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St. John of the Cross sees the spiritual Journey as one to the summit of Mt. Carmel. Mt. Carmel is a luxuriant mountain in a largely barren land. And, on this Carmel of contemplation, one ceases reasoning and reflecting on even the written Gospel or other spiritual texts.
St. John tells us to “desire to enter for Christ into complete nudity, emptiness and poverty in everything in the world” (The Ascent of Mt. Carmel, trans. K. Kavanaugh and O. Rodriguez). This is the Way of Nothingness, the todo y nada. This Way of darkness, nakedness, emptiness, the Way of Nothingness, is based on interpretation of the Gospel:
So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he or she has cannot be my disciple. (Luke 14.33, ESV, Inclusive Adaptation)
Contemplation is what the New Testament calls metanoia, “a returning, a repenting.” This turning is reconciliation with the Basic Ground, which is without addition. Everything, I mean everything, you identify as you is renounced in contemplation. Therefore, you cease to exist, you have died in Christ and for Christ.
In contemplation you know, immediately, your self as an expression of the Basic Ground, but you cannot know your self as other than the Basic Ground, even as wind could not know itself as other than air. Your birth, like the birth of the Word in Nazareth, is a manifestation of Formlessness, evidencing as a nativity of form.
Therefore, to contemplate “for Christ” is to realize that, like Christ, your birth, which is the birthing of self identity, is a nativity, and within that birth is a manifestation of non-identity. Here, manifestation and nativity are different aspects. You are a particular articulation of the Word, in time, for in Eternity you are one with the Word, for Word in its prior state is the Basic Ground from which springs every “word.” The Spirit is wording Creation into existence, and you are part of that wording.
Likewise, in contemplation you are unclothed of every emotion and all knowledge. The metanoia is return to the Basic Ground from which every thought and word, every belief and theory, every religion and philosophy, and all feelings, including feelings of religious awe and adoration, arises.
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Nada, nada, nada
Nada, nada, nada,
Aún en el monte
Nada
Nothing, nothing, nothing
Nothing, nothing, nothing,
And even on the mountain,
Nothing.
Therefore, contemplation cannot be called, strictly, prayer, though we often refer to “contemplative prayer.” For contemplation is the manifestation of prior union with the Basic Ground,while all other prayer is nativity.
Other forms of prayer are means to an objective. Contemplation is objectless. Contemplation is a return to a union in which there is no prayer, though prayer itself arises from this Basic Ground. Therefore, contemplation is the experience of a state outside causation. Within contemplation, a person cannot cite a cause for the contemplation or a goal for the contemplation.
You could ask, “Why, then, when experiencing contemplation, do emotions and thoughts continue to arise, if contemplation is a prior simplicity before manifestation?” Because these matters arise from the Basic Ground, for the nature of the Basic Ground is to create and Suchness is always creating, in each present, what has never been before nor shall be again. “Why?” For Basic Ground is prior to “what has never been” and “nor shall be.” Basic Ground unfolds and enfolds, and that is manifestation.
You might ask, “Then, in contemplation, what shall I do?” If I say anythinghere, then, I would be leading you from contemplation. So, my only response is Nada, Nothing. That is right, Nothing. You will soon discover how you resist the return to the Basic Ground, largely out of guilt, based on separation from the joy of oneness with the Basic Ground and conformity to a culture resisting the Nothingness that is the summit of Mt. Carmel.
Return to Nada, Nothing, again and again. In a mysterious way, you will find in this simplicity the love, joy, and peace that persons never fully know in activity apart from contemplation. Then, you will bring that love, joy, and peace into activity, and others will sense a depth to your being among them that they will seek, likewise. They will not understand what they are sensing, but they will want it, too.
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