Jubilation, the wordless prayer of ordinary worshipers in the “age of faith,” occupied an even greater place in the prayer lives of mystics during that period and the centuries that followed. The writers speak of jubilation and spiritual inebriation in referring to the entire spectrum of spontaneous bodily and vocal prayer which might include glossolalia, inspired songs, dancing, and intense bodily movement. Until the seventeenth century, this kind of prayer was mentioned by the majority of religious writers and was experienced by most of the well-known mystics.
Many people misunderstand the term mystic as it is applied to Christian experience. A mystic is a person who is given to deep spirituality and seeking after God. Although some mystics practice silence and solitude, most do not. According to original sources, mystics of earlier centuries were warmly involved in intimate human contact. More often than not they possessed an extraordinary sense of humor, and some—like St. John Gosco, St. Philip Neri and St. Francis of Assisi—elevated the art of clowning to a prayer form.
Until the siege mentality developed in the Catholic church after the sixteenth century, mystics were a vital part of the life of the church. Their hunger for God and their evident freedom, tenderness, and joy were startling signs of God’s kingdom being lived out among his people.
Mystic Jubilation
Because mystics were persons who focused their entire beings on the heart of God they were often in the process of radical transformation. Their lives produced great joy and hope, and lent a sense of purpose to the whole Christian church. A mystic’s growth toward union with God and with fellow human beings was usually marked by excruciating cleansing and purging, as well as times of incomparable wonder. It is not surprising that jubilation, the prayer of many ordinary Christians in the “age of faith,” should have played an even more important role in the prayer lives of mystics then and during the following centuries.
The works of several nineteenth-century scholars present an overview of the part jubilation played in the lives of these holy men. Albert Farges gives this description: There are even more violent transports, such as those so often observed in St. Francis of Assisi, St. Philip Neri, St. Joseph of Cupertino, St. Mary Magdalene de Pazzi, and many other holy mystics, whose jubilation or spiritual inebriation showed itself outwardly in actions which astonished and even scandalized the weak and ignorant. Such were their sighs, cries, ardent and broken exclamations, abundant tears, and even laughter, songs, improvised hymns, tremors agitating every limb, leapings, impetuous movements, the violent outward expression of enthusiasm and love. (Albert Farges, Mystical Phenomena [1926], 155)
One of the more thorough studies made on the subject is Die christliche Mystik by John Joseph Gorres. Written in the early nineteenth century, the book’s purpose is to defend the Catholic faith and Catholic mysticism against rationalism. A part of Gorres’s defense is to explain and describe mystical phenomena. He compiled numerous examples from several sources and used science and philosophy to help explain them.
A problem with Gorres’s research is that he was not sufficiently critical and was too prone to accept the authenticity of some of the more bizarre accounts of mystical phenomena. Nevertheless, Gorres rendered the church an important service in describing and attempting to explain mystical jubilation. One chapter is devoted to describing the effects of spiritual experience on the vocal apparatus. Spiritual experience, he asserts, affects the voice by enabling it to sing heavenly melodies in a person’s own language, or even in a language unknown to the one praying; the same process produces prophetic words. Gorres writes: The forces which contribute to the formation of [ordinary speech] can also submit to a transformation in ecstasy, and the sounds produced in this state carry a character which is much different from ordinary sounds.… The spirit itself is articulated in these sounds, words which the spirit of man had not thought. The voice then produces sounds which seem to belong to someone else. Or if this is really the voice of the one speaking, it is like elevated or winged thoughts which are spoken. (John Joseph Gorres, La Mystique [French translation of Die christliche Mystik, 1854], vol. 2, p. 149)
The effect of spiritual experience on the voice could enable a person to speak a foreign language. Gorres gives the example of St. Mary Magdalene de Pazzi, who was able to speak Latin, a language she had never learned. He adds that predictive prophecy is another effect of religious experience on the voice. Gorres tells a story about St. Humiliane, who was known to sing by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. The other sisters in her convent would hear her singing musical glossolalia, “a beautiful song with a voice so delicate that when they did not have their ears right up to her mouth, they heard the song but were unable to distinguish words” (La Mystique, 150–158).
Christine the Admirable also sang in the Spirit, according to Gorres. He writes that Christine would “turn around like a doll agitated by several children.” Then from her lips would issue a marvelous song which nobody was able to understand or imitate in spite of all efforts. There was in this song a very fluid element … and the succession of these sounds. But the words of these melodies, if one wants to call them words, were sometimes incomprehensible.
After her spiritual song Christine was overcome by spiritual drunkenness. Gorres’s account reads, “Little by little she appeared to be drunk—she was drunk in effect, but with a holy and divine drunkenness.” She then led the other sisters in the singing of the Te Deum.
The jubilation of Christine was so entrancing, writes Gorres, that “it seemed to be the voice of an angel rather than the song of a mortal. It was so beautiful to hear that it surpassed not only the sounds of the most beautiful instruments but even the most pleasant human voice.” Christine was also able to sing in Latin, a language she did not understand and had never learned, as well as to pray with glossolalia. Gorres says, “This was the jubilation of her soul which came out in unarticulated sounds” (La Mystique, 14, 158–159).
Invisible choirs were sometimes heard accompanying those who sang. This is Gorres’s account of that phenomenon: Often during the divine service—especially Mass—one often heard invisible choirs making sounds around one of the holy people singing the Sanctus or some other chants. The examples are … frequent …
Jubilation: An Entrance into Deeper Spiritual Life
The gift of tongues is often looked upon in charismatic renewal as an entrance to a deeper spiritual life. The same appears to be true in the spiritual experience of the mystics. Evelyn Underhill makes this point in her biography of Jacopone da Todi. She calls jubilation “the characteristic phenomenon of the beginner in the supersensual life,” and adds: These acute emotional reactions, often accompanied by eccentric outward behavior, are a normal episode in the early development of many mystics, upon whom the beauty and wonder of the new world of spirit now perceived by them, and the Presence that fills it, have often an almost intoxicating effect (Jacopone da Todi, 76, 78).
This suggestion of Underhill is borne out in the writings of many of the mystics. John Ruysbroeck calls jubilation the “first and lowest mode whereby God inwardly declares himself in the contemplative life” (The Book of the Twelve Bequines, chapter 10, as quoted in Underhill, Jacopone da Todi, 78). Richard Rolle received the gift of heavenly song early in the development of his spiritual life as a definite experience.
The same is true of the English mystic Gordic. On a pilgrimage to the Holy Land he spent whole nights praying on the mountains and visiting the Holy Sepulcher. Afterward he had an experience which his biographer describes as follows: In his heart there was a gentleness greater than anything else, in his mouth a sweetness sweeter than honey on the honeycomb, and his ears were filled with the melody of a great jubilation. (Eric Colledge, The Medieval Mystics of England [1961], 39)
It appears, then, that for many contemplatives, entering into the wonder of God with one’s voice and body was a natural part of moving into a deeper spiritual life. There is a strong similarity between this form of initiation and tongues as a form of initiation among charismatics in the present-day charismatic renewal.
Jacopone da Todi
One of the more exciting mystics in the history of the church was Jacopone da Todi (1228–1306), a Franciscan friar. Before his conversion Jacopone enjoyed a happy life as a jurist and as the husband of a pretty, young wife whom he passionately loved. At a wedding celebration he and his wife were attending the floor suddenly collapsed during a dance, and Jacopone’s wife was killed. When her party dress was removed, a hair shirt was found on her body, a sign that she was a woman of prayer who had been praying for the conversion of her husband. Jacopone, profoundly shaken, sold all of his possessions and eventually joined the Franciscans (Karl Vossier, Medieval Culture [1929], vol. 2, pp. 83–84). After many years of soul searching and purging, he entered into a period of overflowing spiritual joy. He describes his mystic journey in a number of songs and poems.
An entire period of his development is related to jubilation, as brought out by Evelyn Underhill in her biography of Jacopone. She records that during this time he “babbled of love with ‘tears and laughter, sorrow and delight,’ and with gestures that seemed foolishness to other men” (Jacopone da Todi, p. 76). In his poem “La Bontade se lamenta,” Jacopone paints a vivid picture of the state of a soul in the joyous abandon of jubilation:
Now a new language doth she speak,
“Love, Love,” is all her tongue can say.
She weeps, and laughs; rejoices, mourns,
In spite of fears, is safe and gay;
And though her wits seem all astray,
So wild, so strange, her outward mien
Her soul within her is serene;
And heeds not how her acts appear.
Another of Jacopone’s poems describes the experience of singing in the Spirit:
Abundance cannot hide herself apart;
And jubilation, from out her nest within the heart,
Breaks forth in song, and in sibilant sound [sibilare]
Even as did Elias long ago.
In the following poem Jacopone personifies and addresses the jubilus directly. This is the most significant of his jubilation poems; in it he describes the power of the jubilus to overwhelm a person’s being with love songs and joy, even when he carries profound sorrow in his heart, so that observers think he has lost his senses:
Of the Jubilus of the Heart
That Breaks Forth in the Voice:
Thou, Jubilus, the heart dost move;
And madest us sing for very love.
The Jubilus in fire awakes,
And straight the man must sing and pray,
His tongue in childish stammering shakes,
Nor knows he what his lips may say;
He cannot quench nor hide away
That Sweetness pure and infinite.
The Jubilus in flame is lit,
And straight the man must shout and sing;
So close to Love his heart is knit,
He scarce can bear the honeyed sting;
His clamour and his cries must ring,
And shame for ever take to flight.
The Jubilus enslaves man’s heart
And see! his neighbours stand apart,
And mock the senseless chatterer;
They deem his speech a foolish blur,
A shadow of his spirit’s light.
Yea, when thou enterest the mind,
O Jubilus, thou rapture fair,
The heart of man new skill doth find
Love’s own disguise to grasp and wear,
The suffering of Love to bear,
With song and clamour of delight!
And thus the uninitiated
Will deem that thou art crazed indeed;
They see thy strange and fervered state,
But have not wit thy heart to read;
Within, deep-pierced, that heart may bleed,
Hidden from curious mortal sight. (Underhill, Jacopone da Todi, 279–281)
Words such as “stammering” and “chatterer,” which Jacopone uses to describe his experience of jubilus, bear a remarkable resemblance to the descriptions of present-day Pentecostal glossolalia.
John Ruysbroeck
The Black Death, the rise of nationalism in the fourteenth century, and other factors began the unwinding of the medieval spiritual synthesis. Spirituality lost much of its unselfconscious innocence as religious writers became more and more introspective and speculative. Even so, mysticism continued to flourish during this time. Best-known and most revered of mystics in the Rhineland School, a tradition of mystics in the low countries of Europe, were John Ruysbroeck and Henry Suso.
Ruysbroeck mentions jubilation a number of times in his writings. His description of its physical manifestations makes most Pentecostal and charismatic worship appear tame by comparison.
Spiritual inebriation is this: That a man receives more sensible joy and sweetness than his heart can either contain or desire. Spiritual inebriation brings forth many strange gestures in men. It makes some sing and praise God because of their fullness of joy, and some weep with great tears because of their sweetness of heart. It makes one restless in all his limbs, so that he must run and jump and dance; and so excites another that he must gesticulate and clap his hands.…Other things sometimes happen to those who live in the fierce ardour of love; for often another light shines into them … and in the meeting with that light, the joy and the satisfaction are so great, that the heart cannot bear them, but breaks out with a loud voice in cries of joy. And this is called the jubilus or jubilation, that is, a joy which cannot be uttered in words. (John Ruysbroeck, The Adornement of the Spiritual Marriage, Book 2, chapters xix and xxiv, as quoted in Underhill, Jacopone da Todi, 78)
Note that Ruysbroeck repeats the classic definition of the jubilus: Joy which cannot be uttered in words. Jubilation is a means by which God makes his friends “happily foolish.” Spiritual experience seizes the believer with such power that he scarcely knows how to contain himself, and knows not how he should bear himself. For he thinks that no one has ever experienced the things that he is experiencing and from thence arise jubilee because he cannot restrain himself.… Such an impatience possesses him outwardly and inwardly with so great a vehemence, that in all his powers and members there is so joyous an experience.…God makes his friends to be happily foolish. Sometimes this ecstasy is wont to grow to so great a height that the matter becomes serious, and more frequently he is compelled to break out into shouting whilst he is being spiritually touched or pricked. (John Ruysbroeck, The Kingdom of the Lovers of God, trans. by T. Arnold Hyde [1919], 89)
For Ruysbroeck, jubilation was part of a deeply personal relationship with God. The Spirit of the Lord says to the heart: “I am yours, O man, and you are mine: I live in you and you live in me.” Such interaction with God causes “great joy and pure pleasure to occupy body and soul,” and the joy is so great that the person cannot endure it. This exultation “is called the jubilus, which no one can express in words.” Says Ruysbroeck: “Hence arises the jubilation, which is the love of the heart, and the burning flame of devotion with praise and thanksgiving and constant reverence and veneration toward God” (On the First Method of True Contemplation, in Opera Omnia Ioannis Rusbrochii, 436).
In Contemplatione Opus Praeclarum, Ruysbroeck describes jubilation as the ebb and flow of reciprocal relationship with the Lord. “This same mutual touch, whether so in turn to touch and be touched, effects the jubilus.” In this state the “free and generous emotion pours back everything unto God” (Opera Omnia, 469).
Henry Suso
Henry Suso (1300–1366) also speaks of intense intimacy with the Lord. “I had certain tender conversations with my Creator in which only my spirit talked,” he writes. “I wept and sighed; I laughed and cried” (John G. Arintero, The Mystical Evolution in the Development and Vitality of the Church [1951], vol. 2, p. 276).
In his autobiography, Henry writes a stirring account of his experience with inspired singing: One day … while the Servant [Henry’s word for himself] was still at rest he heard within himself a gracious melody by which his heart was greatly moved. And at the moment of the rising of the morning star, a deep sweet voice sang.… And this song which he heard was so spiritual that his soul was transported by it and he too began to sing joyously.… And one day—it was in carnival time—the Servant had continued his prayers until the moment when the bugle of the watch announced the dawn. And while his senses were at rest, behold! angelic spirits began to sing the fair response.… And this song was echoed with a marvelous sweetness in the depths of his soul. And when the angels had sung for some time his soul overflowed with joy; and his feeble body being unable to support such happiness, burning tears escaped from his eyes. (quoted in Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism [1911; reprinted 1962], 277)
Richard Rolle
Probably no one person has probed the richness of the gift of heavenly song more than Richard Rolle of Hampole, England. Rolle (1300–1349) was a mystic and writer whose work left an indelible impression on English literature. An educated man, Rolle studied at the University of Oxford and the Sorbonne in Paris, where doubtless he was exposed to the literature of many mystical traditions.
At the age of eighteen, after finishing his work at Oxford and prior to beginning at the Sorbonne, he became a hermit. Thousands of people visited him at his hermitage because of his sanctity and wisdom (C. C. Heseltine, Selected Works of Richard Rolle [1930], viii). Rolle’s writings have much of the warmth and tenderness of Bernard and the early Franciscans.
Jubilation was a central concept in Rolle’s understanding of spiritual experience. He used the word hundreds of times in his writings—one hundred twenty-four times in the Melody of Love (Melos Amoris) alone. He also uses such words as “song,” “chant,” and “melody” when referring to jubilation.
The gift of heavenly song, occurring four years after his conversion, was an event in the life of Richard Rolle that marked an entrance into a deeper spiritual life. Here is his description of the experience: Whilst I sat in the same chapel in the night, before supper, I sang psalms, as I might, and I heard above me the noise as it were of readers or rather singers. Whilst I took heed, praying to heaven with all desire, in what manner I know not, suddenly I received a most pleasant heavenly melody dwelling within my mind. Indeed, my thought was continuously changed into mirth of song, and I had, as it were, praises in my meditation, and in saying prayers and psalms I gave forth the same sound. (Selected Works of Richard Rolle, introduction, pp. xvi–xvii)
Rolle’s use of the psalmic phrase Beatus vir qui scit jubilationem (Ps. 89:15, English versions) indicates that he was familiar with the church’s teachings on jubilation; that phrase is often used as a starting point for discussing jubilation in the tradition. Rolle writes: To me it seems indeed that contemplation is the joyful song of the love of God taken into the mind, with the sweetness of angelic praise. This is the joy which is the end of perfect prayer, of honest devotion in this life. This is the mirth to be had in the mind for the everlasting lover, breaking out with a great voice into spiritual songs. This is the final and most perfect of all deeds in this life. The psalmist, therefore, says “Beatus vir qui scit jubilationem,” that is to say, “Blessed is the man who knows jubilation,” in the contemplation of God. (Selected Works of Richard Rolle, 144)
Rolle also wrote about spiritual inebriation in the context of jubilation as other mystical writers have done: A man is carried above himself, “panting with desire only for the Creator.” … Lifted up to the melody of song, he is inebriated with divine pleasure.
He describes jubilation as the overflowing of the life of God within the believer which unites body and soul: Then I may say that contemplation is a wonderful joy of God’s love, which joy is the praise of God that may not be told. That wonderful praise is in the soul, and for abundance of joy and sweetness it ascends into the mouth so that the heart and the tongue accord as one, and body and soul rejoice, living in God. (Selected Works of Richard Rolle, 50)
In Contra Amores Mundi, Rolle describes the same experience in this way: Wherefore, too, one who has been made a contemplative man … is perpetually raised to such great joy that he is even permitted to hear the song of the angels. Hence he sings his prayers to God, in a wonderful and indescribable way, because, just as now the heavenly sound descends his spirit, so also, ascending in a superabundance of joy to his own mouth, the same sound is heard.… Therefore jubilation is taken up brightly in his mind, and with resonant voice he sings the divine praises.… The more ardently he loves, the sweeter is his jubilation. (Contra Amores Mundi, ed. and trans. by Paul Theiner [1968], 160-161)
Jubilation, says Rolle, is a gift of God made possible by the passion of Jesus. “O good Jesus … you endured torments that I might experience the symphony of heaven (Le chant d’amour [Melos Amoris] [Sources chrétiennes, 1971] 93.5).
This intense spiritual experience is not conversion, but takes place subsequently as a result of fervent seeking after God: Moreover, although we do not receive this gift in the beginning of our conversion, if we seek continually in our love for Christ for peace of mind and body, we shall receive it presently as a gift from God. In that state I have indeed learned to sing the divine praises in exultation and to jubilate in the mellifluous fervor of singing. (Contra Amores Mundi, 71–72)
At least some of the time, Rolle sang his jubilation in the known language. Scholars report that his songs arose naturally from a life of prayer. In Amending of Life he writes: Our heart being kindled with a fervent love, our prayer also is kindled and offered from our mouth in the savour of sweetness in the sight of God, so that it is a great joy to pray. For whilst in prayer a marvelous sweetness is given to him who prays, the prayer is changed into song. (Selected Works of Richard Rolle, 130)
Repetition of the name of Jesus was important to Rolle’s prayers. The phrase “jubilation in Jesus” often occurs in his writings. He explains: I cannot pray, I cannot meditate, but in sounding the name of Jesus.… The name of Jesus has taught me to sing.… Jesus, my Dear and my Darling! My delight is to sing to thee! Jesus, my Mirth and my Melody! (Selected Works of Richard Rolle, 81, 82, 95)
Rolle’s experience of the gift of song seems to have transcended the gift of tongues. His song allowed him to penetrate heaven, to more fully enter the heart of God. Many of the wondrous, the indescribable aspects of God are known in the rhythms and movement of music and sound. Jubilation, the gift of song, was a way of knowing that deep part of God.
St. Teresa of Avila
In the sixteenth century, mysticism took a bright new turn in the lives and writings of St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross. Close friends, these Spanish mystics explored with heart and intellect the experience of union with God. These two saints did not develop their mysticism in a vacuum. They were both well educated and acutely aware of the mystical writings that had preceded them.
Both Teresa and John were influenced by Luis of Granada, a Spanish writer of the early sixteenth century. Luis was one of St. Teresa’s Dominican confessors, as well as a popular preacher whose aim was to formulate a practical spirituality for ordinary people. In his Guide for Preachers, he quotes Gregory the Great’s classic definition of jubilation: “a joy of the inner man so great that it cannot be expressed in words but is expressed in exterior actions” (Louis De Granada, Oeuvres Complètes [1894], vol. 10, p. 199). Luis writes that the joy of jubilation is so great that neither Plato the prince of the philosophers, nor Demosthenes the greatest of orators, were liften up to this good thing.… God is the author and principle of this joy that we call jubilation. (Oeuvres Complètes, vol. 10, p. 199)
St. Teresa is one of the most widely read of the mystical writers on prayer. She exuded happiness and wanted everyone around her to be happy. “I won’t have nuns who are ninnies,” she said. “Gloomy saints” were not to her liking. It is said that her joy was so infectious that when she laughed, the whole convent laughed with her. Dance, inspired song, and group jubilation were a part of the worship of the reformed Carmelite Order which Teresa founded and headed (Marcelle Auclair, St. Teresa of Avila [1953], 220).
She and her nuns enjoyed a warm sense of community and would frequently enter into exuberant praise and worship. In his biography of Teresa, Marcelle Auclair brings together original source material on this expressive worship: While they got on with their spinning, they chatted and composed coplas [little songs] which the young ones sang very charmingly. Teresa improvised poems that her nuns memorized.… One can feel the rhythm of the music.… Even at recreation, fervour would take possession of her and she was incapable of resisting the urge of the spirit. She would begin to dance, turning round and round and clapping her hands as King David danced before the ark; the nuns accompanied her “in a perfect transport of spiritual joy.” (Auclair, St. Teresa of Avila, 220–221)
After some of her nuns had gone to France to found Carmelite convents, the French nuns, to their great surprise, saw the Mother Superior more like a seraphim than a mortal creature executing a sacred dance in the choir, singing and clapping her hands in the Spanish way, but with so much dignity, sweetness and grace that, filled with holy reverence, they felt themselves wholly moved by divine grace and their hearts raised to God. (Ibid.)
It is interesting to note that the dancing was sometimes done “in choir,” that is, in a liturgical setting.
One Easter, Teresa asked one of the nuns to sing an improvised song. The nun sang:
May my eyes behold thee,
Good and sweet Jesus.…
Let him who will, delight his gaze
With jasmine and with roses.
If I were to see thee,
A thousand gardens would lie before my eyes.
Teresa was so overwhelmed with this song that she fell unconscious in ecstasy. After regaining her senses she herself sang an improvised song. From then on whenever she would go into ecstasy, her nuns would surround her and sing softly (Auclair, St. Teresa of Avila, 222–223).
Teresa makes significant references to jubilation in her writings. She devotes several pages to the subject in her mystical treatise Interior Castle. Following are some excerpts: Our Lord sometimes bestows upon the soul a jubilation and a strange kind of prayer, the nature of which it cannot ascertain. I set this down here, so that, if he grants you this favour, you may give him hearty praise and know that such a thing really happens.…The joy of the soul is so exceedingly great that it would like not to rejoice in God in solitude, but to tell its joy to all, so that they may help it to praise our Lord.… She would like to invite everybody and have great festivities.… [In such a state of transport, the soul] cannot be expected to keep silence and dissemble.… Oh, what a blessed madness, sisters! If only God would give it to us all! May it please his majesty often to bestow this prayer upon us since it brings us such security and such benefit. For as it is an entire supernatural thing, we cannot acquire it. It may last for a whole day, and the soul will then be like one who has drunk a great deal, but not like a person so far inebriated as to be deprived of his senses; nor will it be like a melancholiac, who, without being entirely out of his mind, cannot forget a thing that has been impressed upon his imagination, from which no one else can free him either. These are very unskillful comparisons to represent so precious a thing, but I am not clever enough to think out any more: the real truth is that this joy makes the soul so forgetful of itself, and of everything, that it is conscious of nothing, and able to speak of nothing, save of that which proceeds from its joy, namely, the praises of God. (St. Teresa of Avila, Interior Castle, trans. and ed. by E. Allison Peers [1961], 167-169)
In her autobiography, Teresa uses the metaphor of spiritual inebriation to describe this state of prayer: During jubilation the soul knows not whether to speak or be silent, whether to laugh or to weep. This state is a glorious folly, a heavenly madness, in which true wisdom is acquired, and a mode of fruition in which the soul finds the greatest of delight.… I often used to commit follies because of this love, and to be inebriated with it, yet I had never been able to understand its nature.… Many words are spoken, during this state, in praise of God, but, unless the Lord himself puts order into them, they have no orderly form. The understanding, at any rate, counts for nothing here; the soul would like to shout praises aloud, for it is in such a state that it cannot contain itself—a state of delectable disquiet.… O God, what must that soul be like when it is in this state! It would fain be all tongue, so that it might praise the Lord. It utters a thousand holy follies, striving ever to please him who thus possesses it. (The Autobiography of St. Teresa of Avila, trans. and ed. by E. Allison Peers [1960], pp. 163–165)
The writings of Teresa demonstrate that spontaneous and fervent praise of God are a result of a deep and living relationship with the Lord. At the same time, it is a behavior that can be encouraged and developed. For Teresa, jubilation in community was a proclamation that God was truly in the midst of his people. Congregational praise is just such a declaration today.
St. John of the Cross
John was a less practical mystic than his friend Teresa. His spirituality has a more speculative note. At the same time, in sublime and poetic ways he plumbs the height and depth of spiritual experience.
In his references to jubilation John, like Teresa, uses the analogy of festivity. He says: In this state of life so perfect, the soul always walks in festivity, inwardly and outwardly, and it frequently bears on its spiritual tongue a new song of great jubilation in God, a song always new, enfolded in a gladness and love arising from the knowledge the soul has of its happy state.… There is no need to be amazed that the soul so frequently walks amid this joy, jubilance, fruition, and praise of God. (The Collected Works of St. John of the Cross, trans. by Kieran Kavanaugh [1973], 609)
John presents a beautifully poetic description of jubilation in his Spiritual Canticle. He depicts the soul as a nightingale which sings a new and jubilant song together with God, who moves her to do this. He gives his voice to her, that, so united with him, she may give it to him.… Since the soul rejoices in and praises God with God himself in this union … it is a praise highly perfect and pleasing to God.… This voice of jubilance, thus, is sweet both to God and to the soul. (The Collected Works of St. John of the Cross, 560)
Like Crysologus and Rolle, John understood jubilation as the very voice of God with which the worshiper blends his own song in response. He also wrote a long passage in which he discusses spiritual inebriation and its effects upon the soul.
St. Philip Neri
Philip Neri, who lived in the tumultuous sixteenth century, was one of the most human mystics in the history of the church. As a layman he formed a household of laymen to help serve the many pilgrims who were flocking to his native Rome. Ordained late in his life, he was the founder of the Oratory.
Philip strove to keep those around him happy and cheerful, to teach them in his “school of merriment,” as he called it. His biographer Bacci describes this: Even when he had reached an advanced age, and his strength was nearly exhausted by his great labors, the holy man was still to be seen going about the streets of Rome with a train of young men, conversing with them on all sorts of subjects according to their different professions, making them affectionate one toward another and winning their reverence and love toward him.… Sometimes he left his prayers and went down to sport and banter with the young men and others who flocked to him, as we learn from Cardinal Crescenzi, and by his sweetness and the allurements of his conversations to keep them cheerful and win their souls. He very often took them to some open ground and there set them playing together at ball or some other game. He could have a playful style with those in his charge, going up to people, boxing their ears, and saying, “Be merry.” (Bacci, The Life of St. Philip Neri [1902], vol. 1, pp. 194–195)
Philip could also feel people’s sorrows. He had an amazing ability to enter into the feelings of those to whom he ministered. His expressive style with his fellow human beings was paralleled with expressive worship toward his Lord. With great intensity he entered into prayer. Bacci describes this: In those places Philip often was surprised by such an abundance of spiritual consolations that, unable any longer to endure so great a fire of love, he was forced to cry out, “No more, Lord, no more,” and throwing himself down he used to roll upon the ground, not having strength to endure the vehement affection which he felt in his heart.…While he prayed he felt the incentives of divine love multiply with such power within him, and kindle such a flame in his breast, that besides continually weeping and sighing, he was often obliged, in order to moderate the fire, to throw himself on the ground, to bare his breast, and use other means to relieve his spirit which was overpowered by the impetuosity of the flame.…Fabrizio de Massimi, going one morning to confession to him, found the door of his room closed and, opening it very softly, saw the saint in the act of praying, standing up with his eyes raised to heaven and his hands uplifted, making many gestures. (Bacci, The Life of St. Philip Neri, vol. 1, pp. 21, 19, 338)
The spirituality of Philip and his friends exhibited itself in an intense devotion to the name of Jesus. Bacci tells of a scene of spontaneous worship which occurred at the deathbed of a young man: Then in an outburst of joy, he began to sing the hymns which were sung at the Oratory, and particularly the one which begins, “Jesus! Jesus! Jesus! let everyone call on Jesus!” (Bacci, The Life of St. Philip Neri, vol. 1, p. 202)
Thus we see that well into the sixteenth century hymns were sung to the name of Jesus, and devotion to him was very much a part of the religious expression of the period.
Other Mystics
One finds accounts and descriptions of expressive worship, often including glossolalia-style prayer, in most of the major mystics until the end of the sixteenth century, and some significant accounts beyond this period. Let us look at some of these.
Father Hoyos, a priest, describes an intensity of prayer that cannot be expressed in language: Now one breaks forth in groans and tears; now one would wish to be in a desert place in order to cry out and to give vent to the vehement feelings in his breast. (Arintero, The Mystical Evolution in the Development and Vitality of the Church, vol. 2, p. 282)
The Spanish writer on prayer, Juan de Jesus Maria, defines jubilation in this way: Sometimes a joy is felt in the interior and it surpasses all the joys of this world, and those new to the service of God break forth into outward acts of jubilation because they cannot restrain themselves. This is usually called a spiritual intoxication or inebriation. (Arintero, The Mystical Evolution in the Development and Vitality of the Church, vol. 2, p. 263)
St. Alphonsus Liguori describes it this way: Spiritual intoxication causes the soul to break forth in, as it were, delirium, such as songs, cries, immoderate weeping, leaping et cetera. (Ηομο Αποστολιχυς, Appendix I, 15)
St. Catherine of Genoa experienced jubilation in the form of laughter. Her biographer describes it as follows: [During a serious illness] she fixed her eyes steadily on the ceiling; and for about an hour she seemed all but immovable, and spoke not, but kept laughing in a very joyous fashion.… Greater interior jubilation expressed itself in merry laughter; and on the evening of September 7 her joy appeared exteriorly in laughter which lasted, with but small interruptions, for some two hours. (Baron Von Hugel, The Mystical Element of Religion, 13)
Like Catherine of Genoa, Catherine of Siena knew laughter as a form of prayer. According to her biographer, she “was always jocund and of a happy spirit … full of laughter in the Lord, exultant and rejoicing” (Underhill, Mysticism, 438). This doctor of the church could also break into wordless sounds in her prayer: What then shall I say? I will do as one who is tongue-tied, and say: “Ah, Ah” for there is nought else I can say, since finite speech cannot express the affection of the soul which desires thee infinitely. (St. Catherine of Siena [1907], 365)
St. Mary Magdalene de Pazzi is described as another whose behavior, under mystic impulse, could appear bizarre: Then she was restless and could not be still. To pour out this fervor that she could no longer contain, she was forced to bestir herself and she was strangely impelled to move about. And so, at such times, one saw her moving quickly from place to place. She ran through the convent as if crazed with love, and cried in a loud voice: “Love, love, love!” … And she said to the sisters who followed her: “You do not know, beloved sisters, that my Jesus is nothing but love, yes, mad with love. You are mad with love, my Jesus, as I have said and as I shall always say. You are very lovely and joyous, you refresh and solace, you nourish and unite. You are both pain and slaking, toil and rest, life and death in one.” (Reinhold, The Soul Afire [1973], 342-343)
A Fuller Reality
In the jubilation of both common Christians and mystics one finds an apprehension of a wonderfully fresh and joyful reality. Jubilation was an entering into a wondrous song that came forth from the heart of God. This theme is repeated over and over. Richard Rolle described heavenly music entering his ears and his heart and coming out through his voice. Medieval legends describe monks and friars being caught up in ecstasy, hearing the wondrous sound of heaven and then singing it on earth.
Dante, whose work sums up the medieval world, describes laughter and great joy in God at the heart of the Christian universe. Evelyn Underhill summarizes this view: Moreover, the most clear-sighted among the mystics declare such joy to be an implicit of reality. Thus Dante, initiated into paradise, sees the whole universe laugh with delight, as it glorifies God, and the awful countenance of Perfect Love adorned with smiles. Thus the souls of the great theologians dance to music and laughter in the heaven of the sun; the loving seraphs, in their ecstatic joy, whirl about the being of God. (Mysticism, p. 438)
Mystics were people who possessed a childlike gaiety, a perpetual gladness of heart. Deeply in touch with God, they shocked the world with a delicate playfulness that emanated from an experiential knowledge that they were children of a loving Father. A hymn from the medieval period illustrates their vision: There in heaven one hears sweet songs of birds in harmony, angels, too, sing fine melodies; Jesus leads off the dance with all the maiden host. (Anna Croh Seesholtz, Friends of God [1933], 12)
Breakdown of the Mystical Tradition
The jubilation tradition of expressive worship and glossolalia prayer continued as a vital force within western Christianity at least until the end of the sixteenth century. Yet today this tradition has been almost completely forgotten. While more research is required into the causes for the virtual demise of jubilation in the Catholic church, we can distinguish several factors which probably played a role in the diminishing of this long tradition.
End of the Medieval Synthesis. The Middle Ages at its height was a period of extraordinary faith. Beginning with the fourteenth century, however, this remarkable Christian synthesis began to unravel. The rise of nationalism, the bubonic plague which wiped out nearly half the population of Europe in a short time, and a growing superstition within the church were all factors.
In fact, much of Catholic history until Vatican II can be seen as a winding down of the medieval synthesis. The Protestant Reformation of the sixteenth century sent shock waves through the Catholic world. It challenged the church to set its house in order. This was accomplished at the Council of Trent, but the result was that the Catholic church also began a move toward ever-increasing rigidity. Additional assaults on the position of the Roman Catholic church came with the French Revolution and the end of cultural Christianity. The scientific revolution, the growth of secular philosophy, and the loss of church privilege all led to the development of a siege mentality within the Catholic church.
Though one can find examples of great holiness, new religious orders, and new inspiration during this time, a growing formalism and moralism began to arise within Catholicism. There was a tendency to reduce the faith to a set of formulas and rules. This was not a time for rich traditions to continue and flourish.
Abandonment of Mysticism. Mysticism, from the beginning, had been at the heart of the life of the church. The healing and transforming power of the love of God was central to the Catholic tradition. Even the end of the “age of faith” did not mark the end of the mystical tradition. In the midst of political and theological turmoil, wave after wave of genuine mystical movements preserved this vital stream of the church’s life.
In the seventeenth century, however, two opposite heretical traditions grew up: quietism and Jansenism. Quietism replaced mysticism with an emphasis on extraordinary phenomena and interior peace, but neglected active love and repentance. Quietism was often accompanied by immorality. In contrast, Jansenism emphasized the sinfulness and unworthiness of human beings. A priest of Jansenist orientation once boasted that there had not been one unworthy Communion in his church in a year. The reason was that he had not permitted any Communion during the year. The influence of this philosophy was not confined to those who openly espoused Jansenism, and its effects are still with the Catholic church today.
Jansenists and their fellow travelers had little use for mysticism. True mysticism was for them a rare occurrence. An emphasis on unworthiness and a sense of spiritual pride both have the effect of preventing people from moving in a mystical and spiritual direction.
It was necessary for the Catholic church to correct the false mysticism of the quietists, but in so doing it adopted a Jansenist orientation, and true mystical tradition was severely damaged in the process. Henri Daniel-Rops describes what took place: A large field of religious experience, the whole spiritual tradition of St. Bernard, of Tauler and Suso, of St. Teresa and St. John of the Cross … was suddenly abandoned. And that loss was not without harmful effects upon the vitality of the faith. (The Church in the Eighteenth Century [1964], 292)
Knowledge of the mystical tradition had diminished to the point that in the eighteenth century Father de Caussade lamented: Prejudice and an almost absolute ignorance of mystical writers, especially of the matter contained in their works, has gradually made [mysticism] and its ideas so absurd that I am at a loss to describe them.… Since these wretched prejudices have prevented men from reading the true mystics of later times, it is noticeable, even in the cloister, that there has been a decrease in the number of interior souls—souls totally detached, dead to the world and to themselves. (quoted in Pierre Pourrat, Christian Spirituality [1955], vol. 4, pp. 263–264)
Continuing Traces. The experience of jubilation and the recognition of jubilation as part of the mystical tradition did not cease all at once. There seems instead to have been a slow winding down of this style of prayer. The tradition continued in the mystical experience of the Catholic church, at least to some extent, until the nineteenth century. John Bosco, a saint of this period, is said to have experienced jubilation in his prayers.
Catholic culture has maintained traces of the expressive worship tradition. The colorful festivities on saints’ days and feasts, such as Corpus Christi in Latin countries, are remnants of these practices. A number of Catholics from Slavic backgrounds have reported that they remember older parishioners singing, making long extended sounds, and rocking back and forth while at their devotions. Leonids Linauts, Professor of Stained Glass at Rochester Institute of Technology and an expert on Latvian folklore, affirms that jubilation still existed before World War II in Latvia. He relates that it was the custom in some regions of that nation, particularly the Aswege region, for parishioners to arrive an hour or so before mass for singing and prayer. At times during this period the group would improvise wordless sounds and songs to express their devotion.
It is certainly possible that in rural areas, jubilation and other expressive styles of worship have been preserved. This is a matter for further and more precise investigation.