Yes, his poetry and extensive commentary on the subject are arcane and recondite to the casual reader, but to the sojourner in the dark night experience, they are affirming and consoling; they provide context and understanding. And yes, surely the very notion of the dark night experience suggests spiritualization of misfortune, illness, and the changes of seasons, but so often that’s just how God works, and that is just what he is working with. If it serves you better, more contemporary interpretations of the dark night can be found in Thomas Merton’s inspired Contemplative Prayer and New Seeds of Contemplation, and in Richard Foster’s instructive Celebration of Discipline.
In Richard Foster’s wonderful book, he briefly but helpfully addresses the spiritual experience of the “dark night” in his chapter on solitude. Excerpts from his commentary may be useful to us here.
The ‘dark night’… is not something bad or destructive. On the contrary, it is an experience to be welcomed…The purpose of the darkness is not to punish, but to set us free.
What does the dark night of the soul involve? We may have a sense of dryness, aloneness, even lostness. Any overdependence on the emotional life is stripped away…The dark night is one of the ways God brings us into a hush, a stillness so that He may work an inner transformation upon the soul.
[Foster quotes St. John of the Cross, saying] '…the darkness of the soul mentioned here…puts the sensory and spiritual appetites to sleep…It binds the imagination and impedes it from doing any good discursive work. It makes the memory cease, the intellect become dark…and hence it causes the will also to become arid and constrained, and all the faculties empty…And over all this hangs a dense and burdensome cloud which afflicts the soul and keeps it withdrawn from God.
'During such a time, Bible reading, sermons, intellectual debate—all fail to move or excite us…there is often a temptation to seek release from it and to blame everyone and everything for our inner dullness…You may begin to look around for another church or new experience…This is a serious mistake. Recognize the darknight for what it is. Be grateful that God is lovingly drawing you away from every distraction so that you can see Him clearly. Rather than chafing and fighting, become still and wait.
But because it is such an unexpected and challenging experience for which most are wholly unprepared, and because it can continue for many years, it is important, or at least very helpful, to find a gifted spiritual director to guide you through this process. And it can also be very helpful to consult the recorded experience and guidance of St. John of the Cross, Thomas Merton, or other experienced dark-night sojourners. For I’m not sure if these turbulent waters can be navigated at all well without this affirmation, consolation and direction. If you sense the need and the leading, seek out spiritual direction from the people God places there for you. We have discussed this in Guides, Past & Present.
There are particular Scriptures, poetry and commentaries that seem to speak to this experience in guiding and helpful ways. Among the more relevant, contextual Scriptures might be Isaiah 43: 1-3; Jeremiah 6: 16 and 29: 11-14; Ecclesiastes 3; Job; Matthew 16: 24-26; John 15 and 17: 13-26; 1 John 2: 15-17 and 4: 7-21; Romans 12: 1-2; 2 Corinthians 12: 1-10; Galatians 2:19-20; Colossians 3:1-17; and John 14: 25-27. But let me share with you some other poetry and commentary that apparently, arguably, address more directly the experience of the dark night.
St. John of the Cross offers Jeremiah’s Lamentations at chapter 3: 1-26:
…In dark places He has made me dwell,
Like those who have long been dead.
He has walled me in so that I cannot go out;
He has made my chain heavy.
Even when I cry out and call for help,
He shuts out my prayer.
He has blocked my ways with hewn stone,
He has made my paths crooked…
He has turned aside my ways and torn me to pieces;
He has made me desolate.
He bent His bow
And set me as a target for the arrow.
He made the arrows of His quiver
To enter into my inward parts...
He has filled me with bitterness,
He has made me drunk with wormwood.
He has broken my teeth with gravel;
He has made me cower in the dust.
My soul has been rejected from peace;
I have forgotten happiness.
So, I say, 'My strength has perished,
And so has my hope from the LORD.'
[But then hope, mercy and relief]
Remember my affliction and my wandering,
The wormwood and bitterness.
Surely my soul remembers
And is bowed down within me.
This I recall to my mind,
Therefore, I have hope.
The Lords lovingkindnesses indeed never cease,
For His compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.
'The LORD is my portion,' says my soul,
'Therefore, I have hope in Him.'
The LORD is good to those who wait for Him,He also makes reference to the experience captured in Psalm 18: 9-28 where the psalmist searches for and senses God behind the darkness:
To the person who seeks Him.
It is good that he waits silently
For the salvation of the LORD.
He bowed the heavens also and came down
With thick darkness under His feet.
And He rode upon a cherub and flew;
And He sped upon the wings of the wind.
He made darkness His hiding place,
His canopy around Him,
Darkness of waters, thick clouds of the skies.
From the brightness before Him passed
His thick clouds, hailstones and coals of fire.
…[But] He rescued me because he delighted in me…Speaking to me in the same way is the psalmist in Psalm 73: 21-28:
[He] dost light my lamp;
The Lord my God illumines my darkness.
When my heart was embittered,
And I was pierced within,
Then I was senseless and ignorant;
I was like a beast before Thee.
Nevertheless, I am continually with Thee;
Thou hast taken hold of my right hand.
With thy counsel thou wilt guide me,
And afterward receive me to glory.
Whom have I in heaven but Thee?And I sense the same movement and assurance of God in the 23rd Psalm, especially in an alternative but competent translation:
And beside Thee, I desire nothing on earth.
My flesh and my heart may fail,
But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
.…But as for me,
the nearness of God is my good;
I have made the Lord God my refuge…
The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside quiet waters.
He restores my soul;
He guides me in the tracks of righteousness
For His name's sake.
Even though I walk through the valley of deep darkness,
I fear no harm, for You are with me;
Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.
You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;
You anoint my head with oil;
My cup overflows.
Only goodness and lovingkindness will follow me all the days of my life,The 14th-century Sufi master and poet, Hafiz, spoke in his own terms of similar spiritual experiences.
And I will return to the house of the Lord forever.
All the images of winter I see against your sky.
I understand the wounds
That have not healed in you.
They exist
Because God and Love
Have yet to become real enough
To allow you to forgive
The dream…
[And more]
Keep ringing the bell,
Playing the tamboura,
Calling for Him.
For you
Have touched something holy inside
With your spirit body
And now your eyes look broken
Without His sacred presence near.
The heart is like that:
Blessed and ruined
Once it has known Divine beauty.
Then it becomes a restless sky hunter.
The lover keeps circling in his being
His sweetest moments with God,
Needing to kiss His face again.
[And lastly]
You have done well
In the contest of madness.
You were brave in that holy war.
You have all the honorable wounds
Of one who has tried to find love
Where the Beautiful Bird
Does not drink…
Wayfarer,
Why not rest your tired Body?
Lean back and close your eyes.
Come morning
I will kneel by your side and feed you.
I will so gently
Spread open your mouth
And let you taste something of the
Sacred mind and life.
SurelyThe poetry of St. John of the Cross prominently addresses this invitation to follow God into these dark and unknown places—and into deeper intimacy with Him. These are places that cannot be traversed without Faith, Hope and trust in God. And, in the darker, more despairing times, we must also walk with forgiveness—forgiveness of others, the world, ourselves, and God.
There is something wrong
With your ideas of God,
If you think
Our Beloved would not be so
Tender.
From The Spiritual Canticle:
Where have you hidden,
Beloved, and left me moaning?
You fled like the stag
After wounding me;
I went out calling you,
But you were gone….
O woods and thickets
Planted by the hand of my Beloved!
O green meadow,
Coated, bright, with flowers,
Tell me, has He passed by you?...
Ah, who has the power to heal me?
Now wholly surrender yourself!
Do not send me any more messengers;
They cannot tell me what I must hear….
Why, since you wounded this heart,And from The Dark Night:
Don’t You heal it?
And why, since You stole it from me,
Do You leave it so,
And fail to carry off what you have stolen?...
[But,] In the inner wine cellar
I drank of my Beloved,
And, when I went abroad through all this valley,
I no longer knew anything,
And lost the herd that I was following.
One dark night,
Fired with love’s urgent longings
—ah, the sheer grace!—
I went out unseen,
My house being now all stilled.
In darkness, and secure,
By the ladder, disguised,
—ah, the sheer grace!—
In darkness and concealment,
My house being now all stilled.
On that glad night
In secret, for no one saw me,
Nor did I look for anything
With no other light or guide
Than the one that burned in my heart.
This guided me
More surely than the light of noon
To where He was awaiting me
—Him I knew so well—
There in a place where no one appeared.
O guiding night!
O night more lovely than the dawn!
O night that has united
The Lover with His beloved...
And from his Commentary:
O, then, spiritual soul, when you see your appetites darkened, your inclinations dry and constrained, your faculties incapacitated for any interior exercise, do not be afflicted; think of this as grace, since God is freeing you from yourself and taking from you your own activity.
And lastly, some practical advice from Richard Foster on relating your situation to others during the Dark Night experience:
What should we do in such a time of inward darkness? First, disregard the advice of well-meaning friends to snap out of it. They do not understand what is occurring. Our age is so ignorant of such things that I recommend that you not even talk about these matters. Above all, do not try to explain or justify why you may be “out of sorts.” God is your justifier; rest your case with Him.First written: July 2008
© Gregory E. Hudson 2008
