Salesian Literature

Chapter 12:  The soul’s two parts are made up of four divisions of the human reason

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Solomon’s temple possessed three courts.  The first was for Gentiles, for strangers bent on turning towards God in prayer, who came to worship in Jerusalem.  The second was for the Israelites, both men and women; Solomon was not responsible for the separation of the sexes.  The third was for the priests and the Levites.  Last of all, beyond these, was the sanctuary, or inner shrine, which the high priest alone could enter once each year (cf. Heb. 9:7).

 

The human reason – or rather, the human soul in so far as it is rational – is truly the temple of almighty God, where he is chiefly fain to dwell.  “Search I made for you around me.” Said St. Augustine[1], “but failed to find you; within me, all the time, your dwelling-place.”  This mystic temple also boasts three courts – the three distinct grades of reasoning.  In the first, our reasoning is based on sense data; in the second, it is based on human wisdom; in the third, it is based on data supplied by the truths of faith.  Lastly, in addition to all that, it has an apex, the highest point in the spiritual faculty of reason.  No light of human reasoning functions there; the mind simply knows, the will simply acts, forcing the soul to acknowledge and submit to the truth of God, and to his will.

 

The sanctuary, the temple’s inner shrine, is an obvious symbol of this apex, this highest point of the soul.  The temple sanctuary contained the ark that bore witness to God’s covenant.  In the ark were the two stone tablets of the law; also in the ark, or nearby, lay the manna in its golden jar, together with Aaron’s staff which sprouted flowers and fruit in a single night (cf. Heb. 9:4).

 

In the highest point of the soul we have: the light of faith – symbolized by the urn of hidden manna – through which we assent to the truth of mysteries we do not understand; the value of hope – symbolized by Aaron’s flowering fertile rod – through which we consent to the promises of rewards we cannot see; the delicate charm of gracious charity – symbolized by the commandments of God which it comprises – through which we consent to spiritual union with God, a union of which we are scarcely conscious.  For although faith, hope and charity lavish their heavenly impulses on practically all the soul’s faculties, reasonable as well as sensitive, although they bring those faculties to submit to the rightful authority of the theological virtues – yet their special domain, where clearly these virtues naturally belong, is the soul’s highest point.

 

So you see, Theotimus, there are two divisions in the higher part of the human reason. In one of these we reason according to data supplied by faith, by supernatural knowledge; in the other we simply give the assent of faith, hope and charity.

 

St. Paul felt his soul torn between two longings: he wanted to have done with the body, so as to go to heaven, to be with Christ; he also wanted to wait in the body, to remain on earth, to further the conversion of souls (cf. Phil 1:23,24).  Each of these desires undoubtedly belonged to the higher part of his soul – charity, the source of both!  Yet his determination to observe the second of these alternatives was not the outcome of reasoning, but of a simple sight, a simple sense of his Master’s will.  To that will only the apex of this great servant’s soul assented – overruling all the conclusions arrived at by reasoning.

 

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[1]  Confessions, 10. 27.

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