21.0 Mystical Experiences - Overview Page 1 of 15

21.0: Mystical Experiences - Overview

Using the poetical words of the 19 th century French priest and spiritual director Abbé Henri de Tourville, mystical experiences can be considered as: 1

…a foretaste of Paradise amidst the troubles of earth.

If you find this a little too brief, try this explanation from John Blofeld, a British writer on Asian thought and religion, which comes from the first chapter of his book ‘Beyond the Gods’: 2

Perhaps I may be forgiven for paraphrasing a few paragraphs from a book I wrote on Tibetan mysticism, 'The Way of Power', as these, though still very far from expressing the mystery, come as near to it as I can get: 'There are moments when a marvellous experience leaps into mind as though coming from another world. The magic that calls it forth is often so fleeting as to be forgotten in the joy of the experience itself - it may be a skylark bursting into song, the splash of a wave, a flute played by moonlight or the fateful shrieking and drumming of a mountain storm; a lovely smile, perhaps, or a single gesture, form or hue of compelling beauty; a familiar scene transformed by an unusual quality of light, or a cluster of rocks suggestive of beings imbued with life. Or the spell may be wrought by a sudden exaltation, a jerking of the mind into an unknown dimension. A curtain hitherto unnoticed is suddenly twitched aside and, for a timeless moment, there stands partially revealed - a mystery. This mystery has a hundred names, all of them inapt. It has been called the Good, the True, the Beautiful. Philosophers term it the Absolute; Christian mystics, the Godhead. It is the Beloved of the Sufi Moslems, the Tao of the Taoists and, to Buddhists, Nirvana, the Womb of Existence, Suchness, the Void, the Clear Light, the One Mind. Were it not that frequent and clear visions of it engender a compassionate urge to communicate its bliss, it would be best to use no name at all.

In addition, David Hay, a zoologist with a longstanding professional interest in the disputed boundary between biological science and the religious and spiritual dimensions of human experience, tried to explain the different types of mystical experience: 3

If readers can find in their life histories a moment when they have been overwhelmed by strangeness or total 'otherness', this 'mysterium tremendum' is what [Rudolph] Otto is driving at [when using the term numinous] . A second quality is a feeling of the 'awfulness' of the experience, in the sense of a dread or even of a terror which can make the flesh creep. Thirdly there is an element of being overpowered, of being 'dust and ashes' before the divine. Fourthly there is the feeling of being caught up in the power of unbridled energy - 'The love of God is a consuming fire'. Finally, in spite of the fearfulness, there is a powerful element of fascination or alluring charm. ...[the above] shade into another large group of experiences which are called 'mystical' by modern scholars. The difference is that in a mystical episode the experience feels that, in an extraordinary way, all things are One.

Another scientist who appreciated the value of mystical experiences, although rather better

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:30:29 21.0 Mystical Experiences - Overview Page 2 of 15 known, was Albert Einstein. Whilst this giant of theoretical physics emphatically did not subscribe to the personalised modern God, according to the expert on comparative religion Karen Armstrong, he believed that science was no longer averse to mystical wonder and mystery. In his treatise 'Strange is Our Situation Here on Earth' he explained that: 4

The most beautiful emotion we can experience is the mystical. It is the sower of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger ... is as good as dead. To know that what is impenetrable to us really exists, manifesting itself to us as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty, which our dull faculties can comprehend only in their most primitive forms - this knowledge, this feeling is at the centre of all true religiousness. In this sense, and in this sense only, I belong to the ranks of devoutly religious men.

A description which I like is not one which lists all the possible types but which tries to capture the essence of what mystics have been telling us for years. It comes from the South African born Anglican priest Martin Israel, a mystic in his own right: 5

It is no wonder that mystical experience is sought above all else by those who know, for in the glimpse of reality vouchsafed, the meaning and destiny of individual existence is dimly comprehended.

Many different names have been used to refer to these extraordinary and super-sensual experiences. In the Unitarian minister William Houff’s book ‘Infinity in Your Hand’, he mentioned that: 6

...William James called a 'religious experience.' Abraham Maslow named it a 'peak experience.' And James Joyce used the word 'epiphany.'

Call it what you will, it doesn’t really matter. What is important is that these experiences appear to relate to a reality beyond our fives senses. Whilst many of you may feel that the idea of another reality is a bit far-fetched, it seems to be the only explanation for the feelings that the mystics encounter. I will try to explain. As the mystic deepens his relationship with Spirit and particularly during meditation or contemplation their vibrations are raised to such an extent that they come in contact with the level of the Spirit plane just ‘above’ the earth plane. In this way they start to experience what it is like to exist within the Spirit World – the alternative reality. This means that there are at least two realities – the life you live on earth and the life which exists in the Afterlife. I cannot prove this statement yet although, as the Indian philosopher Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan observes: 7

Religious experiences possess their own distinctive character and we seem to be in touch with reality other than that of matter, life or mind.

There have been many different names or ways of referring to this reality. In ‘God and the Evolving Universe’ reference is made to the words of the 19 th century American philosopher and psychologist William James: 8

Plunge into an altogether other dimension of existence from the sensible and merely "understandable" world. Name it the mystical region, or the supernatural region, whichever you choose.

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Another way of referring to this ‘reality’ was expressed by the English mystic and teacher F. C. Happold who quoted from a passage in the Parinirvana Sutra: 9

It is only when all outward appearances are gone that there is left that one principle of life which exists independently of all external phenomena. It is the fire which burns in the eternal light, when the fuel is expended and the flame is extinguished; for that fire is neither in the flame not in the fuel, nor yet inside either of the two, but above, beneath, and everywhere.

Words start to get difficult to understand, not only because of the cultural differences but also the centuries that have passed since these words were uttered or written. In addition, there are some people who do not have the ability to conceptualise; to think in conceptual terms. Of such people, the British philosopher Bertrand Russell wrote: 10

Only those who are practiced in dealing with abstractions can readily grasp a general principle without the help of instances.

The mystics don’t deal in examples; metaphors and paradoxes are their explanatory mechanisms. This means that for some people a problem exists with the way in which some of the European mystics express their view of this reality. The mystical writer Evelyn Underhill states that: 11

…the conscious mind being passive, the more divine mind below the threshold- organ of our free creative life - can emerge and present its reports. In the words of an older mystic [Dionysius the Areopagite in De Divinis Nominibus vii.3] , “The soul, leaving all things and forgetting herself, is immersed in the ocean of Divine Splendour, and illuminated by the Sublime Abyss of the Unfathomable Wisdom.”

This description of the reality to which the mystic ascends is very poetic and typical of the early mystics. Fast-forwarding to the 20 th century, Paul Davies, an English physicist, writer and broadcaster, believed that this contact with another reality is one of the fundamental experiences of a mystic. He states that: 12

The essence of the mystical experience, then, is a type of shortcut to truth, a direct and unmediated contact with a perceived ultimate reality.

It typifies the mystic; it ratifies part of the dictionary definition of ‘mystic – one that seeks God directly, without intermediaries’. Evelyn Underhill added another aspect of mystic experience, when she wrote that there are: 13

...two distinct sides to the full mystical experience. (A) The vision or consciousness of Absolute Perfection. (B) The inward transmutation to which that Vision compels the mystic, in order that he may be to some extent worthy of that which he has beheld: may take his place within the order of Reality.

It all depends how we perceive and examine any mystical experiences. If we consider Near Death Experiences as, in some minor way, a step towards mystical experience then by their analysis we may be able to approach an understanding. Peter & Elizabeth Fenwick believed that it may be possible to: 14

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...give it a physiological interpretation, the Dennett treatment: what is actually happening in the brain, where is the sensory information coming from and what brain centres are active during the experience? We can give it a psychological interpretation: is this the brain's interpretation of a model primarily arising in the 'real' world, or is it a psychological model created entirely by the brain? Or can we interpret it as a transcendental mystical experience, something which suggests that mind and brain are separate and gives positive evidence of a transcendental reality beyond the brain. Each of these interpretations is valid in its own right and none will invalidate the others. Each may hold some truth, but there is no guarantee that any will give us the whole truth.

This glimpse of another reality is not something that even the mystic can get a complete grip on nor can they describe it satisfactorily. It is transient and we can only ever get a brief understanding of its scope. Again in the words of Evelyn Underhill: 15

For the action of God is seldom showy; the true energies of the Kingdom are supersensuous - only a little filters through to the visible world.

What has emerged from the writings about mystical experiences is that there are certain threads which appear to be common to all faiths. Karen Armstrong in her book ‘A History of God’, as noted by the American cardiologist Herbert Benson, understood that each mystical experience is: 16

...a subjective experience that involves an interior journey, not a perception of an objective fact outside the self; it is undertaken through the image-making part of the mind - often called imagination - rather than through the more cerebral, logical faculty. Finally, it is something that the mystic creates in himself or herself deliberately; certain physical or mental exercises yield the final vision; it does not always come upon them unawares.

Some mystics have described this ‘other reality’ as being an ‘Eternal Now’. This has been poetically described by Gerald Hammond: 17

How should I praise thee, Lord! How should my rymes Gladly engrave thy love in steel, If what my soul doth feel sometimes, My soul might ever feel.

Although there were some fourtie heav'ns, or more, Sometimes I peer above them all; Sometimes I hardly reach a score, Sometimes to hell I fall…

Whether I flie with angels, fall with dust, Thy hands made both, and I am there: Thy power and love, my love and trust Make one place ev'ry where.

One mystic, who used this phrase the ‘Eternal Now’ as a title of his book was Eckhart

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Tolle and another who referred to it was Bede Griffiths, a British-born Benedictine monk who lived in ashrams in South India, who, in his book ‘A New Vision of Reality’, expressed the view that: 18

…in mystical experience we discover at a fully conscious level our original oneness with nature and sense of the present moment. There is no longer an awareness of either a past or a future; there is only the present, the total reality experienced in its original unity.

A mystical experience has been described in broad terms by the American William Houff who wrote: 19

As a mystic is one who is actively interested in coming into harmony with the Divine Principle (God, Brahman, One Mind, Cosmic Consciousness, Eternal Thou, Whomever), so a mystical experience is an unexpected yet unforgettable result of making progress on this ultimate spiritual task.

It is through such descriptions of these mystical experiences that we can get a better handle on them. During her research for her book ‘Mysticism’, Evelyn Underhill discovered what she describes as a wonderful passage, unique in the literature of mysticism. She said that Angela of Foligno has reported the lucid vision in which she perceived this truth: the twofold revelation of an Absolute at once humble and omnipotent, personal and transcendent - the unimaginable synthesis of 'unspeakable power' and 'deep humility’: 20

The eyes of my soul were opened, and I beheld the plenitude of God, wherein I did comprehend the whole world, both here and beyond the sea, and the abyss and ocean and all things. In all these things I beheld naught save the divine power, in a manner assuredly indescribable; so that through excess of marvelling the soul cried with a loud voice, saying 'This whole world is full of God!' Wherefore I now comprehended how small a thing is the whole world, that is to say both here and beyond the seas, the abyss, the ocean, and all things; and that the Power of God exceeds and fills all. Then He said unto me: 'I have shown thee something of My Power,' and I understood, that after this I should better understand the rest. He then said 'Behold now My humility.' Then was I given an insight into the deep humility of God towards man. And comprehending that unspeakable power and beholding that deep humility, my soul marvelled greatly, and did esteem itself to be nothing at all.

A totally different type of experience was reported by the parish priest Terry Tastard. In his book ‘The Spark in the Soul’ he described an experience of Thomas Merton: 21

There ‘at the corner of Fourth and Walnut’ he was ‘suddenly overwhelmed with the realisation that I loved all these people, that they were mine and I theirs, that we could not be alien to one another even though we were total strangers. It was like waking from a dream of separateness’

Whatever these mystical experiences are, they seem to be covered by the word ‘feelings’. B.A. Gerrish, an American academic majoring on historical theology, in his book about the theology of Friedrich Schleiermacher, the German theologian and philosopher known for his attempt to reconcile the criticisms of the Enlightenment with traditional Protestant orthodoxy, told us that Schleiermacher: 22

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...locates religion or piety in feeling, not in knowing or doing…

To extend this way of looking at mystical experiences Peter & Elizabeth Fenwick found that in about a quarter of subjects, in a survey of over 300 people who had Near Death Experiences, they found a third 'mystical' factor which relates to ‘feeling’. They concluded that: 23

Mystical feelings included feelings of great understanding, a sense of harmony and unity, feelings of joy and revelation. Memories might be evoked and sometimes there was a feeling of being controlled by some outside force.

Certainly our emotions are very involved in all our mystical experiences, but it seems that the closer we get to union with God the more ‘active’ we become and the greater our incidence of mystical experiences. We become more sensitive or, at least, more sensitised to the consequences. Lumsden Barkway, in his anthology of Evelyn Underhill’s writings, wrote: 24

As we become spiritually sensitive and more alert in our response to experience, I think we sometimes get a glimpse of that deep creative action by which we are being brought into this new order of being, more and more transformed into the agents of spirit; able to play our part in the great human undertaking of bringing the whole world nearer to the intention of God.

As an aside, it is worth noting that during the 1960s in particular there was a belief in some quarters that the use of recreational drugs could bring about a mystical experience. David L Edwards writing in the mid-1970s noted that: 25

Marijuana, heroin and LSD have been widely peddled in recent years as a means of obtaining the ecstasies of religious mysticism without the need to discipline oneself in prayer.

Such practices do not produce mystical experiences; they only divert the ‘tripper’ from their spiritual pathway. However, through taking your own spiritual journey the further you travel the greater the potential for mystical experiences and these are, not may be, life changing. For an example of this, we can look at the consequences that such experiences had on the 13 th century Dominican priest Thomas Aquinas. In reporting on Thomas’ life, the Jesuit priest and historian of philosophy F. C. Copleston noted: 26

As a priest and friar he was in every way exemplary, and at any rate towards the end of his life he enjoyed mystical experience. In December 1273, after an experience while saying Mass, he suspended his writing on the third part of his Summa Theologica, telling his secretary that he had reached the end of his writing and giving the reason the fact that 'all I have written seems to me like so much straw compared with what I have seen and with what has been revealed to me'.

Even though I expect that our spiritual or mystical experiences may have less of an impact on our lives, we will certainly have a different outlook after than before them. They are part of our spiritual growth and thus development and mystical experience go hand in hand. The mystical scholar Margaret Smith, commenting on St John [John vi. 63.], said that to him: 27

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…religion is essentially an inward process of growth, depending upon direct experience.

Taking an Eastern perspective, the English author Aldous Huxley, quoting from Shankara's Viveka-Chudamani, The Crest-Jewel of Wisdom, wrote: 28

Disease is not cured by pronouncing the name of medicine, but by taking medicine. Deliverance is not achieved by repeating the word "Brahman," but by directly experiencing Brahman...

…and from John Blofeld whose spirituality bridged the East West divide: 29

The theistic term for it, 'union with the Godhead' strikes a nice balance between the Western conception of a supreme being and such Eastern expressions as the Tao, Nirvana, denoting not a being but a state. .. It follows that between the Western concept and the more impersonal Eastern concept, there need be no conflict, once it is accepted that direct experience is all that matters.

Thus direct mystical experience is the hallmark of every mystic. Some, who probably look at the two geographical areas of East and West from a theoretical or philosophical perspective, seem to want to separate them more. One such person was the Norwegian intellectual Jostein Gaarder who remarked that: 30

In Western mysticism - that is, within Judaism, Christianity, and Islam - the mystic emphasizes that his meeting is with a personal God. Although God is present both in nature and in the human soul, he is also far above and beyond the world. In Eastern mysticism - that is, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Chinese religion - it is more usual to emphasize that the mystic experiences a total fusion with God or the 'cosmic spirit.'

I think I would take John Blofeld’s approach – being a mystic himself, was probably in a better position to ratify that the experiences were very similar. Either way, mystical experience is about moving towards an absolute union with God or as Martin Israel said: 31

The characteristic feature of a mystical experience ... is an awareness of union.

In this state of union, the mystic is often overwhelmed as Evelyn Underhill reported of the 16 th / 17 th century renowned mystic Jacob Boehme who wrote: 32

Now while I was wrestling and battling, being aided by God, a wonderful light arose within my soul. It was a light entirely foreign to my unruly nature, but in it I recognized the true nature of God and man, and the relation existing between them, a thing which heretofore I had never understood, and for which I would never have sought.

This non-seeking must be observed. That is, during the process of spiritual development it is vital that the only objective is to get closer and closer to our spiritual root. What we must avoid, at all costs, is trying to develop certain characteristics or experience particular

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:30:29 21.0 Mystical Experiences - Overview Page 8 of 15 phenomena or gain specific rewards. This caveat was stressed by Evelyn Underhill: 33

…the mystic serves without hope of reward. By one of the many paradoxes of the spiritual life, he obtains satisfaction because he does not seek it; completes his personality because he gives it up. "Attainment," says Dionysius the Areopagite in words which are writ large on the annals of Christian ecstasy, "comes only by means of this sincere, spontaneous, and entire surrender of yourself and all things."

That does not mean that mystics do not develop enhancing abilities and characteristics but they are not sought. Inspiration comes as part of mystical experiences. Again, from Evelyn Underhill’s ‘Mysticism’ said: 34

This is equally true of mystics, artists, philosophers, discoverers, and rulers of men. The great religion, invention, work of art, always owes its inception to some sudden uprush of intuitions or ideas for which the superficial self cannot account; its execution to powers so far beyond the control of that self, that they seem, as their owner sometimes says, to "come from beyond." This is "inspiration"; the opening of the sluices, so that those waters of truth in which all life is bathed may rise to the level of consciousness.

These truths have flowed into many thousands of mystics over the years and I cannot even begin to estimate the number of books and associated writings which try to describe some of their encounters with this new reality. All Scriptures, being the foundations for our religions, are developments and often accounts of such experiences. For example the Bible and the Qur’an are full to the brim with them. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, the Indian mystic and politician realised that: 35

The life of Mohammad is full of mystic experiences.

He, Radhakrishnan, also looked into the lives of many of the ancients and reminded us that witnesses to the personal sense of the divine are not confined to the East: 36

Socrates and Plato, Plotinus and Porphyry, Augustine and Dante, Bunyan and Wesley, and numberless others, testify to the felt reality of God. It is as old as humanity and is not confined to any one people. The evidence is too massive to run away from.

This was also confirmed by Frederick Happold: 37

...when an examination of the totality of mystical experience, that is of mystical experience as it is found throughout man's history, among people of different geographical and cultural environments, and at different levels of spiritual development, reveals common characteristics, then it becomes a body of evidence which must be taken into consideration in the exploration of the nature of the Real.

Based on his extensive analysis of Near Death Experiences, Raymond Moody was able to express the view that in several accounts: 38

...a single phrase - 'a city of light' - occurs. In this and several other respects the imagery in which these scenes are described seems to be reminiscent of what is

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found in the Bible.

Another quite simplistic assessment of mystical experiences was provided by the Indian Radhakrishnan who believed that a mystical experience: 39

...constitutes dwelling in heaven which is not a place where God lives, but a mode of being which is fully and completely real.

Therefore, all this evidence and analysis we must accommodate in our own philosophy. Bede Griffiths, a monk who spent many years in an ashram (a spiritual hermitage) in India, also praised the spirituality of some of the great mystics: 40

The mind of a Sankara or an Aquinas is equal to that of any modern scientist or philosopher, but it draws on sources of wisdom which raise it to a higher power and carry it beyond their reach. Bertrand Russell was a baby compared with Sankara or Aquinas. His mind, in spite of its excellence, could never get beyond the world of the senses and its extensions in logic and mathematics. But Sankara and Aquinas, though no less logical and rational, were both mystics who had experienced the reality of a world which transcends the senses and could bring their intelligence to bear on that. ... Al-Ghazali did for the mystical vision of Islam what Sankara and Aquinas did for that of Hinduism and Christianity, and what Nagarjuna and Vasubandhu, the doctors of the Mahayana, did for Buddhism. They gave a rational and logical form to the mystical insight into the transcendent Truth.

Others have more recently understood that mystical experiences involve ecstatic states of consciousness in which one is vividly aware of the presence of God. Marcus Borg in his book ‘The God We Never Knew’ considered two such people: 41

The contemporary Catholic scholar Bernard McGinn defines 'the mystical element in Christianity' as 'that part of its belief and practices that concerns the preparation for, the consciousness of, and the reaction to what can be described as the immediate or direct presence of God'. Earlier in the century, Rufus Jones, a Quaker scholar, defined mysticism as: '...a type of religion which puts the emphasis on immediate awareness of relation with God, in direct and intimate consciousness of the Divine Presence. It is religion in its most acute, intense, and living stage.'

In summary we can say, with David Hay, that: 42

Religious heroes are not merely great men, they are people who either are believed to have had direct experience of, or are themselves the manifestation of, the sacred.

…and there are many of them. Those referred to above are included in the lists of the great mystics but that does not mean that we cannot follow in their footsteps. In his study of mysticism, F. C. Happold believed that all of us could, to some extent, become a mystic: 43

We cannot hope to have the profound experiences given to the contemplative saints, but mystical consciousness is much more common than a capacity to rise to the

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heights of Contemplation. To more than is supposed, since they seldom talk about it, there has come, even if only dimly, the experience of 'the intersection of the timeless moment'.

I have talked, so far, about some aspects of mystical experiences but not about the mystical states which characterise the mystic and hence provide the environment for their experiences. F. C. Happold in ‘Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man’ tried to analyse the markings of a mystic: 44

One is enabled to recognise these experiences as truly mystical in character since they invariably contain some at least of the known and recognised characteristics of mystical states. In 'Mysticism' 45 I listed seven characteristics of such states. 1, They defy expression in terms which are fully intelligible to those who have not had some analogous experience 2. Though states of feeling they are also states of knowledge, resulting in a deeper insight into the nature of things. 3. Except in the case of true contemplatives, when they can result in a permanent shift of consciousness, they are infrequent and of short duration 4. They convey the sense of something 'given', not dependent on one's own volition. 5. There is a consciousness of the oneness of everything 6. They also have a sense of timelessness. 7. There is forced on one the conviction that the familiar phenomenal 'ego' is not the real 'I'

Peter & Elizabeth Fenwick discovered another similar analysis of mystical experiences provided by Richard Maurice Bucke a nineteenth-century Canadian psychiatrist who was one of the first Western scientists to try to define such occurrences. He listed: 46

...nine features which he believed categorised its main elements. These were: 1. Feeling of unity. 2. Feelings of objectivity and reality. 3. Transcendence of space and time. 4. A sense of sacredness 5. Deeply felt positive mood - joy, blessedness, peace and bliss. 6. Paradoxicality. Mystical consciousness which is often felt to be true in spite of violating Aristotelian logic. 7. Ineffability. Language is inadequate to express the experience. 8. Transiency. 9. Positive change in attitude or behaviour.

In addition to this, Morton Kelsey, a North American born clergyman and academic, speaking from a Christian standpoint, believes that there are only three types of experience which he says are: 47

...the sacramental, the contemplative, and those giving an inner perception of the Divine in images.

I would be tempted not to classify them in this way because they are so varied and diverse that any classification will only distort the view of them. Even though we must recognise that mystical writings differ in depth, lucidity and understanding, there is some element of

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:30:29 21.0 Mystical Experiences - Overview Page 11 of 15 commonality. Bertrand Russell, in his book ‘Religion and Science’ described them as: 48

The mystics vary greatly in their capacity for giving verbal expression to their experiences, but I think we may take it that those who succeeded best all maintain: (1) that all division and separateness is unreal, and that the universe is a single indivisible unity; (2) that evil is illusory, and that the illusion arises through falsely regarding a part as self-subsistent; (3) that time is unreal, and that reality is eternal, not in the sense of being everlasting, but in the sense of being wholly outside time.

As you will realise, this is just a different slice through the mystical experience pie – and it can be cut in a seemingly infinite number of ways. However, as time progressed from the early mystics, there appeared to be some thread which passed through all experiences. The more you read of the exploits of the mystics, the more you will feel that you understand what they are trying to convey. Again, an example will be useful. In the ‘Ascent of Mount Carmel’, St John of the Cross, albeit in the 16 th century, tried to give an appreciation of mystical experience. He wrote: 49

For spiritual and intellectual visions are much clearer and subtler than those which pertain to the body. For, when God is pleased to grant this favour to the soul, He communicates to it that supernatural light whereof we speak, wherein the soul sees the things that God wills it to see, easily and most clearly, whether they be of Heaven or of earth, and the absence or presence of them is no hindrance to the vision. And it is at times as though a door were opened before it into a great brightness, through which the soul sees a light, after the manner of a lightning flash, which, on a dark night, reveals things suddenly, and causes them to be clearly and distinctly seen, and then leaves them in darkness, although the forms and figures of them remain in the fancy... The effect which these visions produce in the soul is that of quiet, illumination, joy like that of glory, sweetness, purity and love, humility and inclination or elevation of the spirit in God; sometimes more so, at other times less; with sometimes more of one thing, at other times more of another, according to the spirit wherein they are received and according as God wills.

You can see how difficult it is to try to describe to another such experiences. In fact, as Teresa of Avila, a soul companion of St John of the Cross, realised it is only those who have themselves mystical experiences who can understand the description of these experiences: 50

If their recollection is genuine, the fact becomes very evident, for it produces certain effects which I do not know how to explain but which anyone will recognise who has experience of them. It is as if the soul were rising from play, for it sees that worldly things are nothing but toys; so in due course it rises above them, like a person entering a strong castle, in order that it may have nothing more to fear from its enemies.

Being in a tropical rain forest is the only way to really appreciate that environment – study and listening to the accounts of others can take you some way but to personally experience the heat, the sounds, the sensations the creatures is to have been there. This is no different to mystical experiences as Peter & Elizabeth Fenwick explained: 51

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If we have never personally had such an experience we can only theorise. And while theories are fine, and fun and even useful, I believe that we can learn more about its true significance by listening to the people who have been there, who have had first- hand experience of what the rest of us can only talk about.

What is important is for us all to recognise what mystical experiences could be and, as Peter & Elizabeth Fenwick suggest, perhaps we should just accept and value these experiences for what they are. That is to appreciate then as: 52

...experiences which are enormously meaningful and powerful to those who have them, which can change attitudes towards both life and death in a positive and often permanent way, and lead those of us who don't have them to ask far-reaching and universal questions about our nature.

Nevertheless, as time goes on, I’m sure that descriptions will become more and more understandable as mystics of the present and future are able to use the language of sense plus other words and phrases that are developed to be able to convey the nuances of mystical experience. The Jesuit priest Auguste Poulain, according to William Johnston, also recognised that the future holds the key: 53

In the course of the centuries we see that descriptions [of mystical experience] become more and more accurate. Writers come gradually though very slowly to distinguish, one from another, states of consciousness which had previously been confused; and they discover better comparisons with which to describe them. In this respect, mysticism partakes in the forward thrust that can be seen in all the descriptive sciences. There is no reason for thinking that there will be no more progress. Our successors will do better than ourselves. And it is in this direction that mysticism has a future.

Each experience that a mystic has will vary in most respects except one, and that is the joy that the mystic feels. It is overpowering and lasting, and has been expressed by the mystics for as long as mystical experiences have been recorded. In 13 th century Italy the medieval scholastic theologian and philosopher Bonaventure described this as: 54

Thus, through the supernatural power of grace in the human soul, the highest spiritual joy that is possible in the present state of pilgrimage reaches its perfection through immediate, spiritual experiences analogous to sense experiences.

And experiences are not confined to the contemplative’s cell during times of intense union with God. They can occur at any time and in any place and often when they are least expected as the barefooted French Carmelite monk Brother Lawrence recognised: 55

We have a God who is infinitely gracious and knows all about our wants. He will come in His own time when you least expect it.

…and again from ‘Ascent of Mount Carmel’ by St John of the Cross: 56

Wherefore, at certain times, when the soul is least thinking of it and least desiring it, God is wont to give it these Divine touches, by causing it certain remembrances

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of Himself. And these are sometimes suddenly caused in the soul by its mere recollection of certain things -- sometimes of very small things. And they are so readily perceived that at times they cause not only the soul, but also the body, to tremble.

He also chose to emphasise the idea of unexpected mystical experiences in his other famous book ‘The Dark Night of the Soul’: 57

God communicates to the soul, when it least expects it, spiritual sweetness, most pure love, and spiritual knowledge of the most exalted kind, of greater worth and profit than any of which it has previous experience, though at first the soul may not think so, for the spiritual influence now communicated is most delicate, and imperceptible by sense.

William Houf, too, recognised that, from his own experience, these mystical insights cannot be programmed to occur: 58

Like a peak experience, this comes unbidden; it cannot be ordered upon command It has a different source than does linear thought or activity.

Remember also that when I use the word ‘mystic’ I include within its ambit all those other words and phrases which represent those individuals who, through their lives, move into the orbit of God. One example is that given by Peter Spink: 59

Experientially the mystic and contemplative are one. Both recognise the mystery of the unity of all things.

Of the many books which explain and help you to understand more about mystical experiences, one which I could recommend is called ‘A New Vision of Reality’ by Bede Griffiths 60 . He was a 20 th century British-born Benedictine monk who opened a thoughtful and spiritual window on mystical experiences from both a Western and Eastern perspective. After reading this book I noted that it ‘… has a good analysis of mystical experience from the point of view of many religions and finds many similarities between them. It also has a Biblical perspective on mysticism.’

From all the above, you should draw the same conclusion as the medium Horace Leaf who wrote that mystical experience: 61

...is undoubtedly real.

Finally, follow your spiritual pathway as far as you can, and if you are fortunate enough to be able to cross the mystical boundary your joy will be all-consuming. Put into practice your love for all creatures and your environment by, as it is written in the ‘Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart’, following the mystical path: 62

…skilfully with good judgment. And with God's help it will reveal to you things you never expected. Will give you knowledge, will enlighten you, make you wise and will teach you things which formerly your mind could not even receive, when you were walking in the obscurity of passions and dark deeds, plunged in the abyss of forgetfulness and confusion of thoughts.

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1 Abbé Henri de Tourville, Letters of Direction, Mowbray, 1939. XVI - God within Us, (Pg 88) 2 John Blofeld, Beyond the Gods, E P Dutton & Co, 1974. Chapter 1 - The Wish-fulfilling Gem, (Pg 19) 3 David Hay, Exploring Inner Space - Scientists and Religious Experience, Mowbray, 1987. Part Two: What is the Experiential Dimension - 7. Strange and Difficult to Describe: Types of Experience, (Pg 90 / 91) 4 Karen Armstrong, The Case For God, Vintage Books, 2010. Part Two: The Modern God - 11 Unknowing 5 Martin Israel, Summons to Life, Mowbray, 1982. Chapter 15: Mysticism and spirituality, (Pg 114) 6 William Houff, Infinity in Your Hand, Skinner House Books, 1994. Chapter 4: Mystical Experience - And Brahman on the elephant's back, (Pg 39) 7 Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, Unwin, 1980. Chapter III : Religious Experience and its Affirmations - 1. Philosophy of religion, (Pg 67) 8 James Redfield, Michael Murphy, Silvia Timbers, God and the Evolving Universe, Bantam Press, 2002. Part Four - Practices and Readings: 16 Transformative Practice: Basic Elements of Transformative Practice, (Pg 231) 9 F C Happold, Mysticism - A Study and an Anthology, Penguin Books, 1971. The Study: 17. The Mystical Element in Buddhism, (Pg 79) 10 Bertrand Russell, The Problems of Philosophy, Oxford University Press, 1951. Chapter XI On Intuitive Knowledge, (Pg 113) 11 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter III - Mysticism and Psychology, (Pg 64/65) 12 Paul Davies, The Mind of God, Penguin Books, 1992. Chapter 9: The Mystery at the End of the Universe - Mystical Knowledge, (Pg 228) 13 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter IV - The Characteristics of Mysticism 14 Peter Fenwick & Elizabeth Fenwick, The Truth in the Light, BCA, 1995. 2 Virtual Reality - How Real is the Real World, (Pg 21) 15 Evelyn Underhill, The Fruits of the Spirit; Light of Christ; Abba, Longmans, Green and Co, 1957. Abba: Chapter IV - The Kingdom, (Pg 31) 16 Herbert Benson, MD with Marg Stark, Timeless Healing - The Power and Biology of Belief, Scribner, 1996. Chapter 7: The Faith Factor and the Spiritual Experience - Mysticism Common to Us All, (Pg 158 / 159) 17 Gerald Hammond, The Metaphysical Poets, Macmillan & Co, 1990. (from The Temper (!) lines 1-8 and 25-28) The Metaphysical Mode: Alteration of Time, (Pg 201) 18 Bede Griffiths, A New Vision of Reality, Fount, 1992. 2 The New Psychology and the Evolution of Consciousness, (Pg 36) 19 William Houff, Infinity in Your Hand, Skinner House Books, 1994. Chapter 4: Mystical Experience - And Brahman on the elephant's back, (Pg 38) 20 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter IV - The Illumination of the Self, (Pg 252) 21 Terry Tastard, The Spark in the Soul, Darton Longman and Todd, 1989. Chapter 5 - Thomas Merton and God Our Identity. 22 B A Gerrish, A Prince of the Church: Schleiermacher and the Beginnings of Modern Theology, SCM Press, 1984. Religion and Reflection, (Pg 4) 23 Peter Fenwick & Elizabeth Fenwick, The Truth in the Light, BCA, 1995. 1 What is it Like to Die? (Pg 9) 24 Lumsden Barkway, An Anthology of the Love of God (from the writings of Evelyn Underhill), Mowbray, 1953. V Sanctification, The Growth of Love: Growth and Transformation (Mixed Pasture), (Pg 170) 25 David L Edwards, Religion and Change, Hodder & Stoughton, 1974. Part One: Chapter 6 - A New Religion for the Secular West? - Secular Social Gospels, (Pg 269) 26 F C Copleston, Aquinas, Penguin Books, 1970. (Pg 10) 27 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 1: Chapter IV - Early Mysticism in the Near East, (Pg 48) 28 Aldous Leonard Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy, Perennial, Harper Collins, 2004. Chapter I: That Art Thou, (Pg 6) 29 John Blofeld, Beyond the Gods, E P Dutton & Co, 1974. Chapter 1 - The Wish-fulfilling Gem, (Pg 20) 30 Jostein Gaarder, Sophie's World, Phoenix, 1995. Hellenism 31 Martin Israel, Summons to Life, Mowbray, 1982. Chapter 15: Mysticism and spirituality, (Pg 115) 32 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter III - The Purification of the Self, (Pg 227) 33 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter IV - The Characteristics of Mysticism, (Pg 92/93)

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34 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter III - Mysticism and Psychology, (Pg 63) 35 Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, Unwin, 1980. Chapter III : Religious Experience and its Affirmations - 3. Personal experience of God, (Pg 71) 36 Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, Unwin, 1980. Chapter III : Religious Experience and its Affirmations - 3. Personal experience of God, (Pg 71 / 72) 37 F C Happold, Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man, Pelican Books, 1966. Introduction, (Pg 16) 38 Raymond A. Moody, Reflections on Life After Life, Corgi, 1978. 1 New Elements - Cities of Light, (Pg 15) 39 Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, Unwin, 1980. Chapter III : Religious Experience and its Affirmations - 4. Character of religious experience, (Pg 73) 40 Bede Griffiths, Return to the Centre, Collins, Fount Paperbacks, 1978. 14. The Eternal Religion, (Pg 104 & 105) 41 Marcus J. Borg, The God We Never Knew, HarperSanFrancisco, 1997. Part I: Chapter 2: Thinking about God - Why Panentheism? (Pg 39) 42 David Hay, Exploring Inner Space - Scientists and Religious Experience, Mowbray, 1987. Part Two: What is the Experiential Dimension - 5. Religion: Public and Invisible: Dimensions of Religion, (Pg 73) 43 F C Happold, Mysticism - A Study and an Anthology, Penguin Books, 1971. The Study: 26. Conclusion: The Mystic's Universe, (Pg 122) 44 F C Happold, Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man, Pelican Books, 1966. 13 The Idea of Intersection, (Pg 172) 45 F C Happold, Mysticism - A Study and an Anthology, Penguin Books, 1971. The Study: 10. Characteristics of Mystical States, (Pg 45 / 46 / 47 / 48) 46 Peter Fenwick & Elizabeth Fenwick, The Truth in the Light, BCA, 1995. 15 Mind Models, (Pg 231) 47 Morton T Kelsey, The Other Side of Silence, SPCK, 1985. Part Four: The Use of Images in Meditation - 12. Silence Mysticism and Religious Experience, (Pg 131) 48 Bertrand Russell, Religion and Science, Oxford University Press, 1960. Chapter VII: Mysticism, (Pg 179) 49 The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1947. Ascent of Mount Carmel: Book II. Chapter XXIV, (Pg 190) 50 Teresa of Avila, Way of Perfection, Sheed & Ward, 1984. Chapter XXVIII, (Pg 116) 51 Peter Fenwick & Elizabeth Fenwick, The Truth in the Light, BCA, 1995. 17 Beyond the Grave, (Pg 267) 52 Peter Fenwick & Elizabeth Fenwick, The Truth in the Light, BCA, 1995. 17 Beyond the Grave, (Pg 266) 53 William Johnston, Silent Music - The Science of Meditation, Fount, 1979. Part I: Meditation. 4: The science of mysticism, (Poulain, Preface,2), (Pg 47) 54 Bonaventure, The Journey of the Mind to God, Hackett, 1993. Notes: Chapter Four - Note 119, (Pg 65) 55 Brother Lawrence, The Practice of the Presence of God with Spiritual Maxims, Spire Books, 2007. Third Letter, (Pg 38) 56 The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1947. Ascent of Mount Carmel: Book II. Chapter XXVI, (Pg197) 57 St John of the Cross, The Dark Night of the Soul, Thomas Baker, 1924. Book 1 - Chapter XIII – 10, (Pg 65) 58 William Houff, Infinity in Your Hand, Skinner House Books, 1994. Chapter 4: Mystical Experience - And Brahman on the elephant's back, (Pg 42) 59 Peter Spink, Beyond Belief, Judy Piatkus, 1996. 10: Between Two Worlds, (Pg 145) 60 Bede Griffiths, A New Vision of Reality, Fount, 1992 61 Horace Leaf, What Mediumship Is. Spiritualist Press, 1955. Chapter X: The Subconsciousness, (Pg 80) 62 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part Two: Hesychius of Jerusalem to Theodulus - Texts on Sobriety and Prayer – 116, (Pg 302)

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21.1: Mystical Experiences - What Happens?

Each mystical experience opens our eyes wider, tests our comprehension and thrills our imagination. Our spiritual senses expand to accept the enormity of what we are being given. Osbert Burdett’s biography of the mystic, poet and artist William Blake contains the famous quatrain from the "Auguries of Innocence": 1

To see a World in a grain of sand, And Heaven in a wild flower, Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand, And Eternity in an hour.

The enhanced perceptions necessary to experience each of these events could only arrive through mystical experiences – and Blake understood this; he was a true mystic. He was also referred to in a passage by the Indian philosopher and statesman Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan who, in describing the mystical experience wrote that it: 2

…is felt as of the nature of a discovery or a revelation, not a mere conjecture or a creation. The real was there actually confronting us, it was not conjured out of the resources of our mind. He claims for his knowledge of reality an immediate and intuitive certainty, transcending any which mere reason can reach. No further experience or rational criticism can disturb his sense of certainty. Doubt and disbelief are no more possible. He speaks without hesitation and with the calm accents of finality. Such strange simplicity and authoritativeness do we find in the utterances of the seers of the Upaniads, of Buddha, of Plato, of Christ, of Dante, of Eckhart, of Spinoza, of Blake.

It is revelatory knowledge that cannot be gained from study or reasoning. Another philosopher, William James, was referenced in the book ‘God and the Evolving Universe’ where he was quoted as revealing that: 3

...mystical states seem to those who experience them to be also states of knowledge. They are states of insight into depths of truth unplumbed by the discursive intellect. They are illuminations, revelations, full of significance and importance, all inarticulate though they remain.

When subjects are contemplated upon by a mystic, then unrealised vistas open up and the meaning of words, phrases and concept dawns upon them. Hildegard of Bingen, according to Rabbi Dan Cohn-Sherbok, in such a situation revealed that: 4

...and immediately I knew the meaning...

Other types of inspired thoughts are like a camera shutter; one instant it is open and the next it is closed; now you see it now you don’t. This is Sophy Burnham’s description of such an event: 5

For a split second, there up on the shores of the Firth, I understood. What I understand I don't know. I don't know now. I know I understood then and I have remained firm and calm and unshaken upon that rock - i.e. that once I understood -

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ever since.

…and from the mystic Thomas Merton: 6

Sometimes we see a kind of truth all at once, in a flash, as a whole. We grasp it in a block, in its wholeness, but not in its details.

As an explanation to Hazel Courteney, Serena Roney-Dougal, who spent many decades investigating psychic and mystical phenomena, explained that these mystical experiences: 7

Sometimes when a person has a spontaneous 'awakening', when they feel they have all knowledge, it is very fleeting - it might last 15 to 20 seconds or even several minutes.

And that’s about the duration of it. Another specific example comes from the Jesuit priest Gerard Hughes who described one fleeting mystical experience of his: 8

One evening when I was walking through hill country, I saw the fir trees swaying in the wind and suddenly felt that I was part of them. .. On that evening in the Scottish Highlands it was as though I had escaped from my 'particle' form; while watching the swaying fir trees I had been released momentarily from the confines of my whole body to become one with the trees. It was as though I was experiencing my own soul as coterminous with the universe. The experience lasted for a split second. I can recall it, but I cannot place myself back into the wonder of the moment.

Another example in which nature played a large part was recalled by the Scottish medium Gordon Smith during a depressing time in his life. Sitting by a waterfall, Gordon: 9

...became aware of the sound of a branch creaking in the distance and of the tiny trickle of water some 10 feet from where I was sitting. It was as if someone had turned the waterfall off and yet they hadn't. Without lifting my head I knew which tree I could hear the creaking sound from and not only was I aware of the trickling stream, but without looking I could describe every stone that the water was rippling over. I was seeing every blade of grass around me individually, yet without looking at any of them. A sense of calm ran through me like nothing I had ever felt before in my life. Suddenly I was alive - awake to the life around me and the life that was in me. I felt connected to everything that was alive. Every living thing was a part of me and I was part of it.

Nature often has a hand in stimulating mystical experiences. During the 1930s and 1940s the philosopher and mystic Jiddu Krishnamurti was intermittently keeping notes of his philosophical observations, his mystical experiences, his musings about nature, and his discussions with individuals and groups. Many of these thoughts and events were edited by Rajagopal Desikacharya (commonly D. Rajagopal) and published as ‘Commentaries on Life’. Just to provide one example of his many recorded mystical experiences is useful because of the different way Jiddu expresses his feelings: 10

The valley was in solitude and so was the tree. These hills were some of the oldest on earth, and so they knew what it is to be alone and far away. Loneliness is sad with the creeping desire to be related, not to be cut off; but this sense of solitude,

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this aloneness was related to everything, part of all things. You were not aware that you were alone, for there was the trees, the rocks, the murmuring water. You are only aware of your loneliness, not of your solitude; and when you are aware of your solitude, you have become lonely. The hills, the streams, that man passing by, were all part of this solitude whose purity held all impurity within itself, and was not soiled by it. But impurity could not share this solitude. It is impurity that knows loneliness, that is burdened with sorrow and pain of existence. Sitting there under the tree, with large ants crossing your leg, in that measureless solitude there was the movement of timeless age. It wasn’t a space-covering movement, but a movement within itself, a flame within the flame, a light within the emptiness of light. It was a movement that would never stop, for it had no beginning and no cause to end. It was a movement that had no direction, and so it covered space. There under that tree time stood still, like the hills, and this movement covered it and went beyond it; so time could never overtake this movement. The mind could never touch the hem of it; but the mind was this movement. The watcher could not race with it, for he was able only to follow his own shadow and the words that clothed it. But under that tree, in that aloneness, the watcher and his shadow were not.

From my own experience, be it very, very, limited, this contact with another reality is the only way I could describe one of my mystical encounters. During a concentrated discussion with two dear friends and unbidden by me, I had the intense feeling that I ‘knew everything’ and the next second I could not say what the things were that I knew. However, embedded within the ‘knowing’ is a certainty and authority of revealed truths contained therein. Taking another extract from Radhakrishnan’s book ‘An Idealist View of Life’: 11

The experience itself is felt to be sufficient and complete. It does not come in a fragmentary or truncated form demanding completion by something else. It does not look beyond itself for meaning or validity. It does not appeal to external standards of logic or metaphysics. It is its own cause and explanation. It is sovereign in its own rights and carries its own credentials. It is self-established (svatassiddha) self-evidencing (svasamvedya), self-luminous (svayam-prakaa). It does not argue or explain but it knows and is. It is beyond the bounds of proof and so touches completeness. It comes with a constraint that brooks no denial. It is pure comprehension, entire significance, complete validity. Patanjali, the author of the Yoga Stitra, tells us that the insight is truth-filled, or truth-bearing.

St. Teresa of Avila, in chapter 4 of her 'Meditations of the Canticle of Canticles’, revealed that truths emerge during her mystical experiences: 12

Here great truths are communicated to her, for this light is such that it dazzles, because the soul cannot understand what it is, but it makes her see and understand the vanity of the world, although she does not see clearly the Master who is teaching her; but she is fully aware that he is with her. She is so well taught and so much strengthened in the virtues that afterwards she does not know herself, not want to do or say anything else but to praise the Lord.

F C Happold confirmed that for these types of revelation the mystic’s certainty is unshakable: 13

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Though he may not be able to describe it in words, though he may not be able logically to demonstrate its validity, to the mystic his experience is fully and absolutely valid and surrounded with complete certainty.

…and from the 14 th century came these words from Teresa of Avila: 14

Now, you will ask me, how did the soul see this truth (union with God) or understand if it didn’t see or understand anything? I don’t say that it then saw the truth, but that afterward it sees the truth clearly, not because of a vision, but because of a certitude remaining in the soul that only God can place there.

The thread running through many mystical experiences is this overwhelming certitude; knowing that truths have been revealed. The British journalist Hazel Courteney described her own ‘Damascus event’ as: 15

...in that moment I seemed to 'know' all the answers to those profound questions that most people ponder. What are we doing here? Where do we come from? Do we all have a destiny? Intuitively, I knew that what I 'felt' as the answer inside my head was an ultimate truth.

With the certainty which comes with a revelation also comes the confidence in the existence of a Creator; their God exists. When discussing the Upanishads, Swami Paramananda highlighted that: 16

When the Truth shines clearly in the heart of the knower, then he surmounts the apparent duality of his nature and becomes convinced that there is but One, and that all outer manifestations are nothing but reflections or projections of that One.

I’m sure that the Upanishads were also used by Evelyn Underhill in compiling her momentous treatise on mysticism. From an anthology of her work, Lumsden Barkway wrote: 17

The mystics - to give them their short familiar name - are men and women who insist that they know for certain the presence and activity of that which they call the Love of God.

And, of course by definition, the connection between the mystic and God is direct as in the ‘Memorial’ Angela of Foligno, a 13 th century mystic, continued to stress: 18

...when God gave me the certainty that there was no intermediary between me and Him

She also underlines this certainty which is born in mystical experience: 19

Then my soul is drawn away from all darkness and receives a greater knowledge of God than I could think possible; this knowledge brings such clarity and certainty…

Mysticism is experiential; it is based solely on mystical experience. Through these events the plastic mystic is moulded to be more and more spiritual and effective as a reflector of the Divine. Being so sure of God is a feature of every mystic. Of this the young French

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:31:07 21.1 Mystical Experiences - What Happens Page 5 of 12 mystic Simone Weil said: 20

I do not need any hope or any promise in order to believe that God is rich in mercy. I know this wealth of his with the certainty of experience, I have touched it. What I know of it through actual contact is so far beyond my capacity of understanding and gratitude that even the promise of future bliss could add nothing to it for me…

Remember that whatever is revealed to you is for you only. Others may use what you tell them of your experience, but don’t expect it to have the same impact on them as it did on you. On this David Hay, a zoologist with a longstanding professional interest in the disputed boundary between biological science and the religious and spiritual dimensions of human experience, emphasised that: 21

Mystical experiences 'carry authority for him who has them', but for no-one else.

Because mystical experiences are so hard to describe to others, they really only have significance to the one who experiences them. Père De Caussade, perhaps a mystic himself, realised that: 22

...all simple souls have but one general way, though specific and different in each one, which makes up the diversity of the mystical experience.

Nevertheless, examples abound. One comes from 16 th century Saint Ignatius of Loyola. In his spiritual diary he recalls that: 23

Once, or perhaps a few times, I felt spiritual intuitions so great that I seemed to understand that almost nothing more could be known on the subject of the Blessed Trinity.

This revelation of his certainly does not hold any kind of certitude for me. My spiritual experiences are for me only; his are just for him. We are all at different stages in our development and the insights that we are given are those which fit our spiritual, and possibly material, requirements at that point in time and space. Each mystical experience is different and often instantaneous. On one occasion Angela of Foligno described it as: 24

And immediately the eyes of my soul were opened, and I saw the single fullness of God in which I comprehended the whole world...

…and you are not often in control of where or when they happen. The spirit communicator who used the medium Neale Donald Walsch to convey his ideas, impressed him with the thoughts that: 25

In the moment of your total knowing (which moment could come upon you at any time), you, too, will feel as I do always; totally joyful, loving, accepting, blessing and grateful.

There are many emotions which surface consequential upon a mystical experience. The two which I remember are joy and awe. Awe combined with reverence was Adeline Yen Mah’s perception of the consequence of mystical experiences. In ‘Watching The Tree’ she believed that: 26

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...we should seize those moments when our hearts are touched by something beyond logic, something profound with a suggestion of the divine; something mesmerising that induces in us a condition of reverence and awe.

Emotional responses are commonplace. They form part of St. Macarius’ way of describing these experiences. In one of his homilies, written in the 4 th century, he explained: 27

There is a time, when the light itself shining in the heart opens, as it were, the window to another light lying more inward and more deep, so that the whole man is absorbed by that sweetness and by that sight, and is no more in himself, and is considered by the world as foolish and hurtful, because of those strange delights of love and of pleasure, and of the depth of the mysteries, of which he has been found worthy.

Both Joseph Sharp and Marcus J. Borg brought my attention to the Irish poet William Butler Yeats. This master, who had struggled with his art and life for years, described a mystical experience which happened to him, at the age of 50, in a London coffee shop. In part four of his poem 'Vacillation' the first five lines describe the setting and the last four the experience: 28 29

My fiftieth year had come and gone, I sat, a solitary man, In a crowded London shop, An open book, an empty cup On the marble top.

While on the shop and street I gazed, My body of a sudden blazed; And twenty minutes more or less It seemed, so great my happiness, That I was blessed and could bless.

Yes! Those feelings again which, I’m sure, stem from a greater proximity of our soul to our Creator. As well as our emotions, sometimes even our physical being may be affected. As a consequence of one experience Sophy Burnham wrote: 30

...and yet each fragment is so clear that I feel my body shiver again...

…and something similar from Thomas Merton which happened to him whilst in Cuba: 31

And so the unshakeable certainty, the clear and immediate knowledge that heaven was right in front of me struck me like a thunderbolt and went through me like a flash of lightning and seemed to lift me clean up off of the earth.

Physical experiences may not come from oneself but from others. Patrick, an acquaintance of Hazel Courtney revealed to her that in certain communities in India, when a person has mystical experiences: 32

...they were placed in a room with lots of bananas and water, and let out when it's

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all over. I roared with laughter, no wonder they talk about people 'going bananas'...

Humour aside, as well as there being a very personal aspect to mystical experiences, it may have an impact on the community also. Hazel Courteney was informed by Serena Roney- Dougal that sometimes if a mystical experience: 33

...happens within a tribal culture then the person is nurtured and looked after by the whole community. Only in the west is this type of experience thought of as a sickness, and it is usually labelled as schizophrenia, a nervous breakdown or manic depression. In most other cultures it is seen as a major transformation or initiation.

Of course, also of significance is the environment within which the mystic has been raised and educated. Peter & Elizabeth Fenwick were well aware of this and wrote: 34

...culture plays an important part in the form that experiences take.

More often than not, however, the impact of mystical experience is to change our understanding of the total environment in which we live and how we ought to change ourselves to make it and ourselves better. In other words, we must change our characteristics and consequently our Philosophy of Life and how we implement it. The 20 th century spiritual healer and mystic Joel Goldsmith agreed that another type of impact is the change in what we believe we need: 35

Furthermore, when spiritual light has once touched the soul or consciousness of an individual, never again can there be concern about what we call supply; what we shall eat or drink, wherewithal we shall be clothed, or how much money we shall or shall not have.

In his first book, Justin Welby, the 105th Archbishop of Canterbury and the most senior bishop in the Church of England, describes the impact of his mystical experience: 36

I first had a clear sense of the breaking in of Jesus to my life in October 1975. My life went on as it had before. There were the same problems, and there were joys. But there was a new and abundant presence in my life that was completely and totally transformative so that I was no longer the person I had been.

Change is always the consequence. Another person greatly changed by his mystical experience was George Müller, the 19 th century Christian evangelist and Director of the Ashley Down orphanage in Bristol. Henry Thomas Hamblin writes of this caring man: 37

'There was a day.' he relates, ‘when I died, utterly died. I died to George Muller, his opinions, preferences, taste and will - died to the world, its approval or censure - died to the approval or blame even of my brethren and friends and since then I have studied only to show myself approved unto God'. What happened to George Muller was what happens to all who seek entrance to the Path of Attainment as shown and taught by our Lord Jesus Christ. He had to surrender all that he had attained to and achieved. He had to surrender the great Dr. Muller, the renowned man of faith and prayer. He had to surrender his power to control his life and circumstances, and even forces of Nature and the elements. He had to become just a child, or mere clay in the hands of the Potter. Then it was that a greater Muller, or shall I say, a

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greater than Muller, arose. Henceforward he was a different being, shaped and fashioned by God into His own likeness and image.’

Powerful stuff: and not atypical. At the other end of the scale there are some inspirations, which are, I suppose, minor mystical experiences, which are very subtle and sometimes need to be reflected upon for us to realise their importance. This is particularly true at the beginning of our spiritual journey. Plotinus, wrote Evelyn Underhill, realised that one of the major realisations is of the existence of God and our soul as a part of this Creator, thus: 38

'The One', says Plotinus, 'is present everywhere and absent only from those unable to perceive it'; and when we do perceive it we 'have another life ... attaining the aim of our existence, and our rest'. To know this at first hand - not to guess, believe or accept, but to be certain - is the highest achievement of human consciousness, and the ultimate object of mysticism .

There are also little things which when looked at as a whole help us to realise the changes we have to make in our lives. In the book ‘God and the Evolving Universe’ by James Redfield, Michael Murphy, and Silvia Timbers this is explained with reference to Carl Jung and this famous Swiss psychiatrist’s view of what he called "meaningful coincidences" which are: 39

…events that dramatise and reinforce certain turns in our lives in a manner that seems governed by something beyond mere chance. Such events, Jung believed, point to a principle or quality of the world that leads individuals toward further personal growth and their deepest calling. There is reason to believe that as we integrate our greater capacities, we tend to experience more moments that can be called synchronistic. In such moments, which often seem uncanny, events conspire to push or attract us in ways that feel purposeful - or even destined.

In the same book, they referred to Albert Einstein’s autobiography 'The World As I See It' in which he characterised ‘knowing’ in this way: 40

The most beautiful and most profound emotion we can experience is the sensation of the mystical. It is the sower of all true science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead. To know what is impenetrable to us really exists, manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty which our dull faculties can comprehend only in the most primitive form - this knowledge, this feeling is at the centre of true religiousness.

These may also be termed ‘the nudgings of Spirit’.

Some have tried to classify and analyse in detail mystical experiences. Whilst this may be useful to some people, for most it does not move their understanding forward. An example of this was provided by Marcus J. Borg who discovered that: 41

Mystical experiences have been divided into two major types. Extrovertive mystical experiences are 'eyes open' mystical experiences.

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These are moments when one sees the same world one would otherwise see, but it looks radically different. One sees the world 'filled with the glory of God.' ... Introvertive mystical experiences are 'eyes closed' mystical experiences. Typically occurring during deep meditation, there is a sense of entering the presence of God or even becoming absorbed into God.

These are interesting observations but not very useful. I do not intend to try to describe every type of mystical experience which may be felt, yet one which I must not miss is that which seems to open a window onto the Spirit world itself. It is in this situation that the full power of ‘I know everything’ arrives. In the autobiography of Dannion Brinkley he gives us a hint of this when, during one of his Near Death Experiences (NDE) where his spirit was in the Spirit World surrounded by higher beings, he described: 42

At that instant I knew everything there was to know. I was one with creation, and it was one with me.

A different type of NDE was reported by the journalist and writer Jeffrey Iverson in which the subject recalls that: 43

I reached one point, and the only way I can describe it is that I felt I was a firework going off, and connecting with everything that there was in terms of information. Everything made sense. The whole universe made sense, I felt the connection between myself and everything else that ever existed.

...and in Peter & Elizabeth Fenwick’s book ‘The Truth in the Light’ we are provided with the following description: 44

I was peaceful, totally content, and I understood I was born on earth and knew the answer to every mystery - I was not told, I just knew, the light held all the answers.

The remarkable thing is that, after death, it is possible to have the same type of experiences. Maurice Barbanell, once a famous trance medium and through whom the teachings of Silver Birch were received, returned after he had died to tell us that: 45

There are periods here which my friend and I, and others, have experienced in this world where for a moment we get a glimpse, and everything fits into place and we feel we know everything at that point and then it is gone. That is so much stronger over here and lasts, and it feels longer...

…and White Eagle explained: 46

Because we contact the halls of wisdom, the power of heaven comes with us; and those of you who are sensitive are able to catch a little of the light here and there. Your own vision opens; and although you yourself cannot put truth into words, you feel an inner knowing as you grasp these truths, these mysteries of God.

Such knowledge seems to seep into the mystic’s very being even though it cannot be grasped or described. Betty J Eadie, when she initially encountered the Spirit World during her Near Death Experience, described the feeling that: 47

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Knowledge permeated me. In a sense it became me, and I was amazed at my ability to comprehend the mysteries of the universe simply by reflecting on them.

A very different type of experience was described by the Swiss psychologist Carl Jung: 48

I had the feeling that everything was being sloughed away; everything I aimed at or wished for or thought, the whole phantasmagoria of earthly existence, fell away or was stripped from me an extremely painful process. Nevertheless something remained; it was as if I now carried along with me everything I had ever experienced or done, everything that had happened around me. I might also say: it was with me, and I was it. I consisted of all that, so to speak. I consisted of my own history, and I felt with great certainty: this is what I am. "I am this bundle of what has been, and what has been accomplished." This experience gave me a feeling of extreme poverty, but at the same time of great fullness. There was no longer anything I wanted or desired. I existed in an objective form; I was what I had been and lived. At first the sense of annihilation predominated, of having been stripped or pillaged; but suddenly that became of no consequence. Everything seemed to be past; what remained was a fait accompli, without any reference back to what had been. There was no longer any regret that something had dropped away or been taken away. On the contrary: I had everything that I was, and that was everything.

The greatest difficulty that I have and I’m sure that you may have too, is trying to get to the bottom of the meaning of many of the descriptions of mystical experiences. They are strewn with metaphors and paradoxes. For example from the sermons given by Meister Eckhart in the 14 th century we are told that he experienced: 49

...an unknowing which comes not from ignorance but from knowledge.

…and from the pen of the very descriptive mystic Angela of Foligno: 50

Yet when I am in that darkness [with God] I see everything and I see nothing.

This idea of ‘darkness’ was also used by St Dionysius who, according to the ‘Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart’, said: 51

We pray to come into this darkness which is above light and, through non-vision and non-knowledge, to see and to know Him Who is above vision and above knowledge, (that is to see and to know) His very invisibility and unknowability.

Finally, let me leave you with a view of the mystical experience from the Persian Sufi Jalal-ud-Din Rumi as recalled by Andrew Harvey: 52

To die in life is to become life. The wind stops skirting you And enters; all the roses suddenly, Are blooming in your skull.

…which represents the impact of many mystical experiences.

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1 Osbert Burdett, William Blake, Macmillan & Co, 1926. Chapter III - The Lyrical Poems, The "Auguries of Innocence" contain the famous quatrain: (Pg 60) 2 Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, Unwin, 1980. Chapter III : Religious Experience and its Affirmations - 4. Character of religious experience, (Pg 74 / 75) 3 James Redfield, Michael Murphy, Silvia Timbers, God and the Evolving Universe, Bantam Press, 2002. Part Two - The Emerging Human Being; 10: Transcendent Knowing, (Pg 138) 4 Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Jewish & Christian Mysticism - An Introduction, Continuum, 1994. Part II The Christian Tradition - 7 Medieval Christian Mysticism: Hildegard of Bingen, Richard of St Victor and Bernard of Clairvaux, (Pg 104) 5 Sophy Burnham, The Ecstatic Journey, Ballantine Books, New York, 1997. Chapter 9 - Choas and Disintegration, (Pg 181) 6 Thomas Merton, A Secular Journal, The Catholic Book Club, 1959. Part Four : Interlude - Abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemane (Holy week, 1941), April 9, 1941 Our Lady of Gethsemane(Pg 95) 7 Hazel Courteney, Divine Intervention, Cico Books, 2002. Chapter 12: The Long Road Home, (Pg 169) 8 Gerard W Hughes, God in all Things, Hodder & Stoughton, 2004. Chapter Eight: Pilgrimage - Pilgrimage Providing Glimpses of the Unity of All Things, (Pg 152) 9 Gordon Smith, The Unbelievable Truth, Hay House, 2004. Chapter Ten: Consciousness, (Pg 192) 10 J Krishnamurti, Commentaries on Living - Third Series, Victor Gollancz, 1961. The Quality of Simplicity, (Pg 308 / 309) 11 Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, Unwin, 1980. Chapter III : Religious Experience and its Affirmations - 4. Character of religious experience, (Pg 73) 12 Kathleen Pond(ed), The Spirit of the Spanish Mystics, Burns & Oates,1958. Saint Teresa of Avila - Of the Sweet and Delightful Love of God which Arises from His Dwelling in the Soul in the Prayer of Quiet.. (Pg 81) 13 F C Happold, Mysticism - A Study and an Anthology, Penguin Books, 1971. The Study: 2. The Perennial Philosophy, (Pg 19) 14 Teresa of Avila, Selections from The Interior Castle, Harper Collins, 2004. The Fifth Dwelling Places - Chapter 1, (Pg 56) 15 Hazel Courteney, Divine Intervention, Cico Books, 2002. Chapter 2: The Madness, (Pg 15 / 16) 16 Swami Paramananda, The Upanishads, Grange Books, 2004. Katha - Upanishad - Part Three: I, (Pg 53) 17 Lumsden Barkway, An Anthology of the Love of God (from the writings of Evelyn Underhill), Mowbray, 1953. IV The Spiritual Life: II Saints and Mystics, the exponents of Love: The Knowledfge of the Mystics (Man and Supernatural), (Pg 116) 18 Angela of Foligno, Memorial, DS Brewer, 1999. The Memorial of Angela of Foligno - The Seventh Supplementary Step, (Pg 70) 19 Angela of Foligno, Memorial, DS Brewer, 1999. The Memorial of Angela of Foligno - The Seventh Supplementary Step, (Pg 74) 20 Simone Weil, Waiting on God, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1952. Letters of Farewell; Letter VI; Last Thoughts, (Pg 37) 21 David Hay, Exploring Inner Space - Scientists and Religious Experience, Mowbray, 1987. Part Three: Modern Explorations - 8. Entering the World of Personal Experience: The Rise of Modern Interest, (Pg 108) 22 Père De Caussade, The Sacrament of the Present Moment, Fount, 1987. 7: The Mystery of God’s Grace – Seeing Only Him in All Things, (Pg 63) 23 Saint Ignatius of Loyola: Personal Writings, Penguin Books, 1996. The Spiritual Diary: Part I, (Pg 83) 24 Angela of Foligno, Memorial, DS Brewer, 1999. The Memorial of Angela of Foligno - The Fourth Supplementary Step, (Pg 55) 25 Neale Donald Walsch, Conversations with God - Book 1 An uncommon dialogue, Hodder & Stoughton, 1997. Chapter 2, (Pg 65) 26 Adeline Yen Mah, Watching The Tree, Harper Collins, 2001. 12 The Lessons of Silence, (Pg 230 / 231) 27 'Reader', Features of the Church Fathers, Heath Cranton Limited, 1935. Second Century and Onwards: St. Macarius, (Pg 59) 28 Joseph Sharp, Living Our Dying - A Way to the Sacred in Everyday Life, Rider & Co, 1996. Part IV: Living Our Dying – Chapter 10: Intimacy with All Things, (Pg 222) 29 Marcus J. Borg, The God We Never Knew, HarperSanFrancisco, 1997. Part I: Chapter 2: Thinking about God - Why Panentheism? (Pg 43) 30 Sophy Burnham, The Ecstatic Journey, Ballantine Books, New York, 1997. Chapter 4 - The Revelation on Machu Picchu, (Pg 75) 31 Thomas Merton, A Secular Journal, The Catholic Book Club, 1959. Part two: Cuba (Spring 1940), April 29th, 1940, (Pg 40)

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32 Hazel Courteney, Divine Intervention, Cico Books, 2002. Chapter 5: The Happenings, (Pg 80) 33 Hazel Courteney, Divine Intervention, Cico Books, 2002. Chapter 11: The Scientist, (Pg 163) 34 Peter Fenwick & Elizabeth Fenwick, The Truth in the Light, BCA, 1995. 11 Looking for a Pattern, (Pg 163) 35 Joel S Goldsmith, The Contemplative Life, L N Fowler & Co, 1963. Chapter ONE - Conscious Awareness, (Pg 6) 36 Justin Welby, Dethroning Mammon, Bloomsbury, 2016. Chapter 1: What we see we value, (Pg 24) 37 Henry Thomas Hamblin, Divine Adjustment, The Science of Thought Press, 1998. Chapter Three: On Divine Providence, Attainment and Other Problems, (Pg 35) 38 Evelyn Underhill, The Essentials of Mysticism, Oneworld, 1999. The Essentials of Mysticism, (Pg 14) 39 James Redfield, Michael Murphy, Silvia Timbers, God and the Evolving Universe, Bantam Press, 2002. Part Two - The Emerging Human Being; 12: The Experience of Integration and Synchronistic Flow: A Higher Integration, (Pg 151) 40 James Redfield, Michael Murphy, Silvia Timbers, God and the Evolving Universe, Bantam Press, 2002. Part Two - The Emerging Human Being; 9: Transcendent Identity, (Pg 138) 41 Marcus J. Borg, The God We Never Knew, HarperSanFrancisco, 1997. Part I: Chapter 2: Thinking about God - Why Panentheism? (Pg 40) 42 Dannion Brinkley, Secrets of the Light, Piatkus, 2012. Part 1: There and Back Again - 1 My Lively Dance with Death, (Pg 14) 43 Jeffrey Iverson, In Search of the Dead, BCA, 1993. Part Two: Visions and Voices - Chapter Nine: Sea Changes, (Pg 80) 44 Peter Fenwick & Elizabeth Fenwick, The Truth in the Light, BCA, 1995. 4 The Darkness and the Light, (Pg 57) 45 Marie Cherrie, The Barbanell Report, Pilgrim Books, 1987. Part II: Twenty-Four - 4th June 1986, (Pg 153) 46 White Eagle on the Intuition and Initiation, White Eagle Lodge Publishing Trust, 2004. Part One: What the Intuition is, and is not - I: Truth, (Pg 18) 47 Betty J Eadie, Embraced by the Light, Thorsons, 1995. Embraced by the Light, (Pg 45) 48 Carl Gustav Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections, Fontana, 1995. X Visions, (Pg 321) 49 Oliver Davies, Meister Eckhart - Selected Writings, Penguin Books, 1994. Selected German Sermons: Sermon 24, (Pg 220) 50 Angela of Foligno, Memorial, DS Brewer, 1999. The Memorial of Angela of Foligno - The Seventh Supplementary Step, (Pg 69) 51 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part One: Callistus and Ignatius of Xanthopoulos - Directions to Hesychasts – 76, (Pg 243) 52 Andrew Harvey, The Way of Passion, Souvenir Press, 2002. Chapter 3 - Drying, Blossoming

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21.2: Mystical Experiences are Transient

Why all mystical experiences exist only for a short time, I do not know. In fact it probably is not even worth speculating upon. The fact that I cannot understand why they are transient does not invalidate their existence. They are real and, as Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan the Indian philosopher and statesman reveals: 1

The moments of vision are transitory and intermittent.

Normally, in order to appreciate what comes into the mind during everyday events, we must cogitate upon and think through before they seep into the psyche. There is no need for this for mystical experiences – they are there within a blink of the eye. In referring to one’s spirit, the 16 th century Carmelite nun Teresa of Avila knew that: 2

It happens that within an instant so many things together are taught him ...

Another female mystic, the young French activist Simone Weil, although a few hundred years later, recognised the same time frame for experiences: 3

If after a long period of waiting God allows them to have an indistinct intuition of his light or even reveals himself in person, it is only for an instant.

All mystical experiences are absorbed by the soul and never forgotten – they are so memorable, as the mystic and mystical writer Evelyn Underhill recalled: 4

It is a brief act. The greatest of the contemplatives have been unable to sustain the brilliance of this awful vision for more than a little while. 'A flash,' 'an instant,' 'the space of an Ave Maria,' they say. "My mind," says St. Augustine, in his account of his first purely contemplative glimpse of the One Reality, "withdrew its thoughts from experience, extracting itself from the contradictory throng of sensuous images, that it might find out what that light was wherein it was bathed. . . . And thus with the flash of one hurried glance, it attained to the vision of That Which Is. And then at last I saw Thy invisible things understood by means of the things that are made, but I could not sustain my gaze: my weakness was dashed back, and I was relegated to my ordinary experience, bearing with me only a loving memory, and as it were the fragrance of those desirable meats on which as yet I was not able to feed."

…and it is in this instant that everything is conveyed. Agnes Sanford, the American mystic, psychic and healer could not explain it: 5

And even though I did not know the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God entered in a way so defying understanding that I never before tried to explain it. Nor can I explain it now. I can only say that for a split second I lived consciously and aware in the bliss of eternity... Understand now that this did not come the first time that I sought God in His surrounding world, nor the second. Nor am I saying that one can duplicate such an experience.

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Another way that mystical occurrences have been experienced is during Near Death Experiences. This was certainly the case for the American neurosurgeon Dr Eben Alexander who, in recalling and recording his own NDE explained that: 6

Although I still had little language function, at least as we think of it on earth, I began wordlessly putting questions to this wind - and to the divine being that I sensed at work behind or within it. 'Where is this place?' 'Who am I?' Why am I here?' Each time I silently posed one of these questions, the answer came instantly in an explosion of light, colour, love, and beauty that blew through me like a crashing wave. What was important about these bursts was that they didn't simply silence my questions by overwhelming them. They answered them, but in a way that bypassed language. Thoughts entered me directly. But it wasn't thought like we experience on earth. It wasn't vague, immaterial or abstract. These thoughts were solid and immediate - hotter then fire and wetter than water - and as I received them I was able to instantly and effortlessly understand concepts that would have taken me years to fully grasp in my earthly life.

So whether these experiences are realised on earth or in the Spirit World, they always happen in a trice, as Teresa of Avila avowed: 7

The soul experiences deep feelings when it sees itself close to God. Nor does the experience last so long, but for a very short while...

It is not just a particular thing that is grasped in that split second. Somehow, it seems as thought the whole universal knowledge has been emptied into the brain. A neat way of explaining this was achieved by the master of Asian thought and religion John Blofeld: 8

The expansion and deepening of consciousness is a gradual process that cannot often be dispensed with, but the attainment of full awareness whereafter no shadow of delusion remains takes place in a flash. It is as though hitherto one has been observing the fragments of a glass painting of the universe arranging themselves in endless transformations like those seen in a kaleidoscope - when, all of a sudden, everything clicks into place and the universe is intuitively experienced as it really is.

Seeing the universe as a whole is not something that you can plan for, it comes unexpectedly – probably when you are ready for it. In his book about the life of St. Francis of Assisi, John Moorman, the 20 th century English divine, ecumenist, and author wrote: 9

The early writers speak of his feeling himself 'suddenly visited by the Lord', or of his 'gradually becoming aware of the touch of grace', and it appears that these moments of ecstasy came upon him quite unexpectedly and quite irresistibly.

Who could resist that ‘light bulb moment’ when everything falls into place? It is a pity, perhaps, that we can’t sustain this brief event and extend its influence. As soon as it is over, we return sadly to the material world as Morton Kelsey, the American Episcopal priest, reminded us: 10

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There are moments of pure illumination, but then we move back into the fray.

In ‘Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East’ Margaret Smith confirmed that the mystical experiences are very short lived: 11

So, in this world, here and now, the veil is sometimes drawn aside from before the eyes of the spirit, so that the mind is rapt away in ecstasy and gazes upon the Divine glory; but such glimpses of the Invisible are of short duration in this life...

A more poetic way of putting it came from the 15 th century Augustinian monk Thomas A Kempis who used the ‘flashes of light’ metaphor to convey the momentariness of the Divine revelations: 12

O blaze that shines for ever, High above all the fires of earth, Lighten in flashes from above, Finding a way into the secret chambers of my heart.

Not only are the experiences transient but also, for the most part, they are infrequent. F. C. Happold suggested that they may only happen a couple of times in a lifetime: 13

There come to many the sudden moments of intuitive perception, elusive, fading quickly, but of deep significance, illumination which they feel reveal to them new facets of reality. Perhaps only once or twice in a lifetime may come an experience more profound…

This was true for that major philosopher of the ancient world Plotinus who, according to Jostein Gaarder: 14

On rare occasions in his life, Plotinus experienced a fusion of his soul with God.

For many of the great historical mystics, I believe that this is far too infrequent; for people like me, perhaps it is about right. And certainly, the impact of their mystical experiences, as Radhakrishnan realised, is overwhelming: 15

Since the intuitive experiences are not always given but occur only at rare intervals, they possess the character of revelation.

All this ties in with the understanding of the 14 th century English Augustinian mystic Walter Hilton who remarked about mystical experience: 16

Nor can anyone living in mortal flesh have it continually in its overwhelming fullness but only from time to time, when he is visited. And, as I understand from the writings of holy men, this time of visitation is very short .

With these short, infrequent flashes of spiritual knowledge and insights, everything else pales into insignificance. Our worldly lives are put into the correct context. In her short treatise ‘Abba’, Evelyn Underhill commented that: 17

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...the brief flashes of Eternity which sometimes visit us make all else seem dust and ashes, lifeless and unreal.

There is one consolation, however, and that is that when we eventually start to tread our spiritual pathway once we inhabit the Spirit World, then these flashes become more frequent and more illuminating. This is evidential from the communication that Maurice Barbanell, as recorded by the medium Marie Cherrie, had in a conversation with his living friend Paul: 18

Maurice: Can you remember periods where for a brief moment everything seemed clear? Paul: Yes, they're very few and far between though Maurice: But can you remember the feeling of those moments? Paul: Yes I can. Maurice: Well imagine them for a longer period but not permanent, and you have an idea of the hunger and the urge.

It is not always spiritually based mystical experiences that occur. The medium Horace Leaf was aware that the celebrated 18 th century composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart announced that: 19

...he often heard his symphonies as if in a flash. Every instrument played its part in an instantaneous momentary unity.

There is also one characteristic which these experiences impart and which do outlast the brevity of the experience. That is joy. This has been emphasised over and over again. Happiness stems from mysticism. Relating joy and mystical experience, the Anglican priest Martin Israel wrote: 20

...an experience of God's abiding love and the grace that flows out to embrace the happy person who has received it, is not meant to last long.

Happiness and joy has, and always will be, associated with mystical experiences. In the early days of the Christian era and alongside the writings of Paul were the ‘Scripts of Cleophas’. These were lost to humanity until they were recreated from the Spirit World through the automatic writing of Geraldine Cummins. In them is recorded a mystical experience of the apostles: 21

And the Twelve - for they were twelve - did, in one moment, see before their eyes the scroll of the invisible, and the writings of the future time when all the Gentiles should have had word of the Master Christ. It passed with a strange swiftness, and some had no knowledge of it after its passing and yet their spirits knew; and they were filled with a wondrous joy.

This perhaps is an iteration of what St Bernard of Clairvaux meant in his book ‘The Love of God’: 22

Thus only the contemplatives [mystics] can enjoy the freedom of joy in this world, at least partially so [1 Corinthians 13:9-12] and on infrequent occasions.

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Thus, I’ll leave the last words on the brevity of mystical experiences to Martin Israel: 23

All these experiences, from the most expansive and dramatic to the purely intimate still small voice of God in the soul, give the person some preview of eternal life. Something of its range is grasped by the soul in the space of an incredibly short period of time.

1 Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, Unwin, 1980. Chapter III : Religious Experience and its Affirmations - 4. Character of religious experience, (Pg 74) 2 Teresa of Avila, Selections from The Interior Castle, Harper Collins, 2004. The Sixth Dwelling Places - Chapter 5, (Pg 107) 3 Simone Weil, Waiting on God, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1952. Essays: Forms of the Implicit Love of God, (Pg 140) 4 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter VII - Introversion. Part II – Contemplation, (Pg 331) 5 Agnes Sanford, Healing Gifts of the Spirit, Arthur James, 1999. Chapter 1; To the Mental Depressive, (Pg 22 & 23) 6 Dr Eben Alexander, Proof of Heaven, Piatkus, 2014. Chapter 9: The Core, (Pg 46) 7 Teresa of Avila, Selections from The Interior Castle, Harper Collins, 2004. The Fourth Dwelling Places - Chapter 3, (Pg 47) 8 John Blofeld, Beyond the Gods, E P Dutton & Co, 1974. Chapter 6 - The Path of Meditation, (Pg 109) 9 John R H Moorman, Saint Francis of Assisi, SPCK, 1979. 2 Imitatio Christi, (Pg 40) 10 Morton T Kelsey, The Other Side of Silence, SPCK, 1985. Part Four: The Use of Images in Meditation - 12. Silence Mysticism and Religious Experience, (Pg 159) 11 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 1: Chapter V - Early Mysticism in the Middle East, (Pg 101) 12 Thomas A Kempis, The Imitation of Christ, Elliot Stock, 1891. Book IV - Book of Inward Consolation, Chapter XXXIV(II) 13 F C Happold, Mysticism - A Study and an Anthology, Penguin Books, 1971. The Study: 7. What shall we Understand by the term Mysticism, (Pg 39) 14 Jostein Gaarder, Sophie's World, Phoenix, 1995. Hellenism, (Pg 106) 15 Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, Unwin, 1980. Chapter III : Religious Experience and its Affirmations - 4. Character of religious experience, (Pg 73) 16 Walter Hilton, The Stairway of Perfection, Image Books, 1979. Book One: Chapter Nine, (Pg 72) 17 Evelyn Underhill, The Fruits of the Spirit; Light of Christ; Abba, Longmans, Green and Co, 1957. Abba: Chapter II - The Father, (Pg 17) 18 Marie Cherrie, The Barbanell Report, Pilgrim Books, 1987. Part I: Twelve - 8th February 1985, (Pg 68 / 69) 19 Horace Leaf, What Mediumship Is. Spiritualist Press, 1955. Chapter III: The Interpretation of Dreams, (Pg 25) 20 Martin Israel, The Pearl of Great Price, SPCK, 1988. 1 – Intimations, (Pg 6) 21 Geraldine Cummins, The Scripts of Cleophas, Psychic Press, 1961. The First Parchment - Chapter IV: Pentecost, (Pg 18) 22 St Bernard of Clairvaux, The Love of God, Pickering & Inglis, 1983. Chapter III - Treatise on Grace and Free Choice, (Pg 36) 23 Martin Israel, The Pearl of Great Price, SPCK, 1988. 1 – Intimations, (Pg 8)

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21.3: Mystical Experiences are Indescribable

From time immemorial, mystics have been trying to convey to the rest of us the joy of building and participating in a relationship with our Creator. They have all failed. Why? Because, to use the words of Professor Seth Lloyd, who describes himself as a ‘quantum mechanic’, told us in a BBC Horizon Programme entitled ‘'What is Reality' broadcast in January 2011: 1

It is almost impossible to talk about it using normal human language.

Ten years or so earlier, the American medium and healer Agnes Sanford argued that: 2

The real script of the God-to-man communication cannot be framed in words.

A contemporary of Agnes, William Houff, based on his own experience, cautiously declared that: 3

More often than not, authentic religious experiences will lie at least partially beyond the reach of language.

This theme was echoed by the British author and commentator on comparative religion Karen Armstrong who stated that: 4

...the ultimate reality was beyond the competence of language.

Even those in the Spirit World accept that there are concepts, which mystics can experience, but for which there is no competent language to describe. One of the higher spirits, communicating through the trance mediumship of Phyllis V. Schlemmer, was well aware those mystical experiences: 5

...cannot be explained in your language.

Nevertheless, many have tried. One ancient mystic who attempted to give us a description of the mystical experience, was the eleventh century mystic of the Greek Orthodox Church, Symeon the New Theologian, whose attempt, according to Frederick Crossfield Happold, reads: 6

My tongue lacks words, and what happens in me my spirit sees clearly, but does not explain. It sees the Invisible, that emptiness of all forms. Simple throughout, not complex, and in extent infinite. For it sees no beginning, and it sees no end, and is entirely unconscious of any middle, and does not know what to call that which it sees. Something complete appears, not indeed with the thing itself, but through a kind of participation ... I realised suddenly that it was within me, and in the midst of my heart it shone like the heart of a spiritual sun.

This recognises the impossible task that every mystic arrives at of telling us the detail of what they experience. It is made all the more difficult for us to comprehend by the varied environments and characteristics of those who are trying to tell us. This was recognised by that great mystical writer Evelyn Underhill in her tome ‘Mysticism’, where she discussed

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:32:09 21.3 Mystical Experiences are Indescribable Page 2 of 22 the mystic’s description: 7

… of that geography, however - of his path in a land where there is no time and space, no inner and no outer, up or down - will be conditioned by his temperament, by his powers of observation, by the metaphor which comes most readily to his hand, above all by his theological education. The so-called journey itself is a psychological and spiritual experience: the purging and preparation of the self, its movement to higher levels of consciousness, its unification with that more spiritual but normally unconscious self which is in touch with the transcendental order, and its gradual or abrupt entrance into union with the Real.

Of such ways of attempting to describe the indescribable, the psychologist Robert H Thouless wrote: 8

The common use of metaphorical expressions in religion may be a real difficulty to the non-religious person who feels drawn towards religion. He may feel that the acceptance of religion would commit him to the acceptance of propositions which no sensible person can believe. Indeed, many of the statements of religious thought would be absurd if they were understood as literal statements. They are not intended to be so understood. In order to understand any language, it is necessary to know its symbols and the method of their use. One who would understand religious thought must learn the symbols of metaphorical language and their customary usage. The failure to understand them which results from mistaking them for the more usual literal use of language leads to a misinterpretation of religious thought which makes nonsense of a great part of it.

Bearing this in mind, many mystics who have tried to educate us in the mysteries of the mystical experience sometimes recognise the futility of it. The Trappist monk of the Abbey of Gethsemani, Kentucky, Thomas Merton, a mystic himself, also recognised the impossibility of conveying the detail of his own mystical experiences. A prolific writer, having written over 70 books, poet and student of comparative religion, he nevertheless accepted that: 9

The personal and direct grasp of sacred realities by each individual soul is an incommunicable experience.

…and many centuries before, Walter Hilton, a mystic whose spiritual writings were widely influential during 15th century in England, wrote that: 10

One cannot describe with the tongue specific details of the experience, the illuminations, the graces, and the comforts that pure souls perceive through the favouring comradeship of the blessed angels.

Dante Alighieri’s ‘Divine Comedy’ written in the early 14 th century, reflects this inability we have to express what we mystically experience. In the ‘Inferno’ he explained: 11

How frozen I became and powerless then, Ask it not, Reader, for I write it not, Because all language would be insufficient,

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Others have often wished for the ability to communicate to everyone the reality which they have been shown. The French philosopher, Jesuit priest and palaeontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was one such mystic who believed that: 12

…a whole life-time of continued hard work would be as nothing to me, if only I could, just for one moment, give a true picture of what I see.

If only!!!! Although, perhaps, we are not meant to understand but to experience – maybe it is one of the yet unknown Cosmic Laws. In his third section of the Divine Comedy, Paradise, the Florentine poet Dante Alighieri seemed to try to tell us of this limitation: 13

Within the court of Heaven, whence I return, Are many jewels found, so fair and precious They cannot be transported from the realm;

The 20 th century scholar Margaret Smith, after studying in detail the lives of the early middle Eastern mystics and Sufis, also recognised that maybe those living on earth are not permitted to fully understand everything that mystics may experience: 14

But unveiling of that Divine Glory is among the 'unspeakable things' which it is not permitted to describe, nor in truth is it describable.

Then there is Therese of Lisieux, a French Catholic Carmelite nun, also known as “The Little Flower of Jesus”, who understood that it was up to the individual mystic to attempt to convey what principles and experiences they believed to be of value to others: 15

I would not tell you everything even if I could, for there are certain things which lose their fragrance in the open air; certain thoughts so intimate that they cannot be translated into earthly language without losing at once their deep and heavenly meaning.

Whilst Therese was correct in saying that the problem lay in the language that each culture uses, the truth is that all languages have evolved in order to accommodate all that is needed to be said about the physical, visible world. Raymond Moody, an American psychologist and medical doctor who became famous for his books about life after death and Near Death Experiences, used the idea of Plato to stress this viewpoint: 16

...Plato says human language is inadequate to express the ultimate realities directly.

…and more pointedly, Evelyn Underhill said, about words that are available to convey mystical experience: 17

These correspond so well to the physical plane and its adventures, that we forget that they have but the faintest of relations with transcendental things.

She stressed this again and again, and in a later book ‘The Life of the Spirit and The Life of Today’ she wrote of mystical experiences: 18

We are dealing with the most subtle of realities and have only the help of crude

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words, developed for other purposes than this.

The anonymous 14 th century author of ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’ confirmed this attitude, as: 19

Language belongs to the realm of matter …

And because of this, so Robert Thouless tells us, this anonymous author: 20

...warned his readers not to mistake metaphorical language about spiritual things for literal language about material things. “Be wary”, he said, “that thou conceive not bodily that which is meant ghostly, although it be spoken in bodily words, as be these, up or down, in or out, behind or before.”

And because of this, John Wesley, the co-founder of the Methodist movement, as recorded in John M. Todd’s ‘John Wesley and the Catholic Church’, was minded to write: 21

It is hard to find words in the language of men, to explain the deep things of God. Indeed there are none that will adequately express what the spirit of God works in his children.

All languages and the complete set of words which constitute them have developed over millennia to be able to describe everything that our senses experience. It is an evolving set of concepts. Words such as ‘blackout’ did not exist before the advent of WWII and until scientists started to develop their ideas about the structure of the atom, the word ‘quark’ did not exist with reference to atomic theory. These thoughts were enhanced by the Jungian therapist and spiritual counsellor Morton Kelsey: 22

Ordinary concepts and rational ideas are not very helpful. Even scientists find that they are not really adequate to describe matter. The rational and carefully defined concepts of science simply will not stretch far enough to make complete sense of subatomic physics and quantum mechanics. ... Yet, when it comes to the most important of all realities, God, most people either turn to rational concepts or talk about experiences that are beyond verbal communication.

The reason that words have been developed for new experiences or concepts is that they can be understood in relationship to existing words and concepts. That is, I can create a description of a new idea using existing words or at least be able to describe a new word or idea using words which exist in our current dictionaries. This is not the case with mystical experiences; there is no place to start from. This why Bede Griffiths said that: 23

All language defeats itself and one has to go beyond words…

This is difficult to achieve, as the concepts that we can understand articulate seem to constrain and limit our perspective. Based on his work highlighting parallels between ancient mysticism and quantum mechanics, the American author Michael Talbot, in an attempt to explain this wrote: 24

We have discovered that our language limits our experience of the 'realities' encountered in both mysticism and the new physics; and yet our linguistic ways of

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thinking dominate our life. We do not realise that outside the narrow plane of words there may be vast realms of conscious experience which we are denying ourselves. We have been culturally conditioned to think with words.

Through following the Mystic Way, mystics break down these barriers only to be confounded by lack of expressive language. Some mystics have attempted descriptions and create passages in text which seem to bemuse rather than enlighten. Stephen Hobhouse, a prominent 20 th century English peace activist, prison reformer, and religious writer, in a ‘A Discourse on the Life to Come’ explained: 25

William Blake, though at times very obscure, was, I think, one of the wisest of mystics and visionaries. He certainly knew a lot about divine indwelling; probably some of his most confused passages are unsuccessful attempts to describe it.

Blake was one of those very developed mystics whose mystical experiences were very intense and ecstatic. He compares with those seemingly excitable female mystics such as Julian of Norwich, Margery Kempe, Teresa of Avila who use nuptial and bridal language to try to convey their experiences. Of this, F. C. Happold said: 26

It is the intensity of the experience which explains the words which those who have climbed to the heights of the life of union use.

Developing the phrases used by many female mystics, Cristina Mazzoni wrote an interpretive essay in DS Brewers publication of Angela of Foligno’s book ‘Memorial’. In this she explained: 27

Many of these activities, specifically the one's that involve caring for the body (one's own as well of those of one's family members), have been traditionally associated with women's role as carers and carriers. The most obvious examples of this include bearing, giving birth to, and nurturing children, preparing family meals, taking care of the sick, the elderly, the dying, preparing the dead for burial. These situations provide female contexts, images, and metaphors for the woman mystic's union with God and for her spiritual journey in general.

Using such imagery conveys intensity, a little enlightenment but minimal comprehension. Therefore, trying to describe spiritual experiences using words taken from sense experience does not work, most mystics have resorted to the use of oxymorons 28 , metaphors 29 and paradoxes 30 . Saskia Murk Jansen in her book ‘Brides in the Desert - The Spirituality of the Beguines’ said something similar: 31

Prophets and mystics are those who perceive truth, not with their reason, but with their imagination. Their language tends to be full of metaphor, paradox and vivid imagery.

That is, there is a perceived need to use symbols, as suggested by Thomas Merton: 32

In order to express this reality we have to use symbolic language...

Referring again to Cristina Mazzoni’s introduction to ‘Memorial’ where she made the valid comment that: 33

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…the paradox of the very expression "mystical language": etymologically, mysticism refers to that about which we cannot speak, and mystics - Angela among them - frequently lament the inadequacy of referential language to express their union with the divinity: one critic has counted fifty-one such protestations in Angela of Foligno alone.

Sometimes mystics don’t seem to have any choice other than to use these often strange constructs of language if they are to try to give us a view of what their mystical experiences are like. In F C Happold’s ‘Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man’ he too became resigned to it and explained that: 34

We are, therefore, compelled to use the only language available, a language of symbol and paradox, which can be alien and incomprehensible to one not accustomed to it.

It can be very difficult, too, for those who have extensively read mystical texts. Nevertheless, I’ll give a couple of examples the first from the Indian philosopher and statesman Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan: 35

Hinduism admits that the unquestionable content of the experience is that about which nothing more can be said. The deeper and more intimate a spiritual experience, the more readily does it dispense with signs and symbols. Deep intuition is utterly silent. Through silence we "confess without confession" that the glory of spiritual life is inexplicable and beyond the reach of speech and mind. It is the great unfathomable mystery and words are treacherous.

…and from ‘Reflections of My Work’ by Thomas Merton: 36

The goal of the contemplative is, on its lowest level, the recognition of this splendour of being and unity - a splendour in which he is one with all that is. But on a higher level still, the not-being and the emptiness that is so called because it is absolutely beyond all definitions and limitation.

This latter is an example of the use of an oxymoron, of which Cristina Mazzoni said: 37

Mystical Literature is often described as an oxymoron, for common sense demands that the experience of what goes beyond language cannot be verbalised.

Experience is the key; it is the only way to understand what the mystics are trying to tell us. An experienced mystic himself, Henry Thomas Hamblin knew full well that a mystical experience: 38

...is something that can only be experienced, for it cannot be described .

Henry recalled this in a different publication and wrote : 39

Who can describe this [mystical experience]? No one, but all can experience it, and this is far better than merely reading or hearing about it.

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...and as far back as the 2 nd century, the Christian philosopher Origen remarked that: 40

...the glory of the Saviour is such that it is impossible to commit it entirely to writing, and that the Spirit speaks truths which are too great to be expressed in words.

This was also the finding of Neale Donald Walsch’s communicating spirit: 41

The difficulty is that you do not have words for most of what there is to convey, and of that for which you do have words, you do not have a context within which to place them. This is the difficulty with much spiritual and esoteric writing.

If we are not careful in either describing or interpreting others’ descriptions then we could be led away from our spiritual pathway. From one, John Blofeld, who studied the sages and mystics of China, we are provided an insight recognised by students of Ch'an [Zen] who appreciate that: 42

...verbal explanations of the truths hinted at always lead to distortion or to a dead end.

John further expanded this in another book of his ‘The Wheel of Life’: 43

Perhaps silence is wiser than attempted descriptions of the subtler experiences of the spirit, for these seldom escape distortion when forced into the armour-stiffness of words. Yet, were silence always to be maintained, we could not convey even the husks of our greatest experiences to others, and the literature of religion would become a collection of useless and misleading descriptions of externals.

And all this was confirmed by the Quaker Christine Davis: 44

There is good reason for our reluctance to use words to define our experience of the Divine, for words can never be adequate, and their adoption as normative statements of faith inevitably limits and distorts the Truth which they seek to express.

Hence it is important for everyone who reads mystical treatises to realise that all the ways of describing mystical experiences are symbolic and should not be treated as absolute literal definitions. Evelyn Underhill has described this much better than I can: 45

It is too often forgotten by quarrelsome partisans of a concrete turn of mind that at best all these transcendental theories are only symbols, methods, diagrams; feebly attempting the representation of an experience which in its fullness is always the same, and of which the dominant characteristic is ineffability. Hence they insist with tiresome monotony that Dionysius must be wrong if Tauler be right: that it is absurd to call yourself the Friend of God if unknowableness be that God's first attribute: that Plato's Perfect Beauty and St. Catherine of Siena's Accepter of Sacrifices cannot be the same: that the "courteous and dear-worthy Lord" who said to Lady Julian, "My darling, I am glad that thou art come to Me, in all thy woe I have ever been with thee," rules out the formless and impersonal One of Plotinus, the "triple circle" of Suso and Dante.

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They express the same broad notion in different ways according to their personal mystical experiences. In fact, even those spirits who teach us through our mediums often express things of the Spirit in ways which seems contradictory. Michael E. Tymn, an American paranormal author, in his book ‘The Articulate Dead’, recalls for us what spirits have indicated to the medium Allan Kardec, the founder of Spiritism 46 : 47

...even spirits who are really enlightened may express themselves in terms which appear to be different but which, at bottom, mean the same thing, especially in regard to matters which your language is incapable of expressing clearly, and which can only be spoken to you by means of figures and comparisons that you mistake for literal statements of fact.

When we read descriptions of mystical experiences, we naturally use our intellect and reason to try to understand what is written. Herein exposes another problem as articulated by the spirit communicator who used Beatrice Russell as a channel: 48

Do not spoil this victory by trying to use reason or form definitions to describe that which is intangible and cannot be contained in words.

...not only cannot be encapsulated by speech, but it seems that human intelligence is not up to the mark. Cristina Mazzoni in a note in Angela of Foligno’s ‘Memorial’ reported that during a mystical experience: 49

…Angela's soul understands so much more than it can on earth, yet this understanding is ineffable because it goes beyond human intelligence.

Using a poetic turn of phrase and using Harry Wilmer’s use of a quotation from T. S. Elliot’s 'Four Quartets’: 50

And what the dead had no speech for, when living, They can tell you, being dead: the communication Of the dead is tongued with fire beyond the language of the living.

This limitation of the intellect was also identified by Teresa of Avila, a prominent Spanish mystic and Carmelite nun, as a real difficulty: 51

...for there is no way of learning how to speak of them (God’s treasures); neither is the intellect capable of understanding them, nor can comparisons help in explaining them; earthly things are too coarse for such a purpose.

And yet, mystics will continue to do so; it seems to be an inherent feature of their psyche. In David Dulley’s meditative reverie in which he and his cat, Mona, converse, he told his feline listener that: 52

The human struggle to define, refine, abandon and replace words that are at best misleading labels and at worse lethal weapons will last as long as we do.

Therefore, perhaps we should give up all attempts to describe and define those mystical experiences which we hold so dear. Because each experience is a personal one, then other

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:32:09 21.3 Mystical Experiences are Indescribable Page 9 of 22 than in general terms, we should not even consider trying to describe it to others who will have a completely different mind-set. This was the view of the 16 th century mystic Saint Teresa of Ávila: 53

...let us not desire the capacity to understand this union.

…and from the book ‘Mr Jones, Meet The Master’, its author Peter Marshall, a Scottish- American preacher who served twice as Chaplain of the United States Senate, expresses his view: 54

There are moments of spiritual insight that defy the limits of syntax and grammar. There are experiences that can never be poured into the moulds of speech. There are some things too deep for words.

The wisdom of Buddha, says Radhakrishnan, revealed his objection to defining the detail of enlightened experiences: 55

The experience is real though inarticulate. Among the religious teachers of the world, Buddha is marked out as the one who admitted the reality of the spiritual experience and yet refused to interpret it as a revelation of anything beyond itself.

Hugh Martin, in discussing the spirituality of Brother Lawrence's ‘The Practice of the Presence of God’ records that: 56

"Often he had told me," writes his reporter, "that all he had heard others say, all that he had found in books, all that he had himself written, seemed savourless and dull and heavy, when compared with what faith had unfolded to him of the unspeakable riches of God..."

That is, words are inadequate in the extreme, when it comes to describing spiritual experiences. Of this John Blofeld remarked: 57

Whys and wherefores arise only when one sets out to explain them; it is humbling to discover how little can be explained about matters calling not for understanding at the conceptual level but direct experience .

Even though every mystic realises the impossibility of describing the detail of their experiences to another, they all still try. In those attempts they all tell us of the impossibility of doing so, as Angela of Foligno tells us: 58

And so when I return from seeing God's secrets, it is with confidence and detachment that I speak words about them; but these words are external to those ineffable divine powers which are produced in my soul, and come no where near to describing them.

The 14 th century passionate English mystic Richard Rolle tried to explain this in his book ‘The Fire of Love’ and he said of his mystical experiences: 59

...when I became aware, in a way I cannot explain...

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Yet there is an urge, in fact an urgency, to try, as difficult as it may be, to tell others of their mystical experiences. The excitement of the revelations will not allow the mystic to keep it to themselves. There is a perception that it is one of their duties as a pioneer of spiritual experiences. Here are another few examples from the writings of the mystics that indicate their absolute desire to communicate and yet realise their known inability to do so. The following extracts come from writings of Therese of Lisieux, Margery Kempe, the anonymous author of ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’, Evelyn Underhill and Thomas Merton respectively:

All the same, I will try to write a few lines, in spite of the fact that I feel it is quite impossible to put into words things the heart itself can scarcely grasp . 60

...and the holy conversation in which our Lord conversed with her soul, that she could never express them later, so high and so holy they were . 61

Then perhaps he may touch you with a ray of his divine light which will pierce the 'cloud of unknowing' between you and him. He will let you glimpse something of the ineffable secrets of his divine wisdom and your affection will seem on fire with his love. I am at a loss to say more, for the experience is beyond words . 62

The greatest mystics, however - Ruysbroeck, St. John of the Cross, and St. Teresa herself in her later stages - distinguish clearly between the ineffable Reality which they perceive and the image under which they describe it . 63

This serene hunger of the spirit penetrates the surface of words and goes beyond the human formulation of mysteries and seeks, in the humiliation of silence and intellectual solitude and interior poverty, the gift of a supernatural apprehension which words cannot truly signify . 64

Angela of Foligno also recognised the fact of the excitement which follows mystical experience often leads the mystic to excessive descriptions rather than restricting them: 65

...the inadequacy of human language in expressing the mystic's encounter with the divine translates itself not into silence - so much for ineffability - but rather into linguistic excess.

At the end of the day, most people, as observed by the hermit Richard Rolle in 14 th century England, are mostly unable to understand any of the symbols used and hence do not appreciate their experiences: 66

But I could not possibly desert the grace of [God], and accept the views of foolish men who were completely ignorant of all that was going on within me.

This is somewhat harsh as I do feel that even if those who are not mystics or who are just starting out on their spiritual pathway may be inspired or understand a sufficient amount of what is said or written to urge them forward. This was exemplified in a letter from Adelbert, Prior at Mount St. Disibod to Hildegard of Bingen: 67

...for through divine revelation you [Hildegard of Bingen] make many things clear

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that were, before, unseen and unheard, and you open doors that were closed before.

Extending this thought, it seems valid to assume that anyone who is already travelling their mystical path will be much more able to appreciate the descriptions. The English Buddhist Dharmachari Subhuti recognised this and wrote: 68

It gives us a language to understand what is happening to us so that we can live it out. It gives us a medium of communication with others who are engaged in the same process so that we can live it out.

…and the Jesuit theologian William Johnston reports that Auguste Poulain claimed that: 69

…there are many passages in the writings of the mystics that can only be understood by someone who has had similar experience.

Born in 1753 the Rabbi, preacher and writer Kalonymus Kalman Epstein of Cracow, according to Dan Cohn-Sherbok, discussed the nature of this mystical state and in his view a mystical experience: 70

...cannot be explained to those who never have had such experience.

Silver Birch, that extensive teacher from the world of Spirit, told us of this difficulty: 71

Can a mystic explain his mysticism to a man of business? Can an artist explain to those not endowed with his sensitiveness what his inspiration is? He cannot. They are on different mental planes.

Thus, Evelyn Underhill, from her extensive research, was able to report: 72

The mystic may say - is indeed bound to say - with St. Bernard, "My secret to myself." Try how he will, his stammering and awestruck reports can hardly be understood but by those who are already on the way.

Mystics are rarely skilled verbalisers. Their faculties are always directed towards the mystical and nothing else. I could compare this to the general inability of mathematicians to communicate through writing their ideas. The two skills tend to be polarised. Teresa of Avila in her book ‘The Interior Castle’ recognised this limitation: 73

...during these moments (when union takes place) that are so sublime that it’s not fitting for those who live on this earth to have the further understanding necessary to explain them.

...but they still keep on trying even though in their heart of hearts they realise that very, very few will understand. From his experience and knowledge of Mohammed, the Persian Sufi Al Ghazzali wrote: 74

The prophet said, "Never does anyone of you relate a tradition which is beyond the ability of the auditors to understand without becoming a cause of corruption among them." And again, "Communicate with people in terms known to them and discard those which are unknown."

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I’m pleased that this did not happen as we would be much less rich without the attempts of the mystics to provide even a very limited view of their experiences. Nevertheless, I expect if a mystic were to believe that only one person was ever able to understand their description of their mystical experiences then they would still continue in their efforts. Perhaps it is part of the goal of each mystic, as offered by the spiritual author Blair Reynolds: 75

For the goal of process should be to arrive at a coherent explanation of these experiences, no matter how bizarre they may seem.

Can’t do it! Can’t explain it properly! In fact nothing associated with mystical experience can be put on a comprehensible plate and digested. As F. P. Harton noticed: 76

Difficulty of description causes endless trouble in this branch of theology [mysticism] : the saints describe the indescribable in different ways, and the theologians cannot agree upon a terminology, neither of which facts need cause us much surprise.

The scientist David Hay said that part of the difficulty is that: 77

…the realm of religious experience is not only difficult to define, but the experience itself is very strange and difficult to describe...

In trying to explain some of the aspects of Nietzsche’s writings, Carl Jung wrote: 78

Perhaps - who knows? - he had had inner experiences, insights which he had unfortunately attempted to talk about, and had found that no one understood him.

This is typical of many individuals who have insights and mystical experiences. There is a tendency for them to become anxious because of it. Angela of Foligno said: 79

Still my soul is greatly troubled because I cannot clearly describe this vision.

And of all the millions of words which have been written about it, all we can say is trivial compared to the vastness of the canvas which represents the mystical experiences. According to ‘The Book of Privy Counselling’: 80

Whatever we may say of it is not it, but only about it.

Perhaps it is true that anything which is beyond the bounds of the physical and our sensual existence can never be effectively described. I’ll give a couple of example where images and experiences have been relayed but the text which describes them only hints at what was actually experienced. Dan Cohn-Sherbok in his book ‘Jewish & Christian Mysticism - An Introduction’ wrote about Angela of Foligno: 81

Such mystical experience enabled her to attain a union with God as a foretaste of heavenly glory and joy: "Methought I was in the midst of the Trinity, in a manner higher and greater than usual were the blessings I received, and continually were there given unto me gifts full of delight and rejoicing most great and unspeakable.

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All this was far beyond anything which had heretofore happened unto me that verily a divine change took place in my soul which neither saint nor angel could describe or explain."

Similarly, the Scottish theologian Hugh Ross Mackintosh relays the testimony of Claus Harms, later an evangelical preacher of great power, who was a student when Friedrich Schleiermacher’s ‘Addresses’ were published and through the instrumentality of a friend had got hold of the book. He writes thus in his autobiography: 82

It was Saturday, about midday. In the afternoon I began to read, having told my attendant to inform everyone who might call, that I did not wish to be disturbed. On Sunday morning I began again from the beginning ... Thereafter, I laid by the book [Schleiermacher’s ‘Addresses’], and walked round little Kiel – a solitary walk; and during this walk it was that I suddenly recognised that all rationalism, and all aesthetics, and all knowledge derived from ourselves, are utterly worthless and useless as regards the work of salvation, and the necessity of our salvation coming from another source, so to say, flashed upon me. If to anyone this sounds mysterious, or mystical, they may take it as such; I cannot describe the matter more distinctly; but so much I know, that I may with truth call it the hour in which my higher life was born. I received from that book the impulse of a movement that will never cease. More than this Schleiermacher did not do for me; but so much he did do, and, next to God, I thank him for it.

Delight, happiness, joy and other positive emotions are evident in the mystics’ descriptions of their experiences. No matter what the source of these feelings is they are still impossible to completely and unambiguously describe. How much more difficult then, are those which emerge from spiritual activity. Don Piper, an American church minister tried to explain his own Near Death Experience but: 83

As I try to explain this, my words seem weak and hardly adequate, because I have to use earthly terms to refer to unimaginable joy, excitement, warmth, and total happiness.

From this NDE perspective, Dr Eben Alexander, based on his own experiences explained that: 84

The primary hurdle that most NDE subjects must jump is not how to reacclimate to the limitations of the earthly world - though this can certainly be a challenge - but how to convey what the love they experienced out there actually feels like.

This American neurosurgeon went on to expand this indescribability and wrote: 85

Perhaps the best way of conveying that part of the experience is to say that I had a foretaste of another, larger kind of knowledge: one I believe human beings will be able to access in even larger numbers in the future. But conveying that knowledge now is rather like being a chimpanzee, becoming a human for a single day to experience all of the wonders of human knowledge, and then returning to one’s chimp friends and trying to tell them what it was like knowing several Romantic languages, the calculus, and the immense scale of the universe.

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...and from other people who also had Near Death Experiences, Raymond Moody writes: 86

The persons involved uniformly characterize their experiences as ineffable, that is, "inexpressible." Many people have made remarks to the effect that, "There are just no words to express what I am trying to say," or "They just don't make adjectives and superlatives to describe this." One woman put this to me very succinctly when she said: "Now, there is a real problem for me as I'm trying to tell you this, because all the words I know are three-dimensional. As I was going through this, I kept thinking, ‘Well, when I was taking geometry, they always told me there were only three dimensions, and I always just accepted that.’”

Most people who travel their spiritual journey often have spiritual or mystical experiences but tend not to call themselves mystics. One such person is Pamela Young. This North of England retired social worker has tried, without success, to describe her spiritual experiences and wrote: 87

Over the years I have struggled to find the words to explain this experience to others - but how can I describe the indescribable?

All the above does not invalidate each of us reading about the mystical experiences of others. They provide some insights which we ourselves may also receive. It is when we do that the light will dawn and we will be able to relate to every aspect of their lives. On this, the Swedish spiritual counsellor Jostein Saether declared that in his opinion: 88

…every general schooling, including the anthroposophical 89 path, reaches its limits when one enters deeper threshold experiences. The best help at that point is to hear from others what happened to them when they were having similar experiences.

We now know that descriptive attempts have always failed. What about other forms of conveying messages and information? If the mystic is artistic in any way then perhaps they can use forms to get a message over. Evelyn Underhill hinted at this: 90

All kinds of symbolic language come naturally to the articulate mystic, who is often a literary artist as well: so naturally, that he sometimes forgets to explain that his utterance is but symbolic - a desperate attempt to translate the truth of that world into the beauty of this.

She also described the link of the artist with mystical experience: 91

But the artist cannot act thus. On him has been laid the duty of expressing something of that which he perceives. He is bound to tell his love. In his worship of Perfect Beauty faith must be balanced by works. By means of veils and symbols he must interpret his free vision, his glimpse of the burning bush, to other men. He is the mediator between his brethren and the divine, for art is the link between appearance and reality

Bede Griffiths, who understood the mind-set of both Eastern and Western mystics, compared mysticism with poetry in order to try to give us an understanding of the problems

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Poetry and mysticism both derive from a common source, the ground or depth of the soul, where the Mystery of Being is experienced. But the poet is always driven to 'symbolise' his experience, to express it in words or in paint or in music. The mystic seeks the experience in itself, beyond words or sounds or images.

In an attempt to try to show how hard it is to describe mystical experiences, mystics and others have resorted to trying sense experiences. Evelyn Underhill wrote: 93

The mystic, as a rule, cannot wholly do without symbol and image, inadequate to his vision though they must always be: for his experience must be expressed if it is to be communicated, and its actuality is inexpressible except in some side-long way, some hint or parallel which will stimulate the dormant intuition of the reader…

More explicitly, the 16 th century mystic St John of the Cross said generally of mystics: 94

If they should describe to a man that was born blind, and has never seen any colour, what is meant by a white colour or by a yellow, he would understand it but indifferently, however fully one might describe it to him; for, as he has never seen such colours or anything like them by which he may judge them, only their names would remain with him; for these he would be able to comprehend through the ear, but not their forms or figures, since he has never seen them.

Other writers have tended to compare the difficulty with that of the sense of taste. In ‘The Gospel of the Essenes’ it is reported that Jesus the Nazarene said: 95

How may we speak with our lips That which cannot be spoken? It is like a pomegranate eaten by a mute: How then may he tell of its flavour?

In his book on ‘The English Mystics’ the 20 th century author Gerald Bullett wrote: 96

The emphasis, once again, is upon the ‘internal sensating faculty’. All genuine mystical philosophy has its root, not in a theory, but in an actual inward experience. It was when I read this that I felt I understood the difficulty of trying to describe mystical experiences. If you were the only person on Earth to have the power of taste, then how would you describe the taste of an apple to someone else without using any ‘taste’ terms?

…and from the ‘Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart’: 97

...who will explain the sweetness of honey to those who have not tasted it?

Another sense which has been used in this way is that of hearing. This was used by Evelyn Underhill: 98

So, a person hearing for the first time some masterpiece of classical music, would

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have no language in which to describe it objectively; but could only tell us how it made him feel. This is one reason why feeling-states seem to preponderate in all descriptions of the mystic act.

All descriptions are extremely limiting. Take for example the words used by a young man who was one of Raymond Moody’s subjects in taking about his Near Death Experience: 99

The terms I 'm using to describe it are so far from the thing, but it's the best I can do... Because this is a place where the place is knowledge ... Knowledge and information are readily available - all knowledge ... You absorb knowledge ... You all of a sudden know the answers. I go on seeking knowledge, 'Seek and ye shall find.' You can get the knowledge for yourself. But I pray for wisdom, wisdom more than all...

This leads us to think that we can’t describe it in words then what can we do? Perhaps it is the consequences, the resultant impressions, and feelings, which we may be able to get to grips with. It is through what we feel during those enlightened periods that F. C. Happold remarked: 100

...our language has evolved primarily as an instrument for describing experience through the five senses. It does not lend itself easily to descriptions of rare spiritual and psychological states, which, though they may be states of knowledge, are also states of feeling.

This is the way that we sense the experience in a way it is totally beyond the capacity of words to express as William Law, from his own 18 th century experience, realised: 101

Sometimes the light of God's countenance shines so bright upon us, we see so far into the invisible world, we are so affected with the wonders of the love and goodness of God, that our hearts worship and adore in a language higher than that of words, and we feel transports of devotion, which can only be felt.

…or in Frederick Happold’s words: 102

Mystical states, in so far as they can be psychologically examined, must be classified as feeling-states.

Adding to this, the Benedictine monk Aelred Graham refers to the American philosopher and psychologist William James who he reported as saying: 103

Although so similar to states of feeling, mystical states seem to those who experience them to be also states of knowledge. They are states of insight into depths of truth unplumbed by the discursive intellect. They are illuminations, revelations, full of significance and importance, all inarticulate though they remain; and as a rule they carry with them a curious sense of authority for aftertime.

Even though this ‘feeling’ way of looking at mystical experiences is different from the descriptive, it is still indescribable. Ralph Waldo Emerson understood that: 104

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The eye and the ear have a logic which transcends the skill of the tongue.

Because of this inability, there is a temptation for non-mystics to dismiss the experiences as delusory. However, this mystical world, according to Frederick Happold, so Ludwig Wittgenstein, the 20 th century Austrian-British philosopher who had a keen interest in the philosophy of language, informed us: 105

… is real; we can feel it; in a true sense we can know it; but we can neither describe it nor speak about it meaningfully; it is inexpressible.

...neither, as far as I know, has the impact of these mystical experiences succumbed to measurement. This was also true in the early part of the 20 th century when Evelyn Underhill, towards the end of her epic tome on mysticism, wrote: 106

The Unitive Life, though so often lived in the world, is never of it. It belongs to another plane of being, moves securely upon levels unrelated to our speech; and hence eludes the measuring powers of humanity.

However, as psychology and feeling-states are coming more and more under scientific scrutiny and measurement, perhaps one day we will be able to say more about mystical experiences. This point was made by Evelyn Underhill: 107

Our ways of describing and interpreting spiritual experience must change with the rest, if we are to keep in touch with reality, though the experience itself is unchanged.

...and Peter Fenwick, writing ‘The Truth in the Light’ with his wife Elizabeth, took great interest in mystical experiences because: 108

...they seem to lie at the frontier of science; we can find partial scientific explanations for them, but they can't be explained entirely by the mechanism we already know. And yet as an area of research they are unsatisfactory because they occur at random and totally unpredictably. Of course it is interesting when people say they have felt that they are part of the universe or report that visions of the Virgin Mary regularly appear to them. But they can't make these experiences happen to order; they just occur. This makes it impossible to set up a situation in which you can actually monitor what is happening to someone's brain during a mystical experience and correlate this with what they are feeling, their subjective experience.

Until researchers develop a greater understanding of mystical experiences, we have to accept that, as the 5 th century Christian priest Julianus Pomerius explained: 109

...not so much can be set forth in language as can be embraced by the soul.

…and, as Evelyn Underhill recognised, the gulf between the experience and the language is immense: 110

First, there is the huge disparity between his unspeakable experience and the

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language which will most nearly suggest it.

I do believe that this is deliberate. To understand something, in fact anything, we have to experience it. The temptation is that, if the whole truth could be conveyed through language, the experience to be considered as being redundant. Let us be thankful, therefore, that as Aldous Huxley found in the book ‘The Crest-Jewel of Wisdom’ 111

Supreme, beyond the power of speech to express, Brahman may yet be apprehended by the eye of pure illumination.

Each of us can reach this goal through following our spiritual journey to its earthly end. If this is the only way of understanding, then we should just accept the fact and not even attempt to understand it prior to that experience. Follow the thought of Jacob Boehme, the well renowned mystic born in Germany in 1575, who wrote that: 112

We have neither pen nor words to write or to tell what the sweet grace of God - is, and what happens to those who are worthy - which we in our own way have experienced and which we know, so that we have a true ground for our writings. We have shared this gladly with our brothers. If it is possible for them to believe our precious childlike counsel, they will experience in themselves that which this simple hand understands and knows such great secrets.

You have to be there, it is the place of all mystics and we must resign ourselves to the conclusion of Stephen taken from the Book of the Holy Hierotheos, second Discourse, iv.21, as revealed by Margaret Smith, : 113

I do not know ... how to put into words what things belong to the Mind at that time of Coming, since all the glorious and holy Secrets of which the Mind is accounted worthy at the time when it becomes 'without appearance' are, perhaps, beyond the power of speech.

Aldous Huxley seemed to sum-up the whole difficulty: 114

Hence, in all expositions of the Perennial Philosophy, the frequency of paradox, of verbal extravagance, sometimes even of seeming blasphemy. Nobody has yet invented a Spiritual Calculus, in terms of which we may talk coherently about the divine Ground and of the world conceived as its manifestation. For the present, therefore, we must be patient with the linguistic eccentricities of those who are compelled to describe one order of experience in terms of a symbol-system, whose relevance is to the facts of another and quite different order.

…and we should be resigned to the fact that our objective is to follow the mystic way, and through this to achieve our spiritual goal. On this journey, mystical experiences may come our way. Accept them for what they are and enjoy them. David Hay asked the question: 115

But what if there is a particular kind of occurrence in the life of members of our species which leads them to feel that they are directly aware of or being influenced by a transcendent presence or power? Perhaps this is the raw material, as it were, of religious consciousness. Ninian Smart suggests that there are two major strands of human experience which

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fall into this category. They are sometimes called 'numinous' 116 and 'mystical' experience, and both of them have a profound strangeness which makes them very difficult to describe.

Finally, can you imagine what it would be like if every mystic were able to transfer their experiences, through the use of language, into the mind of everyone else? The anonymous author of ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’, in the sister book ‘The Book of Privy Counselling’, speculated that: 117

…if a contemplative had the tongue and the language to express what he experiences, all the scholars in Christendom would be struck dumb before his wisdom.

One day perhaps …

1 Professor Seth Lloyd on the BBC Horizon programme broadcast January 2011 2 Agnes Sanford, Healing Gifts of the Spirit, Arthur James, 1999. Chapter 10; The Gift of Tongues and of Interpretation, (Pg 151) 3 William Houff, Infinity in Your Hand, Skinner House Books, 1994. Chapter 4: Mystical Experience - And Brahman on the elephant's back, (Pg 42) 4 Karen Armstrong, The Case For God, Vintage Books, 2010. Part One: The Unknown God - 1 Homo Religiosus, (Pg 29) 5 Phyllis V. Schlemmer, The Only Planet of Choice, Gateway Books, 1996. I: The Universe and its Beings - 4: The Universal Civilisations, (Pg 40) 6 F C Happold, Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man, Pelican Books, 1966. 9 The Symbols of the Inexpressible, (Pg 105) 7 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter V - Mysticism and Theology, (Pg 102) 8 Robert H Thouless, Authority and Freedom, Hodder & Stoughton, 1954. Chapter Five: Religious Language, (Pg 66) 9 Thomas Merton, The New Man, Burns & Oates, 1985. Free Speech, (Pg 61) 10 Walter Hilton, The Stairway of Perfection, Image Books, 1979. Book Two: Chapter Forty-Six, (Pg 339) 11 Dante Alighieri, Divine Comedy, Capella, 2008. Inferno - Canto XXXIV, (Pg 158) 12 Ursula King, Towards a New Mysticism, Collins, 1980. I Unity of Life and Thought. 1: A Fundamental Vision of Faith, (Pg 22) 13 Dante Alighieri, Divine Comedy, Capella, 2008. Paradiso Canto X, (Pg 312) 14 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 2: Chapter IX - The Mystical Doctrines of Early Sufism, (Pg 214) 15 Therese of Lisieux, The Story of a Soul, Anthony Clarke Books, 1973. Chapter 4, (Pg 40) 16 Raymond A. Moody, Life after Life, BCA, 2001. Three: Parallels – Plato, (Pg 111) 17 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter IV - The Characteristics of Mysticism, (Pg 76) 18 Evelyn Underhill, The Life of the Spirit and The Life of Today, Mowbray, 1994. Chapter VI The Life of the Spirit in the Individual, (Pg 148)

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19 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. The Cloud of Unknowing: Chapter 61, (Pg 128) 20 Robert H Thouless, Authority and Freedom, Hodder & Stoughton, 1954. Chapter Five: Religious Language, (Pg 68) 21 John M. Todd, John Wesley and the Catholic Church, The Catholic Book Club, 1958. Chapter Seven: Assurance, (Pg 134) 22 Morton T Kelsey, The Other Side of Silence, SPCK, 1985. Part Four: The Use of Images in Meditation - 12. Silence Mysticism and Religious Experience, (Pg 152) 23 Bede Griffiths, A New Vision of Reality, Fount, 1992. 11 Christian Mysticism in Relation to Eastern Mysticism, (Pg 244) 24 Michael Talbot, Mysticism and the New Physics, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1981. An Afternote on Language, (Pg 182) 25 Stephen Henry Hobhouse, A Discourse on the Life to Come, Independent Press Limited, 1954. Chapter IV: The Indwelling Life, (Pg 56) 26 F C Happold, Mysticism - A Study and an Anthology, Penguin Books, 1971. The Study: 20. The Unitive Life, (Pg 98) 27 Angela of Foligno, Memorial, DS Brewer, 1999. Interpretive Essay, (Pg 85) 28 An oxymoron is a figure of speech that juxtaposes elements that appear to be contradictory. 29 A metaphor is a phrase that identifies something as being the same as some unrelated thing thus highlighting the similarities between the two to try to convey understanding. 30 A paradox is a statement that apparently contradicts itself and yet might be true (or wrong at the same time). 31 Saskia Murk Jansen, Brides in the Desert - The Spirituality of the Beguines, Darton Longman and Todd, 1998. 2 The Literary Context, (Pg 39) 32 Thomas Merton, The New Man, Burns & Oates, 1985. The War Within Us, (Pg 13) 33 Angela of Foligno, Memorial, DS Brewer, 1999. Introduction, (Pg 9) 34 F C Happold, Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man, Pelican Books, 1966. 11 The Divine Ground of all Existence, (Pg 124) 35 Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, Unwin, 1980. Chapter III : Religious Experience and its Affirmations - 5. Experience and the variety of expressions, (Pg 79) 36 Thomas Merton, Reflections on My Work, Collins, Fontana Library, 1989. Preface to the Japanese edition of 'Seeds of Contemplation', (Pg 100) 37 Angela of Foligno, Memorial, DS Brewer, 1999. Introduction, (Pg 9) 38 Henry Thomas Hamblin, Divine Adjustment, The Science of Thought Press, 1998. Chapter Four: Individuality and Strength, (Pg 61) 39 Henry Thomas Hamblin, The Book of Daily Readings, The Rally, 1944. June 25, (Pg 97) 40 'Reader', Features of the Church Fathers, Heath Cranton Limited, 1935. Second Century and Onwards: Origen on Jeremiah, (Pg 37) 41 Neale Donald Walsch, Friendship with God, Hodder & Stoughton, 1999. Eleven, (Pg 232) 42 John Blofeld, Beyond the Gods, E P Dutton & Co, 1974. Chapter 7 - The Esoteric Path, (Pg 142) 43 John Blofeld, The Wheel of Life, Rider & Co, 1959. Chapter 10 - The Great Pilgrimage, (Pg 231) 44 Christine A M Davis, Minding the Future, Quaker Books, 2008. Chapter 2 - What is this 'Stewardship' anyway? (P 23) 45 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter V - Mysticism and Theology, (Pg 101) 46 Spiritism is a spiritualistic philosophy codified in the 19th century by the French educator Hippolyte Léon Denizard Rivail, under the codename Allan Kardec; it proposed the study of "the nature, origin, and destiny of spirits, and their relation with the corporeal world". Spiritism soon spread to other countries, having today 35 countries represented in the International Spiritist Council. 47 Michael E. Tymn, The Articulate Dead, Galde Press, 2008. Part I: The Earliest Psychical Researchers - Two: The Epidemic Hits France, (Pg 22) 48 Beatrice Russell, Beyond the Veils through Meditation, Lincoln Philosophical Research Foundation, 1986. Goal for Mankind, (Pg 53) 49 Angela of Foligno, Memorial, DS Brewer, 1999. The Memorial of Angela of Foligno - The Seventh Supplementary Step, (Pg 71) 50 Harry Wilmer, Quest for Silence, Diamon, 2000. 7 Spirit and Death: The Ultimate Ordeal, (Pg 137) 51 Teresa of Avila, Selections from The Interior Castle, Harper Collins, 2004. The Fifth Dwelling Places - Chapter 1, (Pg 50) 52 David Dulley, Conversations with Mona, David Dulley, 1993. 14: Religious Impulses, (Pg 36)

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53 Teresa of Avila, Selections from The Interior Castle, Harper Collins, 2004. The Fifth Dwelling Places - Chapter 1, (Pg 57) 54 Peter Marshall, Mr Jones, Meet The Master, Peter Davies, 1955. Were You There? (Pg 111) 55 Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, Unwin, 1980. Chapter III : Religious Experience and its Affirmations - 5. Experience and the variety of expressions, (Pg 78) 56 Hugh Martin, Great Christian Books, SCM Press, 1945., (Pg 54) 57 John Blofeld, Beyond the Gods, E P Dutton & Co, 1974. Chapter 7 - The Esoteric Path, (Pg 139 / 140) 58 Angela of Foligno, Memorial, DS Brewer, 1999. The Memorial of Angela of Foligno - The Seventh Supplementary Step, (Pg 75) 59 Richard Rolle, The Fire of Love, Penguin Books, 1972. Chapter 15, (Pg 93) 60 Therese of Lisieux, The Story of a Soul, Anthony Clarke Books, 1973. Chapter 11, (Pg 150) 61 Margery Kempe, The Book of Margery Kempe, Penguin Books, 2004. Book I: Chapter 29, (Pg 105) 62 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. The Cloud of Unknowing: Chapter 26, (Pg 84) 63 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter IV - The Characteristics of Mysticism, (Pg 79) 64 Thomas Merton, Seeds of Contemplation, Hollis and Carter, 1949. Chapter 12 - Tradition and Revolution, (Pg 89) 65 Angela of Foligno, Memorial, DS Brewer, 1999. Introduction, (Pg 15) 66 Richard Rolle, The Fire of Love, Penguin Books, 1972. Chapter 31, (Pg 142) 67 The Personal Correspondence of Hildegard of Bingen, Oxford University Press, 2006. Chapter 2: Criticism and Response. Letter 7 from Adelbert, Prior at Mount St. Disibod, (Pg 31) 68 Dharmachari Subhuti, The Mythic Context, Padmaloka Books, 1990. The Death of God, (Pg 9 para 3) 69 William Johnston, Silent Music - The Science of Meditation, Fount, 1979. Part I: Meditation. 4: The science of mysticism, (Pg 46) 70 Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Jewish & Christian Mysticism - An Introduction, Continuum, 1994. Part I The Jewish Tradition - 5 Modern Jewish Mystics: Kalonymus Kalman Epstein of Cracow, (Pg 75) 71 A W Austen, Teachings of Silver Birch, Psychic Press, 1993. Reincarnation, (Pg 175) 72 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter IV - The Characteristics of Mysticism, (Pg 75) 73 Teresa of Avila, Selections from The Interior Castle, Harper Collins, 2004. The Sixth Dwelling Places - Chapter 4, (Pg 96) 74 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section III, (Pg 93) 75 R Blair Reynolds, Cosmos and History, Journal of Natural and Social Philosophy,Vol 1, #2, 2005. Introduction 76 F P Harton, The Elements of the Spiritual Life: A study in Ascetical Theology, SPCK, 1950. Part IV - Chapter XIX Contemplative Prayer, (Pg 263) 77 David Hay, Exploring Inner Space - Scientists and Religious Experience, Mowbray, 1987. Part Two: What is the Experiential Dimension - 6. The New England Connection: William James, (Pg 86) 78 Carl Gustav Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections, Fontana, 1995. III Student Years, (Pg 122) 79 Angela of Foligno, Memorial, DS Brewer, 1999. The Memorial of Angela of Foligno - The Second Supplementary, (Pg 47) 80 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. The Book of Privy Counselling: Chapter 11, (Pg 169) 81 Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Jewish & Christian Mysticism - An Introduction, Continuum, 1994. Part II The Christian Tradition - 7 Medieval Christian Mysticism: Franciscan Mysticism, (Pg 108) 82 Hugh Ross Mackintosh, Types of Modern Theology, Nisbet, 1949. II: The Theology of Feeling (A), Schleiermacher’s Interpretation of Religion – Chapter 4: The Idea of God in the ‘Addresses’, (Pg 54) 83 Don Piper, 90 Minutes in Heaven, Kingsway Publications, 2005. 2 My Time in Heaven, (Pg 24) 84 Dr Eben Alexander, Proof of Heaven, Piatkus, 2014. Chapter 9: The Core, (Pg 72) 85 Dr Eben Alexander, Proof of Heaven, Piatkus, 2014. Chapter 15: The Gift of Forgetting, (Pg 82 / 83) 86 Raymond A. Moody, Life after Life, BCA, 2001. Two: The Experience of Dying – Ineffability, (Pg 15) 87 Pamela Young, Hope Street, Coronet, 2011. Part Three: Pamela's Journey, (Pg 156) 88 Jostein Saether, Living With Invisible People - A karmic autobiography, Clairview, 2001. 2. The spiritual breakthrough and early experiences, (Pg 113) 89 Anthroposophy is the philosophy founded by Rudolf Steiner that postulates the existence of an objective, intellectually comprehensible spiritual world, accessible to human experience through inner development. More specifically, it aims to develop faculties of perceptive imagination, inspiration and intuition through the cultivation of a form of thinking independent of sensory experience

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90 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter IV - The Characteristics of Mysticism, (Pg 80) 91 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter IV - The Characteristics of Mysticism, (Pg 75) 92 Bede Griffiths, Return to the Centre, Collins, Fount Paperbacks, 1978. 10. The One Spirit in All Religion, (Pg 75) 93 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter IV - The Characteristics of Mysticism, (Pg 79) 94 The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1947. Ascent of Mount Carmel: Book II. Chapter III, (Pg 71) 95 Edmond Bordeaux Szekely, The Gospel of the Essenes, C W Daniel Co, 1976. From the Essene Book of Jesus: The Sevenfold Peace, (Pg 71) 96 Gerald Bullett, The English Mystics, Michael Joseph, 1950 97 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part One: Callistus and Ignatius of Xanthopoulos - Directions to Hesychasts – 75, (Pg 243) 98 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter VII - Introversion. Part II – Contemplation, (Pg 336) 99 Raymond A. Moody, Reflections on Life After Life, Corgi, 1978. 1 New Elements - A Vision of Knowledge, (Pg 14) 100 F C Happold, Mysticism - A Study and an Anthology, Penguin Books, 1971. The Study: 15. The State of Contemplation, (Pg 68 / 69) 101 William Law, A serious call to a Devout & Holy Life, J M Dent, 1906. Chapter XIV, (Pg 172) 102 F C Happold, Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man, Pelican Books, 1966. 8 The Problem of Language, (Pg 99) 103 Dom Aelred Graham, Christian Thought in Action, The Catholic Book Club, 1958. Chapter Seven: Orthodoxy and Religious Experience, (Pg 105) 104 Ralph Waldo Emerson, Natural History of Intellect, Solar Press, 1995. I. Natural History of Intellect - II. Instinct and Inspiration, (Pg 67) 105 F C Happold, Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man, Pelican Books, 1966. 8 The Problem of Language, (Pg 92) 106 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter X - The Unitive Life, (Pg 414) 107 Evelyn Underhill, The Essentials of Mysticism, Oneworld, 1999. The Essentials of Mysticism, (Pg 8) 108 Peter Fenwick & Elizabeth Fenwick, The Truth in the Light, BCA, 1995. 1 What is it Like to Die? (Pg 12) 109 Julianus Pomerius, The Contemplative Life - 'De Vita Contemplativa', Newman Bookshop, 1947. Book One - Chapter 2, (Pg 19) 110 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter IV - The Characteristics of Mysticism, (Pg 76) 111 Aldous Leonard Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy, Perennial, Harper Collins, 2004. Chapter I: That Art Thou, (Pg 6) 112 Jacob Boehme, The Way to Christ, Paulist Press, 1978. The Second Treatise on True Repentance (1623), (para 17) 113 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 1: Chapter V - Early Mysticism in the Middle East, (Pg 95) 114 Aldous Leonard Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy, Perennial, Harper Collins, 2004. Chapter II: The Nature of the Ground, (Pg 34 / 35) 115 David Hay, Exploring Inner Space - Scientists and Religious Experience, Mowbray, 1987. Part Two: What is the Experiential Dimension - 7. Strange and Difficult to Describe: Types of Experience, (Pg 89) 116 Numinous is used to describe the power or presence or realisation of a God. First coined by Rudolph Otto 117 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. The Book of Privy Counselling: Chapter 11, (Pg 169)

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21.4: Mystical Experiences and Intellect

The intellect, that ability which allows us to bring all we know, understand, and feel to bear on situations and to analyse them in order to draw conclusions, can often be a barrier to mystical progress. Martin Israel, the author of many books on Christian life and teaching, stated this problem as: 1

The intellectual illumination that accrues from mystical experience is spontaneous. It is a primary intimation and does not follow intellectual analysis.

…and from the Journal of Natural and Social Philosophy, Dr. R Blair Reynolds wrote: 2

It was the mystics, not Freud, who discovered the subconscious mind; for the fundamental mystical claim is that the discovery of God is the never-ending process of becoming opened to vast inner depths of experience that ordinarily remain beneath the threshold of normal waking consciousness and so are unreachable by either thought or sensation; hence, the truly mystical quest is the yearning for a richer, more radical unitive experience of God, self, and world than that provided by thought, sense, or the more specialized forms of conscious knowing. So we read in The Cloud of Unknowing, a major 14 th century English work, that in ecstasy “thou findest but a darkness and as it were a kind of unknowing. Thou knowest not what, saving that thou feelest in thy will a naked intent unto God.” The Epistle of Discretion, another outstanding English work from that period, states that “God may not be known by reason, may not be gotten by thought nor concluded by understanding. But He may be loved and chosen by the true lovely will of thine heart.”

All mystical experiences are a function of a person’s spirituality and not their intellect. John Blofeld, a British writer on Asian thought and religion, especially Taoism and Chinese Buddhism, summed it up as: 3

…for mystical attainment is a matter of direct experience having nothing to do with conceptual thought.

In the book ‘Jacob Behmen, an appreciation’ by Alexander Whyte, Jacob is attributed with stressing the validity of knowledge through mystical experience: 4

The gate of the Divine Mystery was sometimes so opened to me that in one quarter of an hour I saw and knew more than if I had been many years together at a university.

Saint Ignatius of Loyola also believed that no amount of studying would reach the knowledge gained through mystical experience: 5

I had very many intuitions about the Blessed Trinity, my understanding being enlightened with them to such an extent that it seemed to me that with hard study I would not have known so much.

James Redfield and his co-authors, tell us that in the East, by the time that the Katha

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Upanishad was written, mystics were already espousing the value of direct experience over intellect: 6

The way is as narrow and hard to traverse as the edge of a razor. Not through much learning is the atman 7 reached, not through the intellect and sacred teaching. Only through direct experience...

Referring to the principles of Zen, the Japanese Buddhist Daisetsu Suzuki wrote: 8

…the question of 'is-ness' is settled only by innerly experiencing it and not by merely arguing about it or by linguistically appealing dialectical subtleties.

Stimulated by his translation and commentary of the Tao Te Ching, Raymond Blakney, a former missionary and teacher in China, came to the conclusion that: 9

The remarkable unanimity of the great mystics of China, India, Persia, the Holy Lands and Europe, is one of the truly impressive facts of the spiritual history of the human race. We may believe that this unanimity is due to personal causes. Generally, the great ones have begun with a deep scepticism about popular or traditional religion and man's power to influence God or the gods. Their insights have been derived from an overwhelming experience of a reality beyond themselves rather than a postulate. They have matured with moral growth rather than intellectual effort. They are usually skilled thinkers, but when they have offered explanations, the explanation is clearly a by-product, rather than an object in itself.

From the spiritual writings of Evelyn Underhill, Lumden Barkway selected the following sentence to convey the necessary split between experience and reason: 10

…we may come to know by the penetration of the heart, that which we can never understand by the exercise of the mind.

Mystics too resort to the use of paradox to try to explain mystical experiences. F. C. Happold said: 11

...it is possible for a man to be united 'to Him Who is wholly unknowable; thus by knowing nothing he knows That Which is beyond his knowledge'.

The mystical experience is all about linking with the Divine Source of all things. This is the only way in which we can achieve any knowledge of God. This point was made by Evelyn Underhill in her book ‘The School of Charity’ which was so admired by Father Andrew: 12

That which we really know about God, is not what we have been clever enough to find out, but what the Divine Clarity has secretly revealed.

…and, writing about the 18 th century mystic William Law, Gerald Bullett explained that: 13

At times Law seems to use 'reason' as a synonym for chop-logic 14 and sceptical disputation, though probably all he means is that knowledge of God is grounded in experience, not speculation.

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Summarising Dionysius, Margaret Smith in discussing early mysticism wrote: 15

In the intent practice of mystic contemplation, it must leave behind the senses and activities of the intellect, and all the things that the senses and intellect can perceive, and all things which are, and, with all the human powers quiescent, strive towards union with Him Who is above all being and knowledge.

It is not just the ancient mystics who took that view, as the zoologist and spiritual thinker David Hay reveals that, for the preacher, theologian, and missionary to Native Americans, Jonathan Edwards: 16

…spiritual understanding is never merely intellectual or theoretical; religious knowledge derives from a direct, first hand encounter with sacred reality.

Mystical experiences provide the mystic with insight which surpasses anything that can be achieved through other routes. These are glimpses of truths which astound us; sensations of feelings which are awesome all because they reveal more and more of Spirit. The school master and mystic Frederick Crossfield Happold in his study on mysticism described the mystic as someone who: 17

…relies not on deductive reason but on intuitive unifying vision to pierce the secret.

…and the secret includes revelations of God through union. This cannot be learned or gained by study and argument as Bede Griffiths, a mystic whose life straddled Western and Eastern traditions, reminded us: 18

One cannot know it by one's reason or by one's intellect, but only when one enters into it does one know it.

In describing ‘The Essentials of Mysticism’, Evelyn Underhill took a sentence from the 3 rd century Greek philosopher Plotinus: 19

This consciousness of the One comes not by knowledge, but by an actual Presence superior to any knowing.

Martin Israel had a similar view: 20

There is one end of perfection only, and that is union with God, Who transcends all categories of rational thought.

Many spiritual experiences occur during contemplation, meditation or prayer. Within these processes everything must be ‘left outside the door’ – the door of the room in which contemplation takes place and the door of your life. As the 14 th century English religious writer Richard Rolle recommends as a necessary factor, everyone: 21

…must, first, fly from every worldly honour; they must hate all vainglory and the parade of knowledge.

So far we have identified that rational thought and mystical experience are at opposite ends of a spectrum. However, intellect does have its value within the context of spiritual

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:32:40 21.3 Mystical Experiences and Intellect Page 4 of 14 development. There are many different types of mystical experience. Those which reveal spiritual truths need to be evaluated after the experience in order to consider their value and place in our own Philosophy of Life. Martin Israel, an English pathologist, Anglican priest, and spiritual director, stated, in ‘Summons to Life’ this necessity as: 22

In no area of life is the balance between intuition and intellect more important that in the interpretation of mystical experience.

Martin extended this in a later book, ‘The Pearl of Great Price’, by saying: 23

We remember once more the teaching in 'The Cloud of Unknowing' that God can be attained in vision only by love, but not by thought alone. This statement is not to be seen as a disparagement of the rational facility, for without it we would soon fall to every type of superstition and fanaticism. It is rather an assertion of the primacy of love and of the warmth of the soul, by which alone the rational faculty, the native intelligence, can be cleansed of emotional blockages and arid pride, and become the chastened vehicle whereby the intuitive knowledge is made available in common life both of the individual and of the greater community.

...and Evelyn Underhill recognised these experiences as ‘food for thought’: 24

Further, "the heart has its reasons which the mind knows not of." It is a matter of experience that in our moments of deep emotion, transitory though they be, we plunge deeper into the reality of things than we can hope to do in hours of the most brilliant argument. At the touch of passion doors fly open which logic has battered on in vain: for passion rouses to activity not merely the mind, but the whole vitality of man. It is the lover, the poet, the mourner, the convert, who shares for a moment the mystic's privilege of lifting that Veil of Isis which science handles so helplessly, leaving only her dirty finger marks behind. The heart, eager and restless, goes out into the unknown, and brings home, literally and actually, "fresh food for thought." Hence those who "feel to think" are likely to possess a richer, more real, if less orderly, experience than those who "think to feel."

Intellect plays its part; using it will help you to build a solid philosophy from the combination of it, your intuitive thoughts, and mystical experiences. F. C. Happold confirmed this in his book ‘Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man’ when he wrote that in mystical experience: 25

…rational thought and intuitive awareness coalesce to create a new form of knowing.

From the same book Peter Spink took a similar extract: 26

It would be misleading to think of intersection as a purely intelligent process ... rather a union of spiritual intuition and rational thought is brought into play ... and the intellect ceases to be the only instrument of knowing.

The two ways of knowing therefore complement each other. Al Ghazzali, an Islamic theologian, jurist, philosopher, cosmologist, psychologist and mystic of Persian origin, referred to the Prophet Mohammad’s words: 27

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The Prophet ... said, "… men will not advance to a higher degree of proximity to God except in proportion to their intellect."

Each mystical experience builds upon our total knowledge to enhance our understanding. It is akin to building a house, where each layer of bricks is constructed on the previous layer and future layers need the current layer on which to rest. In this way the house starts to take shape; slowly but surely. I suppose the mortar between the bricks can be seen as the intellect whilst the bricks themselves are the experiences which life and spirituality bring. The Indian philosopher and statesman Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, using an example from St. Theresa’s life, suggested something similar: 28

Our past experience supplies the materials to which the new insight adds fresh meanings. .. St. Theresa tells us that after her experience she learned to understand the Trinity. Surely she would not have recognised the revelation as that of the Trinity if she had not already known something of the Trinity. Similarly, if Paul had not learned something about Jesus, he would not have identified the voice that came to him on the Damascus road as Jesus's.

So the experiences that we have in the past will help us to rationalise and understand our current experiences. If we had not built up our knowledge in this way then we would not be able to accommodate new ideas which build upon them. The Christian author C S Lewis realised this and wrote: 29

Experience proves this, or that, or nothing, according to the preconceptions we bring to it.

On the other hand, even though I have indicated that the intellect is useful and important, it is not always necessary. You can build very effective structures with very little mortar; it depends on the type of materials (bricks) which the individual is given from Spirit.

Remember that such inspirational thoughts which come from Spirit must be tested, as indicated in the Bible, in order to: 30

…see whether they are from God…

This is vital – the content of any communication from the unseen world can be true or deceptive and only your reasoning will help you to differentiate. If it feels wrong then it probably is; if it feels right then hold onto the notion and it will surely re-emerge in a different and confirming guise. Using such confirmed inspirations your spirituality will develop; you will build your spiritual house brick by brick. You cannot take bricks destined to higher levels to build the lower levels. A similar constructive approach was recorded by Al Ghazzali in ‘The Book of Knowledge’ and explained by the translator Nabih Amin Faris. Al Ghazzali wrote: 31

Similarly unless, in any one of the successive planes, the appropriate time of revelation [of knowledge] is come the time for its expectation does not arrive.

…and as a footnote Nabih Amin Faris explained:

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Mystics hold that God reveals Himself in five phases: (1) the plane of the Essence, (2) the plane of the Attributes, (3) the plane of the Actions, (4) the plane of Similitudes and Phantasy, and (5) the plane of sense and ocular vision. Each of these is a copy of the one above it, so that whatever appears in the sensible world is the symbol of an unseen reality.

There are many such classifications and most of them do not help the acolyte very much. Use your own feelings to guide you along your mystic way. You are one of the fortunate ones. Many, who are steeped in the material world, cannot raise their heads above the material parapet. Of these Aldous Huxley used the words of the Persian Sufi Jalal-ud-Din Rumi to aid his description: 32

"The philosopher who denies divine providence," says Rumi, "is a stranger to the perception of the saints." Only those who have the perception of the saints can know all the time and by immediate experience that divine Reality manifests itself as a Power that is loving, compassionate and wise. The rest of us are not yet in a spiritual position to do more than accept their findings on faith.

It is not faith that drives the mystic, it is personal experience. They have been there and ‘worn the T-shirt’.

Using your intellect, therefore, to assess your mystical experiences is all very well but never, never, attempt to analyse your intuitive thoughts during the time which they are being imparted. Certainly, many mystical experiences are virtually instantaneous and therefore there is no possibility of this happening. Nevertheless, there are some occasions when you may be tempted to apply logic and your intellect during the experience. In ‘The Way of Passion’, Andrew Harvey paraphrased Rumi’s advice: 33

"If anything is happening, it is happening outside anything that you could now call your understanding, and if you think you are understanding then you are missing the point, you are not submitting to the experience. He [Rumi] is saying: "Don't understand. Be led from joy to joy to joy. Allow yourself to be filled by the ecstasy and glory of the Presence again and again.

This is why the mystics advice us, as did the anonymous 14 th century author of ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’ to: 34

…dismiss every clever or subtle thought no matter how holy or valuable. Cover it over with a thick 'cloud of forgetting' because in this life only love can touch God as he is in himself, never knowledge.

Awareness of spiritual potential can sometimes arrive through a ‘Damascus moment’, although for many, in fact most of us, it is frequently stimulated through a desire to understand some of the difficult questions in life. This latter driver will often force us to use our intellect to assess many of our previous beliefs and push us onto our spiritual pathway. We can only learn so much through reading, studying, and discussion. We need to dive below the surface of what we currently know and follow the advice of Imperator, the spirit communicator which used William Stainton Moses as a channel. He said that our soul: 35

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…will have learned that the surface-meanings of things are for the babes in spiritual knowledge, and that beneath an obvious fact lurks a spirit symbolic truth. Such a soul will see the correspondence of matter and spirit, and will recognise in the external only the rude signs by which is conveyed to the child so much of spiritual truth as its finite mind can grasp.

In other words, we can only be given, from Spirit, knowledge which builds upon the combined knowledge and experience that we already possess – it is no use teaching calculus to a person who has not the faintest grasp of algebra. In this ever-learning process there is room for all types of knowledge acquisition. One route, of course, being as suggested by Arthur Findlay who was a significant figure in the history of Spiritualism, being a partial founder of the newspaper Psychic News & International Institute for Psychical Research: 36

However, the next best thing to acquiring knowledge by personal experience is to learn from the experience of others.

This can only be achieved in part – many experiences must be personally lived through. There is no substitute for knowing the taste of liquorice other than personal trial. You have to live the experience and no amount of intellectual ability will be a substitute. The spirit using Neale Donald Walsch as an automatic writing channel wrote: 37

This kind of belief - which I would call Complete Knowing - is not something you try to acquire. In fact, if you are trying to acquire it, you cannot have it. It is something you simply are. You simply are this knowing. You are this being.

The difficulty that I have in applying my reasoning to spiritual experiences is that they are of different types. My mental abilities lean more to the scientific and my mystical experience to the emotional. The British philosopher Bertrand Russell, in ‘Religion and Science’ explained: 38

I believe that, when the mystics contrast 'reality' with 'appearance', the word 'reality' has not a logical, but an emotional, significance. It means what is, in some sense, important. When it is said that time is 'unreal', what should be said is that, in some sense, and on some occasions, it is important to conceive the universe as a whole, as the Creator, if He existed, must have conceived it in deciding to create it. When so conceived, all process is within one completed whole; past, present, and future, all exist, in some sense, together, and the present does not have that pre- eminent reality which has to our usual ways of apprehending the world. If this interpretation is accepted, mysticism expresses an emotion, not a fact; it does not assert anything, and therefore can be neither confirmed nor contradicted by science.

It is only when the men of science deign to accept the reality of mystical experiences and begin the long process of trying to understand these ‘feelings’ that the two sides of the coin will be able to be rationalised. Until then we must put scientific assessment to backstage and bring experience into the limelight. This is what the 19 th century Scottish evangelist Henry Drummond tried to do: 39

Therefore we must not only have quantity of years, to speak in the language of the

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present, but quality of correspondence. When we leave science behind, this correspondence also receives a higher name. It becomes communion.

Do not read into the word ‘communion’ anything other than a direct relationship between God and the mystic – it has nothing to do with the Christian sacrament involving bread and wine. In fact, other than as a potential stimulus and initial vehicle, religion has little to do with mystical experiences. Spirituality does; religion does not. Belief in a particular religion is often a barrier rather than a help. Andrew Harvey recognised this and wrote: 40

Belief is not so important. What is important is experience.

Many people, however, believe that specific traditions are more important than spiritual experiences. This was the case back around the turn of the 17 th century when the French mystic Madame Guyon wrote in her ‘Spiritual Torrents’: 41

I have often wondered why there is an outcry against spiritual books and such opposition to Christians who write and speak on an internal walk in the Lord. It is my judgment that such a writer or speaker can do no harm. The only person who will be harmed is someone who is self-seeking in the first place.

In times gone by when religion held sway over every facet of a person’s life, there were specific protocols and paths laid down which could eventually lead an individual along the mystic way. Zodiac, a spirit teacher, whose words are recorded in ‘Gems of Thought’, recalled that: 42

...many of the saints of old were simple people, many had not the earth knowledge or that which is the so-called culture of this world; yes, they had a life which was restricted and hemmed-in by the very nature of their toil, yet they were the 'Saints of God' because they sought to follow that which had been laid down.

Since those times there has been an explosion of theology, science, and education which combined has given anyone the wherewithal to follow their own spiritual pathway and hence pursue their mystical experiences. Richard Rolle, according to the English historian Henrietta Leyser, was scathing about theologians: 43

'An old woman,' wrote the fourteenth-century hermit and mystic Richard Rolle, 'can be more expert in the love of God ... than your theologian with his useless studying.'

It is all about living rather than knowing; experiencing, not studying and Evelyn Underhill described such mysticism as: 44

…the science of ultimates, the science of union with the Absolute, and nothing else, and that the mystic is the person who attains to this union, not the person who talks about it. Not to know about but to Be, is the mark of the real initiate.

If we put mystical experience at the fore, then we must make sure that everything that we think, say and do fits in with this objective. The one thing that sits above everything else is our deepening love for Spirit and humanity. This has been emphasised by most if not all mystics and was summarised by the Iranian-American religious writer Reza Aslan in his discussion on the Sufi Way: 45

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Sufis believe that reason and theology, creed and ritual, law and its commandments, all must be replaced in the soul of the enlightened person with the supreme virtue: love.

This ‘love’ thread has been delivered from some surprising quarters. Abu Yazid, a 10 th century Berber who led a rebellion in what is now Tunisia and eastern Algeria, against the excesses of the then Caliph, according to Margaret Smith, declared that: 46

Love leads the mystic to gnosis 47 , that knowledge which is the direct gift of God .

Margaret Smith also referred to one of the great Persian Sufis Hujwiri, who lived in the 11 th century in and around what is now Afghanistan and Pakistan. He understood the real importance of receiving knowledge from and of God: 48

All veils come from ignorance; when ignorance has passed away, the veils vanish and this life, by means of gnosis, becomes one with the life to come.

This, yet again, gives a level of importance to learned knowledge in coming together with that gained from mystical experiences. During the time of one of the great Islamic teachers, Al Ghazzali, mystical knowledge had declined to such an extent that he felt obliged to correct it. In the introduction to his book ‘The Book of Knowledge’ he stated: 49

On the other hand the science of the path of the hereafter, which our forefathers trod and which includes what God in His Book called law, wisdom, knowledge, enlightenment, light, guidance, and righteousness, has vanished from among men and been completely forgotten. Since it is the calamity afflicting religion and grave crisis overshadowing it, I have therefore deemed it important to engage in the writing of this book; to revive the science of religion, to bring light to the exemplary lives of the departed imams, and to show what branches of knowledge the prophets and the virtuous fathers regarded as useful.

Within the same book, Al Ghazzali provided his description of what intellect means: 50

The truth, however, is that the word intellect ('aql) is a term used interchangeably for four distinct meanings... First it is the quality which distinguishes man from the other animals.. Secondly the word 'aql is applied to that knowledge which makes its appearance even in the infant... In the third place the word 'aql has been applied to that knowledge which is acquired through experience... In fourth place the word 'aql is used when the power of the intellect develops to such an extent that its owner will be able to tell what the end will be, and consequently he will conquer and subdue his appetite which hankers for immediate pleasures.

Although some of the words used in this translation of Al Ghazzali’s treatise I also use with reference to mystical experiences, I think that this description of intellect is one which excludes any involvement with Divine Union and the path thereto. Nevertheless, Al

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Ghazzali: 51

…brought the orthodox Islam of his time in close contact with Sufism. The orthodox theologians still went their own way, and so did the mystics, but both developed a sense of mutual appreciation which ensured that no sweeping condemnation could be made by one for the practices of the other.

Whilst these two, Orthodox Islam and Sufism, follow the teachings of the Prophet Mohammad, they seem to be very different in their implementation. Sufism, which some people, including the Sufi teacher Idres Shah, believe predates Islam, is the mystical arm whereas Orthodox Islam is the theological aspect. To me this has the significant implication that most followers of Islam value intellect over and above mystical experience which they associate with Sufism. This separation, I do not believe, was in the mind of the Prophet himself nor in fact the master Jesus the Nazarene who stimulated the Christian faith. They are reported, by Al Ghazzali, as saying: 52

The Prophet also said, "A little bit of divine guidance is better than a great deal of knowledge." Jesus also said, "Many are the trees, but not all are fruitful; plentiful the fruit, but not all are edible; (likewise) many are the branches of knowledge, but not all are useful."

Both Prophets look towards Divine guidance being far more use to the individual than knowledge. In ‘The Book of Knowledge’ the impression that I get from Al Ghazzali is that in Islam the reverse is true; that ‘learned men’ are the revered ones. He has used quotations from many traditional sources to support this idea which, in no particular order, include from Al-Hassan, ibn-'Abbas, Ali, Fath al-Mawsili, abu-al-Darda'

The ink of the learned will be likened to the blood of the martyrs, and the former will prove superior . 53

According to ibn-'Abbas the learned men rank seven hundred grades above the believers. [there are many quotes in the Qur'an which qualify this: Surah VII:25, XXXIX:12] 54

Learning is the glory of mankind, The wise are beacons on the road to truth; Man is worth his knowledge, nothing more – The fool will be his inveterate foe, Knowledge in man's hope of life immortal, Man may die but wisdom liveth ever . 55

...for the nourishment of the heart, on which its life depends, is knowledge and wisdom, just as the nourishment of the body is food. 56

The same is meant by the words of the Apostle of God when he said to abu-al- Darda', "Increase in learning and thou wilt draw nearer to God." 57

The more advanced ‘learned men’ combine their knowledge with inherent wisdom which allows them to apply it effectively in support of Islam. This prevents irrational application of knowledge as Al-Hassan (al-Basri) noted: 58

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Be not one of those who combine the knowledge of learned men and the brilliant ideas of the wise but conduct themselves the way of fools.

…which probably led Al Ghazzali to state: 59

Knowledge, therefore, would either doom its possessor to eternal destruction or lead him to life everlasting.

Having used all these quotations from Al Ghazzali, I am minded to recall what Martin Israel said: 60

The difference between the two approaches [reaching the Divine through knowledge acquisition or through mystical experience and self abandonment] to truth is vast, and yet to many unthinking seekers the ways almost coincide.

I believe that the two approaches are complementary and should not be separated. We can use our learned ways to develop greater understanding of our mystical experiences and thus be led by them. This means that experience leads knowledge and not visa versa; God pulls us along the right pathway. This, according to Andrew Harvey, has been much better described by Rumi in his epic poem ‘Mathnawi’: 61

Like the hunter, the Sufi chases game: He sees the tracks left by the musk deer and follows them. For a while, it is the tracks which are his clues, but later It is the musk itself which guides him.

So take the advice of the author of ‘The Book of Privy Counselling’: 62

And stop I urge you: go after experience rather than knowledge .

…and further explained by the Indian teacher Swami Paramananda: 63

Having given a definition of the real Self or Brahman, by which mortals are able to see, hear, feel and think, the teacher was afraid that the disciple, after merely hearing about It, might conclude that he knew It. So he said to him: "You have heard about It, but that is not enough. You must experience It. Mere intellectual recognition will not give you true knowledge of It. Neither can It be taught to you. The teacher can only show the way. You must find it for yourself."

Finally, I feel that I would like to give you the whole of a poem from St John of the Cross which explains the primacy of mystical experience over intellect or knowledge: 64

I entered in, I know not where, And I remained, though knowing naught, Transcending knowledge with my thought.

Of when I entered I know naught, But when I saw that I was there (Though where it was I did not care)

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Strange things I learned, with greatness fraught. But there I stayed, though knowing naught, Transcending knowledge with my thought.

Of peace and piety interwound This perfect science had been wrought, Within the solitude profound A straight and narrow path it taught, Such secret wisdom there I found That there I stammered, saying naught, But topped all knowledge with my thought.

So borne aloft, so drunken-reeling, So rapt was I, so swept away, Within the scope of sense or feeling My sense or feeling could not stay. And in my soul I felt, revealing, A sense that, though its sense was naught, Transcended knowledge with my thought.

The man who truly there as come Of his own self must shed the guise; Of all he knew before the sum Seems far beneath that wondrous prize: And in this lore he grows so wise That he remains, though knowing naught, Transcending knowledge with his thought.

This wisdom without understanding Is of so absolute a force No wise man of whatever standing Can ever stand against its course, Unless they tap its wondrous source, To know so much, though knowing naught, They pass all knowledge with their thought.

This summit all so steeply towers And is of excellence so high No human faculties or powers Can ever to the top come nigh. Whoever with its steep would vie, Though knowing nothing, would transcend All thought, forever, without end.

If you would ask, what is the essence – This summit of all sense and knowing: It comes from the Divinest Presence – The sudden sense of Him outflowing, In His great clemency bestowing The gift that leaves men knowing naught,

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Yet passing knowledge with their thought.

How beautiful …

1 Martin Israel, Summons to Life, Mowbray, 1982. Chapter 15: Mysticism and spirituality, (Pg 116) 2 R Blair Reynolds, Cosmos and History, Journal of Natural and Social Philosophy, Vol 1, #2, 2005. Ecstasy as World-affirming 3 John Blofeld, Beyond the Gods, E P Dutton & Co, 1974. Chapter 4 - The Path of Faith and Compassion, (Pg 85) 4 Alexander Whyte, Jacob Behmen an appreciation, Oliphant Anderson & Ferrier, 1895. (Pg 16) 5 Saint Ignatius of Loyola: Personal Writings, Penguin Books, 1996. The Spiritual Diary: Part I, (Pg 82) 6 James Redfield, Michael Murphy, Silvia Timbers, God and the Evolving Universe, Bantam Press, 2002. Part One - Awakening; 2: A History of Human Awakening: The Vedic Hymns and Upanishads, (Pg 27) 7 The atman refers to the real self beyond ego or false self. It is often referred to as 'spirit' or 'soul' and indicates our true self or essence which underlies our existence 8 Daisetsu T Suzuki, Mysticism Christian and Buddhist, Unwin, 1979. Chapter 2 - The Basis of Buddhist Philosophy. (Pg 42) 9 Raymond B Blakney, The Way of Life, The New American Library; Mentor Books, 1964. Tao Tê Ching, (Pg 28 /29) 10 Lumsden Barkway, An Anthology of the Love of God (from the writings of Evelyn Underhill), Mowbray, 1953. IV The Spiritual Life: III Prayer, (a) Adoration: Adoration and Self-Offering (The Golden Sequence), (Pg 139) 11 F C Happold, Mysticism - A Study and an Anthology, Penguin Books, 1971. The Study: 14. Man's Knowledge of God, (Pg 63) 12 Evelyn Underhill, The School of Charity, Longmans, Green and Co, 1934. Part I - Chapter II - One God, Creator, (Pg 12) 13 Gerald Bullett, The English Mystics, Michael Joseph, 1950. William Law, (Pg 154) 14 Extremely detailed argument with overly complex reasoning. 15 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 1: Chapter IV - Early Mysticism in the Near East, (Pg 81) 16 David Hay, Exploring Inner Space - Scientists and Religious Experience, Mowbray, 1987. Part Two: What is the Experiential Dimension - 6. The New England Connection: Jonathan Edwards, (Pg 79) 17 F C Happold, Mysticism - A Study and an Anthology, Penguin Books, 1971. The Study: 8. The Mysticism of Love and Union and the Mysticism of knowledge and Understanding, (Pg 42) 18 Bede Griffiths, A New Vision of Reality, Fount, 1992. 9 The Ascent to the Godhead, (Pg 181) 19 Evelyn Underhill, The Essentials of Mysticism, Oneworld, 1999. The Essentials of Mysticism, (Pg 32) 20 Martin Israel, Summons to Life, Mowbray, 1982. Chapter 9: The inner life, (Pg 66) 21 Richard Rolle, The Fire of Love, Penguin Books, 1972. Prologue, (Pg 47) 22 Martin Israel, Summons to Life, Mowbray, 1982. Chapter 16: Discerning the spiritual path, (Pg 136) 23 Martin Israel, The Pearl of Great Price, SPCK, 1988. 7 – Diversions, (Pg 61) 24 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter III - Mysticism and Psychology, (Pg 48) 25 F C Happold, Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man, Pelican Books, 1966. 10 The Nature of the Mystical, (Pg 118) 26 Peter Spink, Beyond Belief, Judy Piatkus, 1996. 7: The Mystic and Healing, (Pg 105) 27 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section VII On the Intellect .. (Pg 223) 28 Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, Unwin, 1980. Chapter III : Religious Experience and its Affirmations - 5. Experience and the variety of expressions, (Pg 77) 29 C S Lewis, God in the Dock, Fount, 1998. 1 Miracles (1942), (Pg 2) 30 Bible, New Testament, 1 John, 4:1

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31 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section V On the Properties of the Student and the Teacher, (Pg 131 / 132) 32 Aldous Leonard Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy, Perennial, Harper Collins, 2004. Chapter X: Grace and Free Will, (Pg 173) 33 Andrew Harvey, The Way of Passion, Souvenir Press, 2002. Chapter 2 - The Price of Adoration, (Pg 47) 34 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. The Cloud of Unknowing: Chapter 8, (Pg 60) 35 William Stainton Moses, Spirit Teachings, The Psychic Book Club, Undated. Section XXX, (Pg 257 / 258) 36 Arthur Findlay, The Rock of Truth, SNU, 1999. Part II: Chapter VII: Spiritualism and what it Stands For: Continued Existence and Communication, (Pg 126) 37 Neale Donald Walsch, Conversations with God - Book 3 An uncommon dialogue, Hodder & Stoughton, 1999. Chapter 4, (Pg 83) 38 Bertrand Russell, Religion and Science, Oxford University Press, 1960. Chapter VII: Mysticism, (Pg 186 / 187) 39 Henry Drummond, Natural Law in the Spirit World, Hodder & Stoughton, 1899. Eternal Life, (Pg 220) 40 Andrew Harvey, Hidden Journey, Rider & Co, 1994. LORD MOTHER – ONE, (Pg 15) 41 Madame Guyon, Spiritual Torrents, Christian Books, 1984. Part I: Chapter 2, (Pg 6) 42 Gems of Thought, The Greater World Christian Spiritualist Assn, 1989. The Communing With Souls, (Pg 120) 43 Henrietta Leyser, Medieval Women, Phoenix, 2002. Chapter Ten; Anchoresses and Recluses, (Pg 217) 44 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter IV - The Characteristics of Mysticism, (Pg 72) 45 Reza Aslan, No god but God, Arrow Books, 2006. 8. Stain Your Prayer Rug with Wine: The Sufi Way: (Pg 202) 46 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 2: Chapter X - Some Early Sufi Mystics, (Pg 240) 47 Gnosis is the common Greek noun for knowledge. In Christian, Islamic, or Jewish mysticism, mystery religions and Gnosticism gnosis generally signifies a spiritual knowledge or "religion of knowledge", in the sense of mystical enlightenment or "insight". Downloaded on 12 April 2015 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnosis 48 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 2: Chapter IX - The Mystical Doctrines of Early Sufism, (Pg 210) 49 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Introduction, (Pg 2) 50 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section VII On the Intellect ... (Pg 226 / 227 /228) 51 Downloaded 12 April 2015 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Ghazali 52 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section III, (Pg 79) 53 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section I - On the Value of Knowledge, Instruction, and Learning together with its evidence in tradition and from reason, (Pg 16) 54 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section I - On the Value of Knowledge, Instruction, and Learning together with its evidence in tradition and from reason (Pg 10) 55 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section I - On the Value of Knowledge, Instruction, and Learning together with its evidence in tradition and from reason, (Pg 14) 56 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section I - On the Value of Knowledge, Instruction, and Learning together with its evidence in tradition and from reason, (Pg 15) 57 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section VII On the Intellect .. (Pg 228) 58 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section VI On the evils of Knowledge .. (Pg 155) 59 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section IV On Evils of Debate and the Character-destroying Influences resulting therefrom, (Pg 124) 60 Martin Israel, The Pearl of Great Price, SPCK, 1988. 7 – Diversions, (Pg 60) 61 Andrew Harvey, The Way of Passion, Souvenir Press, 2002. Chapter 9 - The Divine Child, (Pg 262) 62 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. The Book of Privy Counselling: Chapter 23, (Pg 188) 63 Swami Paramananda, The Upanishads, Grange Books, 2004. Kena - Upanishad - Part Two: I, (Pg 89) 64 Poems of St John of the Cross, Collins, Fount Paperbacks, 1891. Poems - IV - Verses written after an ecstasy of high exaltation, (Pg 32-33)

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21.5: Mystical Experiences and Contemplation

Contemplation is the key that can open the door to mystical experiences. I use the term ‘contemplation’ as an umbrella word to cover prayer 1, meditation 2, and contemplation 3. It is a process unique to each of us that sets us spiritually apart and allows us to be still with our Inspirer. The Russian Rabbi, Dov Baer of Lubavich, is reported by Rabbi Dan Cohn- Sherbok to have emphasised: 4

…the importance of contemplation in the quest for ecstatic experience.

This very strong link between mystical experience and contemplation was also highlighted by the Anglican priest and theologian Peter Toon. In his discussion on contemplative prayer he wrote: 5

Contemplation points to the experience of knowing God and is accompanied by delight, admiration and enrapture.

Every mystic gains so much from contemplation. In support of this, and according to Rosamund Allen, the 14 th century English mystic Richard Rolle declared that: 6

...contemplation is a wonderful enjoying of the love of God, and this joy is a way of worshipping God which cannot be described.

Looking at it from the opposite perspective, the Jesuit theologian William Johnston in his book ‘Silent Music - The Science of Meditation’, described mysticism which in his opinion: 7

…is no more than a very deep form of meditation.

The English Anglo-Catholic author of mystical writings Evelyn Underhill explained that contemplation is the mystics’ medium. She went on to describe it in her famous book ‘Mysticism’ as: 8

...an extreme form of that withdrawal of attention from the external world and total dedication of the mind... This strange art of contemplation, which the mystic tends to practise during the whole of his career - which develops step by step with his vision and his love - demands of the self which undertakes it the same hard dull work, the same slow training of the will, which lies behind all supreme achievement, and is the price of all true liberty.

There are so many different ways of relating contemplation to mystical experience. The South African born Anglican priest Martin Israel did so in ‘Summons to Life’: 9

The technique of meditation is one of progressive self-annihilation so that the spirit can make itself known in the soul. This is called contemplation.

Both of the last two quotations stress the difficulties encountered by the developing mystic; it takes real discipline. This notion was discussed by Professor Harry Wilmer, an American

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Jungian analyst, in the context of patience: 10

Meditation is usually a form of disciplined silence for a time when individuals deliberately program their breathing and either focus on an object to empty their minds of ordinary preoccupations and trivia, or actively meditate on a thought or idea seeking insight or enlightenment.

This description is more in keeping with what I call meditation, which has been explained by William Johnston as: 11

Meditation is also a human and natural way of opening the filters [those things which restrict the brain and nervous system from opening to everything about them], welcoming the inflow of reality, and expanding the mind. It is a gradual process, a daily practice, in which the filters or barriers are slowly lifted to allow an almost imperceptible inflow of greater reality into the intuitive consciousness - though this unhurried process may, at times, give way to a sudden collapse of the barriers that causes massive enlightenment or mystical experience.

Mystical experiences are a by-product of bringing the soul in closer contact with God – or as I would say, God’s agents and the Spirit World. Other than the receiver and the provider and the right environment, there are no other conditions that need to apply. It is not dependent upon other people or what others accept or do not accept. In ‘The Life of the Spirit’ the mystic Henry Thomas Hamblin captured this idea when he wrote in the introduction: 12

When science or the Higher Criticism has demolished everything, apparently, the mystic still contemplates the Supreme, and walks with his Lord.

In the distant past, it was believed that only in cloistered surroundings could the contemplative life be executed. The Trappist monk Thomas Merton, according to Dan Cohn-Sherbok, disagreed with this analysis as he emphasised: 13

…the importance of the contemplative life beyond the monastery.

The goal of a contemplative life is, through a spiritual journey, to reach closer and closer to what we believe to be our spiritual destiny which is to approach as close as we can, in this life, to our Creator. White Eagle, a much respected teacher from the Spirit World, tells us that: 14

When you meditate you should focus your whole attention upon God, upon the manifestation of God in form. Thus you will create for yourselves the perfect form, the Perfect One. In that Perfect One your higher self will manifest. As you feel love for your fellows and love for all life, you will find your aura expanding until you are wholly consumed with love, and all thought of self dies. Then you will realise that divine ecstasy which is the goal of mystics and saints of all time. The joy the aspirant experiences in true meditation is beyond anything which man can gain from ordinary mental and material pursuits.

That puts it in a nutshell. So our primary objective in our contemplative aspect of our lives is to reach out to the Eternal through prayer, meditation and contemplation. I must stress

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:33:25 21.5 Mystical Experiences and Contemplation Page 3 of 27 that we must not see any of these processes as an end – they are only the means. It is sad that some mystics as recorded by Dan Cohn-Sherbok, such as Cassian, have been misinterpreted as believing that: 15

...mystical contemplation to be the goal of the ascetic.

…whereas Cassian specifically remarked that: 16

...asceticism, he believed, is not an end in itself; rather it should aspire to the contemplative union with God.

Thus we ought to follow the view of Jean Leclercq, a 20 th century monk of the Abbey of St Maurice et St Maur, Clervaux, Luxembourg, who wrote: 17

But the contemplative vocation is primarily for God, in that God is its source and its goal.

…and this was the sole (soul?) aim of another cleric and modern day mystic Father Andrew who advised us that: 18

We must always remember that prayer is the movement of the soul to union with God...

And Walter Hilton, writing in the 14 th century, concurred with this entirely, as he knew that: 19

…the chief aim of contemplation is union with God.

It does not matter what technique or method is used to achieve what is recognised as ‘Union with God’, it is the result that matters. There are two important features of this union. Firstly that it appears to be unique to the individual and secondly that it is a ‘feeling’ state – you cannot put your finger on it or readily describe it. It is a communion which takes a long time to develop by small imperceptible steps. This was noticed, according to Dan Cohn-Sherbok, by Francis de Sales who believed that: 20

…in prayer this union is accomplished by frequent advances of the soul towards God: as the heart continues to press forward and progress in God's goodness the soul is drawn to God and continues to sink deeper into him.

…and William Johnston also recognised the incremental nature of the decreasing distance between the developing mystic and his Goal: 21

For the meditator or the mystic, going beyond thoughts and concepts and images to a deeper level of awareness, finds himself in an ever growing union with the universe and with others - a union which is enacted at the core of his being.

Evelyn Underhill, too, understood that mystical experiences en route to God may start with simple non-vocal prayers: 22

Consider for a moment what happens in prayer. I pass over the simple recitation of

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verbal prayers, which will better be dealt with when we come to consider the institutional framework of the spiritual life. We are now concerned with mental prayer or orison; the simplest of those degrees of contemplation which may pass gradually into mystical experience, and are at least in some form a necessity of any real and actualized spiritual life. Such prayer is well defined by the mystics, as "a devout intent directed to God.” [The Cloud of Unknowing," Cap. 39.]

In order to make sure that progress is real, the mystic needs to slowly but surely let go of any attachment to material things; must expand the detachment from the material. It is only during contemplation that all ties to anything but God will be broken. In typical mystical language, the Spanish Carmelite friar and priest St. John of the Cross expressed it as: 23

In the delights of my pure contemplation and union with God, the night of faith shall be my guide. Wherein he gives it clearly to be understood that the soul must be in darkness in order to have light for this road.

Many mystics have associated this union with marriage, and many, particularly female, commentators on mysticism have used marriage as a descriptor of the communion. Evelyn Underhill is no exception: 24

This reproductive power is one of the greatest marks of the theopathetic 25 life: the true 'mystic marriage' of the individual soul with its Source.

This leads to another potential conclusion; maybe it is valid to consider that the end of contemplation is the start of union. Evelyn Underhill thought so: 26

Here we are on the verge of that great self-merging act which is of the essence of pure love: which Reality has sought of us, and we have unknowingly desired of It. Here contemplation and union are one.

In some respects Thomas Merton understood something similar. In the Preface to the French edition of 'Martha, Mary and Lazarus' he reminds us that: 27

When Saint Bernard tells us of the contemplative life, he means by it something profound and real. He means a life of close union with God in mystic prayer

Let us look little more at the role of prayer, meditation, and contemplation in leading each of us into deeper mystical experiences. Remember, too, the words the English author, Anglican priest, and Dean of St Paul's Cathedral William Ralph Inge (Usually known as Dean Inge) who, when writing about prayer, said that it: 28

…is a mystical experience which is common to all religious persons, even the most unmystical.

…and from the Quaker, who Leila Ward referred to as Dorothy, came the statement: 29

Prayer to me means that moment when my spirit meets with God's spirit and we are one...

Grace Cooke, the 20 th century medium and channel through whom White Eagle gave us his

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In meditation every individual soul can reach the source of truth and experience the reality of spirit himself.

Whilst, therefore, anyone can consider prayer or meditation as taking them towards God, it is only the mystic who seems to really achieve an ecstatic union. According to Margaret Smith, in the 4 th century Macarius of Egypt, an Egyptian Christian monk and hermit indicated that: 31

Through contemplative prayer the mystic is rapt into ecstasy. Into the unfathomable deep of that other world: his mind is carried beyond all material things, and he becomes oblivious to the interests of the understanding, for his thoughts have been taken captive by divine and heavenly things, by the infinite and incomprehensible, by things beyond all human power of expression.

Evelyn Underhill when expressing what the Sufis do during contemplation of their God, says: 32

God is to be contemplated (a) outwardly in the imperfect beauties of the earth; (b) inwardly, by meditation.

As an aside, William Johnston in his book ‘Silent Music - The Science of Meditation’ discusses the levels of enlightenment through meditation. He links the seven mansions (states of mystical experience) of St Teresa with the four from Auguste Poulain in a chapter that is a really good exposition of the states and their consequent experience. 33 There are many other books which deal with prayer, meditation and contemplation, not only which I have referenced, but which you can find in both new and second-hand book shops. Because of the importance to the mystic of contemplation it is necessary for you, if you wish to follow the spiritual pathway through mystical experiences to your truth, to decide on a method which suits you best. Remembering, of course, that over time this method will need to change as you spiritually develop.

Which ever method or technique that you choose, it is only valuable at the beginning of any ‘sitting’ because, as Isaac of Nineveh wrote: 34

During prayer, prayer itself is cut off and the mind is absorbed in ecstasy and the desire of what the mystic prayed for is forgotten.

Initially, other than in mediation, where the mystic tries to blank the mind, there is usually something which the mystic thinks about. For example Teresa of Avila believed in the value of the Paternoster as the trigger to mystical experience: 35

For thus far in the Paternoster the Lord has taught us the whole method of prayer and of high contemplation, from the very beginnings of mental prayer, to Quiet and Union.

Abbot Christopher Jamison taught the technique of ‘lectio divina’ which he explained as: 36

… read spiritual books and reflect on what they are saying about our own lives. A

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good book can help us to stay focussed on what matters, free from distraction. In the Christian monastic tradition pride of place is given to reading the Bible prayerfully, a reading style called 'lectio divina'. This slow reading has been compared to eating: firstly bite off the words by simply reading them; then chew them, that is repeat them again and again in meditation; then swallow by making those words into a prayer and finally enjoying the flavour of the words in silent contemplation.

In her introduction to Richard Rolle’s English writings, Rosamund Allen also touched on this method: 37

The commentaries [by Richard Rolle] on scripture supply the novice with some of his training in the techniques of 'lectio', the reading of the Bible and the fathers, which was a preliminary to meditation and prayer. This was the traditional training used in the cloisters where the system had been perfected, and where incidentally, it had fostered the development of mystical theology.

From the Spanish mystics, in particular from the book 'Ejercicio de Perfeccion de Virtudes Cristianas’ written by Alonso Rodriguez around the start of the 17 th century, we find that: 38

...it should be noted that for this [spiritual] reading to be profitable, it must not be hastened or hurried, like someone reading a story, but must be performed with great tranquillity and attention. For it is not swift-flowing water or heavy showers which soak through and fertilise the earth, but the soft gentle rain; so for reading to penetrate the heart and saturate it deeply, it is necessary that it should be done with pauses and what we read be pondered over.

...and the same book references the 4 th century bishop St Ambrose as saying: 39

Let sacred reading be the life of the soul...

So this technique, therefore, has a good pedigree which we will do well to accept and perhaps follow. Another, but more recent English mystic, Father Andrew, wrote about reading of spiritual books in one of his letters: 40

Spiritual reading is, I think, a necessary weapon, only you want to read it spiritually, that is, stop on any thought as a bee with a flower that it finds honey in.

Another 20 th century mystic, Joel Goldsmith, believed that nothing should be prayed for. He stated that: 41

...we have found it more efficacious not to pray for anything, but to pray for the attainment of the realisation of God and stop there.

This highlights the difference between praying for something (telling God what to do!!!) and praying in a meditative or contemplative way where the objective is to build our receptivity to mystical experience. The latter takes effort, patience, sacrifice and will, and when we start out on this pathway patience is what we need most of all. This was outlined in the 14 th century mystical treatise ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’: 42

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For in the beginning is it usual to feel nothing but a kind of darkness about your mind, or as it were, a cloud of unknowing. You will seem to know nothing and to feel nothing except a naked intent towards God in the depths of your being. Try as you might, this darkness and this cloud will remain between you and your God. You will feel frustrated, for your mind will be unable to grasp him, and your heart will not relish the delight of his love. But learn to be at home in this darkness. Return to it as often as you can, letting your spirit cry out to whom you love.

As we continue to develop, we will be ‘shown’ more and more of the truths which underpin all life. Using the metaphor of a beach, St Simeon The New Teoilogian, according to the ‘Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart’, tells us: 43

As a man standing on the seashore not only sees the sea but can also walk into it as often as he likes; so is it with men who have reached spiritual perfection: they can also enter the Divine light when they wish, contemplating it and participating in it consciously in proportion to their works, their efforts and aspirations of their desire.

It is interesting to note that my mentor David Perry of Congleton, Cheshire was able to reach this state at a moments notice. So the more we develop the more will be given. And what will help us most on this journey? The answer was given from the Spirit World by the late Frances Banks through her friend and channel Helen Greaves: 44

The answer is that technique and methods which has been known by the few throughout the ages; the technique of communion with the Divine; of using an act of will to close away the illusions of the earth and to open the channel into the Divine Source, into the light of 'conscious knowing'.

Climbing above the illusions and distractions of the temporal world is difficult to achieve. In the preface to the ‘Poems of St John of the Cross’ the term ‘arduous’ was used to describe this: 45

But St John, following the line of the great mystics, in his commentaries on his poems explains how with the grace of God those who are drawn to contemplation may experience the presence of God in a way comparable to that which we enjoy when our friends meet us. The way, however, is exceedingly arduous, so arduous, in fact, as to terrify all except the bravest of lovers. It comes to this, that we must surrender all that is dearest to us in the enjoyment of the senses and go through a dark night in which we live without their help and comfort.

There are many tasks ahead of the aspiring mystic if mystical experiences leading to union with God are aimed for. The most obvious and probably the most difficult is to change one’s character so that the ‘self’ is of no importance. This process has many names including detachment and self-mortification. The latter phrase was used by the Sufi Al Ghazzali: 46

For self-mortification leads to contemplation (mushahadah), and through the intricate details of the sciences of the heart fountains of wisdom will gush forth.

Another often used phrase is self-nullification, which, according to Dan Cohn-Sherbok,

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:33:25 21.5 Mystical Experiences and Contemplation Page 8 of 27 was used by Rabbi Nahman in his 'Outpouring of the Soul': 47

You must include yourself in God's unity, which is the imperative existence. You cannot be worthy of this, however, unless you first nullify yourself. It is impossible to nullify yourself, however, without (mental self-seclusion) meditation.

Renunciation has also been used by Evelyn Underhill: 48

To generous souls who have utterly renounced themselves, God never fails in these raptures to communicate high things...

Walter Hilton in the 14 th century favoured the phrase ‘Dying to the world’. In ‘The Stairway of Perfection’ he wrote: 49

This dying to the world is the darkness I have been talking about. It and no other is the gateway to contemplation and to reforming in experience. There may be many different roads and various works which lead different souls to contemplation according to the diversity of their dispositions and the differences of their states in life (for instance, religious and men in the world) which require different exercises. Nevertheless, there is only one gate.

According to Margaret Smith, one of the Desert Fathers, Cassian, used the idea of freedom from the flesh as his way of conveying the need: 50

"Then," says Cassian, "we shall succeed in reaching perfection, whenever our soul is sullied by no stain or carnal coarseness, but all such having been carefully eliminated, it has been freed from every earthly quality and desire, and by constant meditation on things Divine, and spiritual contemplation, has so far passed on to things unseen, that in its earnest seeking after things above and things spiritual, it no longer feels that it is prisoned in this fragile flesh and bodily form, but is caught up in an ecstasy."

This idea of freedom expresses cutting the ties of materialism and links to the physical world so that the spiritual life becomes the leader. In explaining the mystical doctrines of the early Sufis, Margaret Smith wrote: 51

Then if the mystic is free from all distractions, the light of God will shine upon his heart, and it will be at the first like a blinding flash of lightning. Its sojourn is but brief, but it will return, for it is a prelude of a constant communication with God.

She also quoted the 6 th century Arab leader Abu Talib who said that: 52

Purity of heart exalts (the mystic) stage by stage contemplation of the Essences, until there is no remembrance within the soul save that of God.

In the ‘Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart’ this was summarised as: 53

...the need to look only on heaven (always occupying the mind with contemplation of heavenly things) and to regard as nothing the earth (and all earthly things)...

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…which in more modern terms was given by William Johnston: 54

That is why one must reject all desire and all clinging, not only to the comforts and luxuries and pleasures of life but also to knowledge and the process of thinking. The most rigorous detachment is demanded in the very practice of Zen; because one is constantly renouncing one's natural desire for conceptual knowledge. And the process in Christian meditation is rather similar.

The Hasidic 55 Rabbi Levi Yitzhak of Berdichov, according to Dan Cohn-Sherbok, described how the mystic: 56

...should concentrate on Nothingness - a form of meditation which, he believed, enabled one to ascend to the highest realm.

...and that’s what I call meditation. After all that, I’m sure that you get the idea; setting the ‘self’ below everything else seems to be a mandatory requirement. On top of this we must also put to the rear any dependency that we have on the Spirit World. This point was made by the renowned 14 th century German mystic, theologian and preacher John Tauler in his second sermon for the fourth Sunday after Easter: 57

Therefore, because the soul is a creature, it must cast itself out of itself, and in its hour of contemplation must cast out all saints and angels; for these are all creatures, and hinder the soul in its union with God. For it should be bare of all things, without need of anything, and then it can come to God

Even if we detach ourselves from the physical, when we enter the silence of meditation we have to contend with distractions. This problem of day-to-day disruptions was nicely expressed by the Quaker Jim Pym: 58

As anyone who has tried meditation will know, the moment we try to sit quietly and allow our minds to settle, seems to be the moment our minds run riot with thoughts. The more we try to be silent, or to concentrate on matters relating to the spiritual life, the more the mind - 'the monkey mind' as the Hindus call it - behaves just like a restless monkey, swinging aimlessly from branch to branch.

Another way of describing this phenomenon came from the pen of Henry Drummond in his book ‘Natural Law in the Spirit World’: 59

The lesson of self-denial, that is to say of Limitation, is concentration. ... To concentrate upon a few great correspondences, to oppose to the death the perpetual petty larceny of our life by trifles...

In ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’ is described two ‘clouds’. Firstly the ‘cloud of unknowing’ which sits between the individual and God. For the mystic this veil becomes increasingly thinner. The second is the ‘Cloud of Forgetting’ which the mystic creates between the physical, distracting phenomena of the world and himself. This is introduced in the book as: 60

...in real contemplative work you must set all this [pondering on God and his love, etc] and cover it over with a 'cloud of forgetting'. Then let your loving desire,

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gracious and devout, step bravely and joyfully beyond it and reach out to pierce the darkness above. Yes, beat upon that thick 'cloud of unknowing' with the dart of your loving desire and do not cease come what may.

The anonymous author then goes on to say: 61

But a person who has long pondered these things must eventually leave them behind beneath a 'cloud of forgetting' if he hopes to pierce the 'cloud of unknowing' that lies between him and his God. So whenever you feel drawn by grace to the contemplative work and are determined to do it, simply raise your heart to God with a gentle stirring of love. Think only of God, the God who created you, redeemed you, and guided you to this work. Allow no other ideas about God to enter your mind. Yet even this is too much. A naked intent toward God, the desire for him alone, is enough.

So don’t think about anything else; make your mind a blank canvas upon which truths may be etched. Even more than this, you must try to subdue your knowledge and preconceptions, as St John of the Cross suggested: 62

For, in order to approach God, the soul must proceed by not comprehending rather than by comprehending; it must exchange the mutable and comprehensible for the immutable and incomprehensible.

God’s goal for you, whatever it may be, can best be achieved through linking with the planes of the Spirit World and with its inhabitants who will help you along your planned pathway. They are God’s agents. This is what ‘Union with God’ becomes and therefore should be the mystic’s focus. From the 20 th century monk and academic, Jean Leclercq, we are given this partial description of a mystic who: 63

...does not seek delight, but only to offer himself. Sometimes he feels that God is forgetting him. But his dedication to God is beyond all feeling and subsists in faith. ...He is constantly torn between what he has and what he longs for, between what he already is, and what he wants to become by gradual transformation from light to light, in the glory of [God] ... Everything in the contemplative life must be directed towards a humble experience of God.

The implication is that as the mystic progresses, inevitable changes to character will occur. It is, as many have described it, a type of rebirth. Meister Eckhart in one of his German sermons used this phrase to represent the intermingling of the soul with God: 64

But in this birth you will partake in the divine influx and all its gifts.

This emergence of changed character comes about through two routes. Firstly, by the mere fact that mystical experiences convey so much to the individual, some change will happen consequentially and naturally. Secondly, the ties which held the mystic to the material and physical world will be severed through sacrifice and hard work. Some writers, the priest and theologian Peter Toon being one, used the term ‘cleansing’ to represent character transformation: 65

However, it is true to say that the way of union or contemplation which includes

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spiritual communion with God and delight in his presence must be preceded by a process of cleansing and spiritual enlightenment.

The processes which lead to such quantum changes are all related to contemplative activity. However, according to the collective work by James Redfield, Michael Murphy, and Silvia Timbers, the process is no guarantee of mystical success: 66

Long experience in the sacred traditions has shown that ecstasies, illuminations, and supernormal powers provide no guarantee of lasting goodness and growth, and many contemporary studies have shown that meditation, psychotherapy, and other ways of growth do not automatically transform those who undertake them.

The converse is also true. Individuals can have mystical experiences even though they are not following the mystic way. This was highlighted by W. H. Dyson who wrote: 67

But this must be said - it is not to contemplatives alone that the mystic experience belongs.

As you can see, therefore, in the mystical arena, as in every other area of life, there are extreme exceptions. However, on the whole to reach the heights of mystical experience, the contemplative path is needed. This means that the budding mystic pursues a life which increasingly rejects the tenets and objectives of the material world. The mystic goes beyond the material to the spiritual as Peter Toon remarked: 68

For the mystic prayer is a joyful establishing of and affirming and confirming unity with the Divine plan extending far beyond his or her personal life .

Such a person does not have to live away from the world but must live in a way that it does not control him or her. This is where you may recognise what Dharmachari Subhuti was trying to convey: 69

And you will experience yourself, not just as an ordinary flesh and blood human being as it were, but as a spiritual being with a spiritual destiny

This duality was also described by Evelyn Underhill: 70

...man was a being set in the world of succession and subject to its griefs and limitations; yet able in his prayer to move out of the very frontiers of that world, to lay hold on the Eternal and experience another level of life.

…and Bede Griffiths reminded us that it is a continuous process: 71

We have constantly to learn to see beyond the passing forms of this world to the eternal reality which is always there. It means passing from our present mode of consciousness, which is conditioned by time and space, into the deeper level of consciousness which transcends the dualities external and internal, subject and object, conscious and unconscious, and becomes one with the non-dual Reality, the Brahman, the Atman, the Tao, the Void, the Word, the Truth, whatever name we give to that which cannot be named.

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It becomes a balance of these two opposing aspects and one where, for the mystic, the fulcrum moves inexorably away from the material and towards the spiritual. Bertrand Russell recognised the need for such a balance: 72

The mystic emotion, if it is freed from unwarranted beliefs, and not so overwhelming as to remove a man wholly from the ordinary business of life, may give something of very great value - the same kind of thing, though in heightened form, that is given by contemplation.

During contemplative activity, however, this balance must not exist. The world must be shut out because, as described by the anonymous author of the 14 th century treatise Theologia Germanica: 73

The two eyes of the soul of man cannot both perform their work at once: but if the soul shall see with the right eye into eternity, then the left eye must close itself and refrain from working, and be as though it were dead. For if the left eye be fulfilling its office toward outward things, that is holding converse with time and the creatures; then must the right eye be hindered in its working; that is, in its contemplation. Therefore, whosoever will have the one must let the other go; for no man can serve two masters.

Evelyn Underhill, who quoted the above passage, also recognised the impact which contemplation has on a person’s physical life: 74

The contemplative's power of living this intense and creative life within the temporal order, however, is tightly bound up with that other life in which he attains to complete communion with the Absolute Order, and submits to the inflow of its supernal vitality.

This by-product of the developing mystic can be seen through the eyes of those close to the mystic. What happens is as described by Grace Cooke: 75

...a mystic is not impractical. The power which comes to him as a result of his becoming one, through meditation, with the universal Mind, with God, enables him to attend to earthly matters in greater detail, with greater courage, with quickened, wiser mind.

…and for those individuals who use contemplation regularly, intuitive insights often reveal solutions to problems or the best route though life’s challenges. Paul Davies, an English physicist, writer and broadcaster, in his research discovered that other scientists from their own direct experience believed this to be true: 76

Some scientists, most notably the physicists Brian Josephsom and David Bohm, believe that regular mystical insights achieved by quiet meditative practices can be a useful guide in the formulation of scientific theories.

As a post graduate student at Leeds University working towards my Doctor of Philosophy, I used to have a large sheet of A3 paper pinned to the wall next to my bed and a pencil suspended appropriately. There were many times as I was dropping off to sleep or just at the point of waking up, that I would be able to recall intuitive thoughts and at the time of

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:33:25 21.5 Mystical Experiences and Contemplation Page 13 of 27 recollection I wrote them on my wall-paper. If I did not do it at the time, I would not be able to remember what inspirations I had been given. Such is the nature of many mystical experiences. In the ‘Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart’ it is written that the mystic The Blessed Callistus Patriarch said: 77

Purified of everything external and having entirely mastered the senses by active virtue, the mind rests unmoving within the heart, its vision established in the centre. There it receives mental illuminations, like flashes of lightning, and thus collects Divine understandings.

Most mystical texts do not dwell on the apparently mundane type of inspirational experience but on the flashes of mystical experience which needs a mystic of much greater development. This type is typified by St Paul of whom Father M. C. D'Arcy wrote: 78

Consequently the highest degree of contemplation in the present life is that which Paul had in rapture, whereby he was in a middle state between the present life and the life to come.

…and Walter Hilton described such a soul as: 79

…reformed in experience by the ravishing of love and drawn into the contemplation of God, can be so freed from sensuality and foolish imagination and so far drawn out and separated from his flesh-centred experiences for a time that he will experience nothing but God. That doesn't last, however.

These are neither common nor regular to most mystics. Like a lightning strike, they are vivid and unforgettable as Thomas Merton discovered: 80

The life of infused contemplation does not always begin with a definite experience of God in the strong inpouring of light that has been described. And in any case such moments of freedom and escape from the blindness and helplessness of the ordinary, laborious ways of the spirit will always be relatively rare. And it is not too hard to recognise these sudden, intense flashes of the gift of understanding, these vivid 'rays of darkness' striking deep into the soul and changing the course of a man's whole life. They bring with them their own conviction. They plant in us too deep and too calm and too new a certainty to be misunderstood or quickly forgotten.

I certainly remember my mystical experiences very clearly – I will never forget them albeit that they lasted for a fraction of a second. They did not happen during contemplation, meditation or prayer but during occasions when I least expected such experiences. Morton Kelsey also believed it is true that: 81

…we can encounter this creative Spirit of God without silence and outside the directed process of meditation. God can break in upon a person no matter where one is or what one is doing.

And David Hay, a zoologist with a longstanding professional interest in the disputed boundary between biological science and the religious and spiritual dimensions of human experience, recognised the unplanned nature of some mystical experiences: 82

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In the context of an old church, or beautiful scenery, of listening to music we may lay ourselves open to these experiences; though it is worth repeating that there seems to be no way of 'switching them on' by such means.

Most of the time, mystics receive mystical, ecstatic experiences during periods of contemplation; in those silent times when the mind is stilled and the spiritual nature comes to the fore. The 20 th century psychiatrist Harry Wilmer confirmed this: 83

It has been said by theologians that the highest communication between God and humankind occurs in silence.

Thomas Merton recalling Book of Wisdom (18:14) wrote: 84

When all things were enveloped in quiet silence and when the night had reached the mid-point in its course, from the height of the heavens, Thy all powerful Word leaped down from the royal throne.

Even though these Biblical words were written about fifty years before the coming of Jesus the Nazarene, they do demonstrate that mystical experiences are not recent phenomena and that silence is necessary for contemplation to be effective. This tradition was handed down to later mystics and it is recorded that Basil the Great, in the 4 th century, was concerned with teaching the Mystic Way. According to Margaret Smith, he understood that: 85

There is only one means of securing the tranquillity needed for contemplation, and that is separation from the world altogether, and that not simply by bodily separation, but by the severance of the soul from sympathy with the body, renunciation of all possessions, and retirement into solitude.

This extreme stance is what you would expect from those times. From the writings of Jean Leclercq we were given the view of another cleric St Bernard. This involved a softened approach with regard to separation from the world: 86

Be solitaries, but in soul, not in body. Be solitaries by the orientation of your heart, the gift of your life to God. Be solitaries in an interior way. For [God] who is Spirit, demands solitude of soul not solitude of the body.

During these times of contemplative inactivity, another characteristic of mystical experience is demonstrated; that of awareness of the phenomenon of speed of thought. Dr. Eben Alexander described this as: 87

To experience thinking outside the brain is to enter a world of instantaneous connections that make ordinary thinking (i.e. those aspects limited by the physical brain and the speed of light) seem like some hopelessly sleepy and plodding event.

Taking a look at some of the case studies of the hypnotherapist Michael Newton where his patients were regressed to such an extent that they were able to recall their life in the Spirit World. It seems that some of his subjects: 88

…say that the desire for time alone in the spirit world comes from an intense need

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to dwell within the sacred confines of pure thought to try and touch the Source from which they sprang.

So our own desire for ‘time to ponder’ seems to stem from a deeper desire for silence and solitude. A different way of expressing the same idea exists in the ‘Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart’: 89

Just as the eye, receiving through the sense of light a visual impression of an object, utters no sound but obtains knowledge of what it sees by the very act of seeing, so the mind, directing its loving attention (consciousness) towards God and cleaving to Him with ardent feeling, in the silence of most single contemplation, is illumined by Divine radiance and receives therein a token of the light to come.

The value of these silences to allow stepping away from the world for a short time was articulated by the priest and mystic Father Andrew: 90

Also in the solitude and silences I have learnt things about God and the preciousness of our life that I did not know before.

Another characteristic which seems to develop in those who follow the Mystic Way is one of sensitivity. That is, sensitivity to the feelings and vibrations of other people. The journalist and broadcaster Malcolm Muggeridge tells us about Dietrich Bonoeffer 91 who in his last letter (sent at Christmas 1944 from the Gestapo prison in Flossenbürg) to his fiancée Maria wrote: 92

These will be quieter days in our homes, but I have had the experience over and over again that the quieter it is around me, the clearer do I feel the connection to you. It is as though in solitude the soul develops senses which we hardly know in everyday life. Therefore I have not felt lonely or abandoned for one moment

Feelings are the essence of mysticism, they are different from and above the senses. All the significant documented experiences rely on our understanding of feelings to recognise what the mystic is trying to say. An example of this was given by Evelyn Underhill. She quoted the following poem from the Persian mystic Rumi: 93

While the thought of the Beloved fills our hearts All our work is to do Him service and spend life for Him. Wherever He kindles His destructive torch Myriads of lovers' souls are burnt therewith. The lovers who dwell within the sanctuary Are moths burnt with the torch of the Beloved's face. O heart, hasten thither! for God will shine upon you, And seem to you a sweet garden instead of a terror. He will infuse into your soul a new soul, So as to fill you, like a goblet, with wine. Take up your abode in His Soul! Take up your abode in heaven, oh bright full moon! Like the heavenly Scribe, He will open your heart's book That he may reveal mysteries unto you.

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Thus is mysticism; it is revelatory through mystical experiences using the vehicle of contemplation, meditation or prayer. An interesting description of this was provided by St John of the Cross: 94

These successive words always come when the spirit is recollected and absorbed very attentively in some meditation; and, in its reflections upon that same matter whereon it is thinking, it proceeds from one stage to another, forming words and arguments which are very much to the point, with great facility and distinctiveness, and by means of its reasoning discovers things which it knew not with respect to the subject of its reflections, so that it seems not to be doing this itself, but rather it seems that another person is supplying the reasoning within its mind or answering its questions or teaching it. And in truth it has good cause for thinking this, for the soul itself is reasoning with itself and answering itself as though it were two persons convening together; and in some ways this is really so; for, although it is the spirit itself that works as an instrument, the Holy Spirit oftentimes aids it to produce and form those true reasonings, words and conceptions.

I’m not sure that I wholeheartedly concur with St John’s reasoning, but I do accept the process described. However, this type of ‘discursive meditation’, as outlined in ‘The Book of Privy Counselling’ has to be left behind if true ecstasy is to be encountered: 95

And thus I say to you, at a certain point it is necessary to give up discursive meditation and learn to taste something of that deep, spiritual experience of God's love.

Achieving this depth of union with God, very few attain. Those that have reached these heights seem to differ remarkably in the techniques that they use. For example, Serafim of Sarov, so we are told by his biographer Iulia de Beausobre, spent much of his time, when not working for others: 96

…devoted to the discipline of the Jesus Prayer 97 - the prayer of the publican, repeated many hundreds of times a day - and to reading the Bible and the Fathers.

In this way the phrase becomes a mantra and therefore is little different from the Eastern tradition of repeating ‘Om or Aum’ 98 or the phrase ‘Om Mani Padme Hum’ 99 . They all serve to focus the contemplation. Other mystics, particularly Jewish, concentrate on reciting the different names of God. Dan Cohn-Sherbok tells us that according to Isaac the Blind: 100

The principal task of the mystics and of they who contemplate on his name is, "and you shall cleave to him" (Deuteronomy 13.4)

Many mystics, such as Teresa of Avila recorded, use the Paternoster (The Lord’s Prayer) as their route to concentration. She informs us that in conversation with an aged nun, she: 101

…asked her what prayers she said, and from her reply I saw that, though keeping to the Paternoster, she was experiencing pure contemplation, and the Lord was raising her to be with Him in union.

This demonstrates that each of us have to home in on the technique which suits us best;

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:33:25 21.5 Mystical Experiences and Contemplation Page 17 of 27 there is no ‘one size fits all’. The consequence of this, combined with the fact that we all come with totally different backgrounds, is that the impact of our experiences also are unique to each one of us. John Blofeld, a British writer on Asian thought and religion, touched on this when he wrote: 102

In my view, when a Christian mystic deep in prayer or meditation experiences a Divine response, when a Pure Land devotee feels the presence of Amitabha or Kuanyin, and when a Ch'an [Zen] meditator feels Mind respond to mind, all three are visited by an identical experience; yet it might not do for them to interchange their methods, since each has been conditioned to conceive of the Inconceivable in his own way.

…and this was ratified in the book ‘God and the Evolving Universe’: 103

All of our capabilities, whether normal or supernormal, somatic 104 or extrasomatic, are subject to the limitations and distortions produced by our inherited and socially conditioned nature.

Irrespective of this, there are common threads and common consequences. Eckhart Tolle identified one of them as: 105

There is one certain criterion by which you can measure your success in this practice [contemplation] : the degree of peace that you feel.

He also associated mystical experiences through contemplation also with joy. He advised that: 106

With practice, the sense of stillness and peace will deepen. In fact, there is no end to its depth. You will also feel a subtle emanation of joy arising from deep within: the joy of Being.

About 700 years before Richard Rolle, a renowned English mystic, within his commentary on the English Psalter said: 107

...the spiritual meditation of the contemplative orders, and the joy of mystic contemplation of the highest degree which can occur in humankind…

In her book ‘Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East’ Margaret Smith outlined the life of the Sufi mystic Rabi'a in which she was led: 108

…through meditation and contemplation, to the joy of the mystic experience and Unitive life.

...and the 13 th century Dominican priest Thomas Aquinas recalled the pleasure that contemplation gives: 109

It is evident that in regard to itself contemplative life is continuous for two reasons: first, because it is about incorruptible and unchangeable things; secondly, because it has no contrary, for there is nothing contrary to the pleasure of contemplation...

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This joy is born of freedom; freedom from the shackles of the material world. During the contemplation which leads to union with God, the mind needs to be a blank. It must not be desirous of anything. This is particularly true of psychic phenomena. Through contemplation not only is the mystic driving closer to his Creator but also, along the way, gifts and new characteristics may be received. One of the more common ones is related to clairvoyance and clairaudience. Al Ghazzali, on this topic, wrote: 110

…explicit revelation which involves hearing a definite voice with the ear and seeing the angel with the eye.

It appears that psychic development is a by-product of contemplation as described by Bede Griffiths: 111

We have, then, the world of psychic experiences, but beyond the psychic world there is a deeper dimension, the world of the transcendent. This we find in the great revelations. There what is revealed is not merely the physical or the psychological or the psychic world but rather there takes place an intuitive insight into the ultimate, the transcendent.

So we have to look beyond the psychic to the union with God. White Eagle commented that: 112

The true mystic must of necessity be psychic, because true psychic power is developed on that mystical path.

If we start deliberately to develop our psychic potential then we become side-tracked and lose the focus of our spiritual journey, as Aldous Huxley revealed: 113

The Sufis regard miracles as "veils" intervening between the soul and God. The masters of Hindu spiritually urge their disciples to pay no attention to the siddhis, or psychic powers, which may come to them unsought, as a by-product of one- pointed contemplation. The cultivation of these powers, they warn, distracts the soul from Reality and sets up insurmountable obstacles in the way of enlightenment.

A spirit communicating through the medium Beatrice Russell also agreed that psychic talents distract: 114

As you lose contact with the senses you may find that you are being drawn out of the body ... then comes a great freedom, an acquisition of vastness; it appears that you are filling all space and expending with it. In deeper planes of this consciousness certain events may occur, visions, illuminations and ecstasies. The summit is Cosmic Consciousness when God, the Divine Companion, walks with the soul. Do not seek these states for the joys they bring you only, but that purpose of the Divine may be wrought within you. Of the fullness of this purpose you cannot know now; it must be sufficient that you have glimpsed the dim reflection of this glory in the mirror which God holds before you.

So accept the gifts that you are given and the consequential knowledge that is received. From Al Ghazzali’s ‘The Book of Knowledge’ three type of revelation are itemised: 115

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Then you shall know that those whose hearts have been sanctified have the secrets of heaven made known to them either by inspiration (ilham) which dawns upon them from where they know not, or by actual vision (al-ru'ya al-sadiqah) in their sleep, or in their wakefulness, which unfolds to them the mysteries through the contemplation of types (amihilah), just as in sleep.

Don’t be tempted! One of the real difficulties with psychic phenomena is that they seem to be a route through which many people can be helped. Psychics and mediums fulfil an excellent role. In church services throughout many nations mediums are proving the survival of the spirit and convincing people of life after death. It is easy to halt our journey at this point because what we have is recognisable and understandable. The more we pursue the journey beyond the psychic, the more novel and strange and uncertain and inexplicable our mystical experiences become. Evelyn Underhill said, of contemplation, that it: 116

…is a complete act of perception, inexpressible by ... words

In a subsequent book she expanded this: 117

Nothing is more striking in the literature of contemplation, and of high aesthetic experience, than its steady and unanimous witness to an overplus, and experienced reality, a joy and richness, which can never be conveyed save by allusion. Hence its language must always have a fluid and poetic quality, must suggest more then it ventures to define; for it always points beyond itself, and carries an aura of suggestion.

It is not just inexplicable because the words are not available to convey what has been felt, but it is enigmatic because the mystic cannot totally understand what has happened or what has been revealed. In the ‘Ascent of Mount Carmel’, St. John of the Cross wrote: 118

And thus it is that contemplation, whereby the understanding has the loftiest knowledge of God, is called mystical theology, which signifies secret wisdom of God; for it is secret even to the understanding that receives it.

This is why mystics use all types of literary techniques to try to give us even a slight impression of what they have experienced. The use of a paradox being one of the most common of which a typical example comes from Thomas Merton: 119

The One Word which God speaks is Himself. Speaking, he manifests Himself as infinite Love. His speaking and His hearing are One. So silent is His speech that, to our way of thinking, His speech is no speech, His hearing is no-hearing. Yet in His silence, in the abyss of His one Love, all words are spoken and all words are heard. Only in this silence of infinite Love do they have coherence and meaning.

Can you honestly say that you fully understand what Thomas is trying to say? I get just a fleeting glimpse of what his words may mean. Metaphors too are often used. Again an example of this comes from St. John of the Cross: 120

This place, which here signifies the understanding, which is the candlestick wherein

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this candle of faith is set, must be dark until the day when the clear vision of God dawns upon it in the life to come, or, in this life, until the day of transformation and union with God to which the soul is journeying.

Another technique used is that of poetical expression. The most famous, probably, is Dante’s Divine Comedy. Here he uses the simile of fire to try to impress upon us the impact that God has in use during contemplative activity: 121

These other fires, each one of them, were men Contemplative, enkindled by that heat Which maketh holy flowers and fruits spring up.

All this communication from the mystics we must wade through, filtering according to our own beliefs and perceptions so that we can glean some of the truths of the cosmos. F. C. Happold noted that: 122

Though what is known can only be communicated in evocative symbols which, on the face of them, look like attempts to tell what the contemplative has felt, it brings new knowledge and insight. This knowledge is acquired not by way of observation, but by way of participation.

In other words, follow the advice of White Eagle: 123

Meditation and union with God is of the utmost value in daily life. It is better to 'be' good than to dissipate energy in an endeavour to 'do' good.

Be yourself; you are your own best advert for goodness and godliness. Whilst you have been following the Mystic Way, you have been supported and aided by God’s willing agents who, because of your knowledge, abilities and spirituality have given you the necessary insights for your development. That is, you have been chosen. The 14 th century Flemish mystic John of Ruysbroeck, according to Evelyn Underhill, explained: 124

Contemplation places us in a purity and a radiance which is far above our understanding . . . and none can attain to it by knowledge, by subtlety, or by any exercise whatsoever: but he whom God chooses to unite to Himself, and to illuminate by Himself, he and no other can contemplate God…

…or from Lumsden Barkway: 125

That which we really know about God is not what we have been clever enough to find out, but what the Divine Charity has secretly revealed.

Therefore, whilst we have to be in a ready and fit spiritual state to receive, what is revealed to us is not of our selection, as Evelyn Underhill again tells us: 126

Contemplation is the experience of the All, and this experience seems to him to be given rather than attained. It is indeed the Absolute which is revealed to him: not, as in meditation or vision, some partial symbol or aspect thereof.

The implication is that mystical experiences and revelations are given to us rather than

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:33:25 21.5 Mystical Experiences and Contemplation Page 21 of 27 attained by us. This means it may happen to anyone, as revealed by Walter Hilton: 127

God gives this third stage of contemplation where He wills - to learned and unlearned, to men and to women, to those occupied as prelates and also to solitaries - but it is a special, not a common gift.

I have deliberately not outlined methods which have been and can be used to reach those desirable mystical experiences. Nevertheless, I will give one archaic and arcane set of steps which Richard Rolle documented. Towards the end of his life Richard attempted to schematise the levels of mystic contemplation which he had identified ... In the 'Melos Amoris', probably a work of the mid to late 1330s, Rolle outlines this scheme: 128

First they (the saints who migrate from Babylon to Jerusalem) renounce all they possess; then, eager for heavenly things alone, they are set alight in love of the Creator; third, now they have already tasted the uncreated sweetness, they are enkindled by great eagerness to be part of the angelic choirs ... ; fourthly, because of the greatness of their joy and the enormous love with which they are filled, they receive into themselves the celestial sound, and are shadowed by divine harmony, and flee into solitude lest they should be hindered from that spiritual song.

Such imagery is typical of the period and difficult for us to really appreciate. In the same book ‘Richard Rolle - The English Writings’ Rosamund Allen also recorded the four steps of preparation for infused contemplation by Hugh of St Victor: 129

…study, prayer, meditation and works; contemplation itself he considered a foretaste of blessedness.

You will need to find and develop your own techniques – the section of this series of books entitled ‘Contemplation, Mediation and Prayer’ may help you in this task. Remember, however, that contemplation itself is just one method that you may use in the whole plethora of techniques which you need on your spiritual journey. This was stressed by John Blofeld: 130

...for what is the point of meditation other than to realise identity with the Greater- than-I, which is the Tao, the Buddha Mind, the Godhead - call it what you will? .. Nor can meditation be successfully performed in isolation from other kinds of spiritual practice.

Contemplation, meditation and prayer are means to the ultimate end, as St Gregory pointed out: 131

The contemplative life is the vision of the principle

…and we are following a pathway because it leads, eventually, to meeting God’s objectives. Aldous Huxley too believed that we are on a mission: 132

In all historic formulations of the Perennial Philosophy it is axiomatic that the end of human life is contemplation, or the direct and intuitive awareness of God; that action is the means to that end…

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So, stay with the path, as the ‘Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart’ indicate and don’t be distracted: 133

Blessed meditations, soul-saving memories, Divine contemplations and words of wisdom serve and protect a true monk [I would say mystic] on all his paths of activity which are pleasing to God.

If you do that, then you will be one of the few who will be ‘there at the end’ as: 134

...it is only the mystic who is present at the final transfiguration, who catches a glimpse of the world transfigured in the divine light.

I will leave you with a beautiful poem from the quill of St. John of the Cross. Think about it, even contemplate it… 135

Upon a gloomy night, With all my cares to loving ardours flushed, (O venture of delight!) With nobody in sight I went abroad when all my house was hushed.

In safety, in disguise, In darkness up the secret stair I crept, (O happy enterprise) Concealed from other eyes When all my house at length in silence slept.

Upon that lucky night In secrecy, inscrutable to sight, I went without discerning And with no other light Except for that which in my heart was burning.

It lit and led me through More certain than the light of noonday clear To where One waited near Whose presence well I knew, There where no other presence might appear.

Oh night that was my guide! Oh darkness dearer than the morning's pride, Oh night that joined the lover To the beloved bride Transfiguring them each into the other.

Within my flowering breast Which only for Himself entire I save He sank into his rest And all my gifts I gave Lulled by the airs with which the cedars wave.

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Over the ramparts fanned While the fresh wind was fluttering his tresses, With his serenest hand My neck he wounded, and Suspended every sense with its caresses.

Lost to myself I stayed My face upon my lover having laid From all endeavour ceasing: And all my cares releasing Threw them amongst the lilies there to fade.

1 Prayer is talking to God 2 Meditation is listening to God or the agents of God 3 Contemplation is thinking deeply about a particular topic 4 Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Jewish & Christian Mysticism - An Introduction, Continuum, 1994. Introduction, (Pg 8) 5 Peter Toon, Meditating as a Christian, Collins, 1991. Part Four: How it Develops. 18 Becoming Contemplative, (Pg 184 / 185) 6 Rosamund S. Allen, Richard Rolle - The English Writings, SPCK, 1989. The Form of Living: Chapter 12, (Pg 182) 7 William Johnston, Silent Music - The Science of Meditation, Fount, 1979. Preface, (Pg 10) 8 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter VI - Introversion. Part I - Recollection and Quiet, (Pg 299) 9 Martin Israel, Summons to Life, Mowbray, 1982. Chapter 9: The inner life, (Pg 70) 10 Harry Wilmer, Quest for Silence, Diamon, 2000. 8 Patience - Meditation, Contemplation, and No-Mind, (Pg 161)

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11 William Johnston, Silent Music - The Science of Meditation, Fount, 1979. Part II: Consciousness. 5: Initiation, (Pg 56) 12 Henry Thomas Hamblin, The Life of the Spirit, The Science of Thought Press, 1934. Introduction, (Pg 1) 13 Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Jewish & Christian Mysticism - An Introduction, Continuum, 1994. Part II The Christian Tradition - 10 Modern Christian Mystics: Thomas Merton, (Pg 151) 14 Grace Cooke, The Jewel in the Lotus, White Eagle Lodge Publishing Trust, 1973. XII - Advanced Meditation, (Pg 137) 15 Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Jewish & Christian Mysticism - An Introduction, Continuum, 1994. Introduction, (Pg 9) 16 Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Jewish & Christian Mysticism - An Introduction, Continuum, 1994. Part II The Christian Tradition - 6 Early Christian Mysticism: Evagrius Ponticus and John Cassian, (Pg 97) 17 Jean Leclercq, Contemplative Life, Cistercian Publications, 1978. Yesterday and Today, (Pg 82) 18 Father Andrew SDC, In the Silence, A.R.Mowbray, 1951. Growth in Holiness: V. Affective Prayer, (Pg 44 / 45) 19 Walter Hilton, The Stairway of Perfection, Image Books, 1979. Introduction: IV. The Stairway; Rising Spiral in Image Development, (Pg 17) 20 Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Jewish & Christian Mysticism - An Introduction, Continuum, 1994. Part II The Christian Tradition - 9 Early Modern Christian Mysticism: Francis de Sales, (Pg 132) 21 William Johnston, Silent Music - The Science of Meditation, Fount, 1979. Epilogue. 16: Convergence, (Pg 173) 22 Evelyn Underhill, The Life of the Spirit and The Life of Today, Mowbray, 1994. Chapter IV Psychology and the life of the Spirit: (II) Contemplation and Suggestion, (Pg 95 / 96) 23 The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1947. Ascent of Mount Carmel: Book II. Chapter III, (Pg 73) 24 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter X - The Unitive Life, (Pg 432) 25 Theopathy is religious emotion engendered by the contemplation of or meditation upon God. 26 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter VI - Introversion. Part I - Recollection and Quiet, (Pg 312) 27 Thomas Merton, Reflections on My Work, Collins, Fontana Library, 1989. Preface to the French edition of 'Martha, Mary and Lazarus', (Pg 31) 28 Dean Inge, Goodness and Truth, Mowbray, 1958. Sermon 11: The Efficacy of Prayer, (Pg 91) 29 Leila Ward (compiler), An Exercise of the Spirit, Quaker Home Service, 1984. 3 Dorothy, (Pg 6) 30 Grace Cooke, The Jewel in the Lotus, White Eagle Lodge Publishing Trust, 1973. II - The Purpose of Meditation, (Pg 17) 31 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 1: Chapter IV - Early Mysticism in the Near East, (Pg 64) 32 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter V - Mysticism and Theology, (Pg 108) 33 William Johnston, Silent Music - The Science of Meditation, Fount, 1979. Part II: Consciousness. 6: The road to ecstasy, (Pg 68 to 79) 34 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 2: Chapter VIII - The rise of Sufism and the Early Ascetic Ideal, (Pg 164) 35 Teresa of Avila, Way of Perfection, Sheed & Ward, 1984. Chapter XXXVII, (Pg 161) 36 Christopher Jamison, Finding Happiness, Phoenix, 2008. Part TWO Eight Thoughts: First Thought Acedia - The Remedy for Acedia, (Pg 68) 37 Rosamund S. Allen, Richard Rolle - The English Writings, SPCK, 1989. Introduction: Rolle's Latin and English Writings, (Pg 43) 38 Kathleen Pond(ed), The Spirit of the Spanish Mystics, Burns & Oates,1958. Alonso Rodriguez - Of the Importance of Spiritual Reading, and some ways of performing it well and with profit. (Pg 119 / 120) 39 Kathleen Pond(ed), The Spirit of the Spanish Mystics, Burns & Oates,1958. Alonso Rodriguez - Of the Importance of Spiritual Reading, and some ways of performing it well and with profit. (Pg 123) 40 Kathleen E. Burne, The Life and Letters of Father Andrew, A.R.Mowbray, 1951. Part II: Letters: To Spiritual Children (Various): To Miss A. (Pg 156) 41 Joel S Goldsmith, The Contemplative Life, L N Fowler & Co, 1963. Chapter NINE - Daily Preparation for Spiritual Living, (Pg 151) 42 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. The Cloud of Unknowing: Chapter 3, (Pg 48 / 49)

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43 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part One: St. Simeon The New Theologian - Practical and Theological Precepts: 142, (Pg 131) 44 Helen Greaves, Testimony of Light, Neville Spearman, 1995. The Scripts, (Pg 48) 45 Poems of St John of the Cross, Collins, Fount Paperbacks, 1891. Preface, (Pg 6) 46 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section VI On the evils of Knowledge .. (Pg 189) 47 Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Jewish & Christian Mysticism - An Introduction, Continuum, 1994. Part I The Jewish Tradition - 4 Early Modern Jewish Mystics: Hasidic Mystics, (Pg 72) 48 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter VIII - Ecstasy and Rapture, (Pg 361) 49 Walter Hilton, The Stairway of Perfection, Image Books, 1979. Book Two: Chapter Twenty-Seven, (Pg 262) 50 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 1: Chapter IV - Early Mysticism in the Near East, (Pg 68) 51 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 2: Chapter IX - The Mystical Doctrines of Early Sufism, (Pg 214) 52 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 2: Chapter IX - The Mystical Doctrines of Early Sufism, (Pg 202) 53 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part Two: Hesychius of Jerusalem to Theodulus - Texts on Sobriety and Prayer – 18, (Pg 282) 54 William Johnston, Silent Music - The Science of Meditation, Fount, 1979. Part III: Healing. 11: Deeper healing, (Pg 131) 55 Hasidic Judaism is a branch of Orthodox Judaism that promotes spirituality through the popularization and internalization of Jewish mysticism. 56 Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Jewish & Christian Mysticism - An Introduction, Continuum, 1994. Part I The Jewish Tradition - 4 Early Modern Jewish Mystics: Hasidic Mystics, (Pg 73) 57 Susanna Winkworth, The History and Life of the Reverend Doctor John Tauler with 25 of his Sermons, H.R.Allenson, 1906. Second Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Easter. (Pg 332) 58 Jim Pym, Listening to the Light, Rider & Co, 1999. The Source, (Pg 59) 59 Henry Drummond, Natural Law in the Spirit World, Hodder & Stoughton, 1899. Mortification, (Pg 196) 60 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. The Cloud of Unknowing: Chapter 6, (Pg 55) 61 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. The Cloud of Unknowing: Chapter 7, (Pg 56) 62 The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1947. Ascent of Mount Carmel: Book III. Chapter V, (Pg 239) 63 Jean Leclercq, Contemplative Life, Cistercian Publications, 1978. Yesterday and Today, (Pg 72) 64 Oliver Davies, Meister Eckhart - Selected Writings, Penguin Books, 1994. Selected German Sermons: Sermon 24, (Pg 215/216) 65 Peter Toon, Meditating as a Christian, Collins, 1991. Part One: What it is. 3 Spirituality... (Pg 41) 66 James Redfield, Michael Murphy, Silvia Timbers, God and the Evolving Universe, Bantam Press, 2002. Part One - Awakening; 1: The Mystery of Our Being: The Meandering Course of Evolution, (Pg 18) 67 Dyson, W.H, Studies in Christian Mystics, James Clarke, 1913. Chapter IV - The Mystic Way, (Pg 51) 68 Peter Spink, Beyond Belief, Judy Piatkus, 1996. 6: The How of Learning, (Pg 93) 69 Dharmachari Subhuti, The Mythic Context, Padmaloka Books, 1990. To See with Angels's Eyes, (Pg 9 para4) 70 Evelyn Underhill, The Fruits of the Spirit; Light of Christ; Abba, Longmans, Green and Co, 1957. Abba: Chapter I - Introductory, (Pg 3) 71 Bede Griffiths, A New Vision of Reality, Fount, 1992. 10 The Experience of God in the Old and New Testament, (Pg 226) 72 Bertrand Russell, Religion and Science, Oxford University Press, 1960. Chapter VII: Mysticism, (Pg 189) 73 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter III - Mysticism and Psychology, (Pg 55 / 56) 74 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter X - The Unitive Life, (Pg 432/433) 75 Grace Cooke, The Jewel in the Lotus, White Eagle Lodge Publishing Trust, 1973. VII - The Value of Meditation in Everyday Life, (Pg 59) 76 Paul Davies, The Mind of God, Penguin Books, 1992. Chapter 9: The Mystery at the End of the Universe - Mystical Knowledge, (Pg 227)

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77 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part One: The Blessed Callistus Patriarch - Texts on Prayer – 7, (Pg 272) 78 Father M C D'Arcy, Thomas Aquinas - Selected Writings, J M Dent, 1950. 41. The Contemplative Life, (Pg 206) 79 Walter Hilton, The Stairway of Perfection, Image Books, 1979. Book Two: Chapter Eleven, (Pg 212) 80 Thomas Merton, Seeds of Contemplation, Hollis and Carter, 1949. Chapter 22 - The Night of the Senses, (Pg 152) 81 Morton T Kelsey, The Other Side of Silence, SPCK, 1985. Part Four: The Use of Images in Meditation - 12. Silence Mysticism and Religious Experience, (Pg 155) 82 David Hay, Exploring Inner Space - Scientists and Religious Experience, Mowbray, 1987. Part Three: Modern Explorations - 14.The Resilience of Religious Experience: The social control of religious experience, (Pg 207) 83 Harry Wilmer, Quest for Silence, Diamon, 2000. 5 War - On Not Being Able to Talk, (Pg 106) 84 Thomas Merton, Reflections on My Work, Collins, Fontana Library, 1989. Preface to the Japanese edition of 'Thoughts in Solitude', (Pg 126) 85 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 1: Chapter IV - Early Mysticism in the Near East, (Pg 54) 86 Jean Leclercq, Contemplative Life, Cistercian Publications, 1978. Separation from the world, (Pg 44) 87 Dr Eben Alexander, Proof of Heaven, Piatkus, 2014. Chapter 15: The Gift of Forgetting, (Pg 85) 88 Michael Newton, Destiny of Souls: New Case Studies of Life Between Lives, Llewellyn Publications, 2005. 7: Community Dynamics, (Pg 292) 89 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part Two: Theoleptus, Metropolitan of Philadelphia - A Word... – 16, (Pg 389) 90 Kathleen E. Burne, The Life and Letters of Father Andrew, A.R.Mowbray, 1951. Part II: Letters: To One Trying his Vocation to the Religious Life, Southern Rhodesia, All Hallow E'en, 1932, (Pg 100) 91 Downloaded from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dietrich_Bonhoeffer For historical interest, after being allegedly associated with the plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler, Bonoeffer was briefly tried and then executed by hanging on 9 April 1945 as the Nazi regime collapsed, just two weeks before Allied forces liberated the camp and three weeks before Hitler's suicide. 92 Malcolm Muggeridge, A Third Testament, The Plough Publishing House, 2002. 93 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter IV - The Characteristics of Mysticism, (Pg 87) 94 The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1947. Ascent of Mount Carmel: Book II. Chapter XXIX, (Pg 209) 95 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. The Book of Privy Counselling: Chapter 23, (Pg 187) 96 Iulia de Beausobre, Flame in the Snow - A Russian Legend, Fount, 1979. Part One: Godward Bound - The Place, (Pg 68) 97 The Jesus Prayer is the form of invocation used by those practicing mental prayer, also called the “prayer of the heart.” The words of the prayer most usually said are “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner.” 98 Aum is considered sacred and holy in Esoteric Buddhism 99 Om mani padme hum is a six-syllabled Sanskrit mantra. The first word Om is a sacred syllable found in Indian religions. The word Mani means "jewel" or "bead", Padme is the "lotus flower" (the Buddhist sacred flower), and Hum represents the spirit of enlightenment. 100 Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Jewish & Christian Mysticism - An Introduction, Continuum, 1994. Part I The Jewish Tradition - 2 Medieval Jewish Mysticism: The Mystic Way, (Pg 45) 101 Teresa of Avila, Way of Perfection, Sheed & Ward, 1984. Chapter XXX, (Pg 126) 102 John Blofeld, Beyond the Gods, E P Dutton & Co, 1974. Chapter 8 - Remedies for Discontent? (Pg 160) 103 James Redfield, Michael Murphy, Silvia Timbers, God and the Evolving Universe, Bantam Press, 2002. Part Two - The Emerging Human Being; 3: Our Expanding Perception: Advanced Body Awareness, (Pg 94) 104 referring to the cells of the body 105 Eckhart Tolle, Practising the Power of NOW, Hodder Mobius, 2002 ONE: Being and Enlightenment, (Pg 14) 106 Eckhart Tolle, Practising the Power of NOW, Hodder Mobius, 2002 ONE: Being and Enlightenment, (Pg 12) 107 Rosamund S. Allen, Richard Rolle - The English Writings, SPCK, 1989. The English Psalter and Commentary; Prologue, (Pg 68)

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108 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 2: Chapter X - Some Early Sufi Mystics, (Pg 220) 109 Father M C D'Arcy, Thomas Aquinas - Selected Writings, J M Dent, 1950. 41. The Contemplative Life, (Pg 218) 110 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section VII On the Intellect .. (Pg 234) 111 Bede Griffiths, A New Vision of Reality, Fount, 1992. 12 Synthesis: Towards a Unifying Plan, (Pg 267) 112 White Eagle on the Intuition and Initiation, White Eagle Lodge Publishing Trust, 2004. Part One: What the Intuition is, and is not - V: The Nature of the Intuition, (Pg 42) 113 Aldous Leonard Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy, Perennial, Harper Collins, 2004. Chapter XXIII: The Miraculous, (Pg 260) 114 Beatrice Russell, Beyond the Veils through Meditation, Lincoln Philosophical Research Foundation, 1986. The Silence, (Pg 55) 115 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section VI On the evils of Knowledge .. (Pg 218) 116 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter VII - Introversion. Part II – Contemplation, (Pg 336) 117 Evelyn Underhill, The Essentials of Mysticism, Oneworld, 1999. The Philosophy of Contemplation, (Pg 112) 118 The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1947. Ascent of Mount Carmel: Book II. Chapter VIII, (Pg 97) 119 Thomas Merton, Reflections on My Work, Collins, Fontana Library, 1989. Preface to the Japanese edition of 'Thoughts in Solitude', (Pg 126) 120 The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1947. Ascent of Mount Carmel: Book II. Chapter XVI, (Pg 138) 121 Dante Alighieri, Divine Comedy, Capella, 2008. Paradiso Canto XXII, (Pg 350) 122 F C Happold, Mysticism - A Study and an Anthology, Penguin Books, 1971. The Study: 18. The Higher Stages of Contemplation, (Pg 84) 123 White Eagle on the Intuition and Initiation, White Eagle Lodge Publishing Trust, 2004. Part Two: Developing the Intuition - XI: Becoming Still, (Pg 104) 124 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter VII - Introversion. Part II – Contemplation, (Pg 333/334) 125 Lumsden Barkway, An Anthology of the Love of God (from the writings of Evelyn Underhill), Mowbray, 1953. II The Love of the Godhead: I God, The Source and Sum of Love: Revelation (The School of Charity), (Pg 42) 126 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter VII - Introversion. Part II – Contemplation, (Pg 333) 127 Walter Hilton, The Stairway of Perfection, Image Books, 1979. Book One: Chapter Nine, (Pg 73) 128 Rosamund S. Allen, Richard Rolle - The English Writings, SPCK, 1989. Introduction: Rolle's Mystic Experience, (Pg 38) 129 Rosamund S. Allen, Richard Rolle - The English Writings, SPCK, 1989. Introduction: Sources and Influences, (Pg 57 / 58) 130 John Blofeld, Beyond the Gods, E P Dutton & Co, 1974. Chapter 6 - The Path of Meditation, (Pg 110) 131 Evelyn Underhill, The Essentials of Mysticism, Oneworld, 1999. The Philosophy of Contemplation, (Pg 96) 132 Aldous Leonard Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy, Perennial, Harper Collins, 2004. Chapter XXVII: Contemplation, Action and Social Unity, (Pg 294) 133 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part Two: Theoleptus, Metropolitan of Philadelphia - A Word .. – 7, (Pg 385) 134 Bede Griffiths, Return to the Centre, Collins, Fount Paperbacks, 1978. 5. The One and the Many, (Pg 41) 135 Poems of St John of the Cross, Collins, Fount Paperbacks, 1891. Poems - I - Songs of the soul in rapture at having arrives at the heights of perfection, which is union with God by the road of spiritual negation. (Pg 11- 12)

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21.6: Mystical Experiences and Union with God

Mystical Experiences are waypoints on our spiritual journey. To some extent the types of mystical experience give us a guide as to our progress, and the ultimate aim is union with God. It is this point that few people reach although many try; the mystics, ancient and modern, testify to this. It is the goal of many but even this exalted state is a means to an end. It is probably the highest spiritual peak that anyone can attain during an earthly life, but in the life to come, in the hereafter, I’m sure there are states that can be achieved that are even higher.

What is meant by union with God? Bonaventure a 13 th century Italian medieval scholastic theologian, philosopher, and mystic believed that union with God is where: 1

…the eternal is joined with time-bound man.

…and the English Anglican priest Peter Spink understood that a central characteristic of mystical experiences is, for the individual: 2

…a dawning awareness of a 'unity'

Let me step back for a moment and examine these two statements. Firstly that unity is a joining, in some way, of the physical time-bound person and a world in which time has no significance. Let me posit that this is an integration of the world in which we live and the Spirit World. Hold onto that thought and tie it in with Peter Spink’s statement where, I suggest, he offers the idea that we develop our spirituality and slowly become aware of the proximity of the Spirit World.

Let me add another facet to this argument. God created the Cosmos for some purpose which we cannot even hope to know, although I believe it to be with regard to God’s own development. God, this immense energy source, cannot hope to communicate directly with the lives of all the created creatures for two reasons. Firstly that direct contact of one of us with such power would certainly lead to our demise, and secondly, the number of sentient beings in this world, the Spirit World and all those other worlds of which we yet know nothing. Based upon these two facts, I believe that selected members of the Spirit World act as God’s agents and as such are the entities with whom we unite. There are many different levels within that environment and therefore as an individual develops their spirituality so spirit beings of a higher level are brought to link, support and guide. The higher levels of the Spirit World contain beings that, from our perspective, have characteristics which we would consider as divine. It is from these levels that beings are united with the famous mystics.

I appreciate that this is a very analytical way of looking at union with God, but I cannot see, as yet, an alternative viable hypothesis. You will appreciate that when mystics refer to union of God, I consider this to be union with a higher spirit and/or an awareness of the higher levels of the Spirit World.

Union happens on many different levels, from that which provides intuitive insights, through extended psychic abilities to the ecstasy that many mystics report. This whole gamut of capabilities which comes to the emerging mystic seems only coincidental; they

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:33:53 21.6 Mystical Experiences and Union with God Page 2 of 14 are not the main objective and should be treated with apprehension and trepidation as the modern monk and mystic Thomas Merton suggested that we must remember that: 3

...our experience of union with God, our feeling of His presence, is altogether accidental and secondary. It is only a side effect of His actual presence in our souls, and gives no sure indication of that presence in any case. For God Himself is above all apprehensions and ideas and sensations, however spiritual, that can ever be experienced by the spirit of man in his life.

This latter sentence from Thomas Merton, again gives some level of credence to the supposition I made earlier – God is ineffable and unapproachable. Nevertheless, through God’s agents we are able to recognise something in our soul which is different, something joyful, and something immense which Evelyn Underhill in her tome ‘Mysticism’ described as: 4

This hidden self is the primary agent of mysticism, and lives a "substantial" life in touch with the real or transcendental world. Certain processes, of which contemplation has been taken as a type, can so alter the state of consciousness as to permit the emergence of this deeper self; which, according as it enters more or less into the conscious life, makes man more or less a mystic.

This hidden self, or, as I prefer to call it ‘the soul’, is the sensor of spirituality, being the ‘spark of God’. Perhaps this is something to do with the energy level of a particular plane of the Spiritual World and that of the contemplating mystic who is in concert with it. This gives the mystic the unrecognised ability to ‘tune in’ and hence recognises a communion with the Spirit World. In the late 13 th century a rather vivacious and very worldly Angela of Foligno decided to abandon her existing lifestyle and become a nun. Some time after her conversion Angela had placed herself under the direction of a Franciscan friar named Arnoldo who became her mentor and confessor. Subsequently she established at Foligno a community of sisters, who to the Rule of the Third Order added the three vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, without, however, binding themselves to enclosure, so that they might devote their time to works of charity. About the turn of the century, her book ‘Memorial’ appeared and in it she wrote: 5

In addition to that feeling which assures the soul that God is truly within it, the soul is made to want God so perfectly, that the whole soul is truly in complete harmony with this desire for God.

Unity equates to a harmony between the soul and God. This soul is the real ‘I’, the eternal essence of each of us which is the entity which develops through various lives and eventually will merge with its Creator. This notion was developed a little by James Redfield, Michael Murphy and Silvia Timbers: 6

The realisation of an identity that transcends the constraints of ordinary selfhood has been celebrated by countless Jewish, Christian, and Islamic seers. "My Me is God, nor do I recognise any other Me except my God himself," wrote Saint Catherine of Genoa. "To gauge the soul we must gauge it with God," wrote the German mystic Meister Eckhart, "for the Ground of God and the Ground of the Soul are one and the same. ... The eye with which I see God is the same eye with

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which God sees me."

This is real togetherness; real unity. Evelyn Underhill summarised the similar ideas of the Sufi’s who they say: 7

…is to be contemplated (a) outwardly in the imperfect beauties of the earth; (b) inwardly, by meditation. Further, since He is One, and in all things, "to conceive one's self as separate from God is an error: yet only when one sees oneself as separate from God, can one reach out to God."

The mystics and their paradoxes strike again … Nevertheless; there is a level of perfection which is developed in every mystic which, according to St. Philemon, as recorded in the ’ Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart’, allows their soul: 8

…when it enters into the sphere of essential knowledge and is united with God.

Meister Eckhart in one of his sermons believed that this knowledge dismisses ignorance: 9

So when God enters the temple [the soul] he banishes ignorance, which is darkness, and reveals himself with light and with truth.

The implication is that both parties to the union come to understand each other more as a consequence; God’s agent understanding more of the mystic and the mystic appreciating more of the linking Spirit. This is not necessarily an easy integration as the Benedictine monk Cyprian Smith commented: 10

Knower and known often have to experience the clash of their difference and separateness, in order to find their ground of union and likeness.

Perhaps, the struggle that mystics always seem to have comes from the tremendous difference between God’s agent’s purity and our impurity; between the fusing together of very different essences. Madam Guyon believed that this scenario was reflected in the Old Testament in the life of Job, of whom she said: 11

...I look upon as a mirror of the whole spiritual life.

...she went on to describe: 12

...the case of Job, whose history I consider a mirror of the spiritual life. First God robbed him of his wealth, which we may consider as setting forth gifts and graces; then of his children; this signifies the destruction of natural sensibilities, and of our own works, which are as our children and our most cherished possessions: then God deprived him of his health, which symbolises the loss of virtue; then He touched his person, rendering him an object of horror and contempt. It even appears that this holy man was guilty of sin, and failed in resignation; he was accused by his friends of being justly punished for his crimes; there was no healthy part left in him. But after he had been brought down to the dunghill, and reduced as it were to a corpse, did not God restore everything to him, his wealth, his children, his health, and his life?

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It is the same with spiritual resurrection; everything is restored, with a wonderful power to use it without being defiled by it, clinging to it without appropriating it as before. All is done in God, and things are used as though they were not used. It is here that true liberty and true life are found.

Martin Israel also believed that the mystic needs to pass through the fire of suffering and change before being tempered by God: 13

The one who has emerged entire through the winnowing fire of suffering comes out changed and renewed. He has passed beyond dependence on things mortal and has attained a knowledge of the immortal Principle that lies at the root of his own being - which is also the immanent deity. He has passed beyond pleasure and pain to an inner centre where the peace of God is known. He is neither elated by success nor dejected by failure - as the world understands these two results of action, both of which are in fact illusions - but lives in the only fully substantial world, which is one of union of all things in God. The core of equanimity is well expressed in the Bhagavadgita: "To action alone hast thou a right and never at all to its fruits; let not the fruits of action be thy motive; neither let there be in thee any attachment to inaction" (2:47). In other words, the supreme act of man is to be attentive to God's will and do what is required of him. His reward is the eternal knowledge of God which far outstrips any material advantages that might accrue from it.

There is pain and joy in all intimate relationships, none more so than of the mystic with God. In his self-analysing book, the Catholic theologian and Jesuit Ladislaus Boros referred to St Gregory, who preserves the inexpressibility of God and yet: 14

…stresses the possibility of experiencing God.

This is a real experience; it is not an intellectual or theological exercise but a real, passionate, and fruitful communion of which Thomas Merton states that it is: 15

…not simply an aesthetic extrapolation of certain intellectual or dogmatic principles, but a living contact with the Infinite Source of all being...

Because it is so real and life changing, it infuses everything the mystic does, because, as William Clemmons, the Professor of Christian Education at South-Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary in North Carolina, explained: 16

Union is living attentively to God, living in God's Presence each moment as fully as we are capable and aware, as He reveals Himself to us in the mystery of each experience.

This revelation is not just in the confines of the mystic’s contemplative prayer but in the experiences which bombard each person every moment of the day. Another way of looking at the impact of mystical experiences was given by the spirit communicator who used Beatrice Russell as a channel. He told her and us that: 17

To experience Cosmic Consciousness is to establish a relationship with the Absolute; hence the aftermath of an ecstatic experience must be to relate everything, thought, word, and deed with the concept of the presence of God within.

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The secret of this process is universal love.

Love controls all; being at peace with God and the world gives the mystic wings. An interesting poetic view of this was given by the metaphysical poet George Herbert in The Temper (I) lines 1-8 and 25-28: 18

How should I praise thee, Lord! How should my rymes Gladly engrave thy love in steel, If what my soul doth feel sometimes, My soul might ever feel.

Although there were some fourtie heav'ns, or more, Sometimes I peer above them all; Sometimes I hardly reach a score, Sometimes to hell I fall ...

Whether I flie with angels, fall with dust, Thy hands made both, and I am there: Thy power and love, my love and trust Make one place ev'ry where.

With God everywhere, love stimulates spiritual development which in turn leads to mystical experiences and thereby union with God. Love, in all its forms and nuances, is the key which opens the door to union. This love Evelyn Underhill linked with prayer, where as I would say mystical experience, when she wrote: 19

Love then, which is a willed tendency to God; prayer, which is willed communion with and experience of Him; are the two prime essentials in the personal life of the Spirit. They represent, of course, only our side of it and our obligation.

The natural consequence of love is a developing humility and a real desire to forgo those pleasures of the material world for those of the spiritual. There are two ways to look at love’s development. Either strip away the material to develop love or as love naturally unfolds then the desire for the physical reduces. It is the former of these that the anonymous author of the mid 14 th century German text of the Theologia Germanica believes to be the case. Whilst trying to articulate what union with God is, he wrote: 20

It is that we should be of a truth purely, simply, and wholly at one with the One Eternal Will of God, or altogether without will, so that the created will should flow out into the Eternal Will, and be swallowed up and lost therein, so that the Eternal Will alone should do and leave undone in us. Now mark what may help or further us towards this end. Behold, neither exercises, nor words, nor works, nor any creature nor creature's work can do this. In this wise therefore must we renounce and forsake all things, that we must not imagine or suppose that any words, works, or exercises, any skill or cunning or any created thing can help or serve us thereto.

I expect it is a combination of both these processes and, in fact, I think that Thomas Merton recognised this too: 21

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True mystical experience of God and supreme renunciation of everything outside of God coincide. They are two aspects of the same thing.

This detachment must also happen during our contemplation in order that we can achieve union as described by Meister Eckhart in his 24 th German sermon: 22

...know that you must strip yourself of all other works and must enter a state of unknowing.

This ‘state of unknowing’ is similar to the ‘cloud of forgetting’ which, according to the author of ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’, we must place between ourselves and the physical world when in contemplation. This concept of ‘unknowing’ was also used by Thomas Aquinas, the foremost 13 th century classical proponent of natural theology, when describing how we could achieve knowledge of God: 23

Yet there is, on the other hand, that most divine knowledge of God, which is attained by unknowing in a union that transcends the mind, when the mind recedes from all things and then leaves even itself, and is united to the super-resplendent rays, being illumined in them and from them by the unsearchable depth of wisdom.

With the abandonment of the physical which takes place in our everyday life, love blossoms. In discussing ‘The Upanishads’, Swami Paramananda, who was one of the early Indian teachers who came to the United States to spread the Vedanta philosophy and religion, recognised that abandonment needs discipline: 24

Austerity, the study of sacred texts, and the dedication of action to God constitute the discipline of Mystic Union.

Many mystics have tried to describe the impact of union with God. St Augustine, according to Margaret Smith’s book ‘Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East’, simply recalls how different and how unbelievable was the experience: 25

I awoke in Thee and found Thee infinite, yet otherwise than I had thought, and this vision came not from the flesh …

Those mystical experiences which come to the advanced mystic are somehow amorphous with regard to a particular subject or concept. It is as though the mystic has reached a high plane in the Spirit World and is spiritually amazed as to the feelings engendered and the truths uncovered. The revered Spanish mystic St John of the Cross tried to capture these ideas in his book ‘Ascent of Mount Carmel’: 26

These Divine manifestations of knowledge which have respect to God never relate to particular matters, inasmuch as they concern the Chief Beginning, and therefore can have no particular reference, unless it be a question of some truth concerning a thing less than God, which is involved in the perception of the whole; but these Divine manifestations themselves -- no, in no way whatsoever. And these lofty manifestations of knowledge can come only to the soul that attains to union with God, for they are themselves that union; and to receive them is equivalent to a certain contact with the Divinity which the soul experiences, and thus it is God Himself Who is perceived and tasted therein. And, although He cannot be

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experienced manifestly and clearly, as in glory, this touch of knowledge and delight is nevertheless so sublime and profound that it penetrates the substance of the soul, and the devil cannot meddle with it or produce any manifestation like to it, for there is no such thing, neither is there aught that compares with it, neither can he infuse pleasure or delight that is like to it; for such kinds of knowledge savour of the Divine Essence and of eternal life, and the devil cannot counterfeit a thing so lofty.

Such mystics as St John of the Cross have accepted the unwritten challenge and tried to give us lesser mortals a glimpse into their revealed understanding. This was outlined by Martin Israel in ‘The Pearl of Great Price’: 27

The real knowledge comes from the unitive experience of God; the world's great saints and mystics have been given the key to that knowledge, and it is in turn their burden as well as their privilege to impart it to their fellow creatures.

There are as many different levels of mystical experience as there are people who follow the mystic Way. In the book ‘God, the Good, and Utilitarianism’ edited by John Perry, there is a chapter by John Hare, a British classicist, philosopher, and ethicist, wherein he refers to a paragraph in another treatise of his called ‘God and Morality’. The essence of this is to demonstrate that each of us may have different levels of union with God: 28

God has a route for each one of us, which is a kind of union with God (a way of loving God unique to each person). This route will require loving a subset of the infinite number of good things that draw humans to God, and will also require rejecting a different subset. This is true both for the common route for humans (if there is one) and the particular route for each of us.

These different levels may correspond, in my philosophy, to the different levels of the Spirit World to which the mystic links. Whilst the details of each person’s union may be different, there are some themes which are true for us all. One is the veil which comes between us and God as described in ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’: 29

…as long as we are in these mortal bodies we shall experience the impenetrable darkness of the 'cloud of unknowing' between us and God.

…and Martin Israel used a similar metaphor to express the same idea: 30

The cloud shows us the enormous gulf between us and a knowledge of God.

The implication is as suggested by the spirit who taught us through the mediumship of Dion Fortune, who noted that: 31

...until the individual be developed to his highest, he cannot be part of the collective unit of Divinity to which he should in the end return.

Taking a different simile, Meister Eckhart in sermon 23 used the words of St Paul, taken from 1 Tim 6:16, who offered: 32

God dwells in an unapproachable light .

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There is a secret associated with union with God which the French Jesuit priest Père De Caussade expounds: 33

"Would you know the secret of Union with God?" he asks. "It is none other then to avail yourself of that which He sends you."

This is a lot easier to say than to achieve. Firstly, we have to appreciate the existence of intuitions and mystical experiences, and secondly to come to grips with the knowledge which has been imparted, and thirdly to act upon it. Through this route comes salvation as the 9 th century Egyptian Sufi Dhu al-nun and St. Clement of Alexandria before him, believed: 34

…the Way of salvation to be the attainment of gnosis [knowledge of and union with God].

Such knowledge is very revealing. It shows that all of us can live in the material world with all attendant responsibilities and yet we can pursue our spiritual goals to provide what Julian of Norwich understood to be our salvation. In his treatise ‘Guide for the Inexpert Mystic’ the American Episcopal priest John Swanson declared that: 35

Salvation, for Julian, then is a 'fulfilment' of our divinely-created humanity, not something added to our humanity or something which requires the transcendence or the rejection of our humanity.

...and this can be only achieved if each of us is at one with our Creator, or as John Blofeld put it: 36

...that the real man is pure spirit (Mind) and that this pure spirit is One with the Universal Spirit (generally called the One Mind)

The implication is that it is unlikely that anyone, even the most spiritual adept, could even reach Union with God during his life on earth. The spirit teaching us through the medium Dion Fortune advised us that: 37

Through the intermediation of these Hierarchies all rise to the consciousness of the Cosmos, but they never pause or achieve finality upon any plane of the manifested universe, for there is no finality in manifestation.

Perhaps in our current lives, you and I will never reach the heights gained by those special mystics. Nevertheless, we will reach a level of union which is compatible with our own characteristics, desires and abilities. Because of my own background and gender, it is unlikely that I would have similar mystical experiences to those of many of the medieval female mystics. Their focus was betrothal with Jesus and associated bridal events. The English historian Henrietta Leyser, in her book entitled ‘Medieval Women’, quoted from Roberta Gilchrist who said: 38

Medieval female religious experience, was different from that of men not less successful.

In Spain, towards the end of the medieval period, emerged a great female mystic who was

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:33:53 21.6 Mystical Experiences and Union with God Page 9 of 14 able to explain her understanding of union very well. This mystic was the prominent Spanish mystic and Carmelite nun Teresa of Avila who described union, using a number of well established metaphors, in this way: 39

The soul always remains with its God in that centre. Let us say that the union (with God) is like joining of two wax candles to such an extent that the flame coming from them is but one, or that the wick, the flame, and the wax are all one. But afterward one candle can be easily separated from the other and there are two candles; the same holds for the wick. In the spiritual marriage the union is like what we have when rain falls from the sky into a river or fount; all is water, for the rain that fell from heaven cannot be divided or separated from the water of the river. Or is it like what we have when a little stream enters the sea; there is no means of separating the two. Or like the bright light entering a room through two different windows; although the streams of light are separate when entering the room, they become one.

William Johnston, who wrote extensively on Zen and Christian contemplation, had a different way of explaining union with God. He wrote that the physiognomy 40 of the mystic union can be described in the following way: 41

…during the union, when it is not too deep, we are like a man seated beside one of his friends in darkness and in silence. He does not see him therefore, he does not hear him; he only feels that he is there by the sense of touch since he is holding his hand. And so he goes on thinking about him and loving him.

I would go even further and say that if two lovers are sitting side-by-side then they do not need to hold hands to know that the other is there beside them; they sense it and just know their lover is next to them. It is an inward knowing as the 14 th century English religious writer and hermit Richard Rolle believed: 42

This is just what you must do if you want to find him: look for him inwardly...

If that is the case, then what better objective can there be for one’s life. Father Andrew, that Anglican friar and Church of England clergyman who did so much for so many people leading up to, during and after WWII in Plaistow, London, had the same view. In one of his letters he wrote: 43

There is no other end to strive for but communion with God...

This was the thesis of the monk of the Eastern Orthodox Church who wrote ‘Orthodox Spirituality’. He believed that: 44

The aim of man's life is union (henosis) with God and deification (theosis). The Greek Fathers have used the term 'deification' to a greater extent than the Latins. What is meant is not, of course, a pantheistic identity, but a sharing, through grace, in the divine life: '...Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye may be partakers of the divine nature...' (2. Pet. 1. 4)

...and this monk went on to say that: 45

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Union with God is the perfect fulfilment of the 'kingdom' announced by the Gospel, and of that charity or love which sums up all the Law and the Prophets.

The 20 th century French philosopher and theologian Teilhard de Chardin went even further and in Ursula King’s book ‘Towards a New Mysticism’ she described his belief as: 46

The comparison between the two 'roads' relates primarily to the understanding of mysticism for, in Teilhard's view, the phenomenon of mysticism and the relentless quest for absolute unity underlying it, represents the central core of all religion: 'Without mysticism, there can be no successful religion: and there can be no well- founded mysticism apart from faith in some unification of the universe.'

Because union and mystical experiences are the thread which runs through all religions, it is not surprising that this could be recognised by an expert in comparative religion. One such person was the Methodist minister, and the author of over 30 books Geoffrey Parrinder. In discussing Theravada Buddhism he observed that: 47

Nirvana is release from the limitations of existence, the supreme goal of Buddhist endeavour. Nirvana is variously described as cessation of striving, the attainment of Being, union with ultimate reality.

In his consideration of Judaism he noted that: 48

In the Zohar, the classic of medieval Jewish mysticism, there is a close approach to mystical union with God, and the use of love symbols such as are found in Muslim and Christian mysticism.

Developing the Islamic perspective he recognised that: 49

So the Sufis taught oijana, the passing away of consciousness in mystical union, and this could lead to identity of God and man.

...and he considered that the final goal of the Christian mystics: 50

...is the Unitive Way wherein 'the soul is oned with God'. This comes through contemplation and love where, independently of knowledge, the soul is united with God and centred on him.

Thus all religions need the mystics and their mystical experiences; they are the alpha and omega. Essentially this was the thesis of the 19 th century biblical scholar Marcus Dods who believed that: 51

...fellowship or union with God, which is the beginning and end of all religion, is but another name for holiness. Holiness is union with God, and holiness can better be secured by revealing the holy God as a God of love than by law or by prophets.

Moving through the stages of mysticism and mystical experience to union with God has one outcome; action in gratitude for what we have been given and love for all those involved and a love for humanity which blossoms into deeds which show our spirituality and help to others. This was very neatly described by Andrew Harvey: 52

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Then I understood. "The journey toward you [Mother Meera but really God] begins in duality," I said, "deepens into unity, and then opens again into duality, this time lit with a knowledge of Unity." My hands moved toward each other, closed together, and then opened again like two flowers, joined at the wrist.

When considering mystical experiences we have to be careful not to assume that what we have gained is all our own doing: it certainly is not. The part played by the agent’s of God is probably greater than our own. Our spirit guides and helpers support us throughout our lives and it is something to be grateful for and cherish. Thomas Aquinas understood this to the extent that in his sermon for the Feast of S. Martin he said: 53

First, then, I say that the cause or reason of a man's arrival at such eminence [that is becoming a saint] is the divine aid. .. No one, then, can come to blessedness but by the divine aid.

In one of Thomas Aquinas’ sermons, so Father M C D'Arcy tells us, he indicates that the psalmist David believed that sainthood is: 54

...that goal towards which we are striving.

I don’t expect any of us to reach the dizzy heights of sainthood, but we should all try to reach our own union with God and his divine agents. Once we have reached that point then no one can take it from us. In the ‘Book of the Holy Hierotheos’ Margaret Smith tells us that: 55

Those who have been merely joined together in unification may be separated again, but those who have been truly united in 'commingling' can no more be torn asunder.

...and it allows us to accommodate our humanity and all the baggage that it brings. Thus we should recognise that even though we move towards union with God we will never lose our inherent human features until we ‘slough this mortal coil’. The 17 th century mystic Madame Guyon in her ‘Spiritual Torrents’ recognised this too as she stated that, after union with God, the soul: 56

...does not lose its nature as a creature...

...at least physically. From a spiritual perspective it may appear to lose all trace of individuality as Madam Guyon also noted: 57

And as the torrent, when it enters the sea, loses its own being in such a way that it retains nothing of it, and takes that of the sea, or rather is taken out of itself to be lost in the sea; so this soul loses the human in order that it may lose itself in the divine, which becomes its being and its subsistence, not essentially, but mystically.

We are constituted the same way; we all have a soul and a body. Development of our spiritual aspect whilst it does not annihilate the physical puts it in the right perspective. We aim to be a being in balance with the spiritual much to the fore. Dom Aelred Graham understood that: 58

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...union with God is the only guarantee of a complete personal being. Separation from God, distance from God, is equivalent to a loss of claim to one's own existence.

..and this is supported from the pen of John Swanson: 59

To be a full and complete person is to be in union with God.

God bless you, and may you travel your Mystic Way to union with God remembering the words of Julie Soskin: 60

Being at one with God does not diminish your individuality, it enhances it…

1 Bonaventure, The Journey of the Mind to God, Hackett, 1993. Chapter Six: The Consideration of the Most Blessed Trinity in its Name which is The Good 2 Peter Spink, Beyond Belief, Judy Piatkus, 1996. 4: The Awakened Heart, (Pg 50)

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3 Thomas Merton, No Man is an Island, Burns & Oates, 1997. 12: Recollection, (Pg 198) 4 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter III - Mysticism and Psychology, (Pg 67/68) 5 Angela of Foligno, Memorial, DS Brewer, 1999. The Memorial of Angela of Foligno - The Fifth Supplementary Step, (Pg 62) 6 James Redfield, Michael Murphy, Silvia Timbers, God and the Evolving Universe, Bantam Press, 2002. Part Two - The Emerging Human Being; 9: Transcendent Identity, (Pg 135) 7 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter V - Mysticism and Theology, (Pg 108) 8 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part Three: St Philemon the Abba - The Narrative – 3, (Pg 403) 9 Oliver Davies, Meister Eckhart - Selected Writings, Penguin Books, 1994. Selected German Sermons: Sermon 12, (Pg 153/154) 10 Cyprian Smith, The Way of Paradox [spiritual life as taught by Meister Eckhart], Darton Longman and Todd, 1996. 2 The Eye of the Heart, (Pg 21) 11 Madame Guyon, Spiritual Torrents, Christian Books, 1984. Part II: Chapter X, (Pg 86) 12 Madame Guyon, Spiritual Torrents, The Project Gutenberg at http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/25133, Part II, Chapter I in the translation by A. W. Marston from the Paris Edition of 1790, 2008. 13 Martin Israel, The Pain That Heals, Hodder & Stoughton, 1981. Chapter 12: Equanimity: the Precious Fruit of Suffering, (Pg 132) 14 Ladislaus Boros, Open Spirit, Search Press, 1974. Gregory and Beauty, (Pg 112) 15 Thomas Merton, Reflections on My Work, Collins, Fontana Library, 1989. Preface to the Japanese edition of 'Seeds of Contemplation', (Pg 102) 16 William Clemmons, Discovering the Depths, Triangle, 1989. 12 Living Out of the Depths, (Pg 134) 17 Beatrice Russell, Beyond the Veils through Meditation, Lincoln Philosophical Research Foundation, 1986. Higher Consciousness, (Pg 61) 18 Gerald Hammond, The Metaphysical Poets, Macmillan & Co, 1990. The Metaphysical Mode: Alteration of Time, (Pg 201) 19 Evelyn Underhill, The Life of the Spirit and The Life of Today, Mowbray, 1994. Chapter VI The Life of the Spirit in the Individual, (Pg 163) 20 Susanna Winkworth, Theologia Germanica, Macmillan & Co, 1874. Chapter XXVII, (Pg 92/93) 21 Thomas Merton, Seeds of Contemplation, Hollis and Carter, 1949. Chapter 26 - Contemplata Tradere, (Pg 182) 22 Oliver Davies, Meister Eckhart - Selected Writings, Penguin Books, 1994. Selected German Sermons: Sermon 24, (Pg 219) 23 Father M C D'Arcy, Thomas Aquinas - Selected Writings, J M Dent, 1950. 40. The Divine Names, (Pg 186 / 187) 24 Swami Paramananda, The Upanishads, Grange Books, 2004. The Threads of Union (excerpts from the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali) - Part Two: On Spiritual Disciplines: 2.1, (Pg 112) 25 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 1: Chapter IV - Early Mysticism in the Near East, (Pg 78) 26 The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1947. Ascent of Mount Carmel: Book II. Chapter XXVI, (Pg 196) 27 Martin Israel, The Pearl of Great Price, SPCK, 1988. 7 – Diversions, (Pg 68) 28 John Perry (ed), God, the Good, and Utilitarianism, Cambridge University Press, 2014. Chapter 4, Morality, happiness, and Peter Singer by John Hare 29 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. The Cloud of Unknowing: Chapter 28, (Pg 85) 30 Martin Israel, The Pearl of Great Price, SPCK, 1988. 4 - The Cloud and the Fire, (Pg 33) 31 Dion Fortune, The Cosmic Doctrine, Helios Book Service, 1966. Part II, (Pg 137) 32 Oliver Davies, Meister Eckhart - Selected Writings, Penguin Books, 1994. Selected German Sermons: Sermon 23, (Pg 213) 33 Richard Whitwell, J.P. de Caussade - A Spiritual Study, The Instant Publishers, undated. Chapter VI - The Alphabet of God, (Pg 36) 34 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 2: Chapter X - Some Early Sufi Mystics, (Pg 230) 35 Robert Llewelyn (ed), Julian - Woman of our Day, Darton Longman and Todd, 1986. Guide for the Inexpert Mystic by John Swanson OJN, (Pg 80)

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36 John Blofeld, The Wheel of Life, Rider & Co, 1959. Chapter 7 - Life in a Zen Monastery and the fruits of Meditation, (Pg 170) 37 Dion Fortune, The Cosmic Doctrine, Helios Book Service, 1966. Chapter XX: Influences of the Manifested Universe, (Pg 98) 38 Henrietta Leyser, Medieval Women, Phoenix, 2002. Chapter Nine; Female Monasticism, (Pg 189) 39 Teresa of Avila, Selections from The Interior Castle, Harper Collins, 2004. The Seventh Dwelling Places - Chapter 2, (Pg 122) 40 The assessment of a person's character or personality from his or her outer appearance. 41 William Johnston, Silent Music - The Science of Meditation, Fount, 1979. Part II: Consciousness. 5: Initiation, (Pg 63) 42 Rosamund S. Allen, Richard Rolle - The English Writings, SPCK, 1989. The Commandment, (Pg 145 / 146) 43 Kathleen E. Burne, The Life and Letters of Father Andrew, A.R.Mowbray, 1951. Part II: Letters: Extracts, (Pg 258) 44 A Monk of the Eastern Church, Orthodox Spirituality, SPCK, 1980. Chapter II: The essentials of Orthodox Spirituality, (Pg 22) 45 A Monk of the Eastern Church, Orthodox Spirituality, SPCK, 1980. Chapter II: The essentials of Orthodox Spirituality, (Pg 22) 46 Ursula King, Towards a New Mysticism, Collins, 1980. II Eastern and Western Religions in a Converging World. 6: Two roads to Unity: 'Road of the East' and 'Road of the West', (Pg 124) 47 Geoffrey Parrinder, Worship in the World's Religions, Association Press, 1961. Part II - India and Southern Asia: Chapter 6 - Theravada Buddhism, (Pg 101) 48 Geoffrey Parrinder, Worship in the World's Religions, Association Press, 1961. Part IV - The Near East and the West: Chapter 10 – Judaism, (Pg 182) 49 Geoffrey Parrinder, Worship in the World's Religions, Association Press, 1961. Part IV - The Near East and the West: Chapter 11 – Islam, (Pg 203) 50 Geoffrey Parrinder, Worship in the World's Religions, Association Press, 1961. Part IV - The Near East and the West: Chapter 12 – Christianity, (Pg 231) 51 Marcus Dods, How to Become Like Christ, Thos. Whittaker and also available on-line through Project Gutenberg, 1897. The Transfiguration, (Pg 55) 52 Andrew Harvey, Hidden Journey, Rider & Co, 1994. DOLPHIN CHILD – TEN, (Pg 223) 53 Father M C D'Arcy, Thomas Aquinas - Selected Writings, J M Dent, 1950. 1. Sermon for the Feast of S. Martin, (Pg 2) 54 Father M C D'Arcy, Thomas Aquinas - Selected Writings, J M Dent, 1950. 2. Sermon for the Feast of All Saints, (Pg 13) 55 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 1: Chapter V - Early Mysticism in the Middle East, (Pg 95 / 96) 56 Madame Guyon, Spiritual Torrents, Christian Books, 1984. Part II: Chapter XI, (Pg 98) 57 Madame Guyon, Spiritual Torrents, Christian Books, 1984. Part II: Chapter IX, (Pg 69 / 70) 58 Dom Aelred Graham, Christian Thought in Action, The Catholic Book Club, 1958. Chapter One: What Is the Spiritual Life? (Pg 13) 59 Robert Llewelyn (ed), Julian - Woman of our Day, Darton Longman and Todd, 1986. Guide for the Inexpert Mystic by John Swanson OJN, (Pg 80) 60 Julie Soskin, Transformation, College of Psychic Studies, 1995. Chapter 10 - Use Your Magic, (Pg 90)

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21.7: Mystical Experiences must be Experienced

Trying to explain the types of feeling and emotions which are associated with mystical experience cannot fully be conveyed through words. Take this simple description from the modern mystic Thomas Merton: 1

Sometimes these tides of joy are concentrated into strong touches, contacts of God that wake the soul with a bound of wonder and delight...

I can understand the words from Thomas but as to what he experienced I am at a loss to appreciate. It is this inability to comprehend that trigger many people to reject what the mystic is trying to express. Rudolf Steiner, in his book ‘The Way of Initiation’, indicates that the mystic or as he puts it the messenger of transcendental truths: 2

…is frequently confronted with people who reject him, because - unlike the scientist, for example - he can produce no proofs for his assertions, of such a nature as they can themselves understand.

From the same book is a reference from Annie Besant’s 'Death - and After?' which tries to put mystical experiences into context: 3

A seasoned African explorer would care but little for the criticisms passed on his report by persons who had never been thither; he might tell what he saw, describe the animals whose habits he had studied, sketch the country he had traversed, sum up its products and its characteristics. If he was contradicted, laughed at, set right, by untravelled critics, he would be neither ruffled nor distressed, but would merely leave them alone. Ignorance cannot convince knowledge by repeated asseveration of its nescience 4.

In ‘Religion and Science’, the British philosopher, logician, mathematician, historian, and social critic, Bertrand Russell uses quotations from a few academics to emphasise the same point. Firstly from the Scottish naturalist Sir J. Arthur Thomson: 5

"Science," he tells us, "cannot apply its methods to the mystical and spiritual." Professor J. S. Haldane holds that "it is only within ourselves, in our active ideals of the truth, right, charity, and beauty, and consequent fellowship with others, that we find the revelation of God." Dr. Malinowski says that "religious revelation is an experience which, as a matter of principle, lies beyond the domain of science."

Born about 600 years before Bertrand Russell, was the Italian medieval scholastic theologian and philosopher, Bonaventure. Even in those days he tended to dismiss the machinations of scientists and suggested that a very simple and direct approach was needed: 6

If the highest wisdom here upon earth is obtainable only in mystical union with God, why then should one care about scientific activity with its heavy burden of methodological thinking and its detours of reasoning? Is not the straightest way to it found in the way of Saint Francis, loving God in all simplicity, stripping oneself of all earthly things and affections in order to be free to fly away to union of love

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with God that is a knowledge by tasting.

Tasting? This brings to mind what I call the liquorice syndrome. As a child, living with my widowed mother behind the shop that she ran, I developed a taste for ‘kali and Spanish juice’. Let me explain; ‘kali’ is a synonym for tangy lemon crystals and ‘Spanish juice’ is a very hard refined stick of liquorice. Sucking the liquorice once dipped into the lemon crystals is a taste to savour – especially for a young boy. I have tried to tell others of the real taste extravaganza which bursts onto the palate during this feast but without success. In fact, can you imagine trying to describe the taste of liquorice to someone who has never seen or savoured it in their life? In the Paradise section of Dante’s Divine Comedy comes the following: 7

"O well-created spirit, who in the rays Of life eternal dost the sweetness taste Which being untasted ne'er is comprehended,

I know Dante was not referring to liquorice but to mystical experiences. This metaphor of taste was also used by the 12 th century Benedictine monk William of St Thierrry whose reference to Psalm 43:8 started as: 8

Flavour is in the tasting, and no one can worthily tell of the divine savouring unless he has merited to taste God. 'Taste and see how gracious the Lord is,'

From ‘The School of Charity’ by the mystical author Evelyn Underhill comes another Biblical reference: 9

"Let us press on to perfection", says the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews, "because we have tasted of the heavenly gift and powers of the world to come."

About 300 years after St Paul’s epistle, the Egyptian Christian monk and hermit St Macarius exclaimed: 10

No one knows how to speak of the sweetness of honey without having first known what it is to taste it.

...and using his knowledge of Sufism, Idries Shah wrote in ‘The Commanding Self’: 11

'Who tastes, knows' is a Sufi saying. Equally, whoever does not taste, does not know.

We can then sympathise with the professor of historical theology B A Gerrish who, in his treatise about the German theologian and philosopher Schleiermacher, wrote: 12

It is easy to see why Schleiermacher placed on the title page of 'The Christian Faith' a motto from Anselm: 'He who has not experienced will not understand.'

And, as a consequence of his Near Death Experience the surgeon Dr Eben Alexander was minded to explain that: 13

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The universe is so constructed that to truly understand any part of its many dimensions and levels, you have to become a part of that dimension . Or, stated a little more accurately, you have to open yourself to an identity with that part of the universe that you already possess, but which you may not have been conscious of.

Even the mystics understand that most people will not understand what they are trying to tell them. On this, Angela of Foligno wrote, around the end of the 13 th century, that God: 14

…presses the soul to Himself so sweetly and so lovingly that I don't believe that anyone in the world could believe it, unless they had this experience.

This is exactly as the priest Martin Israel believed: 15

Experience alone confirms that testimony.

The affirmations that the mystics make and the statements of their veracity in no way counter the inability of others to understand. According to Evelyn Underhill the underlying experiences are indescribable: 16

It is an experience which is independent of, and often precedes, any explanation or rationalisation we may choose to make of it: and no one, as a matter of fact, takes any real interest in the explanation, unless he has had some form of the experience.

This difficulty is compounded by the different cultures, backgrounds and languages. Anyone who tries to understand the attempts of the mystic to convey their experiences will therefore be conditioned by the totality of their previous experience. Evelyn Underhill recognised this about such people declared that their: 17

...experience and its interpretation are, then, inevitably conditioned by this apperceptive mass 18 .

How we are conditioned by our environment in the ways we try to interpret mystical experiences of others was articulated by the Indian philosopher and statesman Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan: 19

Something is directly experienced, but it is unconsciously interpreted in the terms of the tradition in which the individual is trained. The frame of reference which each individual adopts is determined by heredity and culture.

The tendency, therefore, to dismiss the experiences of the mystics because they are not easily understandable is rife. I have seen debates where things I have actually experienced are dismissed as being fallacious on the basis that they have not been experienced by the dissenter. The English priest Father Andrew, for whom I have the greatest respect, tried to explain this phenomenon: 20

Again, it is a common mistake that because we cannot understand, a thing is not understandable. It is not our minds that think, but we who think with our minds, and therefore since both we and our minds may be very defective it is a very small argument against the truth of something or the validity of something that a group of people do not believe it or feel the reality of it.

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In a different letter, and many years before the one above, Father Andrew tried to impress the joy and value of personal experience: 21

...spiritual experience is really more real to me than any other experience - though, frankly, I kick against the exactions it has demanded of me very often, I must go on offering my results in that search to other people, although I am not very anxious to hear other people talking in what I feel to be an unoriginal and meretricious way. When I say 'unoriginal,' I mean based upon what they have read, and not what they have experienced.

It is worth pointing out that, whilst you may do everything you can to create the right environment in which to be subjected to mystical experiences, they are given by a ‘higher power’ and are somewhat outside your control. Whilst reading Martin Conway’s ‘The Undivided Vision’ I came across a phrase which describes this well: 22

You cannot choose to fall in love or make a scientific discovery: they happen to you, even if what you have or have not done previously will make a decisive difference.

No matter how these experiences occur, to those who do sense them they are real; more real than life itself. From ‘Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man’, the mystic Frederick Happold wrote: 23

Yet the mystical is real. It can be felt. Though it can neither be described adequately in rational categories nor spoken about 'meaningfully', it can, in a real sense, be 'known'.

So don’t be put off by unfavourable comments, plough your spiritual furrow as hard and as deep as you can and await whatever transpires. In those times of contemplation when life becomes still and your mind is unfocussed, mystical experiences will unfold and inspirations, undiscovered truths and absolute joy will be yours.

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1 Thomas Merton, Seeds of Contemplation, Hollis and Carter, 1949. Chapter 27 - Pure Love, (Pg 192) 2 Rudolf Steiner, The Way of Initiation, Theosophical Publishing Society, 1912. The Way of Initiation: 1 - The Superphysical World and its Gnosis, (Pg 43) 3 Rudolf Steiner, The Way of Initiation, Theosophical Publishing Society, 1912. The Way of Initiation: 1 - The Superphysical World and its Gnosis, (Pg 44 / 45) 4 Lack of knowledge 5 Bertrand Russell, Religion and Science, Oxford University Press, 1960. Chapter VII: Mysticism, (Pg 175) 6 Bonaventure, The Journey of the Mind to God, Hackett, 1993. Notes: Chapter Seven - Note 172, (Pg 70) 7 Dante Alighieri, Divine Comedy, Capella, 2008. Paradiso Canto III, (Pg 294) 8 William of St Thierrry, On the Nature and Dignity of Love, Mowbray, 1956. Chapter IX - A Taste for Holy Things, (Pg 42) 9 Evelyn Underhill, The School of Charity, Longmans, Green and Co, 1934. Part III - Chapter IX - The World to Come, (Pg 101) 10 'Reader', Features of the Church Fathers, Heath Cranton Limited, 1935. Second Century and Onwards: St. Macarius, (Pg 58) 11 Idries Shah, The Commanding Self, Octagon Press, 1994. Sufi Thought, experience and teaching, (Pg 2) 12 B A Gerrish, A Prince of the Church: Schleiermacher and the Beginnings of Modern Theology, SCM Press, 1984. The Christ of Faith, (Pg 38) 13 Dr Eben Alexander, Proof of Heaven, Piatkus, 2014. Chapter 33: The Enigma of Consciousness, (Pg 156 / 157) 14 Angela of Foligno, Memorial, DS Brewer, 1999. The Memorial of Angela of Foligno - The Fifth Supplementary Step, (Pg 62) 15 Martin Israel, The Pearl of Great Price, SPCK, 1988. 8 - The Dark Night of Faith, (Pg 76) 16 Evelyn Underhill, The Life of the Spirit and The Life of Today, Mowbray, 1994. Chapter I: The Characters of Spiritual Life, (Pg 4) 17 Evelyn Underhill, The Life of the Spirit and The Life of Today, Mowbray, 1994. Chapter I: The Characters of Spiritual Life, (Pg 15) 18 apperceptive mass is the whole of a person's previous experience that is used in understanding a new idea 19 Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, Unwin, 1980. Chapter III : Religious Experience and its Affirmations - 5. Experience and the variety of expressions, (Pg 78) 20 Kathleen E. Burne, The Life and Letters of Father Andrew, A.R.Mowbray, 1951. Part II: Letters: To a Religious, Southern Rhodesia, September 16th, 1932, (Pg 113 / 114) 21 Kathleen E. Burne, The Life and Letters of Father Andrew, A.R.Mowbray, 1951. Part II: Letters: To Spiritual Children (Various): To Miss B. June 12, 1924, (Pg 168 / 169) 22 Martin Conway, The Undivided Vision, SCM Press, 1966. Chapter Three - Where are we headed?: History, (Pg 58) 23 F C Happold, Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man, Pelican Books, 1966. Introduction, (Pg 17)

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21.8: Mystical Experiences and the Spirit World

Mystical experiences come in all shapes and sizes. No two people will have exactly the same experience nor will they interpret similar experiences in the same way. There are, however, two primary types which I have discovered in the writings of the mystics. Firstly, those intuitive glimpses of life, spirituality and truths, and secondly those feelings where the mystic ‘knows’ he is with a higher power; in other words, those experiences where spiritual knowledge is imparted and those where just ‘being’ prevails. These are not mutually exclusive occurrences; they can happen at the same time.

Both of these events have one aspect in common; the Spirit World. As England was coming to terms with the consequences of the battle of Hastings, across the channel Bernard of Clairvaux, a French abbot and the primary builder of the reforming Cistercian monastic order, wrote that: 1

There are also those who, like the angelic messengers (through whom and with whom God operates), are willing to do whatever God wants them to do.

The importance of this quotation lies in the parentheses: angels and spirits are commissioned to act as agents of God. It is through our acceptance of this that we can be inspired. This information was given to us through a well known teaching spirit, White Eagle: 2

For willingness to open to the influence of the angels also means willingness to accept God's will rather than one's own...

The implication of this is that it is likely that the ‘voice of God’ comes, in fact, from one of the higher spirits. Thus, when a mystic refers to receiving messages from God, it is an angel or a spirit that they are ‘hearing’. An example of this comes from the ‘The Book of Margery Kempe’, the first autobiography in the English language. In it Margery records that she heard a voice saying: 3

Go forth, daughter, in the name of Jesus, for I am the spirit of God...

‘Hearing’ in this sense is not through the physical ear but through either clairaudience or, more likely, through a ‘knowing’. Communication with spirits often is like a telepathic link whereby thoughts are transferred from one to the other. In this way, the transmitter is not seen but, for many, is felt and is often assumed to be God. This is the case in most mystical writings – I cannot image that the ineffable Deity would act personally but would always do so through appropriate agents. So that when you read such as in P. Franklin Chambers’ anthology of the works of Baron Von Hügel: 4

…religiously, the human soul, upon the whole, in the long run, in its richest developments, certainly, I think, requires not a half-way house for it on its way to God, but God Himself to come down to it, not half way but the whole way.

…it is a higher spirit that reaches down to us. The implication is that union with God is really a union with one or more of the higher spirits and with the Spirit World environment. This means that whenever this relationship is read then it needs to re-interpreted in this

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:34:48 21.8 Mystical Experiences and the Spirit World Page 2 of 16 novel way. We can extend this idea such that in Evelyn Underhill’s ‘The House of the Soul’ we have the following passage: 5

‘You seek,’ says De Caussade, ‘the secret of union with God. There is no other secret but to make use of the material God gives us.’ That material is mixed, like the environment in which we find ourselves.

Where we can view the words of the 18 th century French Jesuit priest and writer Père De Caussade as indicating that the material that we have been given in this life not only includes our characteristics, etc., but also the potential ability to develop the link with our guardian angels and spirit guides – our inspirers. These entities are always with us as implied by the Indian spiritual teacher Swami Paramananda when discussing the Isa Upanishad: 6

They who have true conception of God are never separated from Him. They exist in Him and He in them.

This proximity of God (or his agents) was referred to as far back as the 10 th century BC. At this time the Levite Asaph wrote the 73 rd Psalm which includes: 7

So foolish was I, and ignorant; I was as a beast before Thee, Nevertheless I am continually with Thee: Thou hast holden me by my right hand. Thou shalt guide me with Thy counsel, And afterward receive me to glory. Whom have I in heaven but Thee? And there is non upon the earth that I desire beside Thee

Being close to those in the spirit world has been implied by more modern mystics. The monk Thomas Merton revealed that: 8

The closer we are to God, the closer we are to those who are close to Him.

In fact I would turn this sentence on its head and say that the closer we are to the Spirit World the closer we are to God. In a similar vein, Rosamund S. Allen remarked, in her introduction to Richard Rolle's Latin writings: 9

In commenting on holy scripture Rolle felt himself to be inspired by God: 'Divinitus didici quod dico': By inspiration I have learned what I am saying.

This is the essence of the spiritual life which, according to Evelyn Underhill: 10

…is rooted and grounded in a hidden world.

In another book of hers, ‘The Essentials of Mysticism’ she also stresses that the mystics themselves: 11

…really tap a source of vitality higher than that with which other people have contact.

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It is through close contact with your guardian angels, spirit guides and their helpers that you can receive intuitive knowledge. Many mystics do not understand or recognise the existence of their helping spirits and therefore attribute all they receive as coming from God. In the 14 th century anonymous treatise ‘Theologia Germanica’ we are told that man need not teach mystics: 12

…what they are to do or abstain from; for their Master, that is, the Spirit of God, shall verily teach them what is needful for them to know.

The link that many Christian based mystics have with the Spirit World is perceived to be Jesus the Nazarene. For some, this may be the case for others it could be one of the other higher spirits. One such person is Teresa of Avila who described herself as one whom: 13

…the Lord gives tenderness of devotion and holy inspirations and light on everything.

Inspirations which emanate from the Spirit World and touch each of us - providing we can attune ourselves to receive them – have been recognised for thousands of years. In ‘The Gospel of the Essenes’, in particular the ‘Essene Book of Moses’, into the mouth of Jesus the Nazarene are put the following: 14

Only through the communions With angels of the Heavenly Father, Will we learn to see the unseen, To hear that which cannot be heard, And to speak the unspoken word.

This is a powerful statement. When I first recognised inspirational thoughts, I did not associate them with the Spirit World. It was only many years later, when I wanted to develop my spirituality, that I realised what I had received and that I could continue to do so. Awareness is the key as described by Andrew Harvey: 15

My first instinct was often terror, but with the Light came Knowledge. The Divine Light was now operating on me to teach me directly...

Once you are aware of such possibilities of communication, albeit through intuitive thought, and the potential that you have for it, then your joy seems unsurpassable. In Baron Von Hügel’s biography by Franklin Chambers, it is noted that: 16

Nor is human personality a self-contained closed system; it is beset with influences flowing from without and streaming across experience, stabbing the spirit broad awake or disturbing it with 'the joy of elevated thought'.

This, as Martin Israel remarked, typifies a mystic, and: 17

...the hall-mark of real mysticism is intuitive knowledge.

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This idea of intuition, so we are told by a monk of the Eastern Orthodox Church, was introduced into the early Church by Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite as the notion 'mystical theology' which he used to refer to: 18

...a supernatural and unspeakable intuition...

...which is the only real route to accumulate spiritual knowledge. It cannot be gained just through reading and study but through the direct link with Spirit. When describing the nature and meaning of mysticism, Margaret Smith stated that: 19

...mystic knowledge which is the result of intuition, not of acquired learning.

This is not to say that learning is unimportant. We need to use our reasoning ability and intellect to bring together all that we currently know with what we are receiving from Spirit. In this way our total knowledge base expands. Without spiritual inspiration our knowledge is not always useful; with it and together with inspired truths they become a driving force towards our objectives. According to the academic Ursula King, the French mystic and palaeontologist Teilhard de Chardin, in ‘Letters from a Traveller’, saw mysticism as: 20

…the only power capable of synthesising the riches accumulated by other forms of human activity.

It is through this process that we become enlightened or as Evelyn Underhill would say ‘illuminated’ which she says: 21

…is really an enormous development of the intuitional life at high levels.

Such inspiration can come to each of us through many different routes. W. H. Dyson recalls the phrases that the 18 th century itinerant Quaker preacher John Woolman repeatedly used to describe his sense of direct guidance and help: 22

"I was taught to watch the pure opening; the opening of truth; the movings of His Holy Spirit; a motion of love; baptised into a feeling sense of all conditions; I found drawings in my mind; I found a concern on that account; I felt a stop in my mind; my mind was frequently covered with inward prayer".

…and as Dyson went on to note:

These and many others sayings are the more significant because they are simple and unstudied expressions of experience.

Whilst some of my own inspirations have come at odd times, most occur during my contemplative periods. This seems to agree with the 11 th century Persian Sufi al-Ghazali’s view. According to Margaret Smith he writes of: 23

…the stages of the mystic experience which leads, through contemplation, to the unveiling of the Blessed Vision. The inclination of the Sufis, he says, is towards the knowledge which is the result of inspiration not study, therefore they are not eager to study human knowledge, nor to assimilate what authors have written, but they

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say that the Way is the choice of contemplation, and the annihilation of blameworthy qualities and the cutting off of all ties, and concerning oneself completely with God...

We need these inspired thoughts in order to develop our potentiality. We probably cannot spiritually progress without them. This need was expressed by the American philanthropist John Templeton: 24

On our daily upward struggle towards communion and union with our Creator, we need all the inspirations and revelations which every child of God can give us.

…and as often as required we need, following the advice of clergyman and academic Morton Kelsey’s, to: 25

…contact the reality of the spiritual world.

And we can do this by treating them as friends. Lumsden Barkway in his anthology of Evelyn Underhill’s works describes the sort of relationship needed between mystic and spirit: 26

'Secrets,' says St Catherine of Sienna, 'are revealed to a friend who has become one thing with his friend, and not to a servant.'

This was expanded by the philosopher Blair Reynolds in an article published by the Journal of Natural and Social Philosophy: 27

Mystics, then, often claim a noetic 28 quality for their ecstasies; the level of empathic identification they attain with the universe is so intimate that great secrets are revealed to them, just as secrets are shared with a friend who has become one thing with his or her friend.

It is a relationship between two like entities. This is an echo of Meister Eckhart’s thoughts as reproduced by Stephen Connor: 29

As the authorities say that only between equals can unity be produced.

I think that ‘equal’ refers to objectives as opposed to inherent knowledge. Thus in coming together with like minds a spirit can provide so much knowledge and understanding as reported in ‘Heaven a Dance’: 30

We know a thing only by uniting with it; by assimilating it; by an interpenetration of it and ourselves. It gives itself towards us, just insofar as we give ourselves to it.

So in our relationship with God, or an agent, we must retain our personality, our individuality for without it, as Morton Kelsey noticed, we will be destroyed: 31

Plotinus looked for a union with the Divine in which one's own dim light was absorbed by the centre of light. Plato, on the other hand, saw love as the final process, and this takes two, a person and God. Love means relationship with another, and there can be no love where the ego on one side is dissolved or

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annihilated.

The ultimate goal of our soul is union with our Creator, and our friends can help us along the way as the 14 th century English mystic Richard Rolle believed: 32

...raise your affection to heaven so that you may find comfort among the angels and saints who will assist you on your way to God...

Whilst there are some events and occurrences that we are immediately aware of, I’m sure that there are also many of which we are oblivious and yet which may have an impact on us. This latter point was made in the 16 th century by the Carmelite priest and mystic by St John of the Cross: 33

We say that the soul works not at all, not because it understands not, but because it understands things not discovered by its own industry and receives only that which is given to it, as comes to pass in the illuminations and enlightenments or inspirations of God.

So perhaps our soul is able to understand and learn things which our mind is not able to discern. Again from the writings of Margery Kempe she puts the following words on the lips of her Lord: 34

For in nothing, daughter, that you might do on earth might you better please me than allow me to speak to you in your soul...

A similar notion is embedded in the letter XVI from Père De Causade to Sister Marie-Anne de Rosen: 35

This indistinct knowledge or rather this lively sentiment of the immensity of God is an enriching operation of Grace. It produces and leaves in the soul very salutary effects which no one can explain in detail and on which we should not speculate too much, or even dwell too much unless God inclines us to do so.

I’m not really sure that I can get my head around the fact that our soul can learn things which we, using all our other abilities, cannot recognise. It is more likely that inspirations which we do appreciate can, somehow, affect our soul, or even that everything spiritual that we learn from our guides, etc., passes through our soul first. This was implied in the communication from a spirit guide through the mediumship of Beatrice Russell: 36

Therefore, you will see that we are able to draw through our (soul), from the very Fount of Love itself.

I think that I would, at this stage of my understanding, prefer the simple idea that, as we learn, our characteristics change and so does our soul; our deepest personality. It is natural also that we can only accept those ideas and concepts which build upon those notions of which we have a sound and robust basis within our understanding. As I’ve written before, you cannot teach calculus to someone who does not appreciate algebra. If we again use a quotation from Beatrice Russell to support the fact that spiritual truths: 37

...are not matters of the intellect, but of Divine Interpretation, and will be given to

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you in the proportion that you can assimilate them.

Father Andrew, too, realised the limitations of our abilities particularly with regard to spiritual matters: 38

The only real victories are spiritual victories. The only real defeats are spiritual defeats. However much things may appear to be won or lost on the material or physical plane, it is the spiritual sphere behind the outward appearances that is the sphere of reality. Prophets and saints have always known this. We ask God that to the extent that we are capable of we may both know this truth and act upon it.

The implication is that spiritual is real and the physical is unreal. I do not accept that premise; both realities exist, and it is our role to balance them appropriately. Most of us have responsibilities that we cannot or ought not to shirk and yet it is our innermost desire to follow the spiritual pathway destined for us. We can do both provided the right point of balance is reached. According to Iulia de Beausobre, it took Serafim of Sarov close on 67 years to achieve this balance: 39

At sixty-seven Serafim had, at last, attained to a perfect blending of spirit and body, to a simultaneous life on two levels.

I’m sure that I will not be able to achieve this level of perfection, yet I can but try. It was suggested in an encyclical letter from Pope Pius XI that, provided we keep ourselves free from physical desires, we will achieve the best eternal result: 40

…in the midst of the world each one can conduct himself in a manner suitable to the salvation of his soul, provided he keeps free from the spirit of the world.

Put another way, we have to centre our attention on matters of the Spirit and put to the rear all thoughts of materialism. In his introduction to the book ‘Musings of a Chinese Mystic’ Lionel Giles, then an assistant at the British Museum, wrote: 41

And to this end every taint of self-consciousness must be purged away, the mind must be freed from its own criteria, and all one's trust must be placed in natural intuition.

Developing our intuition comes at a price. It is a difficult journey; the ups and downs of a mystically focussed life must be carried with fortitude. The events in our lives are there to enhance our spirituality not to trip us up, and our spirit friends walk by our sides supporting and helping wherever they can. Knowing this, the Byzantine Christian monk St Symeon the New Theologian, as reported in the ‘Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart’, explained: 42

God does not allow those who strive towards Him with all their zeal to fall completely off this ladder [spiritual progress], but seeing them exhausted, helps and supports them, stretching out the hand of His power and leading them to Himself. Thus He helps them, both openly and secretly, with and without their knowledge, until, having climbed the ladder, they approach Him and, totally uniting with Him, forget all earthly things and abide with Him...

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…and from St John of the Cross: 43

You can be certain of this: He will provide one of two things for His friends. Either they will receive an abundance of all they need or He will give them the physical stamina and a patient heart to endure want. What difference does it make which he does? It is all the same to the true contemplative.

With all this support we can be confident that, provided we play our part, we will achieve our spiritual goals. That does not mean that we can act like a bull in a china shop. Our progress must be careful and slow and sure, and rest assured that we will be given the right inspiration at the right time. God apparently told us, through the writing of the 15 th century Augustinian monk Thomas A Kempis, that: 44

My son, Ever trust your case to Me, I will arrange it in its time. Wait for My ordering of it, And you will feel the good of it.

Let your life be taken in measured strides and, through inspiration, truths will blossom in your mind. Visions and intuitive thoughts can all lead to an unfolding understanding which will strengthen your spiritual awareness and allow you to set everything in the right context both conceptually and in terms of your combined spiritual and physical lives. F. C. Happold recognised that our vision sharpens as truths are revealed: 45

In the true mystic there is an extension of normal consciousness, a release of latent powers and a widening of vision, so that aspects of truth unplumbed by the rational intellect are revealed to him.

Al Ghazzali also believed in the opening of our eyes through inspirations given by our supporting spirits: 46

Besides, the light of knowledge is not made to shine upon the heart of man except through (the instrument of) the angels, and it is not possible for any man to have any communication with God except through revelation or through a veil or through a messenger when God sends and instructs to declare His will. Similarly, whatever knowledge is sent by the grace of God to the human heart is transmitted by the angels who have been entrusted with this responsibility.

…and what a responsibility it is. We must respect this and do what we can to use what we are given correctly. In the same way, it is part of the guiding spirit’s role to recognise the best ways in which we can accept new truths. Henry Suso, a passionate 14 th century German mystic, according to Evelyn Underhill, gained new knowledge through visions which were given to him: 47

In Suso's life these symbolic visions abound: he seems to have lived always on the verge of such a world of imagination, and to have imbibed truth most easily in this form. Thus: "It happened one morning that the Servitor saw in a vision that he was surrounded by a troop of heavenly spirits. He therefore asked one of the most radiant amongst these Princes of the Sky to show him how God dwelt in his soul.

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The angel said to him, 'Do but fix your eyes joyously upon yourself, and watch how God plays the game of love within your loving soul.' "

In Al Ghazzali’s ‘The Book of Knowledge’ we are given an insight into how he perceived inspiration arrives: 48

As to those things which were revealed to the prophets, some were revealed through sight and some through the insight, but both are called 'seeing'.

…and St Augustine, at the end of the 4 th century, just differentiated the mechanism from that of the five senses: 49

...and I awoke in Thee, and saw Thee infinite, but in another way, and this sight was not derived from the flesh.

No matter by what mechanism spirits convey the truths to you, it is important not to place too much weight on the mechanism. If you do, then the temptation is to try to develop the process rather than looking at the end results. Mystical experiences are far more important than developing any psychic powers, as F. C, Happold noted, and such experiences: 50

…must, moreover, be clearly distinguished from such phenomena as clairvoyance, telepathy and extra-sensory perception, which are better termed psychic.

…and Evelyn Underhill warned: 51

The transcendental faculties may become aware of this world [the spirit world] ; only, in the case of the mystic, to pass through it as quickly as they can.

The warning to resist psychic development as an aim in life was also issued by Martin Israel: 52

By contrast, the forces that emanate from the purely psychic level exalt a person above his stature in life and separate him from his fellows in a void of illusion that he mistakes for spiritual reality. His end is solitary, whereas the end of the spiritually based person is in mystical union with a transfigured world in the glory of God.

It is part of the mystical process to set the psychic to one side, as W. H. Dyson stated, no matter through what route the experiences arrive: 53

Voices and vision, and the abnormal generally, have no attraction for him [the mystic] . He knows the danger in these, and ... knows how to bring all these to the test.

Arthur Ford, a 20 th century American medium, used a paragraph from a contemporary British thinker Paul L Higgins to stress the need to circumnavigate psychic phenomena: 54

In the very process of the mystical approach there are very often psychic phenomena. Most of the great mystics demonstrated powers we identify as psychic and had experiences which embraced manifestations generally considered

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paranormal or extrasensory. .. The great mystics have warned against seeking simply psychic experiences; these great souls have again and again stressed the spiritual life...

So climbing the ladder of increasing experience, the mystic passes through the stages of psychic phenomena. This gradation was referred to by Martin Israel: 55

There are then gradations from the trivialities of much mundane psychic communication to the world-transcending vista of the mystic.

…and it is to the latter to which we aim. Whatever inspirations that we are fortunate to receive, recognise, and understand we have to be very careful to ‘test’ the validity of them before total acceptance; we must be discerning. The words intuition and trust need to be taken carefully. Richard Rolle knew this as a real and continuing problem: 56

Sometimes, as well, the Devil tempts men and women who are solitary and alone in a way which is ingenious and sly. He transforms himself into the appearance of an angel of light and materialises in front of them saying that he is one of God's angels come to encourage them, and in this way deceives silly people. But those who are discerning, and refuse to put their faith immediately in every spirit, but instead ask the advice of well-informed people, these he cannot dupe. ...don't give credence to appearances too quickly, until you are certain of the truth.

For Evelyn Underhill well recognised this and said: 57

...so too the mystical consciousness is perpetually open to invasion from the lower centres.

It is often difficult to determine whether an inspired thought is true or not. St John of the Cross wrote that the mystic: 58

…will often think that what comes but from his fancy pertains to God; and often, too, that what is of God is of the devil, and what is of the devil is of God.

There are occasions when a revelation concerns a future event or happening. He, St John of the Cross, advised us to be wary of placing too much trust in them: 59

And herein lies a great delusion, for revelations or locutions which are of God do not always turn out as men expect or as they imagine inwardly. And thus they must never be believed or trusted blindly, even though they are known to be revelations or answers or sayings of God.

…he went on to explain: 60

...for God often makes statements founded upon creatures and their effects, which are changeable and liable to fail, for which reason the statements which are founded upon them are liable also to be changeable and to fail; for, when one thing depends on another, if one fails, the other fails likewise. And thus there is no reason to think that, because sayings and revelations come from God, they must invariably come to pass in their apparent sense, especially

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when they are bound up with human causes which may vary, change, or alter.

In reflecting on these problems he also said that his intention in setting these difficulties before the budding mystic is only to: 61

… instruct the understanding herein, that it may not be hindered or impeded as to union with Divine Wisdom by the good visions, neither may be deceived by those which are false.

So don’t be thrown off from continuing on your spiritual journey.

Intuitions are vitally important to your progress as are another type of mystical experience; where the mystic, primarily during contemplation, meditation or prayer, increase their vibrations to such a degree that they seem to reach and merge with one of the spiritual planes. According to Peter Toon, Jonathan Edwards records under the heading of Tuesday December 21, 1742 how he entered into imageless prayer: 62

God enabled me to pray with as much spirituality and sweetness as I have done for some time; my mind seemed to be unclothed of sense and imagination, and was in a measure let into the immaterial world of spirits.

This fusion with the Spirit World, which is considered to be ‘higher’ than the world we currently inhabit, was referred to by Teilhard de Chardin as he was describing the ‘seer’, another name for the 'mystic', as: 63

...immersed in a universal Milieu, higher than that which contains the restlessness of ordinary, sensible apprehended life.

…and Shankara Acharya used many other words to describe this union of mystic and Spirit: 64

Those who are illumined know this as that in which knower, knowing and known are one, which is endless, above differentiation, absolute, partless, pure consciousness, the highest Being.

This complete integration leads the mystic, not to a specific piece of knowledge or truth, but to a feeling of ‘knowing everything’ as described by Morton Kelsey: 65

Sometimes one has an imageless experience of sensing or knowing the meaning of this psychoid (spiritual) world.

This is the level of my mystical experiences. At the time I never considered the mechanism through which this happened, but my current hypothesis is that my spiritual vibrations closed in on those of one of the Spirit World planes – one at least one ‘higher’ than the earth plane. There have been some previous discussion on such a mechanism and one who has been involved is White Eagle who said: 66

When a soul has learnt to vibrate harmoniously with all forms of life, then it has attained mastership.

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In this case, I think ‘all forms’ includes those spirits in the afterlife. This equalising of energy was also the view of the 5 th century Pope, St Leo, who wrote: 67

God so united Himself to us and us to Him, that the descent of God to the human level was at the same time the ascent of man to the Divine level.

Lifting oneself to the level of the Spirit is one of the implicit objectives of the mystics or seers or rsis 68 as explained by Radhakrishnan: 69

The truths of the rsis are not evolved as the result of logical reasoning or systematic philosophy but they are the products of spiritual intuition, drti or vision. The rsis are not so much the authors of the truths recorded in the Vedas as the seers who were able to discern the eternal truths by raising their life-spirit to the plane of the universal spirit.

This provides a unity; a union of spirit with spirit. This theme has been echoed on many occasions by Meister Eckhart: 70

In the Kingdom of Heaven all is in all, all is one, and all is ours.

…or as, according to Ladislaus Boros, the Swiss born 20 th century Jesuit priest Hans Urs von Balthasar attempted to show that: 71

God's revelation happens in an 'overpowering of the spirit'

All these statements seem to hinge on the fact that the mystic through raising his or her vibrations seems to merge with the Spirit World thereby getting the feeling of complete unity with ‘All That Is’. In his excellent book ‘Nurslings of Immortality, the English physicist and psychic researcher Raynor Johnson expressed a similar view: 72

We have frequently expressed the view that there are different significant levels of reality in the universe. It seems to me a most significant thing that the mystics, in their penetration to the higher levels, return to tell us of the all-pervading sense of unity.

It is not surprising, therefore, that mystical experiences are as difficult to understand as they are to describe. Teresa of Avila highlighted this: 73

Fourth, the words (from God to the soul) are very different, and with one of them much is comprehended. Our intellect could not compose them so quickly. Fifth, together with the words, in a way I would know how to explain, there is often given much more to understand than is ever dreamed of without words.

An even better description of ineffability comes from the ‘Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart’: 74

When men progressing in spiritual perfection are enlightened and illumined in their minds, they have inward vision of the glory of the Lord and are inwardly taught by Divine grace knowledge after knowledge, ascending from contemplation of existing things to knowledge of things which are indeed above everything existing.

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Men approaching perfection, who as yet see only partially the infinity (of spiritual things) and are aware of the incomprehensibility of what they see, are filled with awe and wonder.

Perhaps we ought to look at some of these mystical experiences as a foretaste of the afterlife. Francis de Sales, an early 17 th century Bishop of Geneva, thought just that: 75

...so whilst we are on this sea of mortal life, we often receive feelings of sweetness and delight, which without doubt give us a foretaste of that heavenly country to which we tend and aspire.

…and from the writings of the 11 th century scholar al-Hujwiri, one of the early Persian Sufis: 76

Now has the lover of God become like the sun shining in a cloudless sky, for he is dead to his own attributes and abiding in those of his Beloved. In the light of Love and Union he sees the glory of God and while still in this world penetrates into the mysteries of the world to come.

So those of us who have not been subject to such joy and beauty must try our best to understand the attempts of the mystics to describe their journey and experiences. William Johnston realised the difficulty that both sides of this divide have: 77

All [mystics] are striving to describe a dimension of psychic life which most of us rarely actuate because we live at a superficial level of awareness.

Maybe we should be spurred on to follow in the mystic’s footsteps with the extra revelations that we are given by them, or to paraphrase what Jalal-ud-Din Rumi, a renowned poet and mystic from 13 th century Persia, said: 78

… if you hear something that inspires you in what I am saying, realise that it comes from a state of passion and surrender, and realise that to understand it completely, you will have to enter into that passion and that surrender.

But again be critical in what you believe; never take anything mystical at its face value. Evelyn Underhill made us aware of this: 79

Apart from its content, then, ecstasy carries no guarantee of spiritual value. ... Its worth depends entirely on the objective value of that idea or intuition.

There is also another facet of our relationship with the Spirit World that is helpful to remember; they are with you not only to help but to protect as Pope Pius XII realised: 80

And not only do they [guardian angels] want to protect you from the dangers which waylay you throughout your journey: they are actually by your side, helping your souls as you strive to go ever higher in your union with God…

Let me leave you with one final quote from Evelyn Underhill’s book ‘Mysticism’: 81

This Absolute [God] is discerned by mystic intuition as the "End of Unity" in whom

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all diversities must cease…

Follow the mystical path to the very end, be inspired by spirit and lift your hearts to the level of those who have been assigned to support and protect you.

1 St Bernard of Clairvaux, The Love of God, Pickering & Inglis, 1983. Chapter III - Treatise on Grace and Free Choice, (Pg 49) 2 Walking with the Angels - A Path of Service, White Eagle Lodge Publishing Trust, 1998. Part One - 9. The Angelic Qualities of Humility and Simplicity, (Pg 66) 3 Margery Kempe, The Book of Margery Kempe, Penguin Books, 2004. Book I: Chapter 30, (Pg 112) 4 P. Franklin Chambers, Baron Von Hugel: Man of God. An introductory Anthology compiled with a biographical preface, Geoffrey Bles: The Centenary Press, 1946. An Introduction Anthology - Part Three: Religious - On the Need of a Mediator, (Pg 141) 5 Evelyn Underhill, The House of the Soul, Methuen & Co, 1929. Chapter III, (Pg 41) 6 Swami Paramananda, The Upanishads, Grange Books, 2004. Isa - Upanishad – XIV, (Pg 23) 7 Bible, Old Testament, Psalm 73, 22-25 8 Thomas Merton, No Man is an Island, Burns & Oates, 1997. 9: The Measure of Charity, (Pg 148) 9 Rosamund S. Allen, Richard Rolle - The English Writings, SPCK, 1989. Introduction: Rolle's Latin and English Writings, (Pg 42) 10 Evelyn Underhill, Concerning the Inner Life, Oneworld, 1999. Part One- The Heart of Personal Religion, (Pg 21) 11 Evelyn Underhill, The Essentials of Mysticism, Oneworld, 1999. The Mystic and the Corporate Life, (Pg 53) 12 Susanna Winkworth, Theologia Germanica, Macmillan & Co, 1874. Chapter XXX, (Pg 100) 13 Teresa of Avila, Way of Perfection, Sheed & Ward, 1984. Chapter XXXI, (Pg 133) 14 Edmond Bordeaux Szekely, The Gospel of the Essenes, C W Daniel Co, 1976. From the Essene Book of Moses: The Communions, (Pg 39) 15 Andrew Harvey, Hidden Journey, Rider & Co, 1994. DOLPHIN CHILD – NINE, (Pg 205) 16 P. Franklin Chambers, Baron Von Hugel: Man of God. An introductory Anthology compiled with a biographical preface, Geoffrey Bles: The Centenary Press, 1946. A Biographical Preface, (Pg 27) 17 Martin Israel, Summons to Life, Mowbray, 1982. Chapter 15: Mysticism and spirituality, (Pg 117)

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18 A Monk of the Eastern Church, Orthodox Spirituality, SPCK, 1980. Chapter 1: The Historical Development of Orthodox Spirituality, (Pg 10) 19 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 1: Chapter I - The Meaning and Nature of Mysticism, (Pg 1/2) 20 Ursula King, Towards a New Mysticism, Collins, 1980. I Unity of Life and Thought. 1: A Fundamental Vision of Faith 21 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter IV - The Illumination of the Self, (Pg 234) 22 Dyson, W.H, Studies in Christian Mystics, James Clarke, 1913. Chapter XII – Quakerism, (Pg 151) 23 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 2: Chapter IX - The Mystical Doctrines of Early Sufism, (Pg 213) 24 John M Templeton, The Humble Approach - Scientists Discover God, Collins, 1981. IX. The Benefits of Competition, (Pg 86) 25 Morton T Kelsey, The Other Side of Silence, SPCK, 1985. Part Four: The Use of Images in Meditation - 12. Silence Mysticism and Religious Experience, (Pg 136) 26 Lumsden Barkway, An Anthology of the Love of God (from the writings of Evelyn Underhill), Mowbray, 1953. IV The Spiritual Life: II Saints and Mystics, the exponents of Love: The Essential Link (Mysticism), (Pg 119) 27 R Blair Reynolds, Cosmos and History, Journal of Natural and Social Philosophy,Vol 1, #2, 2005. Ecstasy as World-affirming 28 In philosophy, noetics is a branch of metaphysical philosophy concerned with the study of mind and intellect. 29 Stephen J Connor, Everything as Divine, Paulist Press, 1996. Part I: Excerpts from Selected Sermons - Sermon 2, (Pg 8) 30 Brenda Blanch, Heaven a Dance - An Evelyn Underhill Anthology, Triangle, 1992. Mysticism, (Pg 38) 31 Morton T Kelsey, The Other Side of Silence, SPCK, 1985. Part Four: The Use of Images in Meditation - 12. Silence Mysticism and Religious Experience, (Pg 139) 32 Rosamund S. Allen, Richard Rolle - The English Writings, SPCK, 1989. The Commandment, (Pg 145) 33 The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1947. Ascent of Mount Carmel: Book II. Chapter XV, (Pg 128) 34 Margery Kempe, The Book of Margery Kempe, Penguin Books, 2004. Book I: Chapter 86, (Pg 251) 35 Algar Labouchere Thorold, The Spiritual Letters of Père De Causade, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1934. Book II - The exercise of the virtue of Self-abandonment, Letter XVI - to Sister Marie-Anne de Rosen, (Pg 66) 36 Beatrice Russell, Fragments of Truth from the Unseen. Unknown Publisher, 1951. Love, (Pg 9) 37 Beatrice Russell, Beyond the Veils through Meditation, Lincoln Philosophical Research Foundation, 1986. Right Meditation, (Pg 12) 38 Father Andrew SDC, In the Silence, A.R.Mowbray, 1951. The Eighty-Fourth Psalm: I. Confidence toward God, (Pg 104) 39 Iulia de Beausobre, Flame in the Snow - A Russian Legend, Fount, 1979. Part Two: Return Manward - The Simple Soul, (Pg 138) 40 Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Burns & Oates, 1948. Encyclical letter of Pope Pius XI, (Pg 5) 41 Chuang Tsu, Musings of a Chinese Mystic, John Murray, 1927. Introduction, (Pg 21) 42 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part One: St. Simeon The New Theologian - Practical and Theological Precepts: 106, (Pg 122) 43 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. The Cloud of Unknowing: Chapter 23, (Pg 79) 44 Thomas A Kempis, The Imitation of Christ, Elliot Stock, 1891. Book IV - Book of Inward Consolation, Chapter XXXIX 45 F C Happold, Mysticism - A Study and an Anthology, Penguin Books, 1971. The Study: 2. The Perennial Philosophy, (Pg 19) 46 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section V On the Properties of the Student and the Teacher, (Pg 126 / 127) 47 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter V - Voices and Visions, (Pg 278) 48 Al Ghazzali, The Book of Knowledge, SH. Muhammad Ashraf, 1991. Section VII On the Intellect .. (Pg 231) 49 The Confessions of S. Augustine, Seeley & Co, 1909. Book the Seventh, (XIV)

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50 F C Happold, Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man, Pelican Books, 1966. 13 The Idea of Intersection, (Pg 171) 51 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter VII - Mysticism and Magic, (Pg 156) 52 Martin Israel, The Pain That Heals, Hodder & Stoughton, 1981. Chapter 10: Vicarious Suffering, (Pg 106) 53 Dyson, W.H, Studies in Christian Mystics, James Clarke, 1913. Chapter IX - A Typical Mystic, (Pg 106) 54 Arthur Ford, Unknown but Known, Harper & Row, 1968. Chapter 11 : Developing Latent Psychic Ability, (Pg 149 / 150) 55 Martin Israel, Summons to Life, Mowbray, 1982. Chapter 13: The psychic faculty and the spiritual path, (Pg 104) 56 Rosamund S. Allen, Richard Rolle - The English Writings, SPCK, 1989. The Form of Living: Chapter 2, (Pg 158 / 159) 57 Evelyn Underhill, The Essentials of Mysticism, Oneworld, 1999. The Essentials of Mysticism, (Pg 29 / 30) 58 The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1947. Ascent of Mount Carmel: Book III. Chapter VIII, (Pg 242) 59 The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1947. Ascent of Mount Carmel: Book II. Chapter XVIII, (Pg 148) 60 The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1947. Ascent of Mount Carmel: Book II. Chapter XX, (Pg 158 and 160) 61 The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1947. Ascent of Mount Carmel: Book II. Chapter XVI, (Pg 132) 62 Peter Toon, Meditating as a Christian, Collins, 1991. Part Three: What is Involved. 14 Encountering, (Pg 149) 63 Ursula King, Towards a New Mysticism, Collins, 1980. II Eastern and Western Religions in a Converging World. 5: The search for Unity: From Monistic Pantheism to Mysticism, (Pg 113) 64 Shankara Acharya, The Crest Jewel of Wisdom, John M Watkins, 1964. The Crest Jewel of Wisdom - The Universe is Eternal, (Pg 42) 65 Morton T Kelsey, The Other Side of Silence, SPCK, 1985. Part Four: The Use of Images in Meditation - 12. Silence Mysticism and Religious Experience, (Pg 150) 66 Walking with the Angels - A Path of Service, White Eagle Lodge Publishing Trust, 1998. Part Two - 15. Vibrating in Harmony with the Planets, (Pg 113) 67 F C Happold, Mysticism - A Study and an Anthology, Penguin Books, 1971. The Study: 24. The Coinherence of Spirit and Matter, (Pg 114) 68 Rsis are unique figures in Indian culture with a distinct status 69 Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, Unwin, 1980. Chapter III : Religious Experience and its Affirmations - 3. Personal experience of God, (Pg 70) 70 Aldous Leonard Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy, Perennial, Harper Collins, 2004. Chapter IV: God in the World, (Pg 76) 71 Ladislaus Boros, Open Spirit, Search Press, 1974. Gregory and Beauty, (Pg 95) 72 Raynor Carey Johnson, Nurslings of Immortality, Pelegrin Trust, 1993. Chapter 10 -Light on Evil and Suffering: God and Evil, (Pg 224) 73 Teresa of Avila, Selections from The Interior Castle, Harper Collins, 2004. The Sixth Dwelling Places - Chapter 3, (Pg 91) 74 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part One: St. Simeon The New Theologian - Practical and Theological Precepts: 145, (Pg 131) 75 Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Burns & Oates, 1948. Fourth Part of the Introduction. Chapter XIII - Of Spiritual and Sensible Consolations .. (Pg 240) 76 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 2: Chapter IX - The Mystical Doctrines of Early Sufism, (Pg 203) 77 William Johnston, Silent Music - The Science of Meditation, Fount, 1979. Part IV: Intimacy. 14: Mystical friendship, (Pg 149) 78 Andrew Harvey, The Way of Passion, Souvenir Press, 2002. Chapter 2 - The Price of Adoration, (Pg 46) 79 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter VIII - Ecstasy and Rapture, (Pg 360) 80 Georges Huber, My Angel Will Go Before You, Four Courts Press, 2006. I believe in angels, (Pg 17) 81 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter V - Mysticism and Theology, (Pg 116)

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21.9: Mystical Experiences and Development

Many people have ‘spiritual experiences’. This fact was investigated during the end of Queen Victoria’s reign and, according to Carl Sagan, a very well respected American astronomer, astrophysicist, cosmologist, author, science populariser and science communicator in astronomy and natural sciences, came up with the following interesting information: 1

In 1894 The International Census of Waking Hallucinations was published in London. From that time to this, repeated surveys have shown that 10 to 25 percent of ordinary, functioning people have experienced, at least once in their lifetimes, a vivid hallucination - hearing a voice, usually, or seeing a form when there's no one there. More rarely, people sense a haunting aroma, or hear music, or receive a revelation that arrives independent of the senses. In some cases these become transforming personal events or profound religious experiences. Hallucinations may be a neglected low door in the wall to a scientific understanding of the sacred.

Currently, in May 2015, the UK population is not far off 64 million. Therefore, extending the mathematics from the Victorian data, there are at least 6.4 million people who have had some sort of spiritual experience. Each one of these individuals ought to be questioning why this happened and what does it mean for their beliefs. That is, it should be the trigger, at least, for spiritual investigation; the start of their awareness. I say this in concert with the London born mystic Henry Thomas Hamblin, who in ‘The Life of the Spirit’ wrote: 2

One glimpse of the higher, richer and fuller life of the Spirit: only one short experience of the power of [God] , makes it impossible for us ever to be satisfied with the baubles of the world...

It ought to put a different complexion and spin on our view of non-spiritual matters. The teacher, Abu, communicating from the Spirit World through the very fine deep trance mediumship of Walter Frederick Rickard, taught us that: 3

When man shall grow in spiritual stature, when he shall see glimpses and gleams of light which even now assail his eyes and insist upon the love of God, when he shall see that these things are in very truth the divine light which he should seek and to which he should turn his eyes….

This burgeoning awareness changes our perspectives of our existing life and thereby our emphasis on material matters dwindles. As the 14 th century English mystic Richard Rolle expressed it: 4

The soul which gives up the folly of evil love enters upon the narrow way. It is on this way that the foretaste of the life of heaven is experienced.

Having started on this spiritual developmental pathway then, I would suggest, the first port of call are the books which abound of all matters spiritual and mystical. Let your selection be guided by Spirit; your guide knows precisely what is best for you at this critical time. However, if you do wish to pursue your own spiritual journey, then you must take a very

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:35:19 21.9 Mystical Experiences and Development Page 2 of 12 proactive stance and, somehow, start to gain direct experience of Spirit as recommended by John Blofeld who studied the sages and mystics of the far East: 5

You must open the inner chamber of your mind and experience it there as you experience the sun's heat or water's wetness by direct perception!

Other than those who are born with sensitivity to Spirit, most of us start our spiritual journey having very small spiritual experiences. It is easy to disregard them but we do so at our spiritual peril. The Indian philosopher and statesman Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan recognised this: 6

However much we may quarrel about the implications of this kind of experience, we cannot question the actuality of the experience itself. While the profound intuitions do not normally occur, milder forms are in the experience of all who feel an answering presence in deep devotion or share the spell which great works of art cast on us.

From small flames, raging infernos develop. The glimmer of something more, something greater, and something exciting should be enough to set us on the road to eternity. As our spirituality develops, so do the possibilities of experiencing things deeply mystical. Martin Israel, whose initial spiritual awareness was stimulated by his family’s servants in South Africa, knew that we all have to start somewhere and hence our experiences will be very limited: 7

...there are all grades from the fully manifested experience which is known to the great mystics of the race to the fleeting peak experiences that lighten the worldly darkness of the humble aspirant.

The level of our spiritual development will determine the level of our mystical experience. What the real relationship is, I do not know, but the more a person enhances their spirituality the greater the chances that their mystical experiences expands. Of this Father Andrew, who founded the Society of the Divine Compassion, the first Franciscan order in the Anglican Church, in mid-January 1894, explained: 8

We cannot go beyond our light or run ahead of our spiritual experience, but we must be loyal to the light we are able to see.

The reason for this is that we must have reached a particular level in order to appreciate and understand that which we are being allowed to experience. According to the Jewish writer Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Kalonymus Kalman Epstein of Cracow, a Rabbi whose life spanned the 18 th and 19 th centuries, said of mystical experience that: 9

Each man can only grasp this in proportion to his efforts and the refinement of his spiritual nature. The more a man comprehends of the divine, in general and in particular that is to say the more he attains to profound degrees of comprehension through the refinement of his character, the more difficult does it become for such a one to explain and to communicate to others the secrets of his heart, since he has so much more in his heart and thoughts of that which cannot be conveyed to others.

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The implication is that the more we develop then the greater the experience and the harder it is to describe. This has been the perennial problem; trying to describe something for which no suitable words exist. As another layer on top of this, we do know that everyone’s experience of the spiritual or mystical is different and so this compounds the difficulty of communication. Evelyn Underhill, that titan of mystical writings, said of mystical experiences: 10

These special mystical diagrams, these symbolic and artistic descriptions of man's inward history - his secret adventures with God - are almost endless in their variety: since in each we have a picture of the country of the soul seen through a different temperament.

…and she went on to develop this theme: 11

…as, when two men go together to some undiscovered country, one will bring home news of its great spaces, its beauty of landscape, another of its geological formation, or the flora and fauna that express its life, and both must be taken into account before any just estimate of the real country can be made.

Therefore, it is useful for each of us to read about and appreciate the experiences of others. Whilst this does not give us the direct experiences, it does provide some sort of understanding of the types of mystical experience which others have been fortunate enough to have. This study was suggested in the Qur’an [96:1-5] as noted by the Iranian-American religious author Reza Aslan: 12

Recite, for your Lord is the Most Generous One Who has taught thee by pen; Taught humanity that which it did not know.

However, at the end of the day, we can only really understand through the depths of our own spiritual experiences. Frederick Happold, a Victorian born mystic, understood this and declared that: 13

...mystical experience has no validity except for the one who experiences it; it does not constitute proof to anyone else.

Such experiences are very personal and as the young theologian Martin Conway said: 14

...experience being inevitably personal, no one else can do a man's exploring and experiencing for him.

Although, when he wrote this, he was not considering mystical experiences, it is still very apposite. In fact, he went on to say: 15

...it is a commonplace of philosophy and the natural sciences nowadays to say that the implicit structures of the human mind, let alone variables such as an individual's temperament and the conditions of his upbringing, influence our reception of what we experience.

…which is an expansion of what the 14 th century anonymous author of ‘The Cloud of

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Unknowing’ believed: 16

It is important to realise that in the interior life we must never take our own experiences (or the lack of them) as the norm for everyone else.

We are all unique and running our spiritual race at our own pace, in our own way, and in our own direction. It is a race with no competitors except ourselves and where time is not important but where progress is crucial. Once started, we will always be stimulated to continue. This message has been given by Martin Israel: 17

The ultimate proof of God is a personal one: the experience of the divine fire that will not let anyone alone until one has actualised one's full potential.

He wrote this quite early on in his book ‘The Pearl of Great Price’ and a couple of chapters further on he started to develop his view of the hypothesis contained in ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’ which: 18

...reminds us of the unknowable quality of God as we move on our daily routine in the world. Furthermore, the divine fire is stiflingly dulled by the thoughtless, unheeding, seething masses. And so our exodus from the world of selfish endeavour is attended by the cloud of unknowing in whose mysterious depths we commit ourselves in faith as we progress to the Promised Land of our own destiny.

…in other words – it is a long and difficult journey upon which we have embarked. Rosamund Allen reported that Richard Rolle, at about the same time as the ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’ was written, also stressed the difficulties of the road we walk: 19

No man can arrive at such revelation and grace on the first day, but through long labour and diligence...

Richard, in his book ‘The Fire of Love’ also passionately observed that: 20

It is obvious to those who are in love that no one attains the heights of devotion at once, or is ravished with contemplative sweetness. In fact, it is only very occasionally - and then only momentarily - that they are allowed to experience heavenly things; their progress to spiritual strength is a gradual one.

Six centuries later, so Kathleen Burne informs us, in a letter to one of his spiritual children Father Andrew explained that: 21

...in divine things there is never hurry, and hurry is not a divine thing.

Another potential feature of this developmental process is that of emotional fluctuations. As our sensitivity to Spirit is increased so is our sensitivity to life in general. We become much more aware of ourselves, of others and of our environment. Again quoting Father Andrew from his own book ‘In the Silence’: 22

All people who have had much experience and have at all noted their experience in their spiritual life, know that we pass from one oasis to another.

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Each oasis that we reach becomes more and more charged with love, fellowship and confidence. We know that we are following the right pathway albeit that sometimes we seem to falter. This pathway, ultimately, is the one to union with God. William Johnston, in his introduction to ‘The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling’ quotes Dionysius' advice (from De Myst. Theol., I, i): 23

Do thou, then, in the intent practice of mystic contemplation, leave behind the senses and the operations of the intellect, and all things that senses or the intellect can perceive, and all things which are not and things which are, and strain upwards into unknowing, as far as may be, towards the union with Him Who is above all things and knowledge. For by unceasing and absolute withdrawal from thyself and all things in purity, abandoning all and set free from all, thou shalt be bourne up to the ray of divine darkness that surpasseth all being.

On the same theme and at about the same time, Meister Eckhart introduced a prayer into one of his German sermons: 24

That we may become one with God, so help us 'One God, Father of All'.

…and a consequence of this ‘at-one-ment’ is a change in our focus for our life. Such is the lot of all those that follow the Mystical Way as recognised towards the end of the 4 th century by one of the three holy hierarchs of the Eastern Orthodox church John Chrysostom: 25

…those with [mystical] experience become detached from the earthly and think only of heavenly things...

In days gone by, it was believed that keeping away from material matters was only possible by separating oneself from everyone and everything, as suggested by Simeon the New Theologian as recorded in the ‘Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart’: 26

...illumination by the Spirit is the endless end of every virtue and that whoever attains this illumination by the Spirit has finished with everything sensory and has begun to live with his consciousness in spiritual things alone.

However, I believe that this detachment does not mean that each of us has to retreat into the desert or a cave in the mountains, but we have to let go of our attachment to worldly things; we have to create a different balance between the spiritual and the material. This balance changes considerably as we progress. A nice metaphor for this I recalled seeing in the book ‘Listening to the Light’ by the Quaker-cum-Buddhist Jim Pym: 27

Buddhists have a very unusual way of pointing to this truth. They say that Nirvana (enlightenment) and samsara (this world) are one. This is similar to Jesus' saying, 'I and my Father are one.' The Zen tradition of Buddhism elaborates with this little story: 'When we first embark on the path, mountains are mountains and trees are trees. When we are further along, mountains are no longer mountains and trees no longer trees. But when we are fully enlightened, mountains are mountains and trees are trees.' This is an outline of the spiritual life. When we commence, this world is the only

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reality. Further along the path, and this world seems unreal. But further still, this world and the Kingdom of Heaven' are one.

From my own experience, I know that the more spiritual I become, the easier I find it to cope with and accommodate all the trials and tribulations which are associated with living our earthly life. The zoologist David Hay concurred with this and wrote that after mystical experiences: 28

...people state that they are better able to cope with their problems, and feel an increase in their self esteem.

And in a rather cryptic comment, according to Richard Rolle, Cassiodorus, a Roman Statesman and writer, observes: 29

Deep affection is what brings the impossible to be obviously possible.

Even though ‘impossible’ material tasks are possible by those following the Mystic Way, it is necessary to point out that their success or otherwise has no impact on our spiritual journey other than we have acted in support of humanity. In discussing the spiritual life and referring to the works of Evelyn Underhill, Brenda Blanch wrote: 30

So too, the move - out of the human mind into a new and larger physical world, which is, I suppose, the great fact of our time, does not make any real difference to the soul’s relation to God: even though it may make some difference to the language in which we describe him.

Activity in support of others is part and parcel of your spiritual journey – usually referred to as the primary objectives of love God and love humanity. These two facets expand as we grow. From ‘Mysticism’ by Evelyn Underhill: 31

Hence the purgation of the senses, and of the character which they have helped to build is always placed first in order in the Mystic Way; though sporadic flashes of illumination and ecstasy may, and often do, precede and accompany it. Since spiritual no less than physical existence, as we know it, is an endless Becoming, it too has no end. In a sense the whole of the mystical experience in this life consists in a series of purifications...

It is a step by step progression as understood by the mystic Richard Rolle: 32

Well, we have a long road to heaven, and as many good deeds as we do, as many prayers as we say, as many good thoughts as we think in honesty, hope and love, so many steps do we move toward heaven

Upward and onward could be the motto; keep focussed on your objectives and don’t be distracted from following your destiny. In this process change is the order of the day; it is inevitable that imperceptively your character will strengthen and you will see what has to be done with increasing clarity. Morton Kelsey recognised the importance of mystical experiences to this process of change: 33

While some experiences have very little religious significance, there are others that

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have tremendous religious value, sometimes enough to give meaning to the whole of a person's life…

These are the big changes but with each intuitive thought, each ‘knowing’, we will see life slightly differently and naturally we will reflect this in everything that we do. This is because understanding new truths will force us, perhaps unconsciously, to adjust our Philosophy of Life and our implementation of it. In ‘The Mystery of Sacrifice’ Evelyn Underhill explained that: 34

Contrition succeeds vision; as always in any genuine experience of the Divine.

We do have to be careful not to let our passion for God take us completely away from our responsibilities although it seems to be a consequence that those close to the mystics have recognised. For example, Osbert Burdett in his book about William Blake noted that Blake’s wife: 35

…only recorded complaint was that Mr Blake was so little with her, though in body they were never separated, for he was incessantly away in Paradise.

Blake was an inspired writer, poet, artist, psychic and above all a great mystic. He realised that the link to God was fundamental to his progress in all avenues. It is believed that God, through his agents of change, moves us along our journey. We may sometimes feel that we are in control of the pace and flow of our life-stream but in fact it is dictated by our spirit guides and helpers in conjunction with our own personal spiritual development. Thomas Merton, another well respected mystic, believed this to be true: 36

There is only one true asceticism: that which is guided not by our own spirit but by the Spirit of God. The spirit of man must first subject itself to grace and then it can bring the flesh in subjection both to grace and to itself.

…and from Simeon the New Theologian: 37

For a man who ... follows with undaunted faith those who are wise in things Divine, is guided by them and with them enters into the city of the living God, and, taught and enlightened by the Holy Spirit, sees and knows things which no-one else can see or know. Thus he becomes taught of God.

In his book ‘The Spark in the Soul’, the London priest Terry Tastard used other words from Thomas Merton to make a similar point: 38

Rather we are who we are because of God’s imparting of the power of love. Or as Merton puts it in Thomas Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander, pg 24 ‘Here the individual is aware of himself as a self-to-be-dissolved in self-giving, in love, in ‘letting go’, in ecstasy, in God’

God is the centre of our attention and we must be careful not to treat his agents the same. As they continue to tell us, they too, like us, are mere cogs in the divine wheel who are progressing towards their goal. As we can help others on the earth plane, so too do spirits. That is how they serve their Master. Therefore together, you with your guide and helpers and I with mine, spirits and humans can both develop in ways which we could not achieve

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:35:19 21.9 Mystical Experiences and Development Page 8 of 12 alone. Within the ‘Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart’ we are told that: 39

No good can be achieved solely by our own efforts, but by God's will and power. At the same time, God demands efforts on our part, but these efforts must correspond to His will...

This combination of ourselves and our Divine Source through our guides and helpers, provide a working relationship which helps us to surmount all problems. A realisation of this was given to the English mystic and anchoress Julian of Norwich. In Anna Maria Reynolds’ treatise ‘Woman of Hope’ she reveals that: 40

The first revelation granted to Julian was a showing of the crowning of Christ 'as it were in the time when the crown of thorns was pressed on his blessed head. I perceived, truly and powerfully, that it was he who just so, both God and man, himself suffered for me'. Suddenly the Trinity filled her heart with joy for she understood that because of the passion of the God-man 'there was strength enough for me and indeed for every living creature, against every living creature, against every fiend of hell and all temptations'. This is the first truth. It contains a guarantee of victory for the soul of good will no matter what the odds against it. Trials and temptations there may be in abundance but defeat, never.

This togetherness is so supportive. There is synergy! Thomas A Kempis, in ‘The Imitation of Christ’ recalled the words of God and expressed it as: 41

And those who serve Me freely, willingly, Shall receive one kindness on another

As much as those helpers from the Spirit World love and support us, they do tend to keep their identity secret. Most of the great teachers who have communicated with humankind use nom-de-plumes or lived before recorded history – Silver Birch, White Eagle, Red Cloud, Abu, Zodiac to name but a few. This ‘invisibility’, according to Ladislaus Boros, was identified by Irenaeus the 2 nd century Bishop of Lugdunum in Gaul: 42

So that man may have room to advance, however, God preserves His invisibility.

…or in the words of Evelyn Underhill: 43

...a mystery [of God] which grows deeper, the nearer we approach.

The ‘higher’ up the spiritual ladder we reach, the more we understand and yet the more there is to know. Ah, the paradox of mysticism rears its head again! The German mystics were fond of this way of trying to convey the essence of mystical experience. The 14 th century mystic and contemporary of Meister Eckhart, John Tauler, in his sermon for Whit Sunday, said: 44

…man learns wisdom through humility, knowledge by forgetting, how to speak by silence, how to live by dying.

The last bit, ‘live by dying’, is all about setting the material beneath and behind you – dying to the material world. This is very similar in concept to the idea of ‘going beyond’ of

DAJ 08/11/2019 08:35:19 21.9 Mystical Experiences and Development Page 9 of 12 which Alexandra David-Néel, in discussing ‘The Secret Oral Teachings in Tibetan Buddhist Sects’, said that it: 45

…is, in fact, to cease to cling to the opinions, the connections which belong to the world of illusion, and to understand that they have only a relative value depending on things which themselves have only a relative existence but which we should be wrong to consider as absolutely non-existent.

That is, don’t go down the Christian Scientist route of claiming that the world which we inhabit is nothing more than an illusion. Both this world and the next are real – but different. The reality of the next world is that it is one with a direct link to eternity and therefore is potentially closer to God than we could ever be whilst on earth. Nevertheless, we must try the best we can to develop through our understanding of our infrequent mystical experiences. Of them, the ‘Lost Scrolls of the Essene Brotherhood’ described the effect of them upon the mystic: 46

I have reached the inner vision And through thy spirit in me I have heard thy wondrous secret. Through thy mystic insight Thou hast caused a spring of knowledge To well up within me, A fountain of power, pouring forth living waters, A flood of love and of all-embracing wisdom Like the splendour of Eternal Light.

This ‘knowing’ is typical as is the ‘empty’ state as outlined by Frederick Happold: 47

In the higher stages of mystical experience even the symbols disappear and there remains only an imageless awareness.

These bring to you all the love and power and knowledge which you are able to accommodate; it is unique to you as Andrew Harvey explained: 48

Mad lucidities, triumphs without sound - nobody else sees this, nobody else will ever see this. It happens in the privacy of the heart.

In a much later and excellent book, ’The Direct Path’, he also emphasised an important caveat of which you must be aware: 49

Most of those the New Age calls 'enlightened gurus' or 'avatars' are not divine or divinised beings at all, but powerful, unscrupulous occult manipulators who, from the point of view of authentic mystical tradition, are not only in any way enlightened but spiritually on a lower rung ...

So be careful in who you trust during your spiritual development. Use your intellect and power of reason to not only interpret the mystical experiences which are given to you, but also to ‘read’ the people around you; test everyone and everything. In this way you will be giving yourself the best possible opportunities and it will allow your spirit helpers to provide you with the protection you need and deserve. On this Margaret Smith wrote that

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…has been purified from human passions, and so made serene, as it once was, and now it beholds and experiences unspeakable things, while no passion arising from this world can hurt or disturb it...

This protection will be for ever … as Francis de Sales, who was created Bishop of Geneva in 1602, specified: 51

...since in giving yourself to Him you gain Him and yourself also for eternal life …

Finally, pursue your destiny and you will mount the ladder of success incrementally and slowly as highlighted in ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’: 52

And so to stand firmly and avoid pitfalls, keep to the path you are on. Let your longing relentlessly beat upon the 'cloud of unknowing' that lies between you and your God. Pierce that cloud with the keen shaft of your love, spurn the thought of anything less than God, and do not give up this work for anything.

There is one thought of which I am very grateful, and which seems to be true for me. It was a reflection by Father Andrew in a letter to a spiritual child in 1943: 53

I am sure that as we get older we are called to a more interior intercourse with our divine Lord.

I’m getting there…but slowly.

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1 Carl Edward Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World, Ballantine Books, New York, 1997. Chapter 6 : Hallucinations, (Pg 104) 2 Henry Thomas Hamblin, The Life of the Spirit, The Science of Thought Press, 1934. Chapter V - The Inner Life II, (Pg 34) 3 W. F. Rickard,, Abu Talks, Regency Press, 1992. Chapter 25 - Pre-natal Awareness, (Pg 105) 4 Richard Rolle, The Fire of Love, Penguin Books, 1972. Chapter 29, (Pg 137) 5 John Blofeld, Beyond the Gods, E P Dutton & Co, 1974. Chapter 3 - The Path of Observation and Acceptance. (Pg 62) 6 Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, Unwin, 1980. Chapter III : Religious Experience and its Affirmations - 4. Character of religious experience, (Pg 73) 7 Martin Israel, Summons to Life, Mowbray, 1982. Chapter 15: Mysticism and spirituality, (Pg 118 / 119) 8 Kathleen E. Burne, The Life and Letters of Father Andrew, A.R.Mowbray, 1951. Part II: Letters: To Spiritual Children (Various): To Miss J. October 18, 1939. (Pg 218) 9 Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Jewish & Christian Mysticism - An Introduction, Continuum, 1994. Part I The Jewish Tradition - 5 Modern Jewish Mystics: Kalonymus Kalman Epstein of Cracow, (Pg 76) 10 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part ONE: The Mystic Fact: Chapter VI - Mysticism and Symbolism, (Pg 126) 11 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter VII - Introversion. Part II – Contemplation, (Pg 344) 12 Reza Aslan, No god but God, Arrow Books, 2006. 2. The Keeper of the Keys - Muhammad in Mecca, (Pg 34) 13 F C Happold, Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man, Pelican Books, 1966. Introduction, (Pg 16) 14 Martin Conway, The Undivided Vision, SCM Press, 1966. Chapter Six - Into the way of it: Educating Christians, (Pg 111) 15 Martin Conway, The Undivided Vision, SCM Press, 1966. Chapter Two - The man behind it all: Jesus, (Pg 24) 16 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. The Cloud of Unknowing: Chapter 72, (Pg 141) 17 Martin Israel, The Pearl of Great Price, SPCK, 1988. 1 – Intimations, (Pg 4) 18 Martin Israel, The Pearl of Great Price, SPCK, 1988. 4 - The Cloud and the Fire, (Pg 28) 19 Rosamund S. Allen, Richard Rolle - The English Writings, SPCK, 1989. The Form of Living: Chapter 2, (Pg 158) 20 Richard Rolle, The Fire of Love, Penguin Books, 1972. Chapter 2, (Pg 51) 21 Kathleen E. Burne, The Life and Letters of Father Andrew, A.R.Mowbray, 1951. Part II: Letters: To Spiritual Children (Various): To Miss Q. May 25 (1944?). (Pg 233) 22 Father Andrew SDC, In the Silence, A.R.Mowbray, 1951. Growth in Holiness: I. Our Relationship with God, (Pg 10) 23 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. Introduction: Dionysius, (Pg 26) 24 Oliver Davies, Meister Eckhart - Selected Writings, Penguin Books, 1994. Selected German Sermons: Sermon 17, (Pg 184) 25 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part One: Callistus and Ignatius of Xanthopoulos - Directions to Hesychasts – 5, (Pg 167) 26 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part One: St. Simeon The New Theologian - On Faith .. (Pg 148) 27 Jim Pym, Listening to the Light, Rider & Co, 1999. Commitment, (Pg 92 / 93) 28 David Hay, Exploring Inner Space - Scientists and Religious Experience, Mowbray, 1987. Part Three: Modern Explorations - 12. Doubts about the Despisers: Religious experience and justice, (Pg 178) 29 Rosamund S. Allen, Richard Rolle - The English Writings, SPCK, 1989. The Form of Living: Chapter 10, (Pg 179) 30 Brenda Blanch, Heaven a Dance - An Evelyn Underhill Anthology, Triangle, 1992. The Spiritual Life, (Pg 29) 31 Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, Oneworld, 2005. Part TWO: The Mystic Way: Chapter III - The Purification of the Self, (Pg 203 / 204) 32 Rosamund S. Allen, Richard Rolle - The English Writings, SPCK, 1989. The Form of Living: Chapter 1, (Pg 155) 33 Morton T Kelsey, The Other Side of Silence, SPCK, 1985. Part Four: The Use of Images in Meditation - 12. Silence Mysticism and Religious Experience, (Pg 150)

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34 Evelyn Underhill, The Mystery of Sacrifice, Longmans, Green and Co, 1948. Chapter I - The Preparation, (Pg 3) 35 Osbert Burdett, William Blake, Macmillan & Co, 1926. Chapter XI - Disciples and Death, (Pg 184) 36 Thomas Merton, No Man is an Island, Burns & Oates, 1997. 6: Asceticism and Sacrifice, (Pg 84) 37 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part One: St. Simeon The New Theologian - Practical and Theological Precepts: 116, (Pg 124 / 125) 38 Terry Tastard, The Spark in the Soul, Darton Longman and Todd, 1989. Chapter 5 - Thomas Merton and God Our Identity. 39 Writings From The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, Faber & Faber, 1992. Part Two: St Barsanuphius and St John - Directions in Spiritual Work – 92, (Pg 370) 40 Robert Llewelyn (ed), Julian - Woman of our Day, Darton Longman and Todd, 1986. Woman of Hope by Anna Maria Reynolds CP, (Pg 13 / 14) 41 Thomas A Kempis, The Imitation of Christ, Elliot Stock, 1891. Book IV - Book of Inward Consolation, Chapter IX 42 Ladislaus Boros, Open Spirit, Search Press, 1974. Irenaeus and Patience, (Pg 44) 43 Evelyn Underhill, The Fruits of the Spirit; Light of Christ; Abba, Longmans, Green and Co, 1957. Abba: Chapter III - The Name, (Pg 20) 44 Susanna Winkworth, The History and Life of the Reverend Doctor John Tauler with 25 of his Sermons, H.R.Allenson,1906. Sermon for Whit Sunday, (Pg 349) 45 Alexandra David-Néel, The Secret Oral Teachings in Tibetan Buddhist Sects, City Lights Books, 1981. Chapter V, (Pg 81) 46 Edmond Bordeaux Szekely, The Gospel of the Essenes, C W Daniel Co, 1976. Lost Scrolls of the Essene Brotherhood: The Angel of Eternal Life, (Pg 166) 47 F C Happold, Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man, Pelican Books, 1966. 9 The Symbols of the Inexpressible, (Pg 102) 48 Andrew Harvey, The Way of Passion, Souvenir Press, 2002. Chapter 9 - The Divine Child, (Pg 267) 49 Andrew Harvey, The Direct Path, Rider & Co, 2000. One: The Map - The Map of the Transformation of Consciousness, (Pg 55) 50 Margaret Smith, Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East, The Sheldon Press, 1931. Part 1: Chapter V - Early Mysticism in the Middle East, (Pg 91) 51 Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Burns & Oates, 1948. First Part of the Introduction. Chapter XXI - Conclusion of this First Purgation, (Pg 70) 52 The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counselling, Doubleday, 1973. The Cloud of Unknowing: Chapter 12, (Pg 64) 53 Kathleen E. Burne, The Life and Letters of Father Andrew, A.R.Mowbray, 1951. Part II: Letters: To Spiritual Children (Various): To Miss G. April 1, 1943, (Pg 203)

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