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Prayer of Philaret, Metropolitan of Moscow
My Lord, I know not what I ought to ask of Thee.
Thou and Thou alone knowest my needs.
Thou lovest me more than I am able to love Thee.
O Father, grant unto me, Thy servant, all which I cannot ask.
For a cross I dare not ask, nor for consolation;
I dare only to stand in Thy presence.
My heart is open to Thee.
Thou seest my needs of which I myself am unaware.
Behold and lift me up!
In Thy presence I stand,
awed and silenced by Thy will and Thy judgments,
into which my mind cannot penetrate.
To Thee I offer myself as a sacrifice.
No other desire is mine but to fulfill Thy will.
Teach me how to pray.
Do Thyself pray within me.
Amen.
(http://www.ocf.org/OrthodoxPage/prayers/philaret.html)
Comments
Light is a central theme in the world religions. This Light is seen to be both outside and inside us.
Hildegard of Bingen described her spiritual awakening, which happened at age forty-two, in terms of light. Her awakening spiritually was like a “burning light of tremendous brightness coming from heaven [and] pour[ing] into my entire mind.” And, “Like a flame that does not burn but enkindles, it enflamed my entire heart and my entire breast, just like the sun that warms an object with its rays.” Hildegard called her paintings that arose from this experience “Illuminations.” (Matthew Fox, Illuminations of Hildegard of Bingen)
The same light is the light in all living things. Everything is made, basically, of light. Every living creature, including you and I, are mediums of light waves and particles, for light appears as particle and wave.
This light is manifested in the Hebrew and Christian tradition as “glory.” Glory is the Light that sources all light. Glory is the radiant Presence of the Divine, the Light.
The Prologue to St. John has the following:
1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was in the beginning with God. 3All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being 4in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. 5The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. 6 There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. 7He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. 8He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. 9The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. 11He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. 12But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, 13who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God. 14 And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth. 15(John testified to him and cried out, ‘This was he of whom I said, “He who comes after me ranks ahead of me because he was before me.” ’) 16From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. 17The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known. (NRSV, italics added)
Light is an apt reference for the Word, for Christ, who is the “glory” of the Father. One matter that stands out in the Prologue is the pervasiveness of light. Again, all matter is basically light. Light spreads itself out naturally, enlightening whatever it touches. Likewise, the Word is pervasive. As all Creation is bathed in light, the Light diffuses Light through all Nature. Indeed, the light itself is witness to the Light, deriving from the Light is the light. Our very bodies as well as the body of a tree or a bird perched on a limb of the tree are living witnesses to the Light.
The Prologue to John speaks of this pervasiveness of the Word, Light. The Word, Light, “enlightens everyone.” The “coming into the world” can refer to everyone being born or the historical incarnation of the preexistent Word, Light. Regardless, everyone is being enlightened, according to the Prologue.
What does this mean, this everyone being enlightened by the Light? Everyone has what Judaism refers to as the “spark of the soul.” Christians refer to this as the “image of God.” We each have received a part of the Divine, a seed of Christ lives within us each. God has shared part of Himself with us, not as God in God, but as an expression of the energy that theologians call “divine energies.”
Then how are we to respond, seeing we can be unaware of this spark of the divine? Mechtild of Magdeburg gives us the instructions of enjoying the light within, one with the Light:
Lie down in the Fire.
See and taste the flowing Godhead
through your being.
Feel the Holy Spirit moving and compelling you
within the flowing Fire and Light of God.
(Sue Woodruff, Meditations with Mechtild of Magdeburg)
Notice some matters from Mechtild. First, notice the intimacy. We are to “lie down in,” “see and taste,” and “feel.” We are called to an intimate relationship with this pervasive Light, as it particularizes part of the divine energies within each of us. We are to have a tactile intimacy with the Light. Second, notice the action. This moves and urges us. This Light is not just for us to enjoy, It is for us to obey, for It is an expression of the Holy Spirit, or God-Within. Last, “through your being” speaks, also, of intimacy. The full nature of God, as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, or what is called Godhead, flows through your total being: again, like light.
Again, Light and light provide parallels in varied wisdom traditions over many centuries. I close with a beautiful verse from Kemet, or ancient Egypt, where the African peoples sang praise to the god Aten, who was associated with the Sun, about 1550-1305 BCE. This same verse could be said or sung in the Judeo-Christian tradition, for they exactly represent the theology of Judaism and Christianity:
Beautiful you rise, O eternal living god!
You are radiant, lovely, powerful,
Your love is great, all-encompassing.
Your rays make all radiant,
Your brightness gives life to hearts,
When you fill the Two Lands with your love.
(Malefi Kete Asante and Abu S. Abarry, eds., African Intellectual Heritage)
Reflections
How does light inform you about the nature of Christ? … your relationship with the Godhead? … the relationship of God with Creation?
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