An Episcopalian Speaks of Mystery at Christmas

AN EPISCOPALIAN SPEAKS OF MYSTERY AT CHRISTMAS
Ron Starbuck – Saint Julian Press – ©  December 23, 2022

Of the Father's Heart Begotten
 
Every poet and writer I know has a story to tell and tells their story through the formation of personal mythology. As we travel through life, our life changes.  Our identity shifts, and our sense of who we are as a person turns with the seasons of events and people who enter that life.
 
This is the impermanence of the self, which Buddhist philosophy teaches. It is a vital theme and awareness at work throughout and within Pratītyasamutpāda — Dependent Arising — Interbeing. In Buddhist thought, Being – Becoming – Existence: The infinite possibilities of all things held within creation and how everything in creation depends upon everything else.

“If this exists, that exists; if this ceases to exist, that also ceases to exist.”
 
Buddhism directs us toward the concept of Sunyata–Nirvana–Emptiness–Openness, celebrated in the Heart Sutra. The general principle of pratityasamutpada is complementary to the concept of emptiness (sunyata). Buddhist thought on impermanence teaches us that our sense of self as permanent is false and limited since we are ever-evolving and our lives are ever-changing and dynamic. The self, whom we actively identify with, is empty of such permanence. We are not the same person we were a year ago, twenty years ago, or before. Buddhism refers to this impermanence-illusion or false association as not–self, or no–self, anatta (uhn-uht-tah). It is an ego-clinging self, leading to suffering, misperceptions, selfishness, hubris, and deceitful projections.
 
In the Christian tradition, there is a similar concept, kenosis, the Greek word for emptiness. Kenosis is ‘self–emptying’ one’s own will in becoming receptive to the divine, to be in unity and union with the divine. Christ emptied himself to become a servant of all humankind (Philippians 2:5-11), as revealed in the devotional language and poetry of the scriptures and this ancient hymn. We empty or let go of the self to emulate Christ and become servants to humanity.

       
       Of the Father's Heart Begotten
        Divinum Mysterium – Aurelius Prudentius

       He assumed this mortal body,
       Frail and feeble, doomed to die,
       That the race from dust created,
       Might not perish utterly,
       Which the dreadful Law had sentenced
       In the depths of hell to lie,
       Evermore and evermore.

Translation by Roby Furley Davis
for The English Hymnal (1906)
 
Both heaven and nirvana are alike when we understand them as a spiritual path towards non-duality, to this union with the ultimate divine mystery of God from which all things arise. Creation is ever-expanding and evolving.
 
In a poem, the poet goes through multiple stages and feelings, crafting their words together until the poem ends.  As any poet knows, the poem is never quite finished.  It is almost always incomplete in some sense.  The poet has to let go of it and trust that the creative process goes on within the people who may read their humble efforts.
 
I offer this thought in a spirit of humility.  All our works as poets and writers are a continuation of other works that came before us, the voices of humanity passed down from one generation to another.
 
We are simple gatherers, gathering from those poets, writers, and storytellers who came before us. Even the greatest among us have been inspired by learning and reading the literary works of humankind.  And we, we humble few, are following in their footsteps.  There is something more going on, of course.
 
Each poem begins in silence, stillness, emptiness, an open place waiting to be filled, on a blank page, or as an even deeper divine memory.  And we, we are total participants in its creation.  There is a more profound mystery at work here, an inspiration.  To be creatively inspired is to be filled by the spirit of something more, something beyond the mundane and ourselves.
 
Please let me share this thought with you.  As much as any poem you write is your work, it is also not yours.  You have been inspired. You have heard the whispering of the gods, of God, or the muses of antiquity.  And now you are modestly returning to humankind the voices spoken before in a newer voice.
 
There are no accidents in life, merely a continuation of one life into and with another, in a continuation of consciousness grounded in the divine. Grounded in the great mystery of creation, we cannot quite name it, written within us.  The Holy Spirit may pray in and with us when we do not know how to pray.
 
The words you speak or write are not your own; they have been fashioned before. They abide and rest in a universal divine consciousness and spirit that dwell within us each. They were written upon your soul, deep within your core, heart, and mind, long ago.
 
And now, you have been inspired to return them to humankind in healing for humanity.  The poet within you has heeded the stillness and silence of creation deeply. From such a listening comes a word, a verse, a poem. Each poem is composed as an act of creation, a loving act of giving, healing, and repairing the world.
 
Let me leave you, please, with these opening words from the Gospel of John, with an understanding that they, too, are a poetic metaphor and a symbol pointing us toward a more profound mystery in which we reside and that dwells within us.
 
The Word Became Flesh

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being 4 in him was life,[a] and the life was the light of all people. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. – (NRSV, Anglicised)
 
You, too, are this light.
 
And then there is this great Christmas Carol that touches on the Mystery of Christ. Why did God come in human form to serve humankind with an open and humble heart, to empty himself? This is one answer in the Anglican Spiritual tradition's mystical language and poetry.
 
Of the Father's Heart Begotten, alternatively known as Of the Father's Love Begotten, is a Christmas carol based on the Latin poem Corde natus by the Roman poet Aurelius Prudentius.

​
Of the Father's Heart Begotten
~ Divinum Mysterium – Aurelius Prudentius~

Translation by Roby Furley Davis
for The English Hymnal (1906)
 
Of the Father's heart begotten,
Ere the world from chaos rose,
He is Alpha, from that Fountain
All that is and hath been flows;
He is Omega, of all things,
Yet to come the mystic Close,
Evermore and evermore.

By His Word was all created
He commanded and 'twas done;
Earth and sky and boundless ocean,
Universe of three in one,
All that sees the moon's soft radiance,
All that breathes beneath the sun,
Evermore and evermore. 

He assumed this mortal body,
Frail and feeble, doomed to die,
That the race from dust created,
Might not perish utterly,
Which the dreadful Law had sentenced
In the depths of hell to lie,
Evermore and evermore.

O how blest that wondrous birthday,
When the Maid the curse retrieved,
Brought to birth mankind's salvation
By the Holy Ghost conceived,
And the Babe, the world's Redeemer
In her loving arms received,
Evermore and evermore.

Sing, ye heights of heaven, his praises;
Angels and Archangels, sing!
Wheresoe’er ye be, ye faithful,
Let your joyous anthems ring,
Every tongue his name confessing,
Countless voices answering,
Evermore and evermore.

This is He, whom seer and sibyl
Sang in ages long gone by,;
This is He of old revealed
In the page of prophecy;
Lo! He comes the promised Saviour;
Let the world his praises cry!
Evermore and evermore.

Hail! Thou Judge of souls departed;
Hail! of all the living King!
On the Father's right hand throned,
Through his courts thy praises ring,
Till at last for all offences
Righteous judgement thou shalt bring,
Evermore and evermore.

Now let old and young uniting
Chant to thee harmonious lays
Maid and matron hymn Thy glory,
Infant lips their anthem raise,
Boys and girls together singing
With pure heart their song of praise,
Evermore and evermore.

Let the storm and summer sunshine,
Gliding stream and sounding shore,
Sea and forest, frost and zephyr,
Day and night their Lord alone;
Let creation join to laud thee
Through the ages evermore,
Evermore and evermore.


Of The Father's Heart Begotten (Sir David Willcocks) Ely Cathedral Choir