Three Dimensional Spirituality
31st Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year B
I am more and more convinced that when someone gets deep into prayer life, they live a three dimensional spirituality marked by an inward journey towards the self; an upward journey towards God, and an outward journey towards others and the rest of creation.
This, I think, is also the central theme of the gospel text of today. Which is the first of the commandments? There are two firsts, and the second is tied up with the first “You must love the Lord your God… You must love your neighbour… as yourself.”
Which is the first of the commandments?
It is said that at the time of Jesus the rabbis could count up to 613 commandments contained in the Law: 365 were prohibitive or “proscriptive” (don’t do this!) and 248 were prescriptive (do this!). Some of the rabbis considered all these commandments to be equally important, while others continued to debate in order to identify the most important commandment. That is why, the scribe in the gospel story of today had reasons to ask Jesus, “Which is the greatest commandment of the Law?” Apparently Jesus gives an answer here that is similar to those given by other rabbis (but compare this also with Jn 13:34). For instance, there is a story about one Rabbi Hillel, who lived a few years before Jesus. A ‘pagan’ went to Rabbi Hillel and challenged him, “I will believe in the value of Torah, if you can teach me the whole law while I stand on one foot.” Hillel replied, “Don’t do to your neighbour what you would not want done to yourself! This is the whole law, and all the rest is only a commentary.” This is a negative rendering: don’t do… However, Jesus picks up two sentences and summarises the Torah in positive terms:
- “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind” (from Deutronomy 6:5), and
- “You must love your neighbour as yourself” (from Leviticus 19:18).
In the gospel of Matthew Jesus would add a linking sentence: “the second resembles the first” (Mt 22:34a), and in the Gospel of Luke (10:27) the lawyer would combine the two in one breath! However, in all the synoptic gospels this summary has three dimensions that are put together as the first commandment: love yourself, love your neighbour, and love the Lord your God. This is strongly related to the three dimensional spirituality that I mentioned in the beginning, and how so?.
Love the Lord your God
Jesus repeats the words of the Scriptures, “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.” This sentence seemed very abstract to me until I came to practice contemplative prayer. I suppose the love of God is tangible when we are praying and functioning in the world and interacting with people, being aware of God’s presence. A prayer, in which I am just asking God for his favour does not contemplate the love of God. However, a type of prayer in which I am just available to God, opening up my heart to him, just listening to him becomes an expression of the love of God. And when this attitude becomes a habit in my daily life, and not necessarily tied to specific moments of prayer, then I begin to “love the Lord with all my heart, with all my soul, with all my mind and with all my strength.”
Often our prayers are focused on praying just to get some favours out of God. But in the form of prayer that we can call meditation or contemplation, we focus on God as an end in Himself. God becomes real to us. One young lady who contemplates using the “Jesus Prayer” put it rather plainly in a conversation, “Yeah, I have learnt through silence, God can speak to you… because if you focus on God, you can feel God’s presence.”
As you love yourself…
Contemplative prayer facilitates the journey into the depths of oneself. This journey helps me get in touch with my inner desires, and this prepares me to be empathetic towards others’ desires. And because I am created in the image of God (Gen 1:27; CCC #27, 355, 1705) by getting in touch with the inner self, I get in touch with God. Another person who contemplates says, “Before I came into meditation, I used to be rather careless about my life and my self… but now days I always wake up and be concerned and I think a lot about me, my life, where I am going and where I am coming from.”
The self-awareness that emerges out of true prayer is also accompanied by humility and self-control. “When I start meditating, I feel like being in the presence of God, so I am humbled. I feel like I am not myself, I just feel humbled. You see I don’t know how I can put it.”
Love your neighbour
This process of focused-movement towards God and getting in touch with oneself is also accompanied by a genuine sense of compassion towards others. And forgiveness becomes easier. There is an inner willingness to let go of hurt.
In deep contemplation, Christian calling becomes more real: to love God and others, while getting in touch with ourselves. Though not easy to be consistent with this, I suppose, in our life journey, this is what we are called to.
For other reflections related to this theme, click:
From religious traditions to religious spirituality (Mk 7:21)
Love one another as I have loved you (Jn 15:12)