Why not think of God as the one who is coming, who is moving toward us from all eternity, the Future One, culminating fruit of the tree whose leaves we are? What stops you from projecting his birth on times to come and living your life as a painful and beautiful day in the history of an immense pregnancy? Do you not see how all that is happening is ever again a new beginning? And could it not be His Beginning, for to commence is ever in itself a beautiful thing. If he is to be fulfillment, then all that is lesser must precede him, so that he can fashion himself from out of the greatest abundance. Must he not be last, in order to include everything within himself? And what meaning would be ours, if he, for whom we yearn, had already existed?
Rome, December 23, 1903
Letters to a Young Poet
Rilke's concept of God as the one who is coming, being born, and my own life as a painful and beautiful day in the history of an immense pregnancy . . . resonates with my own desire to create heaven on earth. To think of our creating God, from the divine within us, feels even more powerful after encountering his ideas of it.
ReplyDeleteFirst, I love the Cezanne painting. As a painter, I can tell you that very few artists know how use green well; Cezanne did. As for the excerpt for Rilke, I like the the idea that we are evolving toward something divine that is yet to be born. This reminds me of Tielhard de Chardin's belief that mankind evolves spiritually just as it evolves biologically. Rilke's message here is hopeful. In a world that often seems in decline, both spiritually and culturally, it's nice to ponder the thought that things are unfolding for the better over the long run.
ReplyDeleteTo read this while acknowledging all the violence and pain and suffering in our world today is to move toward hope as an act of prayer.
ReplyDeleteI am loving the Cezanne paintings. One of my favorite Impressionists.
ReplyDelete