First humility is external, having to do with one's dwelling place and clothes-that they are proper, are tailored to a religious cut, and yet are clean. Second humility has to do with conduct in the company of others-that it is lovingly attuned to all needs and in all things. Out of this grows the holy love of God. Third humility has to do with the senses-that a person make proper use of them in all things and love in the right amount. Fourth humility dwells in the soul. This is sinking humility, which performs many a sweet marvel in the love-rich soul. It chases her up into heaven and drags her down again into the abyss. It leads the soul to all creatures one by one and says: "Now look, all this is better than you are!" And it brings her then to the spot where she can go no further: under Lucifer's tail.' If, in her desire to honor God as she would want, she could remain there, she would prefer nothing better. So tightly is the poor love-rich soul bound by humble love that she feels no fear or shame except in the temperate way one is accustomed to fear in heaven.' But the poor body must feel both fear and shame because of the darkness of its heart and the weakness of its external senses, because it has not yet been transformed by death.
When she has thus ascended to those heights possible for her while she is still attached to the body and has sunk to the deepest point that she can find, then she is fully grown in virtues and holiness. Then she shall be adorned with the suffering of long waiting.
5. The Purgatory of a Beguine Whom No Prayer Helped Because of Her Selfishness
Woe, Sin, you are so destructive since even holy works that one performs without counsel are very destructive if one speaks thus: "No, I am beyond the need for human counsel. I intend to live according to God's counsel." I always shudder at these words because no person in any situation can humble himself to better advantage than by following Christian counsel with an obedient heart. This became clear to me in the case of a woman who loved our Lord from her heart and cherished this love with such superhuman exertion that her nature shriveled up and she died. As is the Christian custom, I prayed for her. In a rapture of my spirit I saw her spirit, which was in itself bright as the sun. This came from the faithful love in her pure heart. She was surrounded by great darkness and urgently desired to reach eternal light. Whenever she was ascending, dark night always blocked her. This was her selfish will refusing counsel that so utterly held this person back.
I asked her: "How can one help you?"
She replied: "While on earth I never wanted to follow anyone's advice given according to Christian custom. Because of this no one's prayer or desire can be of help to me."
So I turned to our dear Lord and asked him how it could be that a person could be delivered over to suffering who, while on earth, has assumed so much holy suffering out of love for him.
Our Lord said: "All virtues are worthless to me that come about apart from counsel; for I came to earth because of counsel." And I served my Father and all men on earth with great submission, and then I ascended into heaven in complete freedom. But in what I always did, no one follows me. The longing, prayer, and all the effort that one expends on her on earth shall adorn her when she ascends to heaven."
The soul: "Everything that is given to us as a help on our path to heaven is rightfully ours. But once we arrive there, it is shared by the souls. This God does for us for our own good, so that they might more readily come and help us praise God in eternal glory."
In justice, her suffering was to last seventeen years, but God's mercy reduced it to seventeen months because she had acted out of such intense love. May God help us to right moderation! Amen.
6. How the Soul Praises the Holy Trinity
Lord Jesus Christ, you have flowed spiritually out of the heart of your eternal Father from eternity and were born in the flesh from a pure and untouched virgin, St. Mary, and are with your Father one spirit, one will, one wisdom, one power, one superior might over everything that ever was, forever!
Lord, eternal Father, I, too, the most unworthy of all human beings, have flowed forth spiritually from your heart and, Lord Jesus Christ, was born in the flesh from your side and, Lord God and Man, I have been purified by the Spirit of you both. Thus do I, poor despondent human being, speak:
7. How God Praises the Soul in Return
8. A Good Person Should Have Three Children for Whom to Pray
No one knows what consolation or suffering or longing is unless he is touched by these three himself. I am seeking help because I am sorely afflicted. I have three children that I see suffering great distress.
The first child is poor sinners who lie in eternal death. There is nothing to console them with except that they have a living human body." Alas, I look at the child with a bloody heart and I take it into the arms of my soul with weeping eyes and carry it before the feet of its Father from whom I got it. Then I look at the child and beg its faithful Father, Jesus, that he awaken this child with the same voice of his divine mercy with which he awakened Lazarus.12
To this God replies: "I shall heal the sickness of this child. If it does not again succumb to this death, it shall be like me in my beauty, in my nobility, and in my abundance, surrounded and permeated by all bliss in eternal everlastingness. Arise, my dear child, you are healed! Free will I have given you and shall never take it away, for according to it all your dignity shall be measured, like that of the saints, in the beautiful kingdom of heaven." Alas, this child still lies motionless upon its own selfish will.
My second child: these are the poor souls who are tormented in purgatory; to them I must give my heart's blood to drink. When I pray for them and see the many kinds of distress and the bitter thirst that they suffer in a specific manner for each sin, then I suffer the pain of a mother. And yet I am happy that they suffer torment for their real guilt to the glory of God. They accept their suffering with great patience because they see all their guilt clearly. They suffer their pain with acquired wisdom and drink into themselves much interior suffering. If this child is to recover soon, its mother has to be very faithful and merciful.
My third child: these are the imperfect in religious life. When I look upon all my sick children, for none do I feel more distress than for this one because, alas, it has so completely estranged itself from heavenly things through its external preoccupation with transitory things that it has utterly lost its noble way of life and its sweet intimacy with God, to which God had drawn it by especially choosing it. Because of this they become so completely disoriented that no one can turn them around with words. And so they revile the interior life, pervert God's sweetness, and maliciously interpret everything they see and hear, as well. Thus they appear wise outwardly but unfortunately are all fools inwardly. This child has the worst chance of recovery because it is the first to slip into stubborn contentiousness, then into indolence, then into false consolation, then into despair, and then, alas, it loses all grace. And so this poor child creeps along in its sinful existence till its end. Thus it is very doubtful indeed which direction this confused soul will take.
9. Concerning the Glory of Seventy Men Who Arose with Christ as Testimony
On the glorious day of Easter, when our redemption was so clearly made manifest and Jesus Christ arose in such might and left his grave in such majesty that the Jews and the heathens lost their power and all their honor and true Christians were blessed by the Father's good will, were made fortunate by the power of the Son, and were made holy evermore by the teaching of the Holy Spirit: on that day seventy men arose together with our Lord. They had been obedient to God's commands when they fought God's fight. They were found to be just when they were tempted and, in their great thirst, they splashed water with their hands to their mouth. Their souls were joined again by God to their bodies but in such a way that one could clearly tell that they had been dead.'
But the sinful human juice that Adam bit from the apple, that still courses through all our members because of our nature and, in addition, the cursed blood that originated in the apple for Eve and all women-that was not given bac
k to them because their transformation was supposed to be a divine testimony with God that eternal death was dead. They were no longer subject to death because they did not have in themselves these two things.' Their soul separated from their body without pain or suffering. Their bodies lie in beauty above the air and above the stars. Because they did not die a second time in a human manner, their bodies did not need to be buried on earth.
Adam, and all men with him, retained this juice. Eve and all women kept this shameful blood. This alone it is that by nature torments our flesh and our senses, and ultimately has to die bitterly within us. For after Adam's fall the only affliction Jesus Christ took from us was eternal death and he ordained that, through sorrow, we might come back. He did, however, give us very much sweet consolation, counsel, and teaching through which we might easily recover from all our debilities.
10. How Sin Is Like God's Greatness
The greatness of almighty God is similar to nothing as much as it is to the sinful immensity of my wickedness.
11. A Religious Name Shall Be Exalted. Concerning the Conduct of Sisters. How They Should Pray and Toil with God
O religious Name,15 how noble you are above all earthly names. For this reason Jesus Christ himself wanted to bear you so faithfully his whole life that all lofty names-king, emperor, count, and all names that are named for nobility-must decay; but a religious name alone shall be exalted to the extent that it has been here nobly borne. Indeed, it shall be wonderfully, especially, and in sanctity raised up near Brother Jesus and Sister Mary, who were the very first always to bear a religious name, suffering outwardly such great contempt but with such holiness inwardly. This is very much contrary to those people who here with much ostentation adorn themselves spiritually with holy bearing and deep bowing, and drape themselves in public in beautiful words that one might well imagine that inwardly they possess the flood of the Holy Spirit which is causing it all to come gushing forth. No, unfortunately it is sometimes a very cunning temptation that causes a person to assume out of self-will that, without effort and without striving, he has a good name; and yet he does not feel in his heart the full birth of the Holy Spirit. This comes clearly to light when he turns into a fierce bear and a roaring lion in the presence of his closest companions, when he should be a lamb as to meekness and a dove as to virtues. Thus their life before the world is a sham, and before God and their equals a very damaging lie.
Woe to you, most wretched Lust, how my heart is enraged by you! For you rob my dear sisters of their inward sweetness of God and the outward loveliness that should be preparing them and leading them to the holy bridal bed of the Holy Trinity. You make them so hard inwardly and so indignant outwardly that one cannot utter a spiritual word in their presence without their immediately twisting it.
No, dear Sister, before all else you must have an open mind. Then you will get an obliging heart and an open soul into which grace can flow. If you expand too much your basic needs without reason or necessity, truly you shall never have a share in the heights of holy longing, the breadth of divine feeling, and the depths of God's flowing sweetness. It is an eternal shame and an extreme crudity that a king's bride so much enjoys wallowing in muck.
Ah, Sister, if you are to pray as you should, surrender yourself to God completely and say: "Dear intimate Friend, Jesus, this hour belongs to you alone, to poor sinners, to Holy Christianity, and to distressed souls, but not to me. All power and strength of my heart I give you today, Lord, that you, my Love, to your own praise might come to their aid in accordance with my desire; and grant me thereafter, Lord, that I really know who I myself am. Then I shall really be downcast."
But, dear Sister, when you go to your work, bless yourself and say: "Lord, this hour belongs to you and me. Help me, Jesus, Love of my heart, that I may burrow my soul and my mind so deeply into you that earthly desire may not devour me." Indeed, Sister, if you are just humanly wise, desire will attack you fiercely. But if your wisdom comes from grace, no evil can seduce you or betray you. For in that grace which flows forth from the Holy Trinity into a heart that remains ever open to heaven, one finds truth and good judgment in all things. It is quite easy to seem good to people. But if truth is absent, you are snake's venom. Make your heart ever pure within and be humble outwardly. Then you are one with God.
12. How God Responds to a Brother Concerning What Is Written in This Book"
Master Heinrich, you are surprised at some of the words that are written in this book. I am surprised that you can be surprised at this. Indeed, ever since I, sinful woman, have been required to write, it has been a matter of great distress to me in my heart that I am able to describe this authentic knowledge and these holy sublime contemplations to no one except through these words. They seem to me, compared to eternal truth, all too feeble.
I asked the eternal Master what he had to say about this. He replied: "Ask him how it happened that the apostles, after having been so timid, became so bold when they received the Holy Spirit." Ask also where Moses was when he saw nothing but God.' Then ask as well how it happened that Daniel spoke in childhood.""
13. Tm Kinds of Benefit a Good Person's Prayer Has
14. The Purgatory of Bad Priests
It has been a long time since I saw purgatory. It was like fiery water and boiled like fiery bell metal. Above it was a cloak of murky fog. In the water fish were floating about that had human form. These were the souls of wretched priests who in this world floated in greedy desires and burned in damned lust that so utterly blinds them that they are unable to love anything good. Upon the water were fishermen who had neither boats nor nets. Instead, they fished with their fiery claws because they actually were spirits and devils. When they brought them to the shore, they cruelly tore their skins off and threw them right into a boiling pot. Then they jabbed them with fiery pitchforks. When they decided they were well done, they gobbled them with their beaks. Then the devils went back out on the water, expelled them from under their tails, and then fished for them, boiled them, and devoured them again.
15. The Purgatory of a Good Priest
A pure priest died in his own assigned parish. I prayed for him, as one Christian is accustomed to do for another. Then my soul saw him in marvelous honor, as he was yet in the state of waiting for heavenly glory. Four angels led him across the storms in the first heaven and plucked harps with heavenly strings for his enjoyment. This was the purgatory by which they prepared him for heavenly bliss. I asked him how he had gained this special honor.
He said: "On earth I loved solitude and was fearful only in my prayers."
I said: "Ah, most blessed Man, why did you not ascend right to heaven with these delightful angels?"
He replied thus: "The glory that I am to receive because of my pure priestly life is so great that I cannot yet enter into it."
16. It Is Diabolical to Sin
Some people who are learned say it is human to sin. In every temptation of my sinful body, in every movement of my heart, in every bit of knowledge of my senses, and in the whole nobility of my soul, I could never find anything else but that it is diabolical that one commit a sin. Whether the sin be small or great, the devil is always its companion. Indeed, it is the devilishness that we take upon ourselves through our selfish free will that is much more harmful to us than our whole human nature. This is human: hunger, thirst, heat, frost, pain, grief, temptation, sleep, weariness. These are the things that Christ, who was true man, bore upon his person because of us and with us. Indeed, if sin were purely human, then he should have sinned, too. For he was true man in the flesh, a just man in wisdom, a man steadfast in virtue, and a perfect man in the Holy Spirit. Beyond that he was eternal God in eternal Truth and not a sinner. But if we are to become like him, we also have to live like him or be saved by sorrow.20
17. This Is a Greeting, Praise, and Prayer of a Sinner21
18. How God Responds to This
Thus does God answer:
19. How Seventeen Kinds of Sin Pursue a Perso
n
These things drive a person so far from God that he can never come back to God unless great force is exerted upon him by the Holy Trinity.
Alas, they then receive all things coming from God with such distrust that one scarcely dares say anything at all to them. And what they produce themselves is so twisted and utterly shot through with lies that, alas, no one can find the Holy Spirit in their words. But sometimes they act in a praiseworthy manner. Unfortunately it is deceptive.
You are often saddened by your enemy like hell's frost on heaven's flowers. Yet they go on blooming, exalted in their noble beauty. For through the Holy Spirit the root of their constancy is green in all seasons.
20. Praise of God in Eight Things. An Offering for Sins
21. Why Man Is Rejected and Yet Loved, and How You Should Bless Yourself
Thus does the mind of a person speak who has experienced truth: Lord, my body has been killed through the elimination of all wickedness. That is why your enemies have cast me from their presence like a dead man who smells foul. And yet, Lord, my soul is alive in you. That is why I am loved by your friends. Ah, Bridegroom dear to my heart, my sweet Jesus Christ, I bless myself unceasingly in my heart before all earthly things and I beg you that you keep me untouched by them; for no matter how holy they are, they draw me away from you at the highest point. That I cannot bear, and that is why I must creep away from them.
22. The Seven Things ofJudgment; Shame and Good Will
The noblest joy of the senses, the holiest peace of heart, and the greatest delight in doing come from keeping one's integrity in all that one does. Our dear Lord speaks about this and teaches me seven things that all the blessed shall have about them who shall preside over the last judgment with Jesus Christ.22 Whoever does not have these things shall stand before the court like a sold servant before his master. For all who here struggle against God's truth on the side of crafty lying sell off these virtues.
The Flowing Light of the Godhead Page 17