Those who seek knowledge

“There are those who seek knowledge for the sake of knowledge; that is Curiosity.

There are those who seek knowledge to be known by others; that is Vanity.

There are those who seek knowledge in order to serve; that is Love.” 

Bernard of Clairvaux 

What is the greatest commandment?

So love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and strength. - Deuteronomy 6:5

The man replied, “The Scriptures say, ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind.’ They also say, ‘Love your neighbours as much as you love yourself.’” - Luke 10:27

Bishop N.T. Wright talks about the competing gospels of rationalism and romanticism in his book - Simply the Good News. With our complex world being pulled apart by the Enlightenment, we are now partly scientific, partly political, and now mostly philosophical.  People now see the world as being in two parts - God looking after the spiritual and we taking care of our worldly concerns.

So is it a wonder that with our renewed sense of the spiritual that we may have forgotten about our minds?

Don’t be like the people of this world, but let God change the way you think. Then you will know how to do everything that is good and pleasing to him. - Romans 12:2

Today, we might actually say that the spiritual transformation is what renews the mind and not the other way.

We have a question that we still need to answer - how do we love God with all of our mind?

Henri Nouwen does not help answer this question in his book - The Way of the Heart. He distinguishes between prayer of the mind and prayer of the heart.

He actually says that when we pray with our mind, we merely talk to God or think about God.  He feels that both of these activities are accomplished from a place of detachment and that we talk about things on our mind or things we are trying to work out.  In fact, he goes so far to say that when we pray like that, it is almost like we are talking to ourselves and that there is no real engagement with God at all. Our core is not involved at all.

In fact, Henri was not the first to talk like this.  Theophan the Recluse, the nineteenth-century Russian mystic, Thomas Merton, the twentieth-century monastic leader of the desert fathers started this conversation.

We are neither of these individuals and as much as I appreciate the teaching of our desert fathers, I would like to know more about what Paul meant about being transformed by the renewing of my mind.

The Present is Not the Key to the Past