Sermon 74 on the Song of Songs — Bernard of Clairvaux
On the Visitations of the Word the Bridegroom, How Secretly They Are Made to the Holy Soul, and This Bernard Declares by the Example of Himself for the Edification of His Own, Humbly and Modestly.
1. "Return," she says (Song 2:17). It is clear that he whom she calls back is not present; yet that he had been present, and that not long before: inasmuch as he who is still going away seems to be called back. An untimely calling-back, a sign of great love on the one part, and of great loveliness on the other. Who are these cultivators of charity, and such untiring pursuers of the business of love, of whom the one follows after, the other urges on, so restless a love? And indeed it falls to me, as I remember my promise, to assign this passage to the Word and the soul; but for this to be done worthily even for a little while, I confess that I need the help of the Word itself. And certainly this discourse would have been more fitting for one more experienced, and more privy to holy and secret love; but I cannot fail in my office, nor entirely disappoint your desires. I see my peril, and I do not avoid it; you compel me. You utterly compel me to walk in great things and in wonders above me. Alas! how I fear lest presently I hear: "Why do you declare my delights, and take up my sacrament through your mouth?" Yet hear me, a man who trembles to speak, and cannot be silent. Perhaps the very trembling itself will excuse my boldness; but more so your edification, if it shall result. And perhaps these tears will likewise be seen. "Return," she says. Good. He was going away; he is called back. Who will unseal for me the sacrament of this changeableness? Who will worthily explain for me the going and returning of the Word? Does the Bridegroom act with fickleness? Whence, whither can he come or go again, who fills all things? What local motion, finally, can he have, who is a spirit? Or what motion at all, of whatever kind, do you ascribe to him who is God? For he is altogether unchangeable.
2. But let him who can grasp this, grasp it. Let us, however, walking cautiously and simply in the exposition of the sacred and mystical utterance, follow the custom of Scripture, which speaks wisdom hidden in mystery with our words; which, while it uses figures, insinuates God through our affections; which, by known likenesses of sensible things, as if by certain cups of cheaper material, pours forth to human minds those things which are precious, unknown, and invisible of God. Let us therefore follow also the custom of the chaste utterance, and say that the Word of God, God the Bridegroom of the soul, both comes to the soul as he wills and again leaves her: provided only that we perceive these things to happen by the perception of the soul, not by any motion of the Word. For example, when she perceives grace, she recognizes his presence: when she does not, she laments his absence, and again seeks his presence, saying with the Prophet: "My face has sought you; your face, O Lord, I will seek" (Ps 26:8). Why should she not seek? For indeed, with so sweet a Bridegroom withdrawn from her, she will not in the meantime care — I do not say to desire, but not even to think of — anything else. It remains therefore that she diligently seek the absent one, and call back the departing one. Thus then the Word is called back, and called back by the desire of the soul, but of that soul to which he has once granted the sweetness of himself. Is not desire a voice? And a powerful one. Indeed: "The desire of the poor the Lord has heard" (Ps 9:17). Therefore, as the Word departs, the one continuous voice of the soul in the meantime is its continuous desire for him, as one continuous "Return," until he comes.
3. And now give me a soul which the Word the Bridegroom is accustomed to visit frequently, to which familiarity has given boldness, tasting has given hunger, contempt of all things has given leisure: and I will unhesitatingly assign to this soul alike the voice and the name of bride; nor will I at all judge the passage which is in hand to be alien from her. For such a one is presented here as speaking. For she who calls him back proves without doubt that she has deserved his presence, even if not his abundance. Otherwise she would not have called him back, but called him. Moreover the word of calling back is "return." And perhaps he withdrew himself for this reason, that he might be called back more eagerly, and held more firmly. For he also once pretended to go further, not because he wished this, but because he wished to hear: "Stay with us, Lord, because it is growing toward evening" (Lk 24:28-29). And again on another occasion, walking upon the sea, while the apostles were sailing and laboring at the oars, as though wishing to pass them by, not even then did he wish this, but rather to test their faith and to draw forth their prayer. Indeed, as the evangelist says: "They were troubled, and cried out, thinking it to be a phantom" (Mk 6:48-49). Therefore this kind of pious pretense, or rather saving dispensation, which the Word in the body then exhibited bodily from time to time, the Word as spirit does not cease to carry out continually in its own spiritual manner with the soul devoted to him. Passing by, he wills to be held; going away, he wills to be called back. For this is not an irrevocable Word. He goes, and returns according to his good pleasure, as if visiting at daybreak and suddenly testing. And his going is in a certain way dispensatory; but his returning is always voluntary: yet each is full of judgment. But the reason for these things rests with him.
4. Now truly it is established that such alternations of the Word going and returning happen in the soul, as he says: "I go, and I come to you" (Jn 14:28); likewise: "A little while, and you shall not see me; and again a little while, and you shall see me" (Jn 16:17). O little while and little while! O long little while! Good Lord, you call it a little while that we shall not see you? May the word of my Lord be safe: it is long, and exceedingly very much. Yet both are true: both a little while in respect of merits, and long in respect of desires [in another reading: not a little while in respect of desires]. You have both in the prophet: "If he shall delay," he says, "wait for him, because coming he shall come, and shall not tarry" (Hab 2:3). How shall he not tarry, if he shall delay, unless because what is sufficient for merit is not sufficient for desire? Moreover, the loving soul is carried by desires, drawn by longings, disregards merits, closes its eyes to majesty, opens them to delight, resting in the Savior and acting confidently in him. Fearless, then, and unabashed, she calls back the Word, and with confidence claims again her delights, with her accustomed freedom calling him not Lord, but beloved: "Return, my beloved": and she adds: "Be like a gazelle, and a young hart upon the mountains of Bethel." But of this later.
5. Now indeed bear with a little of my foolishness. I wish to tell, for I have agreed to this, how it goes with me in such matters. It is not expedient indeed. But let me be exposed so that I may be of use: and, if you shall profit, I will console my foolishness; if not, I will confess my foolishness. I confess that the Word has come to me also — I speak in foolishness — and many times. And although he has entered into me quite often, I did not at certain times perceive when he entered. I perceived that he was present, I remember that he had been present, sometimes I was even able to have a presentiment of his entering, but never to perceive it, nor indeed even his departure. For whence he came into my soul, or whither he went again when leaving it; but also by what way he either entered or departed; even now I confess that I do not know, according to that saying: "You do not know whence he comes, or whither he goes" (Jn 3:8). Nor is it a wonder, for he is the one to whom it was said: "And your footsteps shall not be known" (Ps 76:20). Certainly he did not enter through the eyes, because he is not colored; nor through the ears, because he made no sound; nor through the nostrils, because he is not mixed with the air, but with the mind; nor did he taint the air, but made it; nor indeed through the mouth, because he is not chewed or drunk; nor did I find him by touch, because he is not palpable. By what way then did he enter? Or perhaps he did not even enter, because he did not come from outside? For he is not some one thing from among those things which are outside. Yet neither did he come from within me, since he is good, and I know that there is no good in me. I ascended also above my higher part: and behold, the Word was towering above this. To my lower part also I descended as a curious explorer; and no less was he found below. If I looked outward, beyond all that is outside of me I found him to be; if inward, he was more inward still. And I knew that what I had read was true, that in him we live, and move, and are (Acts 17:28): but blessed is he in whom he is, who lives for him, who is moved by him.
6. You ask then, since his ways are thus altogether unsearchable, how I know that he is present? He is living and efficacious: and as soon as he came within, he awakened my drowsing soul; he moved, and softened, and wounded my heart, for it was hard and stony and diseased. He began also to pluck up and to destroy, to build and to plant, to water what was dry, to illuminate what was dark, to open what was closed, to inflame what was cold, and also to make the crooked straight and the rough into smooth ways; so that my soul blessed the Lord, and all that is within me blessed his holy name. Thus, then, as the Word the Bridegroom entered into me from time to time, he never made his entrance known by any signs, not by voice, not by appearance, not by step. By none of his movements, finally, was he discovered by me, by none of my senses did he slip into my inmost parts: only from the movement of my heart, as I said above, did I understand his presence; and from the flight of vices, and the suppression of carnal affections, I perceived the power of his virtue; and from the examination or reproof of my hidden things I marveled at the depth of his wisdom; and from whatever small amendment of my ways I experienced the goodness of his gentleness; and from the renewal and reformation of the spirit of my mind, that is, of my inner man, I perceived in some measure the beauty of his comeliness; and from the contemplation of all these things together I was struck with awe at the multitude of his greatness.
7. But because all these things, when the Word has withdrawn, begin at once to lie languid and cold and torpid, just as if you had taken the fire away from a boiling pot; and this is for me the sign of his departure — my soul must needs be sad until he returns again, and my heart grows warm within me as is its custom; and let this be the sign of his return. Having then such experience of the Word, what wonder if I too take up for myself the voice of the bride in calling him back, when he has absented himself, who am carried, if not by an equal, yet by a similar desire at least in part? It will be familiar to me, as long as I live, for the calling back of the Word, that word of calling back which is "return." And as often as he shall slip away, so often shall it be repeated by me; nor will I cease to cry out as if after one going away, with the burning desire of my heart, that he return, and restore to me the joy of his salvation, restore to me himself. I confess to you [in another reading: I say to you], sons, nothing else in the meantime is pleasing, while that which alone is pleasing is not at hand. And this I pray, that he come not empty, but full of grace and truth (Jn 1:14): in his custom surely, as yesterday and the day before. In which the likeness of the gazelle and the young hart seems to me to be able to be exhibited, since truth has the eyes of a gazelle, and grace the gladness of a young hart.
8. Each thing is necessary to me: both truth, from which I cannot be hidden; and grace, from which I would not wish to be. Otherwise, without either one the visitation will not be full, since the severity of the one without the other can seem burdensome, and the cheerfulness of the other without the one can seem dissolute. Bitter is truth without the seasoning of grace; just as without the bridle of truth, devotion itself is light and lacking in measure, and often even insolent. How many it has not profited to have received grace, for this reason, that they did not equally receive the tempering of truth! For from this they were pleased with themselves more than was fitting, while they did not fear the gaze of truth, while they did not look to the gravity of the gazelle, but rather gave themselves over entirely to the lightness and cheerfulness of the young hart. From this it came about that they were deprived of that grace in which they had wished to exult privately, to whom it could be said, even if too late: "Go therefore and learn what this means: Serve the Lord in fear, and exult before him with trembling" (Ps 2:11). For a certain holy soul had said in her abundance, "I shall never be moved": when suddenly she perceived the face of the Word turned away from her, and herself not only moved, but even troubled (Ps 29:7-8); and so in sadness she learned that she had needed, together with the gift of devotion, also the weight of truth. Therefore the fullness of grace is not in grace alone, but neither is it in truth alone. What does it profit to know what you ought to do, if the will to do it is not also given? What, if you will indeed, but are in no way able? How many I have known to be made sadder by truth once recognized, and all the more so because it was no longer permitted to flee to the excuse of ignorance, knowing, and not doing, what Truth was urging!
9. Since these things are so, neither without the other suffices. I have said too little: neither is it even expedient. Whence do we know this? "To him who knows the good," he says, "and does it not, it is sin for him" (Jas 4:17); likewise: "The servant knowing the will of his master, and not doing what is worthy, shall be beaten with many stripes" (Lk 12:47). But this is for the part of truth. For the part of grace, what? It is written: "And after the morsel Satan entered into him" (Jn 13:27). He speaks of Judas, who, having received the gift of grace, because he did not walk in truth with the Master of truth, or rather with the mistress Truth, gave place in himself to the devil. Hear further: "He fed them with the fat of wheat, and from the rock with honey he satisfied them." Whom? "The enemies of the Lord lied to him" (Ps 80:17-16). Those whom he fed with honey and fat, these lied to him, having become enemies; because they did not join truth to grace. Of whom you have elsewhere: "Strange children lied to me; strange children grew old, and limped from their paths" (Ps 17:46). Why would they not limp, being content with the one foot of grace, and not adding truth? "Their time therefore shall be forever" (Ps 80:16), just as also their prince's, who himself also did not stand in the truth, but was a liar from the beginning (Jn 8:44), and therefore heard: "You have destroyed your wisdom in your beauty" (Ezek 28:17). I do not want a beauty that takes my wisdom from me.
10. You ask who that beauty is, so harmful and so pernicious? Your own. Perhaps you are still without understanding? Hear more plainly. Private, one's own. We do not blame the gift, but the use. Indeed, if you have noticed, not in beauty, but in his own beauty was he said to have lost his wisdom. And, if I am not mistaken, the one beauty of angel and soul is wisdom itself. For what is either this one or that one without wisdom, if not rude and deformed matter? By it, then, he was not only formed, but also beautiful. But he lost it when he made it his own: so that to have lost wisdom in his beauty is nothing other than to have lost wisdom in his own wisdom. Ownership is the cause. That he was wise for himself, that he did not give glory to God, that he did not return grace for grace, that he did not walk according to truth in it, but bent it back to his own will: this is why he lost it; indeed this is what it means to have lost it. For to have in this way is to have lost. "And if Abraham," he says, "was justified by works, he has glory, but not before God" (Rom 4:2). And I: not I [or: therefore] in safety, I say. I have lost whatever I have not before God. For what is so lost as what is exiled outside God? What is death, but the privation of life? So perdition is nothing but alienation from God. "Woe to you who are wise in your own eyes, and prudent before your own faces!" (Isa 5:21.) Of you it is said: "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the prudence of the prudent I will reject" (1 Cor 1:19). They have lost wisdom, because their own wisdom has destroyed them. What have they not lost, who are themselves also lost? Or are they truly not lost, whom God does not know?
11. Moreover the foolish virgins, whom I think to be foolish for no other reason than that, calling themselves wise, they became fools; these, I say, shall hear from God: "I know you not" (Mt 25:12). And likewise those who usurped the grace of miracles for their own glory shall no less hear, that "I do not know you" (Mt 7:23): so that it may be clearly evident from these things that grace does not profit where truth is not in the intention; but rather harms. And indeed both things rest with the Bridegroom. Indeed: "Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ," says John the Baptist (Jn 1:17). If therefore with one or the other of these without the other the Lord Jesus Christ shall have knocked at my door (for he is the Word of God, the Bridegroom of the soul), he will enter indeed not as Bridegroom, but as judge. Far be it; let this by no means happen! Let him not enter into judgment with his servant. Let him enter as the peaceful one, let him enter joyful and cheerful: yet let him enter grave and serious, who by a certain sterner countenance of truth may, while he suppresses insolence, purge my gladness. Let him enter as a young hart leaping, as a gazelle looking keenly about, who by overlooking fault may leap past it, and by having compassion may look upon punishment. Let him enter as if descending from the mountains of Bethel, festive and splendid, and as if proceeding from the Father, gentle and mild, who does not disdain to be called and to become the Bridegroom of the soul that seeks him, since he is God blessed above all things forever. Amen.
Translated from the Latin by AI. Source: Migne, Patrologia Latina 183.