Thomas Merton

Review: The Waters of Siloe

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Cover image of "The Waters of Siloe" by Thomas Merton

The Waters of Siloe, Thomas Merton. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (ISBN: 9780156949545), 1979 (First published in 1949).

Summary: A history of the Trappist monks, from Cistercian beginnings to the reforms at La Trappe, foundations in America, and the contemplative life.

Thomas Merton entered the Trappist monastery at Gethsemani in 1941. Eight year later he penned this history of the Cistercians and the Trappist reform movement within that order. The title is a reference to the words of Jesus: “He that shall drink of the water that I shall give him, shall not thirst forever. But the water I give him shall become in him a fountain of water, springing up into life everlasting.” It conveys the hope of the contemplative life, that in silence, prayer, and penance, the contemplatives shall find the thirst for God satisfied. It also is a reminder of the location of so many of the monasteries in valleys, by streams of water.

Merton begins with a prologue describing the attraction, sometimes visionary, of the monastic life. It is an ascetic life of straw mattresses structured around prayer, penance, vigils, fasting, and work. It is life in a silent community, united in the contemplation of the excellence of God’s love.

Merton then turns to the history beginning with the founding of the Cistercian order at the turn of the twelfth century. The Cistercians sought to reform the Benedictine order. But by the seventeenth century, they were in need of reform. Father Jean-Armand de Rance, abbot of La Grande Trappe (hence the name!) led this reform, a return to a rigor of contemplative discipline. Merton traces the spread of the movement through Europe, the efforts to suppress them in France, and the turning to America.

The early efforts in America were driven by abbots who seemed knights on a quest. Consequently, zeal went ahead of strategic vision. A mission to educate conflicted with the silent, contemplative vision. The first foundation at Gethsemani was an example. The extreme rigors led to the early death of many.

However, a second foundation at Gethsemani led by Father Eutropius Proust was more successful and this work has continued down to the present. Merton traces this history under the different abbots and the growth of the work, resulting in new foundations. And he traces the upsurge of those entering the monasteries after the two wars. Even as these grew, there were others wiped out by the rise of communism. Particularly moving is his account of the martyrs of Yang Kia Ping.

The second and shorter part of the work paints a picture of the contemplative life. First he considers what this looked like under the twelfth century Cistercians and then more contemporary forms. There is a constant tension between external disciplines and allowing the inner space for contemplation. In this section, he sketches the lives of a number of contemplatives.

Merton’s account offers not only history but a word painting of the attractions of the contemplative life. The disciplines, the austerity, the silence all lead to a life available to God. As a result Merton not only informs but answers the question in the minds of many: why become a monk?

Review: The Last of the Fathers

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The Last of the Fathers, Thomas Merton. New York: HarperOne, 1981 (originally published in 1954).

Summary: A brief life of Bernard of Clairvaux, published following the encyclical, Doctor Mellifluous, celebrating the eighth centenary of the death of Bernard, on August 20, 1153.

It was not planned but this review nearly coincides with the Feast Day of Bernard of Clairvaux, who died on August 20, 1153. The book, by Thomas Merton, was first published in 1954, the year following an encyclical by Pope Pius XII, Doctor Mellifluus, celebrating Bernard as a Father or Doctor of the church, eight centuries after his death. He is the last to bear this designation, and the encyclical, as Merton observes, is an argument based on the life and theology of Bernard, to put this beyond question.

After a brief preface, which discusses the occasion for this work and touches on the different “Bernards” united in the person of this last Father of the Church, this work is divided into four parts. The first is a brief life of Bernard, born in Cluny and having access to power and choosing instead the monastic life. Merton takes snapshots of his life at three points: 1115 as the young abbot of a new foundation at Citeaux sent out to begin a new work at Clairvaux with twelve men living in wood shacks; 1124, as he closes his own formation as an abbot and is tested by defections from the order, including Arnold, abbot of Morimond, resulting not in dissolution of the Order but reorganization and a great time of growth; and 1145, when a fellow Cistercian is Pope Eugene III and Bernard accepts the assignment of preaching a Crusade, one that sadly ends in failure–not his but those who led but with which he is associated. Merton observes that these Bernards are not at war but express a singular vision of the greatness of God and his order, communicated through the church to the world. Bernard’s preaching of the Crusade was accompanied by miracles wherever he went, including his overcoming of sickness. Just 21 years after his death, in 1174, he was canonized as a saint by Alexander III.

The second part of the work overviews the writings that warrant the title “Doctor of the Church.” Many focus on the greatness of God and God’s love, evoking the love for God of his children. He envisions a soul made in God’s image and destined for perfect likeness to God in love, captured in his treatise “On the Love of God.” He also wrote on free will, an Apologia challenging the comforts and extravagance of the Benedictines, calling for reform, a number of works on Mary, and De Conversione, on our continuing conversion as grace works in the soul. While many of his works and his life reflective contemplation on God and the spiritual life, he could also engage in discursive theology in writing “Against the Errors of Peter Abelard” whose views of the person of Christ, his Pelagianism, and his views of the work of Christ were deficient. Then there are the eight-six sermons on the Canticle of Canticles exploring the mysteries of God’s love and the mystery of godliness.

The third part of the work is “Notes on the Encyclical Doctor Mellifluus in which he comments on the different aspects of the encyclical beginning with its tribute to the sanctity and wisdom, arising from Bernard’s continual meditation on the scriptures and the Fathers. His theology was not stuffy, or intellectually arid, but flowed from devotion, love that discerned truth. Pius then commends particular works, especially the Canticles. He stresses the hope expressed in these sermons that every sinner might find not only pardon and mercy, but perfect union with God, elaborating the particular gracious workings of God to bring this about. We gain a picture of the unique balance of contemplation and action in the life of this vigorous saint. Part four, then, which follows is the text of the actual encyclical.

This little book by Merton uses the occasion of Pius XII’s encyclical to highlight for Cistercians of his own day and others, the ways that life and theology, contemplation and action, sanctity yoked to wisdom and learning combined in the life of Bernard. What might seem in conflict were rather qualities that walked together in the life of this man. Merton mentions how Bernard’s life came at the time of the early stirrings that would contribute to the rise of universities. For Bernard, knowledge and faith, study and practical leadership were part of a seamless life. Perhaps he may serve as an inspiration to all of us who believe that the love of God and the love of learning may walk hand in hand. And so, as the Feast Day of St. Bernard of Clairvaux approaches, I close with thanksgiving for this Father and Doctor of the Church.