Book of Mercy #46-50

[DBCohen]

Simon,

It’s great having you back with us, and I hope you’ll stay for the finale. And even if we take your word that you’re not a Buddhist scholar, you were always able to supply a fresh angle from the point of view of Zen, or just from your own original point of view, and I’ve been missing that a great deal.

blonde madonna,

Welcome back to you too. I can see what you mean about BoM’s dark images, but you’ll probably admit that it is also filled with beautiful images, with strength and with hope.

[Diane]

Simon - Doron and Mat and you would make a perfect first team for the last few verses.

[DBCohen]

Today is Christmas, and here is the next beautiful prayer from BoM as a kind of Hanukkah-Christmas-New Year gift, with the very best wishes to all those participating in our discussion or following it, and with hope for another glorious year to Cohenites all over:

II.47
My soul finds its place in the Name, and my soul finds its ease in the embrace of the Name. I struggled with shapes and with numbers, and I carved with blade and brain to make a place, but I could not find a shelter for my soul. Blessed is the Name which is the safety of the soul, the spine and the shield of the innermost man, and the health of the innermost breath. I search the words that attend your mercy. You lift me out of destruction, and you win me my soul. You gather it out of the unreal by the power of your name. Blessed is the Name that unifies demand, and changes the seeking into praise. Out of the panic, out of the useless plan, I awaken to your name, and solitude to solitude all your creatures speak, and through the inaccessible intention all things fall gracefully. Blessed in the shelter of my soul, blessed is the form of mercy, blessed is the Name.

[GBY]

These posts are quite beautiful ... thank you for all your good wishes for peace, kindness .. and a better tomorrow.
I am new to this site .. have not figured out how to navigate this Forum and find info, but it is wonderful and comforting to me to find a loving, dedicated group of people whose souls are deeply and poigantly moved to the depths .. by the music and words of Leonard's songs. I can't get enough of him. Have been to only two concerts here in NY -- Radio City and MSG (was away when he played The Beacon) -- but ready to hop a plane to Europe or wherever for more concerts.

Is there anyone who can explain to me how to navigate on here ... if so, please write to me at lcanthem@gmail.com. Thank you so much .... G-d bless everyone with good health, peace and friendship throughout the year and an opportunity to see more LC concerts.

Happy Chanukah .. Merry Christmas .. Happy New Year !!

Debbie .. aka GBY

[Judy]

Today is Christmas, and here is the next beautiful prayer from BoM as a kind of Hanukkah-Christmas-New Year gift, with the very best wishes to all those participating in our discussion or following it, and with hope for another glorious year to Cohenites all over:

Thank you Doron, and thank you for including those following as well as those participating. As a "faithful follower", I too would like to wish everyone here a peaceful and happy new year.

[mat james]

…and you win me my soul.

We have a version of Trinity here.
3 players; “you”, “me” and “my soul”.

“…You gather it out of the unreal…”
“you” ‘…unifies demand, and changes the seeking into praise’
This “you” works on Leonard’s soul
And changes the seeking (of god) into the praising of (the name) god.
The emphasis here is that neither Leonard nor his soul are capable of mystic union on their own; only with the gift of his god (blessing) can ‘seeking’ shift to ‘praising’.
This shift requires input from god.

Then the book of Longing morphs to the book of Mercy.

“…and solitude to solitude” reference to Plotinus (Neo Platonism) again and his famous quote regarding the journey of the mystic;
“…the flight of the alone to the Alone”.

“and through the inaccessible intention”: Here, once again Cohen alludes to the “Cloud of unknowing” (inaccessible)…and faith and longing win the day;
The alone is no longer alone, but Alone.
Mystic union/ holy communion/ I am Who Am!
…one…


MatbbgJ

[DBCohen]

My, my, how time flies. I suddenly realized my long neglect of our discussion. Thanks for that contribution, Mat. I thought your following observation was very much to the point:

The emphasis here is that neither Leonard nor his soul are capable of mystic union on their own; only with the gift of his god (blessing) can ‘seeking’ shift to ‘praising’.
This shift requires input from god.

Only, unlike you (that’s our old debate) I don’t think that his goal is necessarily the mystical union; it can also be reassurance, peace of mind, shelter. Mystical union can be a burning experience, as we know, and here the tone is much more subdued. But perhaps the one does not exclude the other.

On the outer level, it is interesting to note the repetition here once again of the three crucial words in this book: “name”, “shield” and “mercy” (originally, all alternative titles for the book). All three terms first appeared together in I.9, then in II.37 & 42. Now, in II.47, we have them all together in the same prayer for the last time. Apart from “shield” we also have here the (to my ear) softer “shelter”, which evokes well-known verses from the Psalms. It all comes together beautifully in the last verse of this prayer:

Blessed in the shelter of my soul, blessed is the form of mercy, blessed is the Name.

By the way, might “in” in the above verse be a typing error? Should it be “is”, like in the rest of the verse? What do you think?

[Cate]

By the way, might “in” in the above verse be a typing error? Should it be “is”, like in the rest of the verse? What do you think?

Good question Doron (good eye as well).
I don't think it was an error.

Blessed in the shelter of my soul, blessed is the form of mercy, blessed is the Name.

3
Within the shelter of N’s soul, the form of mercy is blessed (he says form of mercy not just mercy?) and the Name is blessed. Earlier he stated he could not find a shelter for his soul, but now after he has awakened to ‘your name’ (small n) his soul has become the shelter.

Question: the 'form of Mercy' I see as being feminine, would 'the Name' be masculine?

'solitude to solitude all your creatures speak' – I really like that

[mat james]

Blessed in the shelter of my soul, blessed is the form of mercy, blessed is the Name.

There are two reasons why I assume that "in" is not a mistake.
"in" works well for me as it is not a verb and therefore relies on/allows the following sentence or two to be the correct gramma.
"Blessed is the shelter of my soul. Blessed is the form of mercy. Blessed is the Name" as I understand it, would be the correct way of structuring these lines if "is" was used instead of "in". And Leonard has not structured it that way.
...the other reason;
When interpreting the meaning of the poetry/lines then the use of "in" is preferable to me than the use of "is".
"in" implies that both "mercy and "Name" are sacred when experienced in the confines of Leonard's "soul", rather than his mind.
I like this perspective. It implies that viewing life through the eyes of the soul is what makes one's life 'sacred'; and if one does not seek out their soul's interplay, then their life cannot be sacred, almost by definition...(the soul is that which experiences the sacred).
I find this thought rather profound.
Thanks for pointing highlighting this sentence Doron. As Cate says, "you have a good eye".

Mat.

[DBCohen]

Cate and Mat,

Thanks for your responses. I guess that when you type out a text, you notice more than when you just read it. In fact, typing out BoM prayers is a profound experience which I can warmly recommend…

I too tend to think that “in” is the correct reading here, although it’s hard to be certain about it. I looked up the Italian translation, which I own thanks to Judy’s generosity, and it seems that the translators read “is” rather than “in” (not that I know much Italian, but I can recognize the pattern):

Benedetto il rifugio della mia anima, benedetta la forma della misericordia, benedetto il Nome.

Ah, what a beautiful language.

[mat james]

Hi Doron,
I thought this info below, may be of interest to you. It argues that Mysticism (Jewish, Christian and Islamic) were all influenced by the Neoplatonists.
I often argue on this BOM discussion that Leonard was/is also likewise influenced by Neoplatonism and perhaps this is why; because all three traditions appear to have taken on Neoplatonic ideas, as outlined below.

Proclus (http://www.kheper.net/topics/Neoplatoni ... ifeof.html)
"The German-Jewish scholar Leo Baeck (1873-1956) makes the controversial propsal that the Gnostic-Proto-Kabbalistic text the Sefer Yetzirah "in its thought as well as in its terminology, is dependent upon the teaching of Proclus, the last great Neoplatonist. Furthermore, the decisive passages of the Sefer Yetzirah are none other than the transference of this Greek scholastic's system into Jewish thought and biblical language." This means that not only Christian Mysticism and Renaissance Platonism, but Kabbalah as well can in part be traced back to Proclus. Both of these latter streams of thought in fact merge in the synthesis that is Western Hermeticism.
Today and for the last several centuries Proclus has been relegated to the status of mere systematizer rather than original thinker. Slowly modern scholarship is coming around to a full recognition of Proclus' genius. Along with Plotinus and Iamblichus, he surely stands as one of the great figures of the late classical wisdom tradition"


Plotinus (http://www.kheper.net/topics/Neoplatonism/Plotinus.htm)

"For Plotinus therefore, the relation between the grades of being, or hypostases, is a two-fold process. There is a downward process of Emanation or "outflowing", and a corresponding upward process of return through Contemplation.
...Every begotten being longs for the being that begot it and loves it..."
These are similar processes to Leonard's writings on "mercy" and "longing".

… Plotinus's Influence - the Islamic Connection
"Plotinus' teachings were to exert an influence not only on later Neoplatonists and Gnostics, but on the Islamic world too. This happened quite by accident. An Arabic translation of a section of Plotinus, padded out with his student Porphyry's commentary, appeared, titled the Theology of Aristotle [10]. Since the medieval islamic thinkers thought very highly of Aristotle, this work exerted a strong formative influence on Islamic philosophical thought. Thus, whereas Neoplatonism is no longer respected in the West, except as an intellectual curiosity or historical movement, the same is most definitely not the case with the intelligent and the mystic Moslem. An Islamicised neoplatonism has retained its popularity among progressive philosophers down to the present day. Indeed, anyone who reads the works of Frithjof Schuon, the important contemporary Sufi-inspired theologian and Traditionalist, will notice the strongly Plotinian bent to his metaphysics."

Food for thought

Regards, Mat.

[DBCohen]

Mat,

Thanks for those quotes. I never doubted that Plotinus’s ideas had a lasting influence on various forms of mysticism in Judaism, Christianity and Islam. I also don’t deny that LC is in a way a partial heir to those traditions. Our main debate, I believe, is that you have him committed to it further and deeper than what I usually find in his work. But this debate has been quite productive, so there’s really nothing to complain about.

Going back once again to that last verse of the prayer, Judy was kind enough to send me the French version as well. In this case it seems that the translator, Jacques Vassal, unlike his Italian colleagues, Francesca Piviotti Inghilleri and Armando Pajalich, translated the “in” as “in:

Bénie dans l'abri de mon âme, bénie est la forme de la miséricorde, béni est le nom.

If anyone’s aware of other translations, let’s have their version too, please.

[mat james]

Doron and all,
I have had a "ramble" on the "everything else" thread and posted a question; "Is G~d an Existentialist?."
My ramblings there have been heavily influenced by my ongoing discussion on this thread about Leonard's BOM and other works.
I partly blame you, Doron, for my stammerings
You may like to take a stumble in that direction? But I warn you, if you are wavering, I do ramble on a bit.
Below is a link.
viewtopic.php?f=18&t=20734&p=214145#p214145

Mat.

[DBCohen]

Mat,

I looked up your page and enjoyed it, but I didn’t vote because I don’t have a clue.

[mat james]

The options were "no" or "yes".
I didn't include "don't have a clue" (or similar) on purpose as it would have won hands down; and in this matter, who is it that does have a clue ?"
Decision making (guessing ?) favors the brave.

MatbbgJ