SPIRITUAL CLASSICS

The Cloud of Unknowing     

Historical context

What was happening in England in the middle of the 14th century?

• Edward III was on the throne, shortly to be followed by Richard II (the boy king)
• The Hundred Years' War was taking men away to fight
• The Black Death was in full swing
• Chaucer was writing gutsy prose in English
• A poll tax was imposed, which was very unpopular
• The Peasants' Revolt was brewing (partly as a result of the poll tax)

Across the channel:

• The Hundred Years' War was being fought
• The Pope was living in Avignon
• Various heresies were rampant
• The first tremors of the Renaissance (and Reformation) could be felt, though this was more easily discerned with hindsight

In Europe :   
Mechtild, Gertrude, Meister Eckhart, Tauler, Suso (Germany) Angela de Foligno, Catherine of Siena (Italy)

Ruysbroek, Thomas a Kempis (Flanders)

England :   Richard Rolle, Walter Hilton, Julian of Norwich

It is interesting to note that there are five women in this list of twelve, which seems an unusually high proportion. However, this was a period when many women in convents were well-educated and had much freedom to think and write.

It would be a mistake to assume that these people all influenced each other. They were separated by chronology and by geography. There were no printed books - Gutenberg and Caxton came a century later. Most of the people on the list were vowed religious, confined to one place. Some were regulated by strict rules of enclosure. So how did this more-or-less simultaneous development happen in so many different places?

Fourteenth-century Europe was a place of turmoil; of war, disease and political unrest. Thoughtful people were prompted to look inwards to consider eternal, spiritual things. Doubtless many others also thought, wrote and taught, but these twelve produced writings, which others found valuable and circulated, so they have survived. Given the importance of pilgrimage during this period, many mendicant monks and friars would also have helped to spread knowledge of their works.

This period is so important in the development of spiritual thought that we shall discuss two of its books in this series. One is very well-known (Julian - Revelations of Divine Love, of which more in three weeks' time); the other (The Cloud of Unknowing) is almost unheard of other than by theologians and mediaeval scholars.

An additional development also helped the dissemination of fourteenth-century spirituality. Rolle, Hilton, Julian and the "Cloud" author all wrote in English, not Latin, which was much more accessible to ordinary people. It is hard for us today, however. Middle English (Chaucer's language) needs translation. I am using Clifton Wolters' Penguin translation of The Cloud of Unknowing (1961 and reprints) but there are others.

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The author

We know nothing about the author of the "Cloud" - not even his name. However, scholars have been able to deduce a certain amount, from linguistic and textual study plus the basic knowledge and development of ideas within the book. So it is generally thought that he was:

• A priest, possibly a monk or a country parson
• A scholarly, gentle man with a sense of proportion and humour
• Probably an experienced spiritual director
• Well-read, and wrote well, almost poetically
• Unable to describe the experience of contemplation (no mystic can) but can write the "how to" very clearly and plainly
• Probably from E. Midlands (comparing his use of language with other writings known to have come from this area suggests this)

We also know that he was aware and critical of the works of Richard Rolle (who died in 1349), that he was criticised by Walter Hilton (who died in 1395), and that the earliest surviving manuscript of his book dates from the late fourteenth century. So we can conclude that it was written in about 1370.

The context of "The Cloud"

The book is a manual for an aspiring contemplative. This may seem a long way from most people's experience, and also from our current religious practice. But even in 1370, there was tension between "active" and "contemplative" religious orders. The "Cloud" discusses this, and the author sees the contemplative life as superior, possibly naturally given his background.

This tension still exists, and in the twenty-first century tolerance for contemplation and mysticism even less obvious. Though many people search for "something deeper," few have the time, the willpower or the discipline to take the contemplative path. But mysticism always draws a few people in each generation. It is found as an aspect of every religion: in the Jewish Kabbala and Islamic Sufism, for example. Buddhism is essentially entirely mystic. Even though each of these developed quite separately, many of the essential elements are the same, suggesting that there is something inherently mystical in human nature - a drive to search for God through one's own interior awareness.

The "Cloud" is particularly interesting because it is largely based on the Greek (Orthodox) understanding of theology rather than the Roman (Western) tradition. The writings of "Pseudo-Dionysius" (originally thought to be Dionysius the Areopagite who is mentioned by St Paul, but later shown to be a much later anonymous author) were very influential in Greek theological development. The author of the "Cloud" had read and translated these, and he uses the Pseudo-Dionysian framework to counter the "enthusiasm" of Richard Rolle.

It is complex to explain these modes of thought, especially as the "Cloud" is a 14th century book written with a 14th century mindset and understanding, but I will try.

On the whole, western theological development has been rational, analytical, and scientific. It grew through the reverent written and spoken logic and argument of the "scholastics" - the schoolmen, steeped in the texts and thought patterns of Aristotle and Aquinas. It is dependent on words and on language, but it accepts that God is beyond any language used to describe him. Thus we may say that God is "good," but God's goodness far exceeds anything we can actually understand by "good." However, the two ideas of "goodness" are the same sort of thing.

This approach is called the "Via Positiva" because it builds up - adds to - what can be said and understood by humans. Because it is based on logic, the Via Positiva is vulnerable to attack from other rational and logical viewpoints such as the development of scientific knowledge. As science apparently explains more, the space for God seems to diminish.

Eastern (Greek) theological development sidelined the use of reason. It holds that it is impossible to discuss or analyse the concept of God, because it is completely above and opaque to human understanding. Words are human constructs, and are therefore utterly inadequate to describe God who, by definition, is ineffable (meaning unutterable, unspeakable). So word-based speech, writing or thought cannot be used; theology must be seen, felt, experienced. God must be approached through darkness and silence. This is (strictly) "agnostic": you cannot know God so don't waste time trying. Just strive to experience God; to be in his presence.

This approach is called the "Via Negativa" because it strips away - takes away from - what we think we know. It is also described as "apophatic" - without words. It has been able to confront the challenges of Communism, Fascism and science more robustly than the Western tradition, perhaps because it won't engage in argument on others' terms, or using their words.

Three underlying biblical texts are of particular importance in the "Cloud":

• After long preparation Moses climbed Mount Sinai to its top, which was hidden in cloud. He got to where God was but did not see or know God although he was in his presence. He was in a "cloud of unknowing."
• In the story of Martha and Mary, Mary is the contemplative who opted for a passive experience at Christ's feet and glimpsed his divinity in veiled form. Martha is the active who is always busy and is told not to criticise the contemplative, because "She has chosen the better part."
• At the Transfiguration, selected disciples are taken up a mountain by Jesus (ie by God's will, not by their own desire). They see Christ momentarily in his full glory before a cloud (of unknowing) hides him from their sight.

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The book itself

I've been tempted into lots of explanation and far too many words for a book based on apophatic theology! Let's get to the book. It has a straightforward structure:

• Ch. 1-26: What contemplation is
• Ch. 27-50: Learning to contemplate; overcoming sin
• Ch. 51-60: What can go wrong
• Ch. 61-67: Using our faculties
• Ch. 68-75: The ultimate experience of contemplation; the validity of a call to the contemplative life

To give you an initial flavour of the book:

The first description of the "Cloud of Unknowing" ( Ch. 3):

Lift up your heart to God with humble love: and mean God himself, and not what you get out of him. Indeed, hate to think of anything but God himself, so that nothing occupies your mind or will but only God. Try to forget all created things that he ever made, and the purpose behind them, so that your thought and longing do not turn or reach out to them either in general or in particular. Let them go, and pay no attention to them. It is the work of the soul that pleases God most. All saints and angels rejoice over it, and hasten to help it on with all their might. Do not give up then, but work away at it until you have this longing. When you first begin, you find only darkness, and as it were a cloud of unknowing. You don't know what this means except that in your will you feel a singe steadfast intention reaching out towards God. Do what you will, this darkness and this cloud remain between you and God, and stop you both from seeing him in the clear light of rational understanding, and from experiencing his loving sweetness in your affection. Reconcile yourself to wait in this darkness as long as is necessary, but still go on longing after him whom you love. For if you are to feel him or to see him in this life, it must always be in this cloud, in this darkness. And if you will work hard at what I tell you, I believe that through God's mercy you will achieve this very thing.

The "Cloud of forgetting" ( Ch. 5):

If ever you are to come to this cloud and live and work in it, as I suggest, then just as this cloud of unknowing is as it were above you, between you and God, so you must also put a cloud of forgetting beneath you and all creation. We are apt to think that we are very far from God because of this cloud of unknowing between us and him, but surely it would me more correct to say that we are much farther from him if there is no cloud of forgetting between us and the whole created world. Whenever I say "the whole created world" I always mean not only the individual creatures therein but everything connected with them. There is no exception whatever, whether you think of them as physical or spiritual beings, or of their states or actions, or of their goodness or holiness. In a word, everything must be hidden under this cloud of forgetting.

For though it is sometimes helpful to think of particular creatures, what they are and do, in this case it is virtually useless. For the act of remembering or thinking about what a thing is or does has a spiritual effect. Your soul's eye concentrates upon it, just as the marksman fixes his eye on his target. Let me say this: everything you think about, all the time you think about it, is "above" you, between you and God. And you are that much farther from God if anything but God is in your mind.

 

How to think of God ( Ch. 6)

But now you will ask me, "How am I to think of God himself, and what is he?" and I cannot answer you except to say "I do not know!" For with this question you have brought me into the same darkness, the same cloud of unknowing, where I want you to be! For though we through the grace of God can know fully about all other matters and think about them - yes, even the very works of God himself - yet of God himself can no man think. Therefore I will leave on one side everything I can think, and choose for my love that thing which I cannot think! Why? Because he many well be loved, but not by thought. By love he can be caught and held, but by thinking never. Therefore, though it may be good sometimes to think particularly about God's kindness and worth, and though it may be enlightening too, and a part of contemplation, yet in the work now before us it must be put down and covered with a cloud of forgetting. And you are to step over it resolutely and eagerly, with a devout and kindling love, and try to penetrate that darkness above you. Strike that thick cloud of unknowing with the sharp dart of longing love, and on no account whatever think of giving up.

Note the "down-to-earthness" of this passage - the author is a contemplative himself but can't describe what he has experienced!

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The writing has close observation and humour:

How not to speak ( Ch. 54):

For there are those who concentrate all their energies on learning how to speak weightily and to avoid making fools of themselves, with many humble bleats and displays of devotion. They are more anxious to seem holy in the sight of men than in the sight of God and his angels. Why, these people will worry and grieve more over unorthodox ritual, or the speaking of an unseemly or unsuitable word, than they will for a thousand vain thoughts or nauseating and sinful impulses, which they have deliberately gathered to themselves, or recklessly indulged in the sight of God, and the saints and angels in heaven. Ah, Lord God! Where there are so many humble bleats without, there must be pride within. I am ready to grant that it is appropriate and seemly for those who are genuinely humble to express the humility of their heart outwardly in words and behaviour. But I cannot say they should be expressed in quavering or high-pitched voices, contrary to the natural disposition of the speaker. For if they are genuine, they are spoken with sincerity, and the speaker's voice is as sound as his spirit. If a man who has naturally a loud and powerful voice, speaks in a pathetic and high-pitched voice (assuming he is not ill, or is not talking with God or his confessor!) then it is a plain token of hypocrisy in young or old alike.

 

What more shall I say of these poisonous errors? Unless they have the grace to leave off this hypocritical bleating, I really believe that between the secret pride of their inmost hearts and the humble words on their lips, their pitiable souls will very soon sink with sorrow. 

Unlike many manuals for mystics, the "Cloud" is gentle and practical. The author even offers "hints and tips" for the novice contemplative:

A spiritual "dodge" ( Ch. 31)

If memories of your past actions keep coming between you and God, or any new thought or sinful impulse, you are resolutely to step over them, because of your deep love for God; you must trample them down under foot. Try to cover them with the thick cloud of forgetting, as though they had never been committed either by you or by anyone else. And indeed, as often as they come up, push them down. And if it is really hard work you can use every "dodge", scheme and spiritual stratagem you can find to put them away. These arts are better learned from God by experience, than from any human teacher.

Short prayers (Chs. 37, 39):

If they (prayers) are in words, as they seldom are, then they are very few words; the fewer the better. If it is a little word of one syllable, I think it is better than if it is of two, and more in accordance with the work of the Spirit. For a contemplative should always live at the highest, topmost peak spiritually.

 

We can illustrate this by looking at nature. A man or woman, suddenly frightened by fire, or death, or whatever you will, is suddenly in his extremity of spirit driven hastily and by necessity to cry or pray for help. And how does he do it? Not, surely, with a spate of words; not even in a single word of two syllables! Why? He thinks it wastes too much time to declare his urgent need and his agitation. So he bursts out in his terror with one little word, and that of a single syllable: "Fire!" it may be, or "Help!"

 

Just as this little word stirs and pierces the ears of the hearers more quickly, so too does a little word of one syllable when it is not merely spoken or thought, but expresses also the intention in the depth of our spirit. Which is the same as the "height" of our spirit, for in these matters height, depth, length and breadth all mean the same. And it pierces the ears of Almighty God more quickly than any long psalm churned out unthinkingly. That is why it is written "Short prayer penetrates heaven." (37)

 

But don't study these words, for you will never achieve your object so, or come to contemplation; it is never attained by study, but only by grace. Take no other words for your prayer, despite all I have said, than those that God leads you to use. Yet if God does lead you to these, my advice is not to let them go, that is, if you are using words at all in your prayer: not otherwise. They are very short words. But though shortness of prayer is greatly to be recommended here, it does not mean that the frequency of prayer is to be lessened. For as I have said, it is prayed in the length of one's spirit, so that it never stops until such time that it has fully attained what it longs for. We can turn to our terrified man or woman for an example. They never stop crying their little words "Help!" or "Fire!" till such time as they have got all the help they need in their trouble. (39)

Letting God shape you ( Ch. 7):

In a word, let this thing (the desire for contemplation) deal with you and lead you as it will. Let it be active and you passive. Watch it if you like, but let it alone. Do not interfere with it, as though you would help, for fear that you should spoil it all. Be the tree: let it be the carpenter. Be the house, and let it be the householder who lives there. Be willing to be blind, and give up all longing to know the why and the how, for knowing will be more of a hindrance than a help. It is enough that you should feel moved lovingly by you know not what, and that in this inward urge you have no real thought for anything less than God, and that your desire is steadily and simply turned towards him.

Wrong ways to go

In contrast to many spiritual writers, the "Cloud" author warns against concentrating on one's own sinfulness. In one memorable sentence he says:

I mean, by sin, the whole lump of it, not particularising any part.

 

Spending too much time focusing on and agonising over one's own sin and wretchedness shows pride and lack of humility. This is self-centred time, not time spent focussed on God.

 

He also counteracts quite explicitly the logical, rational approach of the western "schoolmen":
Be careful not to interpret physically what is meant spiritually.

 

He sees that the great danger of rational analysis is that one becomes caught up in the analysis rather than caught up in God.

The conclusion

The underlying theme and motive for this book is that those whom God calls to contemplative life cannot escape his call. They will be drawn to him and to the contemplative life no matter what obstacles may be placed in their way. But they will progress in the life only by grace and not by own work. All they can bring is their own attentiveness and love for God. When they have stripped themselves of everything: words, worries, sin, thought, consciousness of time and place; when they have nothing and are nowhere, and then they will find themselves in the presence of God and experience the bliss of union.

This is extraordinarily like the teaching of St John of the Cross two centuries later - the "dark night of the soul" followed by the realisation that "nothing is all." Could St John have known the work of this anonymous English mystic? Is this coincidence, or the work of the Holy Spirit?

Let us finish with two further thoughts from our author:

I really believe that those who will not go the hard way to heaven will go the comfortable way to hell.

It is not what you are or what you have been that God looks at with his merciful eyes, but what you would be.

And a final warning - maybe to me for having the presumption to introduce you to this book:

I do not want the loud-mouthed, or flatterers, or mock-modest, or busybodies, or talebearers, or cantankerous to see this book, for it has never been my intention to write all this for them. I would rather that they did not hear it. and also those learned (and unlearned) people who are merely curious. Yes, even if they are good men judged from the active standpoint, all this will mean nothing to them.

 

The Revd Dr Margaret Joachim
© St Peter's Church, Ealing, 2006

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