Lope de Vega: Mary's Solitude

Introduction: Félix Lope de Vega y Carpio (1562-1635) was one of literature's most prolific writers, a monument of the Spanish Golden Age; among his many works are hundreds of plays and poems, including multiple epics, as well as some novels.  Though he had a variety of lovers and mistresses, he was ordained a priest in 1614, and many of his poems are religious.  Among them is the collection Romancero Espiritual (Spiritual Romance-Book, a romance being a type of Spanish folk ballad).  Below are the opening lines of one of these romances, "On the Solitude of Our Lady."  I find the sharp contrasts of these opening lines quite effective as their own poem, separated from the full romance.  They are also fitting lines for Great and Holy Friday.  The source is Lope Félix de Vega Carpio, Obras Escogidas, ed. Federico Carlos Sainz de Robles (Madrid: Aguilar, 1953), II:124.

From Romancero Espiritual XVIII

"On the Solitude of Our Lady"

Lope de Vega

(1562-1635)

Without a Father, because He’s hid;

without a Son, because He’s dead;

without a light, because sun cries;

without a voice, because Word dies;

without a soul, absent her own;

without a body, her body enterred;

without the earth, for all is blood;

without the air, for all is flame;

without the flame, for all is water;

without the water, for all is ice.

 

Translation ©2023 Brandon P. Otto.  Licensed via CC BY-NC.  Feel free to redistribute non-commercially, as long as credit is given to the translator.

St. John of Avila: Sermon 34 (Part One)

 Introduction: St. John of Ávila (1499-1569) overlapped with the famous Spanish Carmelites, Teresa of Ávila and John of the Cross, but he was himself a diocesan priest and preacher, not a religious.  He travelled throughout Andalusia preaching and drawing large crowds; he became the first rector of the University of Baeza; he tried to found a community of apostolic priests, but his burgeoning plans were bowled over by the quick spread of the Jesuits.  Though far less known than his Carmelite compatriots, he was named a Doctor of the Church by the late Pope Benedict XVI in 2012.  Among his writings are copious sermons and letters, a few Bible commentaries, and some treatises.  Below is the first part of a sermon given for Holy Thursday; the source is Obras Completas de Beato Juan de Ávila, ed. Luis Sala Balust (Madrid: La Editorical Catolica, S.A., 1953), II:489-494.

Sermon 34: Incorporated into Christ through Communion, We Possess the Heart of the Father

(For Holy Thursday)

St. Juan de Ávila

(1499-1569)

 

In me manet, et ego in illo.  He is in me, and I in him (Jn 6:57).

 

                    In that prayer that Christ our Lord made to His Father on the Thursday of the Last Supper, at night, He tells Him, among other words: Father, I made Your Name manifest to men, those whom You gave me (Jn 17:6).  And among all the other good, and very good, things that He did, He especially honed Himself in preaching the honor of His Father, attributing to Him the doctrine that He preached, the miracles and works that He did, all for our example, so that He would enkindle the hearts of the apostles in love of the invisible Father, so highly praised by His Son.

                    And one of them, who was Saint Philip, said, as if in the name of all: Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us (Jn 14:8), as if someone said, “Since He has told us so many good things about Him, we would like to see Him, and we would then have nothing more to ask nor to desire.”  He, certainly, had much reason for desiring to see the Father, since He clearly makes blessed[1] those who clearly see Him.  But how will they see Him, if He does not show Himself?  How will He show Himself, if we do not love Him?  Then how did Christ our Lord say, If someone loves Me, I have Myself made Him manifest to him (Jn 14:21)?  And how will we love the Father, if the Father does not first love us (1 Jn 4:19), since our loving Him is the effect of His loving us?

                    And who, on the contrary, has to be loved by so high a thing as God the Father, we being so low that even His arranging us as He wills and giving us the being of nature is a very great mercy and beyond all of our merit?[2]  A mercy is that love with which He loves us men and angels, with which He raises them above all their created nature and makes them consorts by grace and by glory of the divine nature (2 Pet 1:4).

                    To love someone is to give him lordship over oneself; it is to make oneself captive, and to imprison oneself, and to place oneself in his lordship.  Then who will not praise that eternal Father, principle not only of angels and men, but of all creation, and even of two Persons, the Son and the Holy Spirit, from Whom, as Saint Paul says, all fatherhood in heaven and on earth takes its name (Eph 3:15)?  A Father from Whom the Son and the Holy Spirit receive all that They have, and He receives it from no one; He has from Himself whatever He has, and He is Who He is.  But who will say Who He is?  He is an infinite Power Who came to be able to engender a Son equal and similar to Himself; He is such a Goodness that He came to give all of His essence to His Son by way of generation and to the Holy Spirit by way of love; and, finally, He is a sea of infinite perfections Who, to say it better, is an infinite perfection, Whom the angels reverence, and the dominions adore, and the powers tremble at,[3] and the two divine Persons know that He is their principle and that, although there is the highest equality among them, and more than equality, since it is unity in the same nature, yet, along with this, there is the authority of the Father, from Whom the two divine Persons receive what They have, and the Father does not receive anything from them nor from anyone else.

                    Then, setting to one side this highest Majesty and infinite height, raised above us with infinite distance, and, on the other side, our lowness and, what is worse, our thoughts, who will dare to hope, or even think, that two such extreme distances could be joined into one?  Who among men will fly so high that he would catch this prey which flies upon cherubim and wings of winds (2 Sam 22:11)?  Who so rich that he would possess this Lord and wound His heart with the dart of love, and make Him come down to deal with laws of equality of love with creatures so unequal to Him?  “You are truth,” said Saint Augustine, “and I lie and vanity,” etc.[4]  And when will these extremes be able to join themselves into one?  And if they join together, it is a thing most worthy of admiration, as the holy Job felt, saying: Lord, what a thing is man that You would visit him and place Your heart in him? (Job 7:17)  And according to the saying of the Lord, where the treasure is, there is the heart (Mt 6:21); how could a thing as poor as man is be the treasure of a thing as rich as God is?

                    Certainly, there is need here for the faith of Abraham who, not grown thin on the part of the creature,[5] but comforted in the promise of the Creator, gave glory to God, holding Him to be so powerful that He can do everything that He promises.  But what He had promised there was that Sara, sterile and old, would give birth to a son.  A great marvel, for certain; but much more is it that God the Father gives Himself, for love, to a sterile soul, to a worm of the earth, to a sinner and one unworthy of seeing heaven and treading earth and of eating a bit of bread.  That God would love—and with so intimate a love—His creature, the beautiful love the ugly, the king the vassal, the all the nothing, is a thing of greater marvel and more blessed to possess, but very hard to believe; and no small pledges are necessary to make us certain of so great an honor, such grand richness, and such copious blessedness.  Because if they give us sufficient pledges of this, what remains but to lose one’s life, if it is necessary, in order to get the heart of God the Father for our own, and to have it wounded by the dart of love?

                    Blessed be the divine goodness which comes so far, which gives us a good that we do not merit, and His gifts exceed what we ask of Him, and even what desire, and even what we understand, as Saint Paul says (Eph 3:20).  Nothing in regards to doing good to men seems hard to God, and, as much as the height of heaven exceeds the littleness of earth, so are they[6] raised, in doing good for us, over the littleness of our heart for daring to desire and ask for it.  In Your thoughts, Lord, for him who complies[7]—says David—there is no one like You (Ps 40:5).

                    It is thus certain that the divine and paternal heart, moved by His intimate goodness, wants to place itself among men, and to hold them for its treasure, not to enrich Him with them, but rather so that, joining Himself with them, it would make them as rich as Him, since they would possess Him.  And the means He took to join these extremes was His most holy Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, according to what He Himself says: I am the way, the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father except through Me (Jn 14:6).  Let all those who desire to ascend to the height of the Father, then, know that the staircase is Jesus Christ, His Son; let all know that there is no other principal meditator if He is not, because, although the saints be so, they are so through Him, and they are so because He was the mediator in order that they might have worth with God, and that He is the mediator for all, if they want to come to Him.

                    --But, what will we do, since He is also high and most high, as the Church sings?[8]  And yet we can come to His height, as to that of His Father, inasmuch as God has one and the same height and inasmuch as man is united with the very person of the Word of God.

                    --Don’t go about full of aches and pains: it’s been days since God responded to these questions through the mouth of Moses, and, later, of Saint Paul: Do not say—says God—who will go up to heaven and who will descend to the abyss in order to bring us this commandment? (Dt 30:12)  Saint Paul declares the same thing, saying: Who will go up to heaven to bring us to Jesus Christ?  Who will descend to the abyss to bring Him resurrected?  Very near is what was commanded of you; it is in your mouth and in your heart (Rom 10:6-8).

                    You ask me where Christ is, so that you would go and, through Him, ascend to the Father, and I have to respond to you by pointing with my finger, like Saint John the Baptist, and I have to tell you as great a truth as he says, and the same truth that he said: There is the Lamb of God, Who takes away the sins of the world (Jn 1:29).  There He is, clothed in some accidents of bread, and He is there in a much more marvelous manner than He was when Saint John pointed at Him with his finger.

                    Oh divine love of the Eternal Father, which set up Jesus Christ, His Son, as the door through which to enter unto Him, according to what He said (Jn 10:9); and He sets Him up so close to men and so wide open that it appears He is inviting them to enter through it!  The heart of the Father is His Son; he who has His Son, has the heart of the Father.  He places Him in that uncovered reliquary, so that all would see Him, just as publicly as you see Him over there.

                    Oh wisest Father!  Does Your Majesty not know what You have placed in public, being a precious or beautiful thing, that there are many who desire it?  Do you not know, Lord, that, as Your servant Saint Gregory said, “He who carries a treasure publicly, by this act, gives one to understand that he desires that it be stolen”?[9]  You, Lord, have You not said: With every guard, guard your heart, because life proceeds from it (Prv 4:23)?  And if the life of our body proceeds from the heart, and, therefore, You commanded that we place it in a very safe place, why did You not place Your heart in a safer place, since from Him proceeds the life of our heart, and He is the fount of life, by which all living things live in heaven and on earth?  If it were money, it would not be much to guard a little of it, since it’s worth a little; but Your heart, Lord, which is richness itself, and which You loved so much, why do You not fear that they will rob You of it, since it is so beautiful and rich, and it is placed so publicly and so near to us that, in four or five steps, we could approach it and take it?

                    Oh the inventions of divine Wisdom, manifester of its enkindled love for men, which, by being so admirable, ought not to be forgotten or kept silent about, since of them it is said: Declare the inventions of God among the peoples (1 Chr 16:8)!  Oh desire, oh intense thirst which You have, Lord, that men would rob You, possess You, and be blessed by You!

                    The sun enlightens, warms, and gives joy without anyone intreating it, but rather it does so by its own nature; and fire and all Your creatures communicate what You have told them, without choice, but rather by the instinct of nature which You stuck in them, making them participants, in their own way, in Your infinite liberality.  But just as they are, in their being, lower than You, their liberality has nothing to do with Yours; they, if it is given them, do not know what they do; but You, Lord, knowing what You do, and thinking of it, You communicate Yourself with more gain and more copiously than any of Your creatures.  Oh, who could understand, Lord, Your ways full of beautiful love!  Who could understand how, in all things, when You do not yield and when You yield, and when You do and do not do, when You flatter and scold, the end that You intend in everything is our satisfaction and eternal salvation!

                    You command us, Lord, that we close up and guard our heart with every guard (Prv 4:23), so that it not be poured out among creatures and lost from You, Who are its life; you command that it be empty of all love, like the altar of Your sacrifices, and so that all its hollows[10] be filled with You and possess You; and, commanding us to have so tight a guard on our heart, You place Your own in public so that all can rob You of it, and no one takes ours from us, and all rob You of Yours!

                    Woe to the blind world that, to enrich itself, robs the poor and, to satisfy itself, drinks silt, wanders after the wind and smoke of vain honor, and, even with these miseries, it cannot grasp what it desires!  And the love and heart of the omnipotent Father comes to them, and they do not take care of it, though they could be blessed by it!  There it is, men, there is the heart and love of God the Father; why are there so few desirous of it?  We boast that God the Father wants to give His love; why so tepid to receive it?

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[1] The word used here (bienaventurado) often has the specific meaning of described the blessed in heaven, those who have obtained the Beatific Vision.

[2] These two words—“mercy” (merced) and “merit” (merecimiento)—are etymologically connected in Spanish.

[3] These last three phrases are based on the Preface to the Roman Canon.

[4] The closest passage seems to be St. Augustine, Confessions X.41.66, though the quote is not exact.

[5] This is a literal translation of this phrase (no enflaquecido por parte de la criatura); the meaning seems to be that “he did not grow weak in accord with his creaturely nature,” that is, by his created nature, it would have made sense for the old Abraham to grow weak and give up hope.  Instead, he was “comforted in the promise of the Creator.”

[6] The implied plural subject here seems to be the “thoughts of God” mentioned in the next sentence.

[7] I am uncertain what the phrase para lo que cumple means here, as it is not found in the Psalm verse here quoted.  Cumplir typically means “complete” or “fulfill,” but it can also mean “comply.”  The phrase could also mean “for what He completes” or “for what He achieves,” but the jump between second-person (“In Your thoughts”) to third-person (“for what He achieves”) would be very strange.

[8] The reference is to the Gloria: “For You alone are holy, You alone Lord, You alone the Most High…”

[9] See St. Gregory the Great, Homilies on the Gospels I.XI.1: “It is also to be noted in this matter that the treasure, being founded, is hidden, that it be preserved, since he who does not hide the eagerness for heavenly desire from human praises does not suffice for guarding it from malign spirits.  For we are in the present life as if on the way by which we travel to the fatherland.  But malign spirits lay in wait along our way like thieves.  Therefore, he desires to be despoiled who publicly carries a treasure along the way” (PL 76:1115A-B).  St. Gregory is commenting on Mt 13:41-52.

[10] Seno typically means “breast” or “bosom”; its Latin origin, though (sinus), can also mean “womb” or any hollow space.  

Translation ©2023 Brandon P. Otto.  Licensed via CC BY-NC.  Feel free to redistribute non-commercially, as long as credit is given to the translator.

 

Raoul Ardens: Homily XLV: On Palm Sunday

Introduction

Raoul (also known by the Latinized forms Radulfus or Radulphus) was born to a noble family in the Diocese of Poitiers, France, perhaps in the village of Beaulieu, near Bressuire.  According to some, he was born in the first half of the 11th century, became a priest and then court preacher of Guillaume (William) IX, count of Poitiers and duke of Aquitaine, considered the first troubadour, and died shortly after joining Guillaume on the Crusade of 1101.  More recent research, though, says that Raoul flourished in the 1190s, was a follower of the theologian Gilbert of Poitiers, and court chaplain of Richard I of England, the Lionheart.  (Richard I was the younger brother of a different William IX, count of Poitiers, which may have assisted in the confusion.)   

Raoul left a large collection of homilies, on the Epistles and Gospels for the various feast days of the year, among other occasions.  He also wrote a long, unfinished treatise of systematic theology and ethics called the Speculum universale (Universal Mirror).  In addition, there are some letters and a book of history attributed to him.  Below is a sermon for Palm Sunday.  The source is PL 155:1827D-1830C.

Homily XLV: On Palm Sunday I

Raoul Ardens (12th c.)

So have this mind among yourselves, which is also in Christ Jesus, Who, though He be in the form of God, did not deem it robbery to be equal with God (Phil 2:6-7), etc.  The Apostle exhorts us in this reading, beloved brethren, that a Christian should follow the path which Christ followed.  Christ followed humility, obedience, and patience; and, because of this, He was exalted, and He was given the name which is above every name (Phil 2:9).  As the first man followed pride, disobedience, and impatience, so, because of this, he fell.  Since, therefore, through these three vices, the ruin of the human race came to be, it was necessary that, through three virtues, the contraries of the aforesaid vices, it should be repaired.  But there was a four-fold pride in the first man: first, because he willed to be equal to his superior, when he deemed it robbery to be equal with God, which is, properly, arrogance.  Second, because he willed to extol himself over his equal, namely, the angel, which is, properly, pride.  Third, that he wanted to lived according to his own law, not God’s, which is, properly, presumption.  Fourth, that he strove to defend his sin, which is, properly, contumacy.  In which we, too, my brethren, imitate the old Adam, when we either strive to equal ourselves with our superiors, or when we extol ourselves over our equals, or when we want to do, not God’s, but our own will, or when we defend or excuse our sins. 

In the end, that this four-fold pride be destroyed, Christ, descending, displayed in himself a four-fold humility: first, since, as is shown in this reading, He did not deem it robbery to be equal with God.  For what He had by nature, He did not assume by robbery.  Second, since He emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant (Phil 2:7), lower not only than His co-equals—namely, the Father and the Holy Spirit—but also His inferiors, namely, the angels.  In accord with which, it is said of Him, to the Father, through the Prophet: You lowered Him a little lower than the angels (Ps 8:5).  He was also subjected to men, such as Mary and Joseph (Lk 2:51), even rendering tribute to Caesar (Mt 22:21), and washing the feet of His servants (Jn 13:1-20).  Third, since, in all things, He sought to do the will of the Father, not His own.  Wherefore I descended, He says, from heaven, not that I might do My will, but the will of Him Who sent Me (Jn 6:38).  Fourth, since, when He did not has His own sins, He bore others’.  Wherefore Peter says, He bore our sins upon the wood (1 Pet 2:24).  Wherefore He Himself says, God, My God, why have You abandoned Me?  Far from My salvation are the words of My offenses (Ps 22:1), calling our offenses His own. 

Let us, therefore, my brethren, follow not the old man Adam, but Christ, the new man.  Let us humble ourselves not only to our superiors, but also to our coequals and inferiors; let us seek to do, not our own, but God’s will; let us attend to carrying, not only the burden of our sins, but also the burden of others’ sins, making satisfaction and praying. 

There was also disobedience in Adam, since he did not want to obey his Creator in His good, and he obeyed the devil, His enemy, in his evil.  Contrarywise, Christ, as is said, was made obedient to the Father even unto death (Phil 2:8), and this unto the salvation of the human race, not His own race, and He did not obey the devil in hastening unto him.  Adam did not want to obey God in the lightest things, and Christ obeyed the Father in the hardest.  Adam did not want to obey God either through threats or through promises; Christ obeyed the Father, led by His own will.  Adam did not want to obey God so that he would live, abstaining from the tree; Christ obeyed the Father, so that He would merit to be hung on the tree.  Adam, because he was disobedient, lost the dominion which he had over all worldly creatures; Christ, because He was obedient, was given all power in heaven and on earth. 

Let us therefore flee, brethren, the disobedience of the old man, lest we be excluded from the inheritance of the heavenly fatherland, but let us imitate the obedience of the new man, Christ, so that we merit to be glorified with Him.  Moreover, obedience is necessary, because no good can profit without it, and no evil can do harm with obedience.  For though it is good to eat an apple, yet, through disobedience, it was evil.  And so evil that it forbid, not only the doer, Adam, but also his whole posterity, from paradise.  Although it be good to sacrifice to God, and to refrain from food through piety, yet, because Saul did this contrary to obedience, he gravely sinned in this.  Wherefore it was also said by Samuel to him: Obedience is worth more than sacrificial victims (1 Sam 15:22).  Contrarywise, though it is evil to steal or snatch neighbors’ goods, yet the Israelites, despoiling the Egyptians, did not sin, but rather merited, because they did this through obedience (Ex 12:35-36).  Again, though to marry a harlot, and to sire sons of harlotry, is a grave offense, yet the prophet, doing this at God’s command, did not sin, but rather profited (Hos 1:2-3).  And how good obedience is, many miracles of the saints have shown.  Indeed, it is said that Maurus, running at the command of Father Benedict, so that he would snatch the boy Placidus out of the water, walked upon the waters.[1]  It is said that another, too, leaping into a burning oven at the command of the abbot, departed unburned.[2]

Let us therefore love, brethren, obedience in all things, being obedient to God in all things, and obeying our superiors in all things which are not against God, knowing that whatever seems useless or idle in itself, if it is done through obedience, becomes useful and meritorious.  There was also impatience in Adam, since he did not want to suffer the meekest yoke of God, so that, living, he would evade death.  Contrarywise, in Christ, there was maximum patience, since He bore the hard mandate of the Father, so that, dying, He would recall the dead to life.  Adam, also, could not suffer most meekly for himself, but Christ suffered most hardly for others.  Adam could not suffer so to abstain from the tree; Christ sustained so that He would die on the tree—which death is most cruellest, shameful, and long,  wherefore His patience was also greater, and more abject, and more long-suffering.  For the cruel death is not quick, but slays slowly.  Shameful death is reported to occur among the iniquitous.  A long-suffering death is when one is dissolved by long vexation.  But the iniquitous suffered with Him, but dissimilarly.  For, on the left side, the thief suffers for his own sin and he is not corrected, but he reproaches more, and he is more deteriorated.  Also, on the right side, the thief suffers for his own sin, and he is corrected; he prays for himself and is saved.  But Christ does not suffer for His own, but for others’ sins; He prays for enemies, and His virtue is more and more glorified.  Through these three things, three kinds of patience are signified.  Indeed, through the left thief, they are signified who, scourged for their sins, do not amend themselves, but they murmur and are reproached the more.  But through the right thief, they are signified who, scourged for their sins, amend themselves, give thanks, and are saved.  But through Christ, the innocent are signified, they who, without cause, sustain sufferings patiently, give thanks, and pray for their enemies, grow more and more clear.  Therefore, since Christ was so humble, so obedient, and so patient, He was exalted at the right hand of the Father, and He was given a name, which is above every name, so that, namely, He would be one God, with the Father and the Holy Spirit.  And this, too, is, thuswise, said to be given: since it was by nature that He was God, grace was given Him according to man.  So that in the Name of Jesus every knee—that is, every power—would bow, heavenly, and earthly, and infernal.  And so that every tongue, that is, every kind of speech, would confess, that the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father (Phil 2:10-11). 

Therefore, most beloved brethren, if we desire to attain to God’s glory, let us follow His way.  Let us be humbled, let us obey, let us suffer. For he who is proud, disobedient, and impatient, does not attain to the way of Christ, but the way of the devil, and, therefore, with him, he is cast down and damned.  For however much we desire to be exalted in this age instead of humbled, that much more, instead of obeying, we prosper in worldly lusts instead of suffering corrections; we do not know the things of God, but those of the devil.  Let us, therefore, humble ourselves, not only to our superiors, but also to our equals and inferiors.  Let us obey God and our superiors, not by fear, nor for profit, but by love.  Let us suffer scourges and tribulations with equal soul, and let us say that we bear evils, if not innocently (like Christ), then, like the right-hand thief, because of our own sins, giving thanks, and, praying for our persecutors, insofar as these passions are purging and useful for us, so that, with that thief, we might merit to enter paradise.  Through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

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[1] See St. Gregory the Great, Dialogues II.VII.

[2] A later chapter in St. Gregory’s Dialogues (II.X) tells of how an idol caused the monks to hallucinate fire in a kitchen until St. Benedict told them of the delusion and bid them to bless their eyes to remove the hallucination.  Perhaps Raoul is thinking of this story, or possibly a later expansion of it.

Translation ©2023 Brandon P. Otto.  Licensed via CC BY-NC.  Feel free to redistribute non-commercially, as long as credit is given to the translator.