The Specificity of Christian Theosony: Towards a Theology of Listening Nóirín Ní Riain B.Mus. (Cork), M.Mus., H.Dip. in Ed., Dip.Phil. NUI, Dip. CMSM Doctor of Philosophy Mary Immaculate College University of Limerick – Ollscoil Luimnigh Supervisor: Doctor Eamonn Conway Submitted to the University of Limerick August 2003 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This work would not have been initiated without the insight, help and support of my supervisor, Dr. Eamonn Conway. Its fruition to this particular stage has been due to the extremely generous input and textual editing of three people: Mark Patrick Hederman, OSB, John O Donohue, and Cyprian Love OSB. Gregory Collins OSB was a sensitive, prayerful companion throughout the journey. To Father Abbot Christopher Dillon and the Benedictine community of Glenstal Abbey, I am grateful beyond words, for the living and library space to complete the writing. Two people here deserve mention: Librarians Fr. Vincent Ryan and Br. Colmán Ó Clabaigh were, at all times, welcoming, accommodating and tolerant. My mother, to whom this work is dedicated, taught me more about listening to God than I can ever tell. She was called back to God two weeks before the dissertation was submitted. Her common sense intuitively taught me that God does not discriminate; hearing the divine voice is an experience that includes everyone. For miscellaneous reasons, I am so grateful to Senan Furlong OSB, Pattie Punch, UL, Phyllis Conroy and the interlibrary staff of MIC, Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin, Eoin Ó Súilleabháin, Mícheál P.Ó Súilleabháin, Noel Ryan, Ciarán Forbes OSB, Carmel Sheridan, Simon Sleeman OSB, Fintan Lyons OSB, Michael Drumm, (Mater Dei), Sr. Marcellina O’ Sulllivan, Sr. Anne O Leary, Barry McMillan, Oonagh O’ Brien, Thomas Brodie, Margaret Daly, Peter and Margaret Ferguson, Declan Casey and Conor Flynn. The final acknowledgement rests with the triune God: The All-powerful Father created the human being to pray constantly and this work, particularly in its inevitable darknesses and doubts, was always a prayer. Jesus Christ taught humanity to listen and pray in human words which this is made up of. The Holy Spirit guided and enlightened in so many mysterious ways that one could never forget that ‘He who planted the ear, does he not hear? (Ps. 94:9) Benedicamus Domino. Deo gratias. ABSTRACT The burden of this thesis is to show that of all the existential prevenient sites where nature prepares for the event of revelation, the human ear is the most sensitive and theologically attuned. The foundation stone of this work is that the encounter with the incarnate Word of God through the Holy Spirit takes place primarily, although not excepting other media, through the human sense of hearing, listening and its associate silence. The second hypothesis proposed here is that such acts of listening to the Spirit of God are undervalued, unexplored and unappreciated in Western Christianity. That sound preceded sight is a fact of the Christian narrative yet the Christian tradition has made little effort to develop a methodology to explore such an aural concept of God’s self-disclosure. Without overestimating the intention of this thesis, it would be fair to say that the present writer has identified a lacuna in theology. It is her modest intention to propose and sketch one possible methodology in order to begin to address this absence. At the outset, I wish to underline three elements of our proposed methodology: Firstly, defining an aural ontology requires the coining of a new word: theosony. Secondly, four branches of learning are harnessed to sketch the groundwork towards a theory of auditory Christianity: theology, philosophy, biology and linguistics. Thirdly, a taxonomy of divine/human encounter through the medium of sound will be set out. God provides both the faculty of hearing and the content of what is heard as prevenient grace. Such aural grace is ubiquitous and indiscriminate, it precedes all human experience in and of the world. ‘Theo’ in theosony evokes this graced Christian experience. Theosony itself is treated at three levels: Cosmic Theosony relates to all sounds which are non-human, mundane and pre-conceptual; Kerygmatic Theosony deals with sounds that communicate, carry a message or a meaning; Silent Theosony treats of the intimate salvatory presence of God that is silent, aphonic and solitary. As in human silence, the realm of God’s silence is a positive ground or horizon of sound; theosonic silence is, in this sense, the horizon of God. Many insights from contemporary philosophy have been used to develop this aural ontology. For the most part, this work could be described as a phenomenology of hearing as the basis for human interconnectedness including our relationship with God. It describes the human ear as the heart of human being: the membrane which allows access to all that is beyond ourselves and, therefore, one of the most privileged inlets to God. THE SPECIFICITY OF CHRISTIAN THEOSONY Towards a Theology of Listening Contents Acknowledgements PART ONE: THEOSONY AND THEOLOGY Introduction ♦ Two intentions and two premises 1 ♦ The sense of hearing in selected theological sources 6 ♦ The limitations of human language 8 ♦ Some reasons for the neglect of the sense of hearing 11 ♦ Interfaith dialogue 15 ♦ Synopsis of the thesis 20 ♦ Motivating influences and contribution 23 ♦ Summary 26 Chapter One: ‘Theosony’ and Parameters Introduction to the phenomenon of ‘theosony’ 31 1.1 Defining the word ‘theosony’ 33 1.2 Theological framework and interdisciplinary nature 35 1.3 Christian parameters 38 1.3.1 Theosony as grace 43 1.4 The critical, the obedient, the clairaudient ear 50 1.5 Summary 55 Chapter Two: Theosony and the Sense of Hearing Introduction 58 2.1 Hearing – ‘a physiological phenomenon’ 64 2.2 Listening – ‘a psychological act’ 70 Brain/Mind considerations 72 Theological implications 75 Listening according to Roland Barthes 77 2.3 Neurotheology 80 2.4 ‘The grain of the voice’ 83 2.5 ‘Vox fortis in aure interiore’ - Paul of Tarsus (d.c. 67), Augustine of Hippo (354-430) and Patrick of Ireland (d.c. 461) 87 Five considerations: conversion, rhetoric, narrative, conversation, and wisdom 93 2.6 Summary 98 PART TWO: THEOSONY AND SCRIPTURE Chapter Three: The Reader and the Voices of the Pages Introduction 3.1 Literary criticism 103 3.2 The oral/aural nature of Scripture 109 3.3 Four overtones on the oral and aural nature of Scripture 113 3.3.1 Contingency and continuity 116 3.3.2 ‘Off by heart’ 123 3.3.3 ‘Who made the [ears] but I? / Truth, Lord…’ 126 3.3.4 Folklore, poetry, story-telling and literacy 129 3.3.5 To write is to hear – To read is to hear 134 3.4 A summary of the ‘voice of the pages’ 140 Chapter Four: Theosonic Scriptural Events Introduction 146 ♦ Six arguments for preferring the Gospel of John 147 4.1 Hebrew ‘däbär’, Greek ‘logos’, Prologue ‘Logos’ 154 4.2 Hearing the Risen Christ Jn. 20:11-18; [Lk. 24: 13-32] 161 4.2.1 Mary Magdalen’s christophany – the recognition drama 164 4.2.2 Naming and names 167 4.2.2.1 The Names of Jesus and Mary 172 4.2.2.2 The Name of all Names and No Name 173 4.2.3 Good Shepherding 176 4.3 ‘The wind/spirit/breath …the sound/voice of it’ (Jn.3: 8) 177 4.4 Summary 183 PART THREE: THEOSONY, SILENCE AND RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE Chapter Five: Theosony and Silence Introduction 185 5.1 Towards a phenomenology of silence 190 5.2 The Base of the Triangle – Silence and Divine Discourse 199 5.2.1 Silence in ‘the great Trilogy of …virtues’ 205 5.3 Silence – the book ends of Scripture 209 5.4 Summary 214 Chapter Six: Theosony and religious experience Introduction 219 6.1 Religious experience, fundamental theology and theosony 220 6.2 Three theories of religious experience: Friedrich Schleiermacher, Rudolf Otto, William James 230 6.3 A taxonomy of theosonic religious experience in Scripture 237 6.3.1 Cosmic Theosony 238 6.3.2 Kerygmatic Theosony 242 6.3.3 Silent Theosony 248 6.4 Summary 251 Chapter Seven: Towards a conclusion Introduction 255 7.1 Socratic midwifery and the daimonion: Jesus, the Holy Spirit. St. Paul 258 7.2 Ten aspects of theosonic alertness 265 7.3 A theosonic ‘Approach-Road’ to God 274 7.3.1 Theosony – the metaphor 275 7.4 Summary 280 BIBLIOGRAPHY 282 Introduction At times the sound of a vocable, or the force of a letter, reveals and then defines the real thought attached to a word …All important words, all the words marked for grandeur…are keys to the universe, to the dual universe of the Cosmos and the depths 1 of the human spirit. 1 Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space, trans. Maria Jolas, Boston: Beacon Press, 1958, (1964), p.198. From Abraham to the incarnate Son of God, the connection between humanity and God was through the ear. God taught and continues to teach the universe to listen. Any listening, therefore, is, in itself, the voice of God in the transcendental ear of the listener. It is a dialogue between partners and friends. Two intentions and two premises The first intention is to argue that God’s self-disclosure can occur through a certain kind of listening. Such listening is an aural understanding that involves hearing, obedience and silence. The English term ‘obedience’ is derived from the Latin ‘ob-audire’; the Hebrew and Greek words meaning ‘to obey’ are also connected with the verb ‘to hear’.2 The first intention, therefore, is to present a taxonomy, i.e. a classification, of the human listening experience which can be taken up into a Christian sensibility.