About the Book
The verse contained in the present volume was composed between 1980 and 1984, often under difficult circumstances, as may be picked up from an attentive reading of what is written between the lines, the reason being that the very notion of literary activity was not particularly encouraged in the context of the Carthusian cloister, at least in the early eighties in France. It is hardly an exaggeration to note that the problem of the compatibility or otherwise of literary output with the strictly contemplative life became in this instance a veritable "test case". This case was subsequently picked up and studied in detail by a very competent scholar, Eva Schmid (later Schmid-Morwald), who produced a magisterial and balanced doctoral thesis on it at Salzburg University, published in 1994 under the title The Lyre and the Cross: Incompatibility or symbiosis of the poetic vein and strict monasticism in the poetry of Alun Idris Jones, a Welsh Novice Monk. It is hoped to reprint this study in the present series, with Original Writing, Dublin. To resume the problem in a few words, it is as follows.
The contemplative life in its purity seeks no justification for its existence outside the rights of the Creator, to whose gratuitous praise and adoration it has to be exclusively orientated. It is seen as an anticipation of the future life, and those who are called to that specific form of life within the Mystical Body are entrusted with a role on earth that corresponds closely to the role in heaven of the angels that are not called to intervene directly in the material service of mankind but only in the continuous praise of the thrice-holy God before His throne of Majesty. The creation and protection of an ambience in which this may happen is the very raison d' etre of the claustral structure. Having been given the great boon of this structure in its purest form, that of the strictest Order in the Catholic Church, to seek then to pass once again from the entirely vertical to the partly horizontal, in the orientation of the powers and fruits of contemplation towards the literary service of Man, is to display an absence of purity of intention and even of faith and correct understanding of the rights of God over all for His own sake alone.
The concept is referred to as Spiritual Virginity, and it was studied and popularized by the deeply spiritual Jesuit author, R.P. Andre Ravier, confessor to the Grande Chartreuse. In a word, it can be summed up thus. The energy of the soul in the purely contemplative life belongs on every level to the One to whom it has been consecrated, and praise and adoration is purely gratuitous, because of the sovereign nature and therefore rights of the Creator. To "inquinate" or render impure, therefore, the limpidity of that mental and physical dedication and channeling of energy to anything but the Divine is to indicate that He is not sufficient for Himself, and that He has not the right to the exclusivity and totality of the powers and energies of a part of His creation, called apart for Him alone by choice of His Will and Providence. That it is a valid line of thought is proven by the fact that much mental and even physical distraction and rechanneling of energy does in fact take place when meditation is no longer purely gratuitous, and when part of the mind's attention is drawn to think directly of Man and his needs.
However, the issue is not entirely simple, as another line of thought has been taken by St Thomas Aquinas, who in question 182 and following of the Summa Thoeologia (IIa IIa), sets out to analyse the way in which it is actually superior not to be alight only but to be alight and also to shed light. It is the model contained in his famous expression, contemplare, et contemplata tradere (to contemplate, and to hand on the things contemplated). Moreover, there was not unanimity within the Order itself on this line, as it was pointed out that historically it had not been without active engagement in the field of literary output, even from early times, and with considerable influence in that very field. The particular situation of the author became uncomfortable, firstly on local level - he had been invited to burn or destroy poetic output - and then on the level of the Order's higher echelons (the Superior General had indicated that it might be sufficient to put away the already existing corpus without showing it again, but to obey with regard to future compositions). This explains why no more is written after 1982.
The two which appear right at the end of the volume in 1984 were written precisely at the moment when he was told that the Superior General did not wish him to continue in the Order and renew his vows. Curiously, both his own Prior and the Superior General were subsequently replaced with time, and their successors took a different line on the issues in question. In fact the local Superior invited Dom David to write to the General Chapter to ask for re-admittance to the Order, and it appears that the new Superior General, himself from Dom David's local Community, was open to the possibility, but the Definitory did not allow it, no doubt as a result of the message given previously by the former Superior General. This happened despite the request made at the same General Chapter by his former Master, himself by then Superior of another house. All this took place several years after the initial drama, when Fr David was already a priest, but ill at ease because of the increasingly active orientation of the the Community to which he by then belonged, and where he was Novice Master.
It explains how when, after the change of Superior at that house, and the subsequent change of functions within it, he asked if he could return to the eremitic life in Ireland, where he now is, in the grounds of a very ancient Celtic monastery, Duleek being by tradition the first stone-built church in the country, as the Gaelic name for the place suggests. What had initially begun as a poem to accompany a melody composed by his mother, which despite its beauty did not succeed in gaining the prize at the National Eisteddfod, had become a factor at the level of interpretation of vocation. However, Providence was not absent from the meanderings of chance, and the harnessing of all the elements became possible through the openness of the kind Bishop of Meath, as also of close friends, such as John McKeever who suggested setting up the website which retains all the major sermons, and makes them available in audio or video form, or both, along with much other material of possible interest to visitors to the website, the address of which is www.frdavidjones.com.
Dom Augustin Devaux, his mentor in the Chartreuse, made a study of all the Latin poets of the Order in history (La Poesie Latine chez les Chartreux, in Analecta Cartusiana, 131, 1997), and concluded with a section on the latest period, finishing with Dom David. When sendng the book to him at his Ordination, he dedicated it in Latin with a quotation from a comment made by one who had read the volume: Versiculi multissimi, poeta autem solus unus ("so many verses, but only one poet" - the reference being to Dom David). The verse composed and preserved in this volume saw the light of day thanks Dr James Hogg, who had himself been a junior professed monk of the same monastery, but earlier, and who became an important influence in the subsequent life of the author, both by his hospitality in the literary and academic field and by his human and even supernatural wisdom. The present volume was initially published under his editorship in the Analecta Cartusiana (129, 1988). It was the chance discovery of this volume that led to a student of his changing course in the choice of author for study.
Being a student of profound interior life, she was well suited to the analysis of the subject matter. Her only regret was her inability to enter into the specifically Welsh domain, although she did spend time researching Welsh culture in depth in key centres of that culture in the summer of 1990. She summed up her studies in one verse chosen from the sonnets composed by then: - For depths with ink embrace.
About the Author :
The author is currently living as a hermit in Duleek, Co. Meath, Ireland, within the grounds of a very ancient monastic settlement, dating from the time of St Cianan, a disciple of St Patrick himself. Although he is living a life of strict prayer, he has been asked to celebrate a public Mass on a Sunday, and at the request of several people, the weekly sermon is recorded, and may be heard on the website set up by one in the congregation. On that same site may be heard several poems being read by the author, often with video clips put together by the same competent friend, who has made available a whole corpus of talks and retreats recorded at different periods, even in other languages. Thus one may find readings from this very volume on the website www.frdavidjones.com, as well as many biographical video clips and photographs. The visitor and reader is advised, however, to take but a little at a time, for fear of contracting spiritual indigestion.
