The Merton Seasonal 38 no. 2 (Summer 2013): 47-50에 게재된 리뷰를 옮겨 놓는다. 엄밀하게 말하면 '서평'이 아니라 '강의평'이다. 강의를 듣고 글을 쓰는 데 많은 시간을 투자했는데, 이 강의들은 개인적인 영성생활에도 많은 도움이 되었다. 


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Ways of a Prayerful Life

 

Review of Ways of Prayer: A Desert Father’s Wisdom

Introduction by Fr. Anthony Ciorra

14 Lectures on 7 CDs

Rockville, MD: NowYouKnowMedia, 2012

(www.NowYouKnowMedia.com)

$169.95 (list); $39.95 (sale) (CD)

$159.95 (list); $29.95 (sale) (MP3)

 

Reviewed by Hyeokil Kwon

 

 

Ways of Prayer: A Desert Father’s Wisdom is a collection of the recordings of Thomas Merton’s thirteen conferences on John Cassian, which were delivered to the novitiates of the Abbey of Gethsemani in 1962, with an introductory lecture by Dr. Anthony Ciorra. A 7-CD set of these conferences was given to me for review at the Scholars Retreat at Gethsemani in the summer of 2012. For me, the retreat was an invaluable opportunity to immerse in a climate of monastic payer and to touch the legacy of Thomas Merton. Being able to listen to these conferences even after returning from the short retreat has extended the grace of the monastic climate of prayer to my urban life, and has helped me to be on intimate terms with Fr. Louis (as his novices knew him). Thus, I have realized Dr. Ciorra’s “prediction” from his introduction to this volume: “As you listen to him, you will get in touch with the person of Thomas Merton, because … he is not just passing on information [but] he is also sharing himself. He is sharing in the way in which he himself is trying to integrate this material.”


But Dr. Ciorra spends a good deal of his time in his introduction explaining Cassian and The Conferences rather than Merton’s conferences on The Conferences. As such, Dr. Ciorra’s introduction fits an audience which is unfamiliar with the ancient monk and his text. More detailed information about Merton’s lectures on Cassian can be found in Prof. Patrick F. O’Connell’s introduction to Cassian and the Fathers: Initiation into the Monastic Tradition, a compilation of Merton notes for conferences on the Early Fathers and John Cassian (xlvii-liv). Merton’s novitiate conferences were recorded on audiotape to be played for the brothers who worked in the abbey kitchen, and the dating of the tapes is not definitive. Because Merton had already reached the third and final section of his Cassian conferences when his lectures began to be recorded on April 27, 1962, only the last part of the lectures is in his actual voice. However, the remaining notes for the lectures published in the above book show the outline and contents of the lectures and enable us to compare the last part of his notes (226-255) with the actual conferences. Thus, Prof. O’Connell, in his introduction, makes some comparisons focusing on Merton’s teaching method. O’Connell writes, “[Merton] knows that the novices will eventually have a copy of the written lectures (in 1962 they were distributed on July 21, the third last class), so he feels no pressure to include everything that appears in the text in his oral presentation. He shows a good deal of flexibility, and a willingness on occasion to follow out a particular line of thought” (liii). Therefore, I am certain that many zealous listeners will keep the text before their eyes while lending their ears to the lectures, in order both to enjoy the vivid atmosphere of the classroom and to grasp the dense details of Merton’s text.  


As Gregory J. Ryan points out in his review of Thomas Merton on Contemplation, another series of Merton’s lectures recently published by NowYouKnowMedia, most of the NowYouKnow recordings of Merton’s lectures had previously been released by other companies under the same or different titles. All of Merton’s lectures in this volume have also been separately released by Credence Communications or/and Electronic Paperbacks since 1982 (a Table of Correspondences is included in Cassian and the Fathers as Appendix B, pp.281-282). However, it is the first time for Thomas Merton’s Cassian conferences to be delivered in a single volume. When I compared the last two talks of Ways of Prayer, “Prayer of Fire, Part II” and “Frequent and Constant Prayer” (NowYouKnowMedia, 2012) with Does God Hear Our Prayer? (Credence, 2004), I realized that good improvements have been made in reducing background noise so that listeners can better concentrate on Merton’s voice. Another change made in the NowYouKnow recordings is chopping the preliminary period of each lecture. As O’Connell describes in his introduction, Merton often began his conferences by taking up with practical matters or by informing his students of various social issues (xlviii). For example, on July 9, 1962, Merton in the beginning of his lecture mentions the US testing of an anti-missile method, which was sparked by the deployment of Russian missiles in Cuba. By cutting out such parts from the conferences, NowYouKnowMedia seems to intend to make the lectures intensive and neat. In my view, however, such changes keep listeners from tasting various aspects of the monastic life and from grasping the deep relationship between a prayerful life and social issues.



As for the contents of Merton’s talks, Dr. Ciorra informs us that Thomas Merton is focusing on The Conferences rather than The Institutions, Cassian’s other influential document on the monastic tradition. Specifically, Merton covers the early chapters of the Fourth Conference in the first talk given on April 28, 1962 and the Ninth Conference in the rest of the twelve talks given between May 14 and August 4, 1962. Thus, those who are eager to read “the text of Merton’s class” can either purchase/borrow The Conferences or access a free online copy of the book at: http://www.ccel.org/ccel/cassian/conferences. Generally speaking, Merton faithfully interprets and explains the thoughts of John Cassian contained in the Fourth and Ninth Conferences. However, Merton sometime states his views confidently, to appropriate Cassian’s thoughts for himself and his audience.


First, in the talk entitled “Desires of the Flesh and the Spirit” Merton introduces an anecdote narrated in the Fourth Conference in which Cassian and Germanus ask Abba Daniel, a representative of the most humble man, of why our thoughts are so mobile and unstable. Merton explains that Cassian addresses this topic from the point of view of balance rather than of power to control the desires of the flesh and the spirit. Cassian, like other ancient writers, viewed that a natural fleshly desire was good to a degree, and, on the contrary, an excessive desire for the things of the spirit created opportunities for the devil. Merton, therefore, urges his novices to develop and to preserve a balance and freedom in-between the desires of the flesh and the desires of the spirit, in order to make a wise decision. He continues that God permits us trials to test “the seriousness of our desire to stand in the middle and to exercise our freedom for the love of God.” Thus, Merton concludes, “What you are supposed to have is good will and a certain manner of intelligence and a certain manner of an enlightened exercise of your freedom which makes use of both these things.” Such teachings of Merton, as well as Cassian, are based on their understanding of human nature. Merton explains that we, as human beings, swing like a pendulum from one extreme to the other, and so are sometime pulled in the direction of the flesh and sometimes pulled in the direction of the spirit.


In the second conference, “The Life of Prayer,” Merton again considers human nature when he deals with the issue of constant prayer. He states that God did not make us “to pray explicitly at every moment of a day” and that we cannot “keep constantly before our mind a conscious definite concept of God.” Rather, “one of the fundamental laws of our nature is a constant alternation between different things.” To pray constantly, therefore, is “a way of living, in which in the series of alternation the alternation of prayer comes in more frequently.” He goes back to this topic in the final lecture, “Frequent and Constant Prayer.” Merton contends that the constant prayer of Cassian and the Desert Fathers is a frequent renewal of an ejaculatory prayer, a short sentence, which sums up what is in the pray-er’s heart. The ejaculatory prayer is not only the easiest form of prayer but also a crucial way that enables human beings to pray constantly. To quote a phrase from Merton’s notes for Cassian conferences, the “summit of prayer” is constant prayer rather than a prayer of fire, a higher prayer that he repeatedly mentions in the subsequent lectures (232). He extracts, in the second talk, a fundamental principal of the monastic life from the words of Abba Isaac: “The purpose of the monastic life is purity of heart, and the purpose of purity of heart is constant prayer.” The balance between spiritual and bodily works, and between desires of the flesh of the spirit promote this true prayer. Then, Merton deals with various practical matters in the life of prayer, such as relationship with the life of virtue, belief, and activity, and sources of distraction in the third and fourth lectures entitled “Virtues and Distractions in Prayer,” which are extensions of the second lecture. Therefore, it is certain that in his Cassian conferences Merton is talking about the life of prayer or a prayerful life and not simply about some techniques of prayer. In this sense, a more proper title of this series of lectures is, in my view, “Ways of a Prayerful Life” rather than “Ways of Prayer.”


The rest of the talks should also be understood from the perspective of a life of prayer. Following the flow of Abbot Isaac’s discussion in the Ninth Conference, Merton explains four kinds of prayer in the fifth and sixth lectures: First, supplication (obsecratio) refers to petitions concerning sins. Second, prayers (orationes) are regular prayers in which we offer God promise/vow or make a resolution. The third is intercessions (postulationes), which springs from love for others and the world. Lastly, the fourth kind of prayer is thanksgiving (gratiarum actio), gratitude for the gifts of God that wells up “in an indescribable transport of the spirit.” Merton does not remain in the informational explanation of the various kinds of prayer. Instead, he goes further by addressing a practical topic of when and how one moves to a higher state of prayer, the prayer of fire, and so he encourages his students to advance in their life of prayer. He quotes from Abba Isaac’s teaching, “Out of these four kinds of prayer arises the loftier state of prayer…Here the mind throws itself into love for God and converses familiarly with him as with its own Father.” At this point, Merton, following Cassian, passes to “The Our Father” which he annotates in detail using Cassian and Tertullian from the seventh to the tenth lectures. Merton summarizes that The Lord’s Prayer is a basic source in the contemplative life and is itself a perfect prayer. This prayer nonetheless “leads those who practice it well…at last to that payer of fire, ignita oratio, burning prayer,…which is inexpressibly high degree of prayer” and which is wordless and indeed passive. In this way, Cassian and Merton do not simply give us knowledge on various kinds of prayer, but lead the readers/listeners to the ascent in the life of prayer.


In final, I would like to give an example of how Merton adapted Cassian’s wisdom to his audience. In the eleventh and twelfth lectures entitled “Prayer of Fire,” Merton raises two fundamental questions: “What are the sources of fervor in prayer, in the monastic life” and “how do we know that God hears our prayer.” After summarizing Cassian’s thoughts on the sources of fervor, Merton mentions a big source that Cassian did not mention at all. According to Merton, “Texts of scriptural readings are the great sources of fervor…because they contain God’s promises, revelation of His will, revelation of His mercy, revelation of His love. These are the big sources of fervor.” Merton prefers the scriptural text, the text of liturgy, as the chief source of fervor in prayer and the monastic life, more so than what Cassian gave us, because Merton thinks that they are more or less subjective. As for the second question, he again cautions his novices that depending unduly on subject experiences is extremely dangerous in the spiritual life. Cassian teaches, through Abba Isaac, “Firm and unshakeable confidence in God is a sign that He has heard our prayer.” Merton comments that Cassian can say this because he has his eyes fixed on God, and so is objective to his experience. “Now we us,” Merton says, “haven’t even got an eye fixed on God. We’ve got eyes looking more ourselves.” Thus, he states that “our prayer is heard, if we believe that [the prayer] is heard. And when I say ‘believe,’ I mean I believe on an object faith.” To conclude, Thomas Merton, a Desert Father of our times, guides his novitiates – and also those who participate in his class through this collection of his Cassian conferences – to the simple ways of a prayerful life taught by an ancient Desert Father.