers, and with their affections curved at the touch of our devotion receive us into their inmost depths, whenever we knock upon them with a worthy intention. For "to him who knocks it will be opened." It will be permitted therefore to each one of us, even in this time of our mortality, to hollow out for ourselves, in whatever part we wish, hollows in the supernal wall; now indeed to revisit the patriarchs, now truly to greet the prophets, now to mingle with the senate of the apostles, now to be inserted into the choirs of the martyrs; but also to traverse and survey with the entire alacrity of the mind the stations and mansions of the blessed virtues, from the least angel even to the cherubim and seraphim, as each one's devotion may carry him. With whichever ones he will be more moved, the Spirit sending itself into him as it wills; if he has stood and knocked, immediately it will be opened to him, and a hollow having been made, as it were, in the mountains, or rather in the holy minds, since they freely bend themselves to piety, he will rest even a little while among them. The face and voice of every soul that acts thus is pleasing to God: the face, on account of its purity; the voice, on account of its confession. For "confession and beauty are before him" (Ps 95:6). Whence it is also said to the one who is of this kind: "Show me your face, let your voice sound in your ears." The voice is wonder in the mind of the one contemplating, the voice is the giving of thanks. God is exceedingly delighted by hollows of this kind, from which the voice of the giving of thanks resounds to him, the voice of wonder and praise.
3. Happy is the mind that has striven to hollow frequently for itself in this wall; but happier the one that has done so in the rock. It is indeed permitted to hollow also in the rock; but for this a purer edge of the mind is needed, and an altogether more vehement intention, and also superior merits of holiness. And for these things, who is fit? Surely he who said: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God: this was in the beginning with God" (Jn 1:1-2). Does he not seem to you to have immersed himself in the very inmost recesses of the Word, and to have drawn out from the hidden depths of his breast a certain most sacred marrow of interior wisdom? What of him who spoke wisdom among the perfect, wisdom hidden in a mystery, which none of the princes of this world knew? (1 Cor 2:6, 8). Did he not, with one heaven and then another pierced by his keen but pious curiosity, bring forth this at last from the third, a pious searcher? But he did not keep it silent from us, faithfully making it known in whatever words he could to the faithful. Yet he heard "unspeakable words, which it was not permitted for him to speak" (2 Cor 12:2, 4). Not indeed to any man, for he spoke those things to himself and to God. Suppose therefore that God consoles the anxious charity of Paul in this manner, and says: Why are you troubled that what you have conceived cannot be grasped by human hearing? Let your voice sound in my ears; that is: If what you feel is not permitted to be revealed to mortals, take comfort nevertheless, that your voice is able to soothe the divine ears. You see the holy soul, now indeed sober for us by charity, now truly exceeding to God by purity? (2 Cor 5:13). See also concerning holy David, whether perhaps he himself is the very man of whom he speaks with God, as if about another: "For the thought of man shall confess to you, and the remnants of thought shall keep festival to you" (Ps 75:11). Therefore whatever of prophetic thought could come forth publicly by the word and example of the Prophet, the Prophet immediately released into public confession, and from it he confessed to the Lord among the peoples, keeping the remainder for himself and God, and together with him spending it festively in joy and exultation. This, then, is what he wished to make known to us by the aforementioned verse. Whatever, that is, he was able to draw out from the secret place of wisdom by his searching and eager thought, the part that he could he imparted for the salvation of the peoples by zealous preaching; the remainder that the common people could not grasp, he spent in festive jubilation in the praises of God. You see that nothing is lost to holy contemplation, since what cannot be spent for the edification of the people is, on that very account, a most pleasing and fitting praise to God.
4. Since these things are so, it is clear that there are two kinds of contemplation: one, concerning the state and happiness and glory of the heavenly city, with what activity or rest that great multitude of heavenly citizens may be occupied; the other, concerning the majesty, eternity, and divinity of the King himself. The former is in the wall, the latter is in the rock. But the latter, the more difficult it is to hollow, the more sweetly does what you draw out from it taste. Nor should you fear that which Scripture threatens against searchers of majesty (Prov 25:27). Only bring a pure and simple eye; you will not be oppressed by glory, but admitted to it, unless you have sought not God's glory but your own. Otherwise each person is oppressed by his own glory, not God's, while inclined toward the former, he is not permitted to lift his neck to the latter, weighed down as it is by desire. With this cast off, let us securely search in the Rock, in which "are hidden treasures of wisdom and knowledge" (Col 2:3). If you still doubt, hear the Rock itself: "Those who work in me," it says, "will not sin" (Ecclus 24:30). "Who will give me wings like a dove, and I will fly, and I will rest?" (Ps 54:7). There the gentle and simple one finds rest, where the deceitful, or the proud, and the one desirous of vain glory is oppressed. The Church is a dove, and therefore she rests. A dove, because she is innocent, because she groans. A dove, I say, because "in meekness she receives the implanted word". And she rests in the Word, that is in the rock: for the rock is the Word. The Church therefore is in the clefts of the rock, through which she peers in and sees the glory of her Bridegroom; nor is she oppressed by the glory, because she does not usurp it for herself. She is not oppressed, because she is not a searcher of majesty, but of the will. For as regards majesty, sometimes indeed she dares to gaze even upon it, but as if wondering, not as if searching. But even if it should happen at some time that she is carried away into it by an ecstasy, this is the finger of God, graciously lifting up the human person, not the temerity of a human person insolently invading the heights of God. For since the Apostle recalls that he was "caught up" (2 Cor 12), so as to excuse his boldness, what other mortal would presume to entangle himself in this dread scrutiny of the divine majesty by his own efforts, and as an importunate contemplator burst into the awesome mysteries? Searchers of majesty, therefore, I consider to be called intruders, that is, not those who are caught up into it, but those who burst in. They themselves therefore are oppressed by glory.
5. Therefore the searching of majesty is fearsome: but that of the will is as safe as it is pious. Why should I not press on with all diligence in searching the mystery of the glory of the will, which I know I must obey in all things? Sweet is the glory that proceeds from nothing else than the contemplation of his very sweetness, than from the beholding of the riches of goodness and of great compassion. Indeed "we have seen this glory, the glory as of the Only-begotten from the Father" (Jn 1:14). For all that appeared of glory in this regard was entirely benign and truly paternal. That glory will not oppress me, even if I strain toward it with all my strength: I rather will be imprinted upon it. For "with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror, we are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, as by the Spirit of the Lord" (2 Cor 3:18). We are transformed when we are conformed. But far be it that conformity to God by man should be presumed in the glory of majesty, and not rather in the modesty of the will! This shall be my glory, if ever I should hear concerning myself: "I have found a man after my own heart." The heart of the Bridegroom, the heart of his Father. What is it like? "Be merciful," he says, "just as your Father also is merciful" (Lk 6:36). This is the form which he desires to see, when he says to the Church: "Show me your face": the form of piety and meekness. This face she lifts up with all confidence to the Rock, to which she is like: "Come to him," he says, "and be enlightened, and your faces shall not be confounded" (Ps 33:6). In what way will the humble be confounded by the humble, the holy by the pious, and the modest by the meek? Surely the pure face of the bride will not be abhorrent to the purity of the rock, no more than virtue to virtue, or light to light.
6. But since the Church cannot yet for the present approach the rock for hollowing in every respect (for it does not belong to all who are in the Church to inspect the mysteries of the divine will, or to apprehend by themselves the deep things of God), therefore she is shown to dwell not only in the clefts of the rock, but also in the hollows of the wall. Therefore in the perfect indeed, who dare to search out and penetrate the secrets of wisdom by purity of conscience, and are able to do so by keenness of understanding, she dwells in the clefts of the rock. For the rest, in the hollows of the wall: so that those who either are not able or do not presume to dig in the rock by themselves, may dig in the wall, being content to behold even the glory of the saints in their mind. If for anyone not even this is possible, for him indeed Jesus will be set forth, and him crucified: so that even he, without labor of his own, may dwell in the clefts of the rock, in which he himself did not labor. The Jews labored in these, and he himself shall enter into the labors of the faithless, so as to be faithful. Nor should it be feared that he will suffer rejection, who is even called to enter. "Enter into the rock," he says, "hide yourself in the pit of the ground from the face of the fear of the Lord, and from the glory of his majesty" (Is 2:10). To the soul that is still weak and sluggish (which, as a certain man in the Gospel confesses of himself, "is not able to dig, and is ashamed to beg") (Lk 16:3), a pit of the ground is shown where it may hide, until it grows strong and advances, so that it too may be able by itself to hollow out for itself clefts in the rock, through which it may enter into the interior things of the Word, assuredly by vigor and purity of mind.
7. And if we have understood the pit of the ground to be that which says: "They have dug my hands and my feet" (Ps 21:17), there will be no doubt about the health to be more quickly obtained in it for the wounded soul that will abide in it. For what is so efficacious for healing the wounds of conscience, and also for purging the eye of the mind, as the diligent meditation on the wounds of Christ? But until it has been perfectly purged and healed, I do not see how that which is said can be applied to it: "Show me your face, let your voice sound in my ears." How indeed should it dare to show its face, or lift up its voice, when it is also told to hide? "Hide yourself," he says, "in the pit of the ground." Why? Because its face is not beautiful, nor worthy to be seen. It will not be worthy to be seen, so long as it is not fit to see. But when through the inhabiting of the pit of the ground it has made so much progress in healing the interior eye, that "with unveiled face" it too can "behold the glory of God"; then at last what it will see, it will speak with confidence, pleasing in voice and face. The face must needs be pleasing, which is able to gaze upon the brightness of God. For it could not do this unless it were itself also bright and pure, having been transformed indeed into the same image of brightness which it beholds. Otherwise it would recoil from the very dissimilarity, repelled by the unaccustomed splendor. Therefore when, being pure, it has been able to behold the pure truth, then the Bridegroom will desire to see its face, and consequently also to hear its voice.
8. For how much the preaching of truth with purity of mind pleases him, he shows when he immediately adds: "For your voice is sweet." That indeed the voice does not please if the face displeases, he demonstrates when he forthwith adds: "And your face is beautiful." What is the beauty of the interior face, if not purity? In many, this has been pleasing without the voice of preaching; the latter without the former, in no one. Truth does not show itself, Wisdom does not entrust itself, to the impure. What therefore do they speak, who have not seen it? "What we know," he says, "we speak, and what we have seen we testify" (Jn 3:11). Go then, you, and dare to testify what you have not seen, and to speak what you do not know. You ask whom I call impure? He who seeks human praises, who does not provide the Gospel without charge, who preaches in order to eat, who considers piety to be gain, who does not seek the fruit, but the gift. Such persons are impure; and while they do not have the means to see the truth on account of their impurity, they do have the means to speak it. Why do you act so hastily? Why do you not wait for the light? Why do you presume upon the work of light before the light? "It is vain for you to rise before the light." The light is purity, the light is charity, "which does not seek the things that are its own" (1 Cor 13:5). Let this go before, and the foot of the tongue is not placed on uncertain ground. By the proud eye the truth is not seen; to the sincere eye it lies open. There is no reason for the truth to deny itself to be seen by the pure heart, and therefore neither to be spoken. But to the sinner God says: "Why do you declare my statutes, and take my covenant upon your mouth?" (Ps 49:16). Many, having neglected purity, have tried to speak before they could see; and they have either erred gravely, not knowing the things of which they spoke, nor the things which they affirmed; or they have sunk into disgrace shamefully, since those who would teach others had not taught themselves. From this twofold evil may the Bridegroom of the Church, Jesus Christ our Lord, who is over all things God blessed forever, ever guard us, entreated by you. Amen.
Translated from the Latin by AI. Source: Migne, Patrologia Latina 183.