Listening and doing

Over the last six weeks we have been considering the ancient art of Lectio Divina mainly through an examination of Basil Pennington’s book. During this time, I have been hunting for a better book I might recommend and profit from. Well, Success! I have found such a book: Eugene H. Peterson’s EAT THIS BOOK: A CONVERSATION IN THE ART OF SPIRITUAL READING [William B. Eerdman’s Publishing Company, 2006]. A Presbyterian Pastor, Peterson gives us a different view than most of the books I have looked at—all of which were written by Catholics in Monastic orders. He is also quite a scholar so there are many chapters that look more deeply into Biblical issues than Pennington’s or others I have read. I recommend especially his chapter on “God’s Secretaries” which examines the problem of translation and how it affects Lectio Divina. Peterson has recently translated the Bible into contemporary American English which has been received very well in the marketplace. This is now available on-line. Take a look at it: http://www.biblegateway.com/versions/Message-MSG-Bible/

What I find missing in Peterson as in Pennington and all the others I have read is any recognition or understanding or embrace of the Historical Critical tradition which has transformed the way we think about the text. The last 125 years have produced a geyser of ancient documents which teach us more about the first 300 years of Christian tradition than Christians have ever known before.

Indeed, we are today Post Modern Christians whether we wish to acknowledge it or not: Most authors on Lectio Divina opt to deny the importance of these discoveries and the transformative quality they have had on our appreciation and perception of Biblical texts. That this is so, is for me a disheartening and disturbing feature of contemporary Lectio Divina practice. It is almost as if to practice Lectio Divina we have to return to a more primitive understanding of the Bible and the Church itself.

In reference to one of the most influential groups of biblical scholars in the last twenty years, The Jesus Seminar, Pennington writes: “We hear of some rather ridiculous things today that go under the name of ‘biblical scholarship,’ like the so-called Jesus group that cast votes, in diversely colored beads, to determine which saying in the New Testament are authentically Words of the Lord. Such nonsense is enough to turn one away from modern rationalistic scriptural studies. A reason that is not informed by faith and aided by Holy Spirit can hardly hope to attain to any truly fruitful understanding of the Word” [102].

My guess is that Pennington never read any of the Jesus Seminar scholarly productions such as Crossan’s The Historical Jesus, a magisterial reconsideration of the historical contexts of the man Jesus and his time. Certainly, he never understood the process behind The Five Gospels, an edition of Mathew, Mark, Luke, John and Thomas, in which these scholars tried to determine which words were likely to be actually from Jesus and which were invented for one purpose or another. Such studies clearly question the authenticity of the text and the historical process by which we received it.

The problem then is knowing this scholarship, how can we return to Lectio Divina and accept the predispositions Pennington demands in his first chapter? Perhaps by extension we might use something of Coleridge’s “A willing Suspension of Disbelief” [well disbelief might be too harsh a word, but perhaps a willing suspension of skepticism would work.]

I find it interesting that in Chapter Seven Pennington quotes Paul’s letter to Timothy in which Paul says that “All scripture inspired by God is useful for teaching and refutation for correction and putting us in the way that is right with god for communication and communion.” The only problem with this is that Paul wrote this letter long before there was any other scripture not from his own hand. He could not have been referring to what we now call “The New Testament” as it did not yet exist. He was in all likelihood referring to Hebrew scripture, but suddenly the “All” is taken by Pennington and many others to mean The Bible as we now have it. This kind of retrojection is frequent in the books I have read on Lectio, and it comes from a willful disregard for Biblical scholarship. [Retrojection is the throwing backwards of a modern idea into earlier historical periods as if it actually came from that time. For example, the writers of the New Testament retrojected their experience back into the experience of Jesus and the crucifixion.

I like very much what Pennington has to say here about the nature of friendship. “Our friend is someone we can really count on. St. James tells us in his epistle that the reason our prayer is not heard is because we are like the waves of the sea: up and down, up and down. I believe, I don’t believe, I trust, I don’t trust” [76].

I think this is the modern reader’s predicament. We are skeptical, we are true believers. We are skeptical, we are true believers. We are skeptical, we are true believers. We oscillate between these two states until nothing at all happens.

In Chapter Eight Pennington continues this argument by saying: “If I am content to gather beautiful thoughts in a book and feel good about myself because I am so faithful to my Lectio, then maybe I had better get rid of my book, stop collecting thoughts, and let some of the Lord’s words sear my soul” [86].

Beautiful thoughts, brilliant analyses, can be a kind of idol that we use to substitute for the relationship we could have with God in Lectio.

It is like Franz Kafka once wrote: “Altogether, I think we ought to read only books that bite and sting us. If the book we are reading doesn't shake us awake like a blow to the skull, why bother reading it in the first place? So that it can make us happy, as you put it? Good God, we'd be just as happy if we had no books at all; books that make us happy we could, in a pinch, also write ourselves. What we need are books that hit us like a most painful misfortune, like the death of someone we loved more than we love ourselves, that make use feel as though we had been banished to the woods, far from any human presence, like suicide. A book must be the axe for the frozen sea within us. That is what I believe” (From a letter to Oskar Pollak dated January 27, 1904).

Having said this I think it would be good to end this class with a shared Lectio. This is what Lectio was in the beginning, you will remember. It was read by those literate monks who had access to a Bible to their confreres often during meals. It is so different from the kind of readerly Lectio occasioned by the advent of print and the liberation of the Bible from centuries of being forbidden to laity. So I think it only fitting to remember what Lectio was and should be again among us as listening Christians.

Following Pennington’s suggestions at the end of Chapter 12, lets read the first chapter of James.

We will read it three times.

After the first reading each of us choose a word or phrase from the reading and quietly repeat it within ourselves. Then there will be a time of sharing

After the second reading the reader will ask you to consider: “what has the Lord said to me in this reading with regard to my life today?” Then there will be a time of sharing: I hear the Lord saying to me . . . .

After the third reading each of us will reflect on what the Lord wants us to do today/this week.
Then there will be a time of sharing what has come forth.

Then we will rise and all say together the Lords prayer.


Let us call upon the Holy Spirit to be with us in this place and open our ears that we may hear the divine word and be renewed.
James 1
1James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ,
To the twelve tribes scattered among the nations:
Greetings.
Trials and Temptations
2Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, 3because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. 4Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. 5If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. 6But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. 7That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord; 8he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does.
9The brother in humble circumstances ought to take pride in his high position. 10But the one who is rich should take pride in his low position, because he will pass away like a wild flower. 11For the sun rises with scorching heat and withers the plant; its blossom falls and its beauty is destroyed. In the same way, the rich man will fade away even while he goes about his business.
12Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.
13When tempted, no one should say, "God is tempting me." For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; 14but each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. 15Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.
16Don't be deceived, my dear brothers. 17Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. 18He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created.
Listening and Doing
19My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, 20for man's anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires. 21Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you.
22Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.23Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror 24and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. 25But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does.
26If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless. 27Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.