Dark Night of the Soul#In Roman Catholic spirituality

The poem of St. John of the Cross, in eight stanzas of five lines each, narrates the journey of the soul to the mystical union with God. The time or place of composition are not certain. It is likely that the poem was written between 1577 and 1579. It has been proposed that the poem was composed while John was imprisoned in Toledo, although the few explicit statements in this regard are unconvincing and second-hand.Lucinio del SS. Sacramento, Nota Introductoria a la 'Subida' y la 'Noche' in Vida y Obras completas de San Juan de la Cruz, 5th ed., Madrid: Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos, 1954, p. 358.

The journey is called "dark night" in part because darkness represents the fact that the destination "God" is unknowable, as in the 14th-century mystical classic The Cloud of Unknowing; both pieces are derived from the works of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite in the 6th century.{{cn|date=September 2024}} Further, the path per se is unknowable. The "dark night" does not refer to the difficulties of life in general,{{Cite web|url = https://www.michaelmirdad.com/dark-night-of-the-soul/|title = The Dark Night of the Soul|date = 13 December 2018|access-date = 9 January 2019|archive-date = 5 August 2020|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20200805164357/https://www.michaelmirdad.com/dark-night-of-the-soul/|url-status = dead}} although the phrase has been taken to refer to such trials.

{{Verse translation|lang=es|

La noche oscura del alma{{cite book |author1=San Juan de la Cruz |author1-link=San Juan de la Cruz |editor1=Silverio de Santa Teresa |editor1-link=Silverio de Santa Teresa |title=Obras de San Juan de la Cruz |date=22 July 1929 |publisher=El Monte Carmelo |location=Burgos |pages=4–5 |url=https://archive.org/details/obrasdesanjuande02john/page/4/mode/2up |language=es}}

En una noche oscura

Con ansias en amores inflamada,

¡Oh dichosa ventura!

Sali sin ser notada,

Estando ya mi casa sosegada.

A oscuras, y segura

Por la secreta escala disfrazada,

¡Oh dichosa ventura!

A oscuras y encelada

Estando ya mi casa sosegada.

En la noche dichosa

En secreto, que nadie me veia,

Ni yo miraba cosa,

Sin otra luz, y guia,

Sino la que en el corazón ardia.

Aquesta me guiaba

Más cierto que la luz del mediodia,

A donde me esperaba,

Quien yo bien me sabia,

En parte, donde nadie parecia.

¡Oh noche que guiaste,

Oh noche amable más que el alborada;

Oh noche que juntaste

Amado con amada,

Amada en el Amado transformada!

En mi pecho florido,

Que entero para él sólo se guardaba,

Allí quedó dormido,

Y yo le regalaba,

Y el ventalle de cedros aire daba.

El aire de la almena,

Cuando yo sus cabellos esparcia,

Con su mano serena

En mi cuello heria,

Y todos mis sentidos suspendia.

Quedéme, y olvidéme,

El rostro recliné sobre el Amado,

Cesó todo, y dejéme,

Dejando mi cuidado

Entre las azucenas olvidado.

|Dark Night of the Soul{{cite book |author1=Saint John of the Cross |author1-link=Saint John of the Cross |editor1=Silverio de Santa Teresa |editor1-link=Silverio de Santa Teresa |title=Dark Night of the Soul |year=1959 |translator1=Edgar Allison Peers |translator1-link=Edgar Allison Peers |pages=14 |url=https://ccel.org/ccel/j/john_cross/dark_night/cache/dark_night.pdf#page=20}}

On a dark night,

Kindled in love with yearnings

—oh, happy chance!—

I went forth without being observed,

My house being now at rest.

In darkness and secure,

By the secret ladder, disguised

—oh, happy chance!—

In darkness and in concealment,

My house being now at rest.

In the happy night,

In secret, when none saw me,

Nor I beheld aught,

Without light or guide,

save that which burned in my heart.

This light guided me

More surely than the light of noonday

To the place where he (well I knew who!)

was awaiting me—

A place where none appeared.

Oh, night that guided me,

Oh, night more lovely than the dawn,

Oh, night that joined

Beloved with lover,

Lover transformed in the Beloved!

Upon my flowery breast,

Kept wholly for himself alone,

There he stayed sleeping,

and I caressed him,

And the fanning of the cedars made a breeze.

The breeze blew from the turret

As I parted his locks;

With his gentle hand

he wounded my neck

And caused all my senses to be suspended.

I remained, lost in oblivion;

My face I reclined on the Beloved.

All ceased and I abandoned myself,

Leaving my cares

forgotten among the lilies.

}}

File:Zurbarán (atribuido)-John of the Cross-1656.jpg

The treatises Ascent of Mount Carmel (1581–1585) and Dark Night (the {{lang|es|Declaración}}, 1584–1586) are commentaries on the poem, explaining its meaning line by line. Both works were left uncompleted.

The Ascent of Mount Carmel is divided into three books that reflect the two phases of the dark night. The first is a purification of the senses (titled "The Active Night of the Senses"). The second and third books describe the more intense purification of the spirit (titled "The Active Night of the Spirit").Ascent of Mount Carmel, Ch. 1, 2 The active purgation of the senses comprises the first of the classical three stages of the mystical journey, followed by those of illumination and then union. The passive purgation of the spirit takes place between illumination and full union, when the presence of God has already been felt but is not stable.Underhill, Mysticism, Ch. 4.

At the beginning of the commentary Dark Night, John wrote: "In this first verse, the soul tells the mode and manner in which it departs, as to its affection, from itself and from all things, dying through a true mortification to all of them and to itself, to arrive at a sweet and delicious life with God."

The dark night of the soul is a stage of final and complete purification, and is marked by confusion, helplessness, stagnation of the will, and a sense of the withdrawal of God's presence.{{refn|group=note|name="Underhill"}} It is the period of final "unselfing" and the surrender to the hidden purposes of the divine will. The final stage is union with the object of love, the one Reality, God. Here the self has been permanently established on a transcendental level and liberated for a new purpose.{{sfn|Greene|1987|pp=22-38}}

The term "dark night of the soul" can be used as a synonym for a crisis of faith.{{cite journal |title=The Dark Night of the Soul: Spiritual Distress and its Psychiatric Implications |first1=Glòria |last1=Durà-Vilà |first2=Simon |last2=Dein |date=September 2009 |journal=Mental Health Religion & Culture |volume=12 |issue=6 |doi=10.1080/13674670902858800 |pages=543–559|s2cid=144177148 }} More generally, it is "used informally to describe an extremely difficult and painful period in one's life".{{refn|group=note|Ronald W. Pies:

The phrase "dark night of the soul" is often used informally to describe an extremely difficult and painful period in one's life, for example, after the death of a loved one; the break-up of a marriage; or the diagnosis of a life-threatening illness. For many, the loneliness, isolation and fear associated with the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic is, indeed, a dark night of the soul. There is nothing wrong with these informal usages, and they have obvious links to the concepts of demoralization and despair, as we have defined them. But they differ significantly from the original meaning and context of the phrase, as first conceived by the Spanish mystic John of the Cross (1541–1597 AD).Ronald W. Pies (2020), [https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/view/psychiatry-dark-night-soul Psychiatry and the Dark Night of the Soul]

See, for example, {{Cite book|last=Culadasa PhD, John Yates.|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/971364730|title=The Mind Illuminated : a Complete Meditation Guide Integrating Buddhist Wisdom and Brain Science for Greater Mindfulness.|date=2017|publisher=Hay House Publishing|others=Immergut PhD, Matthew.|isbn=978-1-78180-879-5|location=London|oclc=971364730}}}}

This crisis may endure for a long time. The "dark night" of St. Paul of the Cross in the 18th century endured 45 years, from which he ultimately recovered. The dark night of Mother Teresa, whose own name in religion she selected in honor of Thérèse of Lisieux, "may be the most extensive such case on record", having endured from 1948 almost until her death in 1997, with only brief interludes of relief, according to her letters.{{cite news |title=Mother Teresa's Crisis of Faith |author=David van Biema |url=https://time.com/4126238/mother-teresas-crisis-of-faith/ |magazine=Time |date=23 August 2007 |access-date=7 April 2020}}{{cite news |title=A Saint's Dark Night |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/29/opinion/29martin.html?em&ex=1188532800&en=9e59f11fbd412882&ei=5087 |work=The New York Times |author-link=James Martin (Jesuit writer) |first=James |last=Martin |date=29 August 2007}}

Other authors have made similar references:

Inayat Khan states, "There can be no rebirth without a dark night of the soul, a total annihilation of all that you believed in and thought that you were."{{cite book |last1=Khan |first1=Hazrat Inayat |title=Thinking Like The Universe: The Sufi Path Of Awakening}} Joseph Campbell states "The dark night of the soul comes just before revelation. When everything is lost, and all seems darkness, then comes the new life and all that is needed."{{cite book |last1=Campbell |first1=Joseph |title=Reflections on the Art of Living: A Joseph Campbell Companion}}

Roberto Assagioli states:

Before the full and final victory, however, the soul has to undergo another test: it must pass through the "dark night" which is a new and deeper experience of annihilation, or a crucible in which all the human elements that go to make it up are melted together. But the darkest nights are followed by the most radiant dawns and the soul, perfect at last, enters into complete, constant and inseparable communion with the Spirit, so that – to use the bold statement employed by St John of the Cross – "it seems to be God himself and has the same characteristics as him".{{cite book |last1=Assagioli |first1=Roberto |title=Transpersonal Development |date=2007 |publisher=Inner Way Productions |pages=146–147}}

Other writers have connected the Dark Night of the Soul to the work of Stanislav Grof.{{Cite journal |last=Bache |first=Christopher M. |date=1991-09-01 |title=Mysticism and psychedelics: The case of the dark night |url=https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00986399 |journal=Journal of Religion and Health |language=en |volume=30 |issue=3 |pages=215–236 |doi=10.1007/BF00986399 |issn=1573-6571}}

• Ego death
• Existential crisis
• Loevinger; Loevinger's stages of ego development
• Dabrowski; Theory of positive disintegration
• Kenosis
• Lawrence Kohlberg; Kohlberg's stages of moral development
• Nigredo
• Psychology of religion
• Divinization (Christian)

{{reflist|group=note|refs=

In Mysticism, part II, chapter 9, Underhill quotes John:

"This," says St. John of the Cross again, "is one of the most bitter sufferings of this purgation. The soul is conscious of a profound emptiness in itself, a cruel destitution of the three kinds of goods, natural, temporal, and spiritual, which are ordained for its comfort. It sees itself in the midst of the opposite evils, miserable imperfections, dryness and emptiness of the understanding, and abandonment of the spirit in darkness."

}}

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{{Catholic|wstitle=St. John of the Cross}}

{{refbegin}}

• {{cite book |last =Chong-Beng Gan | first =Peter | year =2015 | title =Dialectics and the Sublime in Underhill's Mysticism | publisher =Springer}}

• {{cite magazine | last =Greene| first =Dana | title=Adhering to God: The Message of Evelyn Underhill for Our Times | magazine =Spirituality Today| date = Spring 1987 | volume =39 | pages =22–38}}

• {{cite book | last =Schneiders | first =Sandra M. |year =2005 | chapter =John of the Cross | editor-last =Jones |editor-first =Lindsay | title =MacMillan Encyclopedia of religion | publisher =MacMillan}}

• {{cite book | last =Underhill | first =Evelyn | date =1999 | title =Mysticism | publisher =Oneworld Publications | isbn =1-85168-196-5}}

{{refend}}

• {{cite book |last=May |first=Gerald G. |year=2004 |title=The Dark Night of the Soul. A Psychiatrist Explores the Connection Between Darkness and Spiritual Growth | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SE8TjqynNAAC&printsec=frontcover | publisher=HarperCollins |location=New York City |isbn=0-060-55423-1 |id=}}
• {{cite book |last=McKee |first=Kaye P. |year=2006 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZVLEAAAACAAJ |title=When God Walks Away. A Companion to the Dark Night of the Soul |publisher=Crossroad Publishing Company | location=New York City|isbn=0-824-52380-6 |id=}}

• [https://ccel.org/ccel/john_cross/dark_night Dark Night of the Soul] at Christian Classics Ethereal Library
• [http://www.gnostic.org/underhill/mysticism_part_2_09_night.html Chapter titled "The Dark Night of the Soul" from Evelyn Underhill's Mysticism] at Gnostic.org.
• [https://prodigalcatholic.com/2019/05/31/summary-of-the-dark-night-of-the-soul-by-st-john-of-the-cross/ Summary of The Dark Night of the Soul by St. John of the Cross]
• {{librivox book | title=The Obscure Night of The Soul| author=Cross}}

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