Conceptions of The Love of God
Introduction
S. Teresa of Jesus
of the Order of our Lady of Carmel
St. Teresa of Avila
From the Book,
"Minor Works Of St. Teresa
Conceptions Of The Love Of God
Exclamations, Maxims And Poems"
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Title Page of the Source Book
From
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Conceptions Of The Love Of God.
Introduction
The adventures of the small work entitled
— somewhat infelicitously —
Conceptions of the Love of God
might almost find a place
among the romances of literature.
Like all her other books,
St. Teresa wrote it at the bidding
of holy Obedience.
When she informed her Confessor,
Diego de Yanguas,
that it was completed,
he,
without even looking at it,
commanded her to throw it into the fire,
as it was unbecoming
that a woman should write
on the Canticle of Canticles.
Ribera thinks it would have been
far better for her to have
waited a few days
and
consulted some more experienced men,
but Teresa,
at the word of command,
knew no delay,
and the precious papers
were consigned to the flames.
Ribera says the name of that rash confessor
was not known,
but some years after the publication
of his biography,
Father Jerome Gracian was
not only able to mention the name,
but even to print some chapters
of the work itself,
which, he says, had been furtively copied
by one of the nuns
and thus saved from destruction.
Untiring researches
into the life and works of St. Teresa,
begun in the middle of the eighteenth century
and
continued to the present day,
have step by step elucidated the mystery,
and at the same time
furnished us with a text superior
to that printed by Father Gracian in 1611,
so that we are now in a position
to present the reader
with a work in no way inferior
to the other writings of the Saint.
The limits of time between which
this book must have been composed
can be accurately fixed by two dates.
In the seventh chapter,
the Saint refers to an event
which took place in Easter week 1571,
while she was staying at Salamanca.
Hearing one of the nuns sing most tenderly
of the sufferings of a soul
desirous of seeing God
but retained in this mortal life,
she fell into so deep a trance
that her life became seriously endangered.
She related this occurrence
in one of the additions to her Life,
and also
in the Interior Castle. [ 1 ]
The Conceptions must therefore
have been written after 1571.
The other date, June 10, 1575,
supplies the terminus ad quern.
On the first leaf of the copy
of the Conceptions
known as that of Alba de Tormes
there appears a note in the handwriting
of Father Dominic Banez :
"This consideration is by Teresa of Jesus;
I have found nothing in it to shock me.
Fray Domingo Banez " ;
and towards the end of the first leaf
he wrote the following censure:
"I have carefully examined these four quires
which comprise eight leaves and a half ;
I can find nothing reprehensible
in the doctrine contained in them,
which, on the contrary,
is good and safe.
Given at the college of San Gregorio
at Valladolid,
June 10, 1575.
Fray Domingo Banez."
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
The movements of St. Teresa in the interval
are well known.
She left Salamanca
in the early summer of 1571,
remained a short time at Medina,
and went to Avila;
In June she was sent back to Medina, and
in the middle of July
she was again called to Avila,
where she lived first at St. Joseph's convent,
and
in October went to the Incarnation
in the quality of prioress,
remaining there one year and nine months,
allowing only for a short journey
to Alba de Tormes in February 1573.
In July of that year (1573)
she was sent to Salamanca,
where she lived for six months,
after which,
passing through Alba, Medina and Avila,
she proceeded to Segovia,
where she founded a convent.
In October 1574
she returned for a short while to Avila
and went afterwards to Valladolid.
Three months later she went by way
of Medina, Avila, Toledo and Malagon
to Veas, where she stayed
from February 1575 till May,
when she went to Seville.
Now, it is known
that during her stay at Segovia
she was engaged on the composition
of a work
which cannot have been
either her Life or the Way of Perfection,
both long since completed,
nor the Book of Foundations,
then interrupted and laid aside,
nor the Interior Castle,
which was only begun three years later.
One of the nuns then living at Segovia,
Anne of the Incarnation (de Arbizo)
relates in her deposition
that she, being then a novice,
repeatedly witnessed the ecstasies
of the Saint.
One evening while passing by her door
she saw her writing,
her face being lit up as by a bright light.
She wrote very fast,
without making any corrections.
An hour later, at about midnight,
she ceased, and the light disappeared;
The Saint then knelt down
and remained in prayer for three hours,
after which she went to sleep. [ 2]
The same witness thinks the book
then in course of composition
was the Interior Castle,
but that is impossible,
for this was only begun in June 1577,
when Anne of the Incarnation
was in the convent of Caravaca.
It must therefore have been a different work;
And remembering that Father Banez' censure
bears the date of June 1575,
and
is not appended
to the original manuscript
but to a copy,
and, moreover,
that the " rash " confessor
who commanded the book to be destroyed
was Fray Diego de Yanguas,
then living at Segovia
and
acting as the Saint's confessor
during her sojourn there,
the conclusion is irresistible
that the Conceptions were written
in that convent in summer 1574.
Three nuns have left it on record
that this learned and excellent theologian
afterwards expressed from the pulpit itself
his regret at having
given a rash command to the Saint,
and
thus caused the loss
of so valuable a writing.
Perhaps it was not so very rash,
after all.
Although not a commentary
on the Canticle of Canticles,
the Conceptions do
comment on some texts taken from it.
Just at that time the Spanish Inquisition
was extraordinarily strict and vigilant,
- not only with a view
to prevent dangerous books
from obtaining circulation,
- but even withholding excellent works
which in the hands
of inquisitive or unsettled readers
might lead to misunderstandings.
St. Teresa, herself, complained once
to our Lord of the sweeping order
of the Grand Inquisitor [3 ]
which deprived her even of the works
of Fray Luis de Granada.
Though she courted an inquiry
by the Inquisition
into her spirit and way of prayer,
she was seriously troubled
when she learned
that the manuscript of her Life
was in the hands of the Holy Office
(spring, 1575),
where it remained
until some years after her death.
At the very time when she wrote
on some verses of the Canticles,
the saintly and learned Fray Luis de Leon
was languishing in the prisons
of the Inquisition at Valladolid
for having translated
the Canticle into Spanish;
He remained a prisoner from March 1572
till the end of 1576.
What would have been the fate of St. Teresa
if the Inquisition had got hold of her work,
especially during the time
when she was maligned
on account of the quarrel
between the Calced and the Discalced
Carmelites ?
But whether de Yanguas's action
was rash or no,
it did not deprive us of St. Teresa's writing.
The story how the book came to be saved
is not quite clear.
It appears that the Saint was in the habit
— though not an invariable one —
of getting her books copied
as soon as they were written,
sometimes
even before they were completed.
Either one of the nuns made a fair copy,
or St. Teresa herself dictated
to an amanuensis,
[ Blog Note: scribe or secretary,
(a/ab = from, by) ( manus = hand) ]
taking the opportunity of making
additions or alterations;
which accounts for certain variants
in her works.
It is quite possible that,
instead of one,
several copies may have been taken
of the Conceptions,
for, according to the sworn information
of Dona Maria de Toledo y Colonna,
Duchess of Alba,
Fray Diego de Yanguas ordered the Saint
"to get together the original and any copies
that might have been taken,
and burn the whole." [4]
A similar order
had been given her years before
by Fray Domingo Banez
with regard to the Life,
but she had asked him to
reflect well on the matter,
and then
burn the book if he thought it necessary;
but he was satisfied
with her obedience and humility,
and on second thoughts
did not venture to burn the volume. [5]
It is true
that de Yanguas, too, pretended afterwards
that he only wished to try her obedience,
but this seems
rather a lame excuse,
and
his true motive was in all probability
the one already explained.
Be that as it may,
at least one of the copies escaped destruction.
The Duchess of Alba (already mentioned)
says that the community of Alba de Tormes
hid it
and
gave it to her safe keeping
when Father de Yanguas ordered the work
to be burnt.
But here again
there is an inexplicable difficulty.
The order must have been given
while both the Saint and her confessor
were at Segovia,
and, as we have seen,
almost immediately upon the completion
of the work.
How, then,
did the community of Alba secure
a copy of it so soon,
and
before the work had received
any approbation ?
It is more likely
- that at the moment of the destruction
of the original,
the copy in question was on its way
to Father Banez at Valladolid
for approbation
(especially if the order to write it
had come from him),
and
- that he gave it to the nuns at Alba,
as the Saint was then at Seville,
where she remained a year.
It is more than doubtful
whether she ever knew
that this copy had survived.
Besides the copy of Alba,
there exist three others;
one at Consuegra,
which begins with what it calls Chapter VII
which, however, is identical
with Chapters III and IV of the printed text,
while Chapter VIII corresponds
to Chapters V and VI,
and
another unnumbered chapter contains
the beginning of Chapter VII below.
The copy of Baeza
agrees more or less with that of Alba,
while the last, of Las Nieves,
is akin to that of Consuegra,
but contains some important additions
not to be found elsewhere.
The only way to account for these variants
is to suppose
- that the Saint herself revised the text
during the transcription
and
- that copies of the two versions
escaped the flames.
When Fray Luis de Leon undertook
the publication of the works of St. Teresa,
he knew nothing of the Conceptions,
or,
if he was acquainted with the book,
did not venture to print it,
having been taught a lesson
by his own experience.
In the year 1611 Father Jerome Gracian,
then at Brussels,
published the first edition of the Conceptions
from a copy
which he says had been communicated to him.
A second edition appeared
in the following year.
His text
- agrees, on the whole,
with the copy of Alba,
- but does not contain the prologue,
and
- presents some considerable omissions;
In many places he "improved"
on the words of the Saint,
as was his habit;
He also wrote a more or less extensive
commentary on each chapter.
This edition,
minus the commentaries
which were forbidden by the Inquisition,
has been reproduced in every issue
of the works of Saint Teresa until 1861,
when Don Vicente de la Fuente
availed himself for the first time
of the labours of Fathers
Manuel de Santa Maria
and
Andres de la Encarnacion.
Woodhead
in his English translation of 1675,
and
Canon Dalton
(who only translated four chapters)
followed it.
It goes without saying
that the translation contained
in this volume
has been
- made from the ancient copies,
and
- embodies the variants.
But it is necessary to answer a question
which must present itself to the reader.
How much of the original work
has been preserved ?
- The story of the furtive preservation
of "some chapters",
- the fact that the copy of Consuegra
begins with Chapter VII,
and
- a remark by Father Jerome Gracian
to the effect
that the Conceptions formed
a "large book"
— although he avers
that he has never seen the original, —
have led many writers,
inclusive of Ribera and the Bollandists, [6]
to suppose that only a small fragment
has survived destruction.
On the other hand,
both the opening and the conclusion
of the treatise
present analogies
with the openings and conclusions
of the Saint's remaining works;
Sister Isabel of St. Dominic,
who says she has had the autograph
in her hands,
and
Father Banez, speak
not of a large book,
but of "some quires";
The author of the Reforma, [7]
though he is mistaken
in assigning 1578
as the date of composition,
and
in defending Yanguas against the charge
of having ordered the burning
of the manuscript,
is of opinion
that nothing has been lost.
The present writer had long since come
to the same conclusion on other grounds,
and
the French Carmelites share this conviction.
[ 8]
Foot Notes:
[ 1 ]
Conceptions, ch. vii. 2 ;
Relation iv. 1 and 2 ;
Interior Castle, M. vi. ch. xi. 8.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Blog Addition:
Regarding Foot Note #1
"Hearing one of the nuns sing most tenderly
of the sufferings of a soul
desirous of seeing God
but retained in this mortal life,
she fell into so deep a trance
that her life became seriously endangered."
Conceptions, ch. vii. 2
...Sometimes love is so strong
...someone who during this state of prayer
heard a beautiful voice singing,
and she declares
that unless the song had ceased
she believes that her soul would have
left her body from the extreme delight
...which our Lord made her feel. ...
that on several occasions she was
at the point of death
in consequence of her extreme longing
to see God,
and the excessive sweetness experienced
by her at feeling herself caressed by Him
and melted by love for Him.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Relation iv. 1 and 2 ;
Last night, being with the community,
I heard one of them singing
how hard it is to be living away from God.
[ Relation 4: #1 ]
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Interior Castle, M. vi. ch. xi. 8.
"indeed, so violent was the attack
that she completely lost consciousness.
This occurred when she unexpectedly
heard some verses to the effect
that life seemed unending;
[ Interior Castle: Mansion 6:
Ch. 11: # 8 ]
Isabel of Jesus, in her deposition
in the Acts of Canonisation
(Fuente, Obras, vol. vi. 316)
declares that she was the singer.
The words were:
Veante mis ojos,
Dulce Jesus bueno:
Veante mis ojos,
Y muerame yo luego.
[Interior Castle: Mansion 6: Ch. 11:
# 8: Foot Note # 384 ]
Let my eyes see you
Good Sweet Jesus
Let my eyes see you
and then may I die
________________________
[ 2]
Interior Castle,
new edition,
Introduction, p. xiii.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Blog Addition:
Regarding Foot Note #2
Anne of the Incarnation...
while passing by ( St. Teresa's) door
she saw her writing,
her face being lit up as by a bright light.
She wrote very fast,
without making any corrections.
An hour later, at about midnight,
she ceased, and the light disappeared;
The Saint then knelt down
and remained in prayer for three hours,
after which she went to sleep. [ 2]
Interior Castle,
Introduction, p. xiii.
[5]
A somewhat similar incident is reported
by Mother Anne of the Incarnation
(Ibid. p. 213),
but it appears to be wrongly
brought into connection
with the composition of the Castle.
The nun in question had belonged
to the convent of St. Joseph at Segovia
at an earlier period,
but there is no evidence
that St. Teresa visited this place
in the course of the six months
during which she composed this work.
The Bollandists, indeed, maintain
that it was
commenced at Toledo,
continued at Segovia and
completed at Avila
(n. 1541),
but their sole authority
for including Segovia
is the passage in question,
which, however, must refer to
some other work of the Saint.
The sister,
passing St. Teresa's door,
saw her writing,
her face being lit up as by a bright light.
She wrote very fast
without making any corrections.
After an hour, it being about midnight,
she ceased and the light disappeared.
The Saint then knelt down
and remained in prayer for three hours,
after which she went to sleep.
[ Interior Castle: Introduction:
Foot Note #5 ]
_____________________
[ 3]
Life, ch. xxvi. 6.
The order was issued in 1559.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Blog Addition:
Regarding Foot Note #3
"St. Teresa, herself, complained once
to our Lord of the sweeping order
of the Grand Inquisitor [3 ]
which deprived her even of the works
of Fray Luis de Granada."
Life, ch. xxvi. 6.
When we were
deprived of many books
written in Spanish, and
forbidden to read them,
I felt it deeply,
- for some of these books
were a great comfort to me,
- and I could not read them in Latin,
our Lord said to me,
"Be not troubled;
I will give thee a living book."
[Life: Ch. 26: #6 ]
_____________________
[ 4 ]
Oeuvres, v. 371.
On p. 369 the French Carmelites quote
a letter of St. Teresa
to the prioress of Valladolid,
dated Segovia, May 13 and 14, 1574,
in which she is represented as saying,
"Father Dominic will show you
certain papers which I am sending him,"
as if these papers referred to the Conceptions.
But read in the context they will be found
to refer to an entirely different matter.
"I laughed a little at his letter,"
St. Teresa writes,
free from the complaint at the time.
Do not tell Padre Domingo this,
for I wrote him a very charming note
[muy graciosamente]
which perhaps he will show you.
Indeed I was delighted with both your letters,
especially with yours, at knowing that saint,
[ i.e. Sister Beatriz of the Incarnation,
see Foundations: Ch. xii. ]
is at rest,
having died such a beautiful death."
In the same letter, alluding to the mission
of Fathers Gracian and Mariano
in Andalusia
(see Foundations,
Introduction, p. xxxiii. and
Ch. 24: Foot Note #1 )
she says:
'Oh, if you only knew
what an agitation is going on secretly
in favour of the Discalced ! '
There is reason to thank God for it.
The whole stir has been caused by the two
who went to Andalusia,
(Frs) Gracian and Mariano.
My pleasure is tempered by sorrow
at the pain it will give our Father General,
to whom I am deeply attached.
On the other hand,
I see that otherwise we should have lost all.
Will you all pray about the matter ?
Father Domingo and some papers
I am sending you will inform you
about what is happening."
Neither passage has any connection
with the Conceptions.
_________________________
[5]
Fuente, Qbras, vi, 175, n. 23.
_________________________
[6]
Ribera, bk. iv. ch. vi.
Acta SS. St. Teresa, no. 1550-53.
_________________________
[7]
Reforma, bk. v. Ch. xxxvii, 6-8.
_________________________
[8]
Oeuvres, v. 363-90.
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End of
The Introduction
of
Conceptions of The Love of God
S. Teresa of Jesus
of the Order of our Lady of Carmel
St. Teresa of Avila
From the Book,
"Minor Works Of St. Teresa
Conceptions Of The Love Of God
Exclamations, Maxims And Poems"
|
Note:
Attempt was made to display the quotes
of the other books being cited
by the editor's foot notes.
But, they may not be the actual intended passages
that were cited by the editor
since the editions/translations used by the editor
may have different paragraph numbering
than those available to this blog.
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