The Selected Works of Isaac of Stella

A Cistercian Voice from the Twelfth Century

Daniel Deme

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781138275713
• eBook ISBN: 9781351882040
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

This book presents an invaluable selection of sermons and theological treatises of the twelfth century author, Isaac of Stella. The English born abbot of the French Cistercian monastery of Stella on the Isle of Ré is one of the most inspiring, yet equally elusive, representatives of the great twelfth-century Cistercian Renaissance more widely associated with the person of Bernard of Clairvaux. The astonishing spiritual and intellectual depth of Isaac's surviving writings makes him a valuable read for anyone aiming to receive a complete picture of the intellectual heritage of the Middle Ages. Of the twenty-five sermons by Isaac presented in this volume, ten are made available here in an English translation for the first time. These are accompanied with two new studies examining Isaac of Stella's work from an historical, literary as well as theological perspective.

PART 1
Sermons and Letters

Sermon One: For the Feast of All Saints

1. ‘Jesus, seeing the crowds, went up into a mountain’ (Mt 5:1). If only we could sometimes do the same; see the crowds, dismiss them, and then ‘place ascending steps in our hearts’ (Ps 84:5). But it is difficult in a crowd to see the crowd.¹ Inevitably there is some confusion in a crowd and confusion makes clear vision and discernment and sound judgment impossible. The crowd must be sent away if it is to be seen and judged. And anyone who really sees the crowd has no further time for it, he longs to escape and gladly sends it away.
   2. If a man has never seen light he will not recognize darkness either.² It was only after ‘he commanded light to shine out of darkness’ (2 Co 4:6) that the Almighty ‘separated light from darkness.’³ Then it was that he discerned and judged and ‘he called the light Day and the darkness Night.’⁴ And God saw, says Genesis (Gn 1:4), as though he had not seen before. In the same way a man who has scarcely got above the level of the crowd, has not yet seen the crowd. Furthermore, if he has never known the silence of solitude, he will not hear the crowd’s clamour, he will not realize the commotion it is making.⁵
   3. My Lord Jesus⁶ and perhaps he alone, could be in a crowd and yet be undisturbed by it and so could see it. Yet he, ‘when he saw’ (Mt 5:1) it, dismissed it, and ‘withdrew’ (Lk 5:16, 9:10, Mt 14:23, Mk 6:46) ‘into a mountain’, where it could not follow him. How sad it is, brothers, that many nowadays resolve to leave the crowds yet settle down where they are certain to be found by them again. Then they are even more harassed than before and the ‘final’ disturbance from the crowd ‘is worse than the first’ (Mt 27:64).
   4. So, brother, ‘escape far away’ do not run back to the crowd but ‘stay in solitude’ (Ps 55:7), ‘follow’ Jesus, climb the mountain, tell the crowd: ‘Where I am going, you cannot come’ (Jn 8:21). Although the literal sense, beloved, makes reference to an earthly mountain and an exterior crowd, it is upon the allegorical sense that I wish to focus attention, especially upon that which will most teach us how to live and ‘build’ us ‘up on the one foundation’ (1 Co 3:12).
   5. For though it is difficult, if not impossible, that a real crowd should be without accompanying clamor, yet with still greater reason do I distrust that interior crowd, so to speak, which is all the more troublesome as it is inward.⁷ So, ‘because of this’ crowd, ‘climb high’ (Ps 7:7), follow Jesus. He has descended into you, so that you, after him and through him, may ascend above yourself, even up to him who is within you.⁸
   6. Here is deep mystery indeed! Leaving the crowds, Jesus ‘climbs up the mountain’ (Mt 5:1). The disciples—all of them and only they—follow him. Surely all the disciples were not physically stronger than all the others in the crowd! Was it not, rather, that they were spiritually more fervent, so that ‘they went wherever the Spirit urged them’ (Ezk 1:12)? But why then, at another time, when the disciples were just as willing and eager, just as strong and ardent, did Jesus leave nearly all of them behind and with only a few climbed another mountain which was, as Scripture testifies, ‘very high (Mt 17:1)?’ And indeed, brothers, what of that further occasion, when Jesus left behind even these disciples, and all the others, indeed he left behind all men and ‘alone he went up the mountain to pray?’⁹
   7. What do these mountains signify? He climbs the first in order to teach, the second to reveal his glory, the third to pray to his Father!¹⁰ Surely here is ‘the mountain of the house of the Lord, set on the summit of the mountains’ (Is 2:2)? It is perhaps in this sense ‘that He comes, leaping upon the mountains, skipping over the hills’ (Sg 2:8). Skipping first over all the crowds, he leaps up the mountain with his disciples; then skipping over the other disciples to prefer the three he leaps with his crowd upon the ‘very high’ mountain; finally, overleaping the whole of creation, where no one can follow him he leaps alone, the Equal to the Equal, the Son to the Father. On the first mountain the Son alone is heard; on the second the Son is seen and the Father heard; but here on the third no one sees or hears ‘the Father except the Son’, nor ‘the Son except the Father’ (Mt 11:27).
   8. Are these, perhaps, the ‘ineffable things which man may not utter’ (2 Co 12:4)? Or may we perhaps interpret these three mountains as three heavens? In the first, man’s spiritual life is formed, in the second the angelic life is manifested and in the third the life of God himself lies hidden. The first designates holiness in our present existence, the second discloses the glory that is to come. The third is as it were ‘the heaven of heavens’, to which ‘he climbs upon the sunset’, rising even to his Source; his name is the Lord.’¹¹ Here dwells the glorious Trinity, known only to itself and to the Man who was ‘taken up to’ (Mk 16:19) God and who ‘dwells in unapproachable light. ‘¹²
   9. Though abiding in ‘peace surpassing all our thinking’ (Ph 4:7), that Man prays to the Father for us; as the apostle says: ‘He stands in the presence of his Father and intercedes for us’ (Heb 7:25, Rm 8:34). See how secretly he prays, who taught us to ‘pray in secret to the Father’ (Mt 6:6). So, brother, make for yourself a hidden place within yourself, in which you can flee away from yourself and pray in secret to the Father.
   10. ‘And now let us hear what the Lord God will speak’ (Ps 85:8) about this first hidden or secret place, this first chamber, this first heaven or mountain. He tells us: ‘Happy are the poor in spirit’ (Mt 5:3). The crowd has been left behind. No mention now of the day’s troubles, of human weakness and sin; his discourse is wholly of goodness of life, happiness in glory, the kingdom of heaven.
   11. ‘Happy’, he says, ‘are the poor in spirit.’ Wisdom always acts and speaks wisely. Wishing to draw the weak, he opens seven cases of ointments for them, so that delighted by the fragrance, they may hasten after him, as it is written: ‘Draw me after you, we will run in the fragrance of your perfumes. ‘¹³
   12. ‘And when he had sat down, he opened his mouth’ (Mt 5:2). May it be granted me to sit with Jesus, to sit at his feet on the mountainside and partake of his instruction. When he is in the crowd he is standing and walking, occupied and wearied, and so hard pressed that neither he nor his disciples are, as it were, allowed to eat bread, ‘the bread of life and understanding’ and to drink ‘the water of wisdom’ (Si 15.3). For this water can only be drunk in a time of leisure, and it is drawn by those who have little to do. For ‘the well is deep’ (Jn 4:11).
   13. ‘And he opened his mouth’ (Mt 5:2). The mouth, from which the Bride implores ‘a kiss’ (Sg 1:2). That mouth so infinitely rich, ‘in which are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge’ (Col 2:3). The mouth, by which ‘day to day pours forth speech’ (Ps 19.2). Many have searched for wisdom, and for happiness, but because they did not hear this divine Mouth nor see his day, they stumbled in the palpable darkness of error, and thus night to night declares knowledge, that is knowledge only in name.
   14. Opening his mouth Jesus speaks to the heart of Jerusalem, talking to her in solitude or on the mountain, and this is what he says: ‘Happy are the poor in spirit’ (Mt 5:3). He who is Happiness speaks of happiness, he who became poor of poverty, Bread speaks of repletion, Mercy of mercifulness, he who is the Purity of hearts speaks of purification of heart, the truly Peaceful of peace-making, the Son by nature speaks of sonship. The true Word of the Father speaks that which he is, divine Wisdom teaches what he is and says: ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit.’ Wisely indeed he puts first, giving it precedence over everything else, what every man seeks, every man craves and desires, though almost all go astray in their search for it.
   15. For who does not want to be happy? Why do men universally quarrel and fight, bargain, resort to flattery, and inflict injuries on one another? It is not simply in order to obtain, by fair means or foul, what seems good to them, something that promises to make them happy? For everyone imagines himself the happier the more he obtains what he desires. Men agree, then in their desire for happiness, but their conceptions of it differ widely. For one it consists in physical pleasure and fleeting enjoyment, for another in strength of character, for yet another in knowledge of truth.¹⁴
   16. So the Teacher of all men, who by love alone has become ‘a debtor to the unwise as well as to the wise’ (Rm 1:14), begins by redirecting those who have lost the way, then he gives guidance to those who are making good progress, and finally he gives admittance to those knocking at the door, just as he says: ‘Knock and the door will be opened to you’ (Lk 11:9). In the name of the wanderers the Prophet prays: ‘Guide me, Lord, in your way’ (Ps 86:11); for those on the way: ‘Let me walk in your truth’ (Ibid.); for those who are knocking: ‘Make my heart rejoice to reverence your name’ (Ibid.). And in another psalm again he prays for the wanderers: ‘Lead me, Lord in your justice’ (Ps 5:8) for those on the journey: ‘Make my path straight in your sight’ (Ibid.); and for those who are knocking: ‘May all those that trust in you have joy, they will rejoice for ever and you will dwell in them; all those that love your name will glory in you’ (Ps 5:11), and so on.
   17. So he who is ‘the Way, the Truth and the Life’ (Jn 14:6), he who corrects, guides and welcomes, begins with the words: ‘Happy are the poor in spirit.’ The false wisdom of this world, which is true stupidity, not understanding what it is saying nor of what it is speaking, has its own scale of values. In its estimation the happy are those aliens ‘whose right hand is the right hand of falsehood and whose mouth speaks lies’ (Ps 144:8, 11), because their ‘barns are full to overflowing’, their ‘flocks are increasing’ and their ‘cattle fat’ (Ps 144:13–14). In a word, they have everything that relates to wealth that may fail, and to peace that is no peace, and to empty gladness. In direct contradiction, the Wisdom of God, the Right Hand of the Father, his own Son, the Mouth that speaks truth, declares that the happy people are the poor, they will be the kings of a kingdom that is everlasting.
   18. As if he were to say: ‘You seek happiness but it is not where you think it is. You are running hard, but off the track. Here is the right road, here is the way to happiness. Poverty is the way, poverty willingly embraced for my sake. Happiness is the kingdom of heaven in me. You run energetically but not profitably, for the faster you run, the further you are from the track. Poverty is the way to happiness.
   Keep to the way and you will arrive.’
   19. Courage, then, brothers; it is for us who are poor to listen to the Poor Man commending poverty to the poor. Someone speaking from experience is to be believed; Christ was born poor, lived poor and died poor. He willed to die; certainly he did not will to become rich. Let us believe Truth when he tells us of the way to life. If it is hard, it is brief, while happiness is eternal. It is narrow but it leads to life and brings us out into freedom; it will ‘set our feet in an open place’ (Ps 31:8). It is steep, of course it is, for it goes uphill, it reaches to heaven! So we must be lightly equipped, not heavily encumbered, for the climb.
   20. What are we seeking? Is it happiness? The Truth shows us true happiness. Is it wealth? The king shares his kingdom and makes kings. Men are plagued with a restless desire for novelty. Though they can obtain a sufficiency without difficulty, they must sweat for more. Some make five yoke of oxen a pretext for not coming to the heavenly wedding feast (Lk 14:19), the feast in which poverty becomes plenitude, want becomes satiety, and the last place becomes the first. There lowliness is transformed into greatness and labour into repose.¹⁵ Elisha slaughtered just such oxen that he might follow Elijah the more readily (1 K 19:21). Taking this as model and type, let us...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Contributors
• Acknowledgements
• PART 1 Sermons and Letters
• PART 2 Historical and Theological Introduction
• Bibliography
• Index