Revelations of Divine Love · 7 of 127 · tr. Grace Warrack
Chapter V
"God, of Thy Goodness, give me Thyself;—only in Thee I have all" In this same time our Lord shewed me a spiritual sight of His homely loving. I saw that He is to us everything that is good and comfortable for us: He is our clothing that for love wrappeth us, claspeth us, and all encloseth us for tender love, that He may never leave us; being to us all-thing that is good, as to mine understanding. Also in this He shewed me a little thing, the quantity of an hazel-nut, in the palm of my hand; and it was as round as a ball. I looked thereupon with eye of my understanding, and thought: What may this be? And it was answered generally thus: it is all that is made. I marvelled how it might last, for methought it might suddenly have fallen to naught for little[ness]. And I was answered in my understanding: It lasteth, and ever shall [last] for that God loveth it. And so All-thing hath the Being by the love of God. In this Little Thing I saw three properties. The first is that God made it, the second is that God loveth it, the third, that God keepeth it. But what is to me verily the Maker, the Keeper, and the Lover,—I cannot tell; for till I am Substantially oned to Him, I may never have full rest nor very bliss: that is to say, till I be so fastened to Him, that there is right nought that is made betwixt my God and me. It needeth us to have knowing of the littleness of creatures and to hold as nought all-thing that is made, for to love and have God that is unmade. For this is the cause why we be not all in ease of heart and soul: that we seek here rest in those things that are so little, wherein is no rest, and know not our God that is All-mighty, All-wise, All-good. For He is the Very Rest. God willeth to be known, and it pleaseth Him that we rest in Him; for all that is beneath Him sufficeth not us. And this is the cause why that no soul is rested till it is made nought as to all things that are made. When it is willingly made nought, for love, to have Him that is all, then is it able to receive spiritual rest. Also our Lord God shewed that it is full great pleasance to Him that a helpless soul come to Him simply and plainly and homely. For this is the natural yearnings of the soul, by the touching of the Holy Ghost (as by the understanding that I have in this Shewing): God, of Thy Goodness, give me Thyself: for Thou art enough to me, and I may nothing ask that is less that may be full worship to Thee; and if I ask anything that is less, ever me wanteth,—but only in Thee I have all. And these words are full lovely to the soul, and full near touch they the will of God and His Goodness. For His Goodness comprehendeth all His creatures and all His blessed works, and overpasseth without end. For He is the endlessness, and He hath made us only to Himself, and restored us by His blessed Passion, and keepeth us in His blessed love; and all this of His Goodness.
The path of loving devotion and self-surrender to a personal deity as itself sufficient means of liberation — the Gita's 'to those constantly devoted, I come forward as their deliverer,' Kabir's and the Sant poets' love-religion, the devotional stream that parallels Sufi love-mysticism. Distinct from mystical_union (the resulting state), fana_annihilation (the ego's unmaking at the path's end), ladder_of_love (eros staged toward Beauty), and prayer (the practice of address): bhakti names devotion as the soteriological road itself.
The passage emphasizes 'homely loving' and the soul's simple, plain yearning for God as the primary path to salvation, stating that only in God is there fullness.
Eckhart's Abgeschiedenheit/Gelassenheit — radical letting-go of will, image, and grasping that opens the soul to God; distinct from inner_silence (quietness) and from material renunciation, and adjacent to Sufi tark and Buddhist non-grasping as a practice rather than a metaphysical claim.
The author advocates holding 'as nought all-thing that is made' and seeking rest only in the Unmade God, reflecting a radical letting-go of created attachments.
Pronoia — the doctrine that the divine actively orders the unfolding of the cosmos and human affairs toward intelligible ends, against pure chance or blind necessity.
The passage asserts that all things last and have being solely because 'God loveth it' and 'keepeth it,' indicating active divine sustenance of creation.
Sufi self-effacement in God — the via by which the lover is unmade as a separate ego and recovered as God's act; specifies the practice/event rather than mystical_union's resulting state.
The text explicitly states that the soul must be 'willingly made nought' regarding all created things to receive spiritual rest and fully possess God.
Salvation through direct experiential knowledge of the divine nature, not through faith, ritual, or moral works alone.
The passage describes a 'spiritual sight' and understanding granted directly by God, bypassing intellectual reasoning to reveal the nature of creation and divine love.
The divine conceived as active, present, and dynamic—not an abstract principle but a personal responsive reality.
God is depicted as an active, personal presence who 'wrappeth,' 'claspeth,' and 'keepeth' the soul with tender love, rather than an abstract principle.
The merging of the individual soul or self with the divine, transcending personal identity.
The passage centrally describes the soul's desire to be 'Substantially oned' with God so that nothing created stands between them, defining this union as the only source of true rest and bliss.
Direct address to the divine, whether petitionary, contemplative, or liturgical; speech and silence offered upward.
The text centers on the prayer 'God, of Thy Goodness, give me Thyself,' describing it as a simple, plain address that pleases God and touches His will.
The felt condition of exile from one's divine origin — Rumi's reed flute torn from its bed, Plotinus's 'we have forgotten,' the Gnostic forgetfulness; the affective wound that complements return_to_source and gives the return its motive.
The passage implies a state of unrest caused by seeking rest in created things rather than God, highlighting the soul's current separation from its true source.