i Double Vision: Imagination and Visualization in the Catholic and Protestant Meditation Traditions. ISBN: 978-1-5323-6071-8 Copyright: 2017 Published by: LionFace Publications LionFacePub.com Cover: Nicolas Poussin (1593-1694) c. 1665. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No part of this publication may be reproduced stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher, except as provide by USA copyright law. PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA PERMISSION TO QUOTE NASV: Unless otherwise indicated, all scripture quotations are from the NASV Bible (New American Standard Version). Citations to scripture are made by “Permission to Quote” from the Lockman Foundation, copyright 1977. Because there are many quotations of scripture, all scripture quotations are printed in bold text rather than with quotation marks and citations are generally provided in the footnotes as to their book, chapter and verse number. Comments at: www.LionFacePub.com. i Double Vision: Imagination and Visualization in the Catholic and Protestant Meditation Traditions By: David Prince ii iii CONTENTS Chapter _ __________ Page Introduction . 5 1. The Miracles of Jesus and Imagination. 12 2. Imagination in the Bible. 15 3. Looking for Detail . 18 4. Wake-Up! . 19 5. Imagination, Memory and Love . 21 6. Christianity as Memories . 23 7. Imagination and Memory in Practice. 24 8. Sensitizing the Imagination. 26 9. A Model for Communion with God . 28 10. Mysticism by Transcript . 30 11. Sifting Out Spiritual Errata. 35 12. Synthesis. 37 13. Conclusion. 39 Appendix I: Excerpts of The Spiritual Exercises, By Ignatius de Loyola. 41 iv Introduction Meditation, as a practice, has a large and growing footprint in Western culture. It seems to be everywhere. Contemporary corporate cultures are pushing it, Doctors are prescribing it,1 politicians are advocating it in their political platforms,2 Swamis ubiquitously hawk their special brand of TM (Transcendental Meditation) in bookstores, seminars, webinars, corporate workshops and in the village square. It’s become the cool and upbeat thing. Conversely, meditating on the bible has come to be viewed as mundane. Can you imagine your doctor prescribing you to meditate on your bible? Yet it is perfectly acceptable in sophisticated society for a physician to recommend meditation for your stress which implicitly is understood to be an eastern style of meditation. Equally odd, despite meditating on the bible no longer being the cool thing to do, Jesus Christ Himself maintains a very good reputation in the culture as a good and venerable teacher of the ancient world. Jesus is good but Eastern meditation is cool. Sadly, it is the miniscule few who are interested enough to follow Jesus’ practices in prayer and meditation on the Bible.3 Thus, according to the culture, Eastern meditation techniques are in, meditating on the Holy Bible is out. The reason is because the bible is perceived by contemporary culture as an old fashioned and historically backward literary work with no clear and distinguishable value. The truth is, however, the Bible is very cool and Western culture has been weakened by turning away from the blessings and benefits of a culture that values the word of God. Worse, the church is being gently and subtly wooed over to a false form of meditation. For many years “culturally sensitive” and “seeker friendly” churches have been slowly shifting toward a form of prayer that is nothing more than warmed over TM (Transcendental Meditation). The code name that has been adopted for this soft form of TM is called “centering prayer.” A pleasing, gentile and reasonable sounding title, yet it is a 1 A May 2011 joint medical study by the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) and the Harvard Medical School gathered information from about 23,000 U.S. households and discovered that 6.3 million Americans were referred by doctors to practice activities like meditation. Also google “doctors prescribing meditation” and see how many hits you get. 2 Sound unbelievable? John Hagelin, a former physics professor at Maharishi University of Management (MUM), was the National Law Party candidate for President of the United States in 1992, 1996 and 2000. The party platform proposed that political problems could be solved through alignment with the "Unified Field" of all the laws of nature through the use of Transcendental Meditation and TM-Sidhi programs. The NLP later merged with the Reform Party and ran Ralph Nader as their Candidate in 2008. 3 For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it, Matthew 7:14. 5 wolf in sheep clothing. Transcendental Meditation has substantially captured the culture under the slick and cosmopolitan sales job that it will help you relax, reduce stress, lower your blood pressure, increase your productivity, bring you success and enhance your sex life. Meanwhile, stunningly little is said in the public square about the benefits of meditating on the holy scriptures and how that is far and away the best life enhancement that money can not buy. It is useful here to define some terms. Biblically based meditation is a mystical method of communicating and communing with God. It is rooted in scriptural teaching such as verses like Joshua 1:8 which states: This book of the law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night. Joshua 1:8 is not the cold and dogmatic command that some would like to believe and claim. Rather it is a codex pointing to profound spiritual truths and it is a spiritual prescription with a promise: Then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have success.4 How cool is that? The clear and unmistakable message is that if you meditate on God’s holy word then you will be prosperous and successful. Do you lack success? Do you lack prosperity? If yes, then the prescription for you by Dr. Jesus is to meditate on your bible. Do you know if this will work? Can you say that you know it will not work? Note the fabricated ersatz which all the self-help gurus and TM proponents make regarding success and prosperity. They ubiquitously claim practicing some form of TM will bring you success. Yet they are spiritual counterfeiters who merely mimic the promises in the word of God. God does promise true success and prosperity pursuant to Joshua 1:8, but the counterfeiters fail to deliver the complete message – it is the God of the holy scriptures that brings the success, not the technique and process in and of itself. The Hebrew word for meditate here is, “Hagah” which means to: “murmur, to ponder, imagine, meditate, mutter, speak, study talk, utter.”5 The idea is simple enough. Joshua 1:8 tells us to take the holy inspired word of God and record it into our mind like a software download and ruminate on it over and over again. David, the Psalmist, reminds us to practice Joshua 1:8 at Psalm 77:11-12: 11 I shall remember the deeds of the Lord; Surely I will remember Your wonders of old. 4 Joshua 1:9. 5 Strongs Exhaustive Concordance. 6 12 I will meditate on all Your work And muse on Your deeds. Biblical meditation calls for the disciple to think about God’s word, ponder it, visualize it and yes, pray it right back to God for our own benefit and for the good of mankind. Conversely, and make no mistake about it, attempting to engage in a mind-numbing mental silence to achieve an undefined cosmic consciousness or oneness with an impersonal universe will accomplish nothing for you in seeking to know the Lord, and it may in fact be harmful to your spiritual wellbeing. The issues here can be very (very) subtle. Biblical meditation is spiritually different from the Eastern religions’ style of meditation and there is no warning label to alert the casual user. Not knowing what you are doing while you play with spiritual fire can be dangerous. A good example of the danger being described here is demonstrated by a pair of venturous young brothers named Nadab and Abihu. These young men, the sons of Aaron the Priest under Moses, were two brothers who decided to go on a spiritual departure and burn some “strange fire” before the Lord. In the end, they got burned. Now Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took their respective firepans, and after putting fire in them, placed incense on it and offered strange fire before the Lord, which He had not commanded them. And fire came out from the presence of the Lord and consumed them, and they died before the Lord. Then Moses said to Aaron, “It is what the Lord spoke, saying, ‘By those who come near Me I will be treated as holy, And before all the people I will be honored.6 One might be tempted to think these young fellows were just innocently burning some incense before the lord and were very harshly treated by God for doing something that wasn’t clearly in error. However, Nadab and Abihu’s violation was not merely in exercising un- prescribed spiritual practices but also in being familiar with the holiness of God. It was therefore a direct violation of God’s holiness. Always remember, when dealing with God’s holiness, caveat emptor. Three verses down, in Leviticus 10:8, we find a clue as to one element of the issue was that destroyed Nadab and Abihu: The Lord then spoke to Aaron, saying, ‘Do not drink wine or strong drink, neither you nor your sons with you, when you come into the tent of meeting, so that you will not die—it is a perpetual statute throughout your generations.’ 6 Leviticus 10:1-3.