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Fathers of the Church Medieval Continuations
Henry Suso: Wisdom's Watch Upon the Hours
Written by Dominican preacher and mystic Bl. Henry Suso (c. 1300-1366), Horologium Sapientiae, or Wisdom's Watch upon the Hours, was one of the most successful religious writings of its time. Early translations of this literary masterpiece appeared in many languages, including French, Dutch, Italian, English, Czech, Swedish, Danish, Hungarian, and possibly Polish. Now the first translation based on Pius Kunzle's critical Latin edition is offered to the English-speaking world. Essentially a dialogue between the author, who was by nature and calling a romantic, and Divine Wisdom, the Watch tells of Suso's service to and espousal of Wisdom, his "most cruel bride, " with a charm reminiscent of contemporary chivalric romance literature. The Watch's many readers doubtless esteemed it for its devotional fervor and for the solutions Suso offers to the problems inseparable from a sincere Christian life. He teaches that a devotion of sharing in the Savior's self-sacrifice is the path to spiritual perfection, as well as a consolation for the soul amid life's cares. Based on his own shrewd observations on shunning "sensory forms and earthly imaginings, " Suso develops the essential elements of ascetic and mystical theology.
346 pages, Hardcover
First published September 1, 1994
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September 5, 2018
A medieval devotional classic, and very, very deservedly so. While (as an Evangelical) I can't get fully onboard with everything Suso describes (particularly some of his hyperbolic Mariology, or the strong affirmation of purgatory, or some sketches of reality that owe perhaps a bit more to Ps.-Dionysius than to sober thinking), and while the attachment to suffering may be a bit overstated in its salvific import, nevertheless this is among the most striking books I've had the privilege of reading, in certain respects.
Structured as a dialogue, the text puts Suso and/or the reader ("Disciple") into dialogue with Wisdom herself - described at times in feminine terms, but very explicitly revealed to be a manifestation of Jesus Christ, such that Wisdom forthrightly narrates the crucifixion in the first-person ("They afflicted me with mockery and blows, insults and abuse without number. They spat their filthy spittle in my fair face, they blindfolded my eyes, they rained blows on my neck as they derided me...").
The language is uncompromisingly vivid and capable of lighting a flame in the reader's soul. On the one hand, the portrayal of Jesus' love is among the most moving portraits I've seen outside the Old and New Testaments themselves: "The flames of my love were raging so that they would spare nothing, that they would not suffer tempering. That fire burned so in me that no one ever knew so fiery a thirst for springs of most limpid waters, no dying man ever craved for the life that all mortals cling to, as I for love have thirsted to save sinners and to show myself to them to win their love. It would be easier to bring back the day that is gone, to make every flower that has withered since the beginning of the world to bloom again, to store up once more every countless raindrop that ever fell, than to measure or to estimate the incomprehensible boundlessness of my love; and so it was that my fair body was given over to unnumbered sufferings, for it to bear as certain tokens of my love, so that upon all my crucified body there was not found room even to dot an 'i,' there was nowhere that the marks of sorrow and love didn't shine out. … And all these wounds of love I have sustained with a great longing of my heart, so that with my bruises I might heal the wounds of sinners, that I might pay the debts of wretched sinners, and that I might reconcile to our heavenly Father all who wish to go back to him."
For his part, Disciple at times gives voice to absolute dejection, self-criticism, and lament ("O sin, what have you brought to me? O unhappy fault, O pleasure bought with toil, to what wretched state have you led me? O unclean world, full of deception and dizzying deceits! ... With honeyed words, calculated to entice me, you robbed me of my wits as though with sirens' songs and the sweet playing of flutes. With your whore's face and your sleek throat and your smiling eyes, you transfixed this idiot's heart. When I asked for water, you opened a vessel of milk, and you made me drunk on soothing poison and sweet wormwood. ... You evil beast! You are smeared with your victim's gore! Now cruelly you bite what you so smoothly anointed"). And yet Wisdom/Jesus counsels Disciple, even at his weakest, not to despair: "Upon no account must you despair of your salvation, for it was for this that I came into this world: to seek and save that which was lost" (cf. Luke 19:10).
At other points, in answer to such abundant grace, Disciple waxes lyrical in praise ("O boundless ocean of divine mercy, not understood by any mortal, exceeding what we might think of, surpassing what we ought to ask for, transcending all that every merit might deserve!").
Throughout the dialogue, Wisdom counsels Disciple to bear up well in the face of suffering, which is certainly a complaint Disciple offers. Wisdom urges Disciple that "a pilot is recognized in a storm; a knight is tried in the battle line," and so, too, must Disciple be unveiled in testing and tribulation. Wisdom argues that Disciple, as a human person, is made to be "a mirror of the godhead," "an image of the Trinity," "a pattern of eternity," and "so the desire of your soul is like a boundless abyss, to fill which not all the joys together of the world could suffice, no more than a single drop could fill the vastness of an ocean." Here is Augustine's dictum on steroids.
To illustrate this to Disciple, Wisdom gives him two visions, and here Suso is at his most Dantesque: first comes a vision of hell and purgatory in one, grotesque in all its horror; this evokes a greater willingness from Disciple to suffer penitentially now, that damnation might be avoided. But the second vision is a heavenly one, depicting the New Jerusalem, the assembly of the elect, the "vast and most lovely plain, adorned with its splendor of starry mansions and with delights of every kind" matching the best of every earthly season in "the vale of joyfulness and the vision of love." Disciple beholds in glory those who suffered most severely for Christ's name on earth, seeing them crowned with golden wreaths. Disciple is bidden to "consider how with thirsting lips they drink from that First Source and are inebriated; how by looking into that most divine mirror from which all things shine out, they are made glad." For "these heavenly hosts, all as one, leading the choirs with untellable rejoicing, utter their melodies before the throne. Then the stream of the river flows out and makes drunk with pleasure their minds and fills their mouths with joy." Much of the imagery derives from the visions in Revelation, but develops it with appropriate vividness. In the wake of seeing it, Disciple wants nothing but to remain in the glorious city then and there - but Wisdom declines the request, for "the humility of Zion is not yet complete," and for the present, Wisdom says to Disciple, "there are still many battles you must fight for the faith of Christ." The vision was provided "so that in every wrestling and adversity you may know how to return here, and may be able more easily to bear all your adversities."
In the wake of such visionary experiences, Disciple receives further tutorials in the proper usage of tribulation, which Wisdom tells him "takes away sins, it shortens purgatory, it repels temptations, it extinguishes carnality, it renews the spirit, it strengthens hope, it enlivens the countenance, it brings peace of conscience, and it offers the unending fullness of inward joys." In response, Disciple learns how to view tribulation this way by continual meditation on the Passion, and thus clinging tightly to Jesus Christ: "Whoever may wish to have an everlasting salvation ... must always carry you, Jesus, Jesus, I say, crucified, in his breast. ... Never did any precious jewel so adorn some lovely girl who wore it on her bosom, so much as the crucified Jesus, enclosed within the mind, makes the devout heart all beautiful."
Needless to say, some of the purgatorial and penitential themes may hit a sour note for Protestant readers. That said, Suso's portrayal also keeps a very firm eye on the seriousness of sin (even in the baptized), and on the inability of Disciple to repay the grace that was given to him. When Disciple wishes to have "Solomon's wisdom, Samson's strength, Absalom's beauty, and all the riches and glory and strength of all the princes of this world, so that I might offer all this, and much more than all this, freely in the service of my Savior," Wisdom nevertheless answers Disciple that "if you were gifted to perform all men's good works, if you shone with the purity of all consecrated virgins, if you surpassed confessors and teachers, if you bore the banner of the martyrs, if you had the power of all created beings, you could not make worthy recompense to such a Redeemer or repay the least drop of the blood that was shed for love of you." And here, Suso sees (momentarily) the truth of grace - even if, afterwards, Disciple still aims to 'repay' grace, and is instructed in the imitatio Christi and in assimilating self-discipline and self-denial mentally and spiritually to the crucifixion of Christ.
Toward the end of the work, Disciple is tutored in the art of dying and its required purity of heart, while still perceiving the gap between what he must do ("always to lift your spirit high up in the contemplation of divine things") and what he can do ("no mortal man can constantly hold fast to such contemplation," but yet "you may know where you ought to have your mind's intention fixed"). Disciple ultimately finds that the core of his piety must be eucharistic, and he admonishes his soul to joy in light of Christ's Real Presence ("You have been seeking Jesus, and you have found Jesus"). Some of the most vibrant passages come as Disciple encounters the loving union confirmed in Communion ("Your presence sets all my love violently on fire"), especially in that Suso, as Disciple, is a priest who then receives instruction on how to reverently celebrate the Eucharist: "running to meet your God, be filled with humble devotion, and wonder that so great a Lord deigns to come to so poor a servant, such nobility to a wretched little worm, so much majesty to a vile leper..." Suso/Disciple laments how many times he was oblivious to the immense reality staring him in the face at the altar: "Every day I was bidden to the most delectable table, and I came away from it empty and starved."
Finally, after a prayer to the Sacramental Host for his love to "be set on fire," Disciple is taught how to praise God fittingly in spite of his unworthiness. He longs to have his thirsty heart erupt in praise, "so that the fire that burns within me might break out and travel over the whole earth, and might raise your praise in every heart and make it blaze fiercely with your love." And so, after pleading that even the "very worms and foul frogs" in swamps praise their Creator as best as they can, Wisdom inspires him with sample prayers in the face of demonic temptation and earthly beauty, until at last Disciple attains his prayer that he may "open my heart in your praise, and that from it there may then arise a great brand of some resplendent and light-bearing star, blazing with the fire of your praise ... And from this torch of praise, let there then arise a perfumed pillar of smoke of your glorification, pleasing as if it were composed of all aromatical spices, of myrrh and frankincense and of all the powders of the perfumer ... Let the torch of this praise be so full of love and delight that your eyes may turn to it in pleasure, and let the whole hall of heaven dance. And let this mount up constantly and ceaselessly, with the most ardent fire and the swiftest heat of your love, up from my heart through devout meditation, through fervent words from my lips, and from all my works, by means of my holy and heavenly way of life; and may this torch of praise by its power repel every enemy, increase grace, gain me a blessed end, and acquire for me the glory of eternal blessedness, so that the end of this praising on earth may be the beginning of the eternal praise in our heavenly native land. Amen."
In this closing prayer, Suso demonstrates himself a true mystic, properly offering us an inspiring vision as many saints have, of the spirit of love that ought to undergird the whole Christian life. It's no wonder this book became such a devotional classic. It has life-changing potential, and opens one's eyes to realities to which one is frequently blinded. I hope, by God's grace, to have opportunity to revisit it again and again in the future.
Structured as a dialogue, the text puts Suso and/or the reader ("Disciple") into dialogue with Wisdom herself - described at times in feminine terms, but very explicitly revealed to be a manifestation of Jesus Christ, such that Wisdom forthrightly narrates the crucifixion in the first-person ("They afflicted me with mockery and blows, insults and abuse without number. They spat their filthy spittle in my fair face, they blindfolded my eyes, they rained blows on my neck as they derided me...").
The language is uncompromisingly vivid and capable of lighting a flame in the reader's soul. On the one hand, the portrayal of Jesus' love is among the most moving portraits I've seen outside the Old and New Testaments themselves: "The flames of my love were raging so that they would spare nothing, that they would not suffer tempering. That fire burned so in me that no one ever knew so fiery a thirst for springs of most limpid waters, no dying man ever craved for the life that all mortals cling to, as I for love have thirsted to save sinners and to show myself to them to win their love. It would be easier to bring back the day that is gone, to make every flower that has withered since the beginning of the world to bloom again, to store up once more every countless raindrop that ever fell, than to measure or to estimate the incomprehensible boundlessness of my love; and so it was that my fair body was given over to unnumbered sufferings, for it to bear as certain tokens of my love, so that upon all my crucified body there was not found room even to dot an 'i,' there was nowhere that the marks of sorrow and love didn't shine out. … And all these wounds of love I have sustained with a great longing of my heart, so that with my bruises I might heal the wounds of sinners, that I might pay the debts of wretched sinners, and that I might reconcile to our heavenly Father all who wish to go back to him."
For his part, Disciple at times gives voice to absolute dejection, self-criticism, and lament ("O sin, what have you brought to me? O unhappy fault, O pleasure bought with toil, to what wretched state have you led me? O unclean world, full of deception and dizzying deceits! ... With honeyed words, calculated to entice me, you robbed me of my wits as though with sirens' songs and the sweet playing of flutes. With your whore's face and your sleek throat and your smiling eyes, you transfixed this idiot's heart. When I asked for water, you opened a vessel of milk, and you made me drunk on soothing poison and sweet wormwood. ... You evil beast! You are smeared with your victim's gore! Now cruelly you bite what you so smoothly anointed"). And yet Wisdom/Jesus counsels Disciple, even at his weakest, not to despair: "Upon no account must you despair of your salvation, for it was for this that I came into this world: to seek and save that which was lost" (cf. Luke 19:10).
At other points, in answer to such abundant grace, Disciple waxes lyrical in praise ("O boundless ocean of divine mercy, not understood by any mortal, exceeding what we might think of, surpassing what we ought to ask for, transcending all that every merit might deserve!").
Throughout the dialogue, Wisdom counsels Disciple to bear up well in the face of suffering, which is certainly a complaint Disciple offers. Wisdom urges Disciple that "a pilot is recognized in a storm; a knight is tried in the battle line," and so, too, must Disciple be unveiled in testing and tribulation. Wisdom argues that Disciple, as a human person, is made to be "a mirror of the godhead," "an image of the Trinity," "a pattern of eternity," and "so the desire of your soul is like a boundless abyss, to fill which not all the joys together of the world could suffice, no more than a single drop could fill the vastness of an ocean." Here is Augustine's dictum on steroids.
To illustrate this to Disciple, Wisdom gives him two visions, and here Suso is at his most Dantesque: first comes a vision of hell and purgatory in one, grotesque in all its horror; this evokes a greater willingness from Disciple to suffer penitentially now, that damnation might be avoided. But the second vision is a heavenly one, depicting the New Jerusalem, the assembly of the elect, the "vast and most lovely plain, adorned with its splendor of starry mansions and with delights of every kind" matching the best of every earthly season in "the vale of joyfulness and the vision of love." Disciple beholds in glory those who suffered most severely for Christ's name on earth, seeing them crowned with golden wreaths. Disciple is bidden to "consider how with thirsting lips they drink from that First Source and are inebriated; how by looking into that most divine mirror from which all things shine out, they are made glad." For "these heavenly hosts, all as one, leading the choirs with untellable rejoicing, utter their melodies before the throne. Then the stream of the river flows out and makes drunk with pleasure their minds and fills their mouths with joy." Much of the imagery derives from the visions in Revelation, but develops it with appropriate vividness. In the wake of seeing it, Disciple wants nothing but to remain in the glorious city then and there - but Wisdom declines the request, for "the humility of Zion is not yet complete," and for the present, Wisdom says to Disciple, "there are still many battles you must fight for the faith of Christ." The vision was provided "so that in every wrestling and adversity you may know how to return here, and may be able more easily to bear all your adversities."
In the wake of such visionary experiences, Disciple receives further tutorials in the proper usage of tribulation, which Wisdom tells him "takes away sins, it shortens purgatory, it repels temptations, it extinguishes carnality, it renews the spirit, it strengthens hope, it enlivens the countenance, it brings peace of conscience, and it offers the unending fullness of inward joys." In response, Disciple learns how to view tribulation this way by continual meditation on the Passion, and thus clinging tightly to Jesus Christ: "Whoever may wish to have an everlasting salvation ... must always carry you, Jesus, Jesus, I say, crucified, in his breast. ... Never did any precious jewel so adorn some lovely girl who wore it on her bosom, so much as the crucified Jesus, enclosed within the mind, makes the devout heart all beautiful."
Needless to say, some of the purgatorial and penitential themes may hit a sour note for Protestant readers. That said, Suso's portrayal also keeps a very firm eye on the seriousness of sin (even in the baptized), and on the inability of Disciple to repay the grace that was given to him. When Disciple wishes to have "Solomon's wisdom, Samson's strength, Absalom's beauty, and all the riches and glory and strength of all the princes of this world, so that I might offer all this, and much more than all this, freely in the service of my Savior," Wisdom nevertheless answers Disciple that "if you were gifted to perform all men's good works, if you shone with the purity of all consecrated virgins, if you surpassed confessors and teachers, if you bore the banner of the martyrs, if you had the power of all created beings, you could not make worthy recompense to such a Redeemer or repay the least drop of the blood that was shed for love of you." And here, Suso sees (momentarily) the truth of grace - even if, afterwards, Disciple still aims to 'repay' grace, and is instructed in the imitatio Christi and in assimilating self-discipline and self-denial mentally and spiritually to the crucifixion of Christ.
Toward the end of the work, Disciple is tutored in the art of dying and its required purity of heart, while still perceiving the gap between what he must do ("always to lift your spirit high up in the contemplation of divine things") and what he can do ("no mortal man can constantly hold fast to such contemplation," but yet "you may know where you ought to have your mind's intention fixed"). Disciple ultimately finds that the core of his piety must be eucharistic, and he admonishes his soul to joy in light of Christ's Real Presence ("You have been seeking Jesus, and you have found Jesus"). Some of the most vibrant passages come as Disciple encounters the loving union confirmed in Communion ("Your presence sets all my love violently on fire"), especially in that Suso, as Disciple, is a priest who then receives instruction on how to reverently celebrate the Eucharist: "running to meet your God, be filled with humble devotion, and wonder that so great a Lord deigns to come to so poor a servant, such nobility to a wretched little worm, so much majesty to a vile leper..." Suso/Disciple laments how many times he was oblivious to the immense reality staring him in the face at the altar: "Every day I was bidden to the most delectable table, and I came away from it empty and starved."
Finally, after a prayer to the Sacramental Host for his love to "be set on fire," Disciple is taught how to praise God fittingly in spite of his unworthiness. He longs to have his thirsty heart erupt in praise, "so that the fire that burns within me might break out and travel over the whole earth, and might raise your praise in every heart and make it blaze fiercely with your love." And so, after pleading that even the "very worms and foul frogs" in swamps praise their Creator as best as they can, Wisdom inspires him with sample prayers in the face of demonic temptation and earthly beauty, until at last Disciple attains his prayer that he may "open my heart in your praise, and that from it there may then arise a great brand of some resplendent and light-bearing star, blazing with the fire of your praise ... And from this torch of praise, let there then arise a perfumed pillar of smoke of your glorification, pleasing as if it were composed of all aromatical spices, of myrrh and frankincense and of all the powders of the perfumer ... Let the torch of this praise be so full of love and delight that your eyes may turn to it in pleasure, and let the whole hall of heaven dance. And let this mount up constantly and ceaselessly, with the most ardent fire and the swiftest heat of your love, up from my heart through devout meditation, through fervent words from my lips, and from all my works, by means of my holy and heavenly way of life; and may this torch of praise by its power repel every enemy, increase grace, gain me a blessed end, and acquire for me the glory of eternal blessedness, so that the end of this praising on earth may be the beginning of the eternal praise in our heavenly native land. Amen."
In this closing prayer, Suso demonstrates himself a true mystic, properly offering us an inspiring vision as many saints have, of the spirit of love that ought to undergird the whole Christian life. It's no wonder this book became such a devotional classic. It has life-changing potential, and opens one's eyes to realities to which one is frequently blinded. I hope, by God's grace, to have opportunity to revisit it again and again in the future.
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