---
title: "A Spiritual Canticle"
author: "John of the Cross"
translator: "David Lewis"
languages: [en]
shelf: "Mystics"
section: 9 of 36
url: https://scriptura.si/works/john-of-the-cross-a-spiritual-canticle/9/
cite: "John of the Cross, tr. David Lewis, A Spiritual Canticle, section 9. Scriptura (scriptura.si), https://scriptura.si/works/john-of-the-cross-a-spiritual-canticle/9/"
---

# A Spiritual Canticle

*John of the Cross, tr. David Lewis*

The soul and the Bridegroom, after the Song of Songs.

## 9. Stanza VII.

Source: https://scriptura.si/works/john-of-the-cross-a-spiritual-canticle/9/ · cite a paragraph as https://scriptura.si/works/john-of-the-cross-a-spiritual-canticle/9/#p-N

[¶0] THE soul describes itself in the foregoing stanza as wounded, or sick with love of the Bridegroom, because of the knowledge of Him which the irrational creation supplies, and in the present, as wounded with love because of the other and higher knowledge which it derives from the rational creation, nobler than the former; that is, angels and men. This is not all, for the soul says also that it is dying of love, because of that marvelous immensity not wholly but partially revealed to it through the rational creation. This it calls “I know not what,” because it cannot be described, and because it is such that the soul dies of it.

[¶1] 2. It seems, from this, that there are three kinds of pain in the soul’s love of the Beloved, corresponding to the three kinds of knowledge that can be had of Him. The first is called a wound; not deep, but slight, like a wound which heals quickly, because it comes from its knowledge of the creatures, which are the lowest works of God. This wounding of the soul, called also sickness, is thus spoken of by the bride in the Canticle: “I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if you find my Beloved, that you tell Him that I languish with love.” The daughters of Jerusalem are the creatures.

[¶2] 3. The second is called a sore which enters deeper than a wound into the soul, and is, therefore, of longer continuance, because it is as a wound festering, on account of which the soul feels that it is really dying of love. This sore is the effect of the knowledge of the works of God, the incarnation of the Word, and the mysteries of the faith. These being the greatest works of God, and involving a greater love than those of creation, produce a greater effect of love in the soul. If the first kind of pain is as a wound, this must be like a festering, continuous sore. Of this speaks the Bridegroom, addressing Himself to the bride, saying: “You have wounded My heart, My sister, My bride; you have wounded My heart with one of your eyes, and with one hair of your neck.” The eye signifies faith in the incarnation of the Bridegroom, and the one hair is the love of the same.

[¶3] 4. The third kind of pain is like dying; it is as if the whole soul were festering because of its wound. It is dying a living death until love, having slain it, shall make it live the life of love, transforming it in love. This dying of love is affected by a single touch of the knowledge of the Divinity; it is the “I know not what,” of which the creatures, as in the stanza is said, are speaking indistinctly. This touch is not continuous nor great, — for then soul and body would part — but soon over, and thus the soul is dying of love, and dying the more when it sees that it cannot die of love. This is called impatient love, which is spoken of in the book of Genesis, where the Scripture says that Rachel’s love of children was so great that she said to Jacob her husband, “Give me children, otherwise I shall die.” And the prophet Job said, “Who will grant that . . . He that has begun the same would cut me off.”

[¶4] 5. These two-fold pains of love — that is, the wound and the dying — are in the stanza said to be merely the rational creation. The wound, when it speaks of the unnumbered graces of the Beloved in the mysteries and wisdom of God taught by the faith. The dying, when it is said that the rational creation speaks indistinctly. This is a sense and knowledge of the Divinity sometimes revealed when the soul hears God spoken of. Therefore it says:

[¶5] 6. That is, the rational creation, angels and men; for these alone are they who serve God, understanding by that word intelligent service; that is to say, all they who serve God. Some serve Him by contemplation and fruition in heaven — these are the angels; others by loving and longing for Him on earth — these are men. And because the soul learns to know God more distinctly through the rational creation, whether by considering its superiority over the rest of creation, or by what it teaches us of God — the angels interiorly by secret inspirations, and men exteriorly by the truths of Scripture — it says:

[¶6] 7. That is, they speak of the wonders of Your grace and mercy in the Incarnation, and in the truths of the faith which they show forth and are ever telling more distinctly; for the more they say, the more do they reveal Your graces.

[¶7] 8. The more the angels inspire me, the more men teach me, the more do I love You; and thus all wound me more and more with love.

[¶8] 9. It is as if it said: “But beside the wound which the creatures inflict when they tell me of Your unnumbered graces, there is yet something which remains to be told, one thing unknown to be uttered, a most clear trace of the footsteps of God revealed to the soul, which it should follow, a most profound knowledge of God, which is ineffable, and therefore spoken of as ‘I know not what.’” If that which I comprehend inflicts the wound and festering sore of love, that which I cannot comprehend but yet feel profoundly, kills me.

[¶9] 10. This happens occasionally to souls advanced, whom God favors in what they hear, or see, or understand — and sometimes without these or other means — with a certain profound knowledge, in which they feel or apprehend the greatness and majesty of God. In this state they think so highly of God as to see clearly that they know Him not, and in their perception of His greatness they recognize that not to comprehend Him is the highest comprehension. And thus, one of the greatest favors of God, bestowed transiently on the soul in this life, is to enable it to see so distinctly, and to feel so profoundly, that it clearly understands it cannot comprehend Him at all. These souls are herein, in some degree, like the saints in heaven, where they who know Him most perfectly perceive most clearly that He is infinitely incomprehensible, for those who have the less clear vision, do not perceive so distinctly as the others, how greatly He transcends their vision. This is clear to none who have not had experience of it. But the experienced soul, comprehending that there is something further of which it is profoundly sensible, calls it, “I know not what.” As that cannot be understood, so neither can it be described, though it is felt, as I have said. Hence the soul says that the creatures speak indistinctly, because they cannot distinctly utter that which they would say: it is the speech of infants, who cannot explain distinctly or speak intelligibly that which they would convey to others.

[¶10] 11. The other creatures, also, are in some measure a revelation to the soul in this way, but not of an order so high, whenever it is the good pleasure of God to manifest to it their spiritual sense and significance; they are seemingly on the point of making us understand the perfections of God, and cannot compass it; it is as if one were about to explain a matter and the explanation is not given; and thus they stammer “I know not what.” The soul continues to complain, and addresses its own life, saying, in the stanza that follows:

### Stanza VIII.

[¶12] THE soul, perceiving itself to be dying of love, as it has just said, and yet not dying so as to have the free enjoyment of its love, complains of the continuance of its bodily life, by which the spiritual life is delayed. Here the soul addresses itself to the life it is living upon earth, magnifying the sorrows of it. The meaning of the stanza therefore is as follows: “O life of my soul, how can you persevere in this life of the flesh, seeing that it is your death and the privation of the true spiritual life in God, in Whom you live in substance, love, and desire, more truly than in the body? And if this were not reason enough to depart, and free yourself from the body of this death, so as to live and enjoy the life of God, how can you still remain in a body so frail? Besides, these wounds of love made by the Beloved in the revelation of His majesty are by themselves alone sufficient to put an end to your life, for they are very deep; and thus all your feelings towards Him, and all you know of Him, are so many touches and wounds of love that kill,

[¶13] 2. We must keep in mind, for the better understanding of this, that the soul lives there where it loves, rather than in the body which it animates. The soul does not live by the body, but, on the contrary, gives it life, and lives by love in that which it loves. For beside this life of love which it lives in God Who loves it, the soul has its radical and natural life in God, like all created things, according to the saying of St. Paul: “In Him we live, and move, and are;” that is, our life, motion, and being is in God. St. John also says that all that was made was life in God: “That which was made, in Him was life.”

[¶14] 3. When the soul sees that its natural life is in God through the being He has given it, and its spiritual life also because of the love it bears Him, it breaks forth into lamentations, complaining that so frail a life in a mortal body should have the power to hinder it from the fruition of the true, real, and delicious life, which it lives in God by nature and by love. Earnestly, therefore, does the soul insist upon this: it tells us that it suffers between two contradictions — its natural life in the body, and its spiritual life in God; contrary the one to the other, because of their mutual repugnance. The soul living this double life is of necessity in great pain; for the painful life hinders the delicious, so that the natural life is as death, seeing that it deprives the soul of its spiritual life, wherein is its whole being and life by nature, and all its operations and feelings by love. The soul, therefore, to depict more vividly the hardships of this fragile life, says:

[¶15] 4. That is to say: “Besides, how can you continue in the body, seeing that the touches of love — these are the arrows — with which the Beloved pierces your heart, are alone sufficient to deprive you of life?” These touches of love make the soul and heart so fruitful of the knowledge and love of God, that they may well be called conceptions of God, as in the words that follow:

[¶16] 5. That is, of the majesty, beauty, wisdom, grace, and power, which you know to be His.

[¶17] NOTE

[¶18] AS the hart wounded with a poisoned arrow cannot be easy and at rest, but seeks relief on all sides, plunging into the waters here and again there, while the poison spreads notwithstanding all attempts at relief, till it reaches the heart, and occasions death; so the soul, pierced by the arrow of love, never ceases from seeking to alleviate its pains. Not only does it not succeed, but its pains increase, let it think, and say, and do what it may; and knowing this, and that there is no other remedy but the resignation of itself into the hands of Him Who wounded it, that He may relieve it, and effectually slay it through the violence of its love; it turns towards the Bridegroom, Who is the cause of all, and says: