Book Review: Bede Griffiths: Essential Writings
Bede Griffiths
Essential Writings
Orbis
2004
It is fitting that the Essential Writings of Bede Griffiths, sage and prophet of our times, are included in the Modern Spiritual Masters Series of Orbis Books.
The historian Arnold Toynbee spoke to us once saying: “When we look back on this 20th century and ask: what is the greatest event? The answer will not be man to the moon or the civil rights movement; rather, it will be East meeting the West.” In this time of globalization, a prophet and a mystic was sent—Bede Griffiths.
Bede had a new vision of reality: to transcend the cultural limitations of the great religions that he saw had become “fossilized” and to find a wisdom, a philosophy that can reconcile differences and reveal the unity underlying all their diversities. The need is to reclaim the “perennial philosophy,” the eternal wisdom in each religion. Bede was a seeker of unity. His life’s work was that of calling us to see the necessity of the marriage of East and West.
In this selection of Bede’s writings, Thomas Matus has chosen a fine synthesis of Bede’s works. From nine of Bede’s books, Matus gives an insightful sampling of his writings. He also gleaned insights from having spent time at Saccidananda Ashram. He seems to have a real knowledge of Bede as monk, prophet, and man of wisdom.
In his Introduction, Matus gives a biographical sketch of Alan (later, Bede) Griffiths, who became a “universal monk” and who evoked the “wholeness” and “universality” intrinsic to Catholicity in the church of India. Bede often said, “My monastery is the world.” In five chapters, Matus shows the evolution of Bede’s life and vision. Each chapter begins with a commentary.
Chapter 1 is entitled “The Vision of Nature.” Walking in nature and experiencing the hawthorn trees, the sun setting, the lark, Bede was brought in this early phase of his life to a contemplative moment. He expressed this in the line, “I give you the end of a golden string” from Blake’s poem. His poet companions, Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats, took him further into the vision of the universe as sacrament, and he posed the question: Who am I?
Chapter 2, “The Challenge of Hinduism,” recounts Bede’s landing in Bombay, when he went to see the Elephanta Caves. He found, as he looked at the great statue of Shiva graven in stone, a profound spirit of contemplation that has given inner meaning to all Indian life and thought. This led him to the knowledge of the cave of the heart, “garbha griha.” He spoke of his coming to India as a search for “the other half of my soul.” This chapter also discusses and contrasts the Avataras and the notion of incarnation.
In Chapter 3, “Awakening of the Feminine,” Matus details Bede’s affliction with a stroke, and the breakthrough to the feminine it caused in him. Bede speaks of this as “the greatest gift I have ever had in my life.” There came out of this the realization for Bede of God as Mother. Bede now saw, at a deeper level, the male-female dyad, the key to the complementary relationship of peoples, cultures, and religion.
Bede’s search for how the structures of the church must change is explored in Chapter 4, “The New Age.” Bede saw the church in crisis. He questioned: science or wisdom? He subscribed to Gandhi’s idea of ahimsa (nonviolence) that he derived from the example of Christ. Gandhi wrote: “I saw that nations like individuals could only be made through the agony of the cross . . . joy comes not out of the infliction of pain on others but out of pain voluntarily borne by oneself.” From materialism and ecological crisis, Bede expressed the feeling of the end of an age. Will there be catastrophe or renewal?
Chapter 5, “Final Unity,” addresses how Bede, through his spiritual pilgrimage, came to a cosmic vision: universal community capable of embodying universal wisdom and uniting all humanity in one body, one living whole in which “Fullness,” the whole of the Godhead dwells. At the center of all religion is the holy place where encounter with the divine takes place.
The Matus anthology is a gift for those seeking the prophet’s vision of a movement from East-West estrangement, dualism, materialism, and possible destruction, to a view of unity in the cosmos—a birthing of the Cosmic Christ. To have this comprehensive grasp of Bede’s writings from 1954–1994 is a valuable contribution to interreligious dialogue and to one’s own spiritual pilgrimage.
The historian Arnold Toynbee spoke to us once saying: “When we look back on this 20th century and ask: what is the greatest event? The answer will not be man to the moon or the civil rights movement; rather, it will be East meeting the West.” In this time of globalization, a prophet and a mystic was sent—Bede Griffiths.
Bede had a new vision of reality: to transcend the cultural limitations of the great religions that he saw had become “fossilized” and to find a wisdom, a philosophy that can reconcile differences and reveal the unity underlying all their diversities. The need is to reclaim the “perennial philosophy,” the eternal wisdom in each religion. Bede was a seeker of unity. His life’s work was that of calling us to see the necessity of the marriage of East and West.
In this selection of Bede’s writings, Thomas Matus has chosen a fine synthesis of Bede’s works. From nine of Bede’s books, Matus gives an insightful sampling of his writings. He also gleaned insights from having spent time at Saccidananda Ashram. He seems to have a real knowledge of Bede as monk, prophet, and man of wisdom.
In his Introduction, Matus gives a biographical sketch of Alan (later, Bede) Griffiths, who became a “universal monk” and who evoked the “wholeness” and “universality” intrinsic to Catholicity in the church of India. Bede often said, “My monastery is the world.” In five chapters, Matus shows the evolution of Bede’s life and vision. Each chapter begins with a commentary.
Chapter 1 is entitled “The Vision of Nature.” Walking in nature and experiencing the hawthorn trees, the sun setting, the lark, Bede was brought in this early phase of his life to a contemplative moment. He expressed this in the line, “I give you the end of a golden string” from Blake’s poem. His poet companions, Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats, took him further into the vision of the universe as sacrament, and he posed the question: Who am I?
Chapter 2, “The Challenge of Hinduism,” recounts Bede’s landing in Bombay, when he went to see the Elephanta Caves. He found, as he looked at the great statue of Shiva graven in stone, a profound spirit of contemplation that has given inner meaning to all Indian life and thought. This led him to the knowledge of the cave of the heart, “garbha griha.” He spoke of his coming to India as a search for “the other half of my soul.” This chapter also discusses and contrasts the Avataras and the notion of incarnation.
In Chapter 3, “Awakening of the Feminine,” Matus details Bede’s affliction with a stroke, and the breakthrough to the feminine it caused in him. Bede speaks of this as “the greatest gift I have ever had in my life.” There came out of this the realization for Bede of God as Mother. Bede now saw, at a deeper level, the male-female dyad, the key to the complementary relationship of peoples, cultures, and religion.
Bede’s search for how the structures of the church must change is explored in Chapter 4, “The New Age.” Bede saw the church in crisis. He questioned: science or wisdom? He subscribed to Gandhi’s idea of ahimsa (nonviolence) that he derived from the example of Christ. Gandhi wrote: “I saw that nations like individuals could only be made through the agony of the cross . . . joy comes not out of the infliction of pain on others but out of pain voluntarily borne by oneself.” From materialism and ecological crisis, Bede expressed the feeling of the end of an age. Will there be catastrophe or renewal?
Chapter 5, “Final Unity,” addresses how Bede, through his spiritual pilgrimage, came to a cosmic vision: universal community capable of embodying universal wisdom and uniting all humanity in one body, one living whole in which “Fullness,” the whole of the Godhead dwells. At the center of all religion is the holy place where encounter with the divine takes place.
The Matus anthology is a gift for those seeking the prophet’s vision of a movement from East-West estrangement, dualism, materialism, and possible destruction, to a view of unity in the cosmos—a birthing of the Cosmic Christ. To have this comprehensive grasp of Bede’s writings from 1954–1994 is a valuable contribution to interreligious dialogue and to one’s own spiritual pilgrimage.
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Fr. Bede Griffiths, OSB, (1906-1993) was born in England and educated at Oxford, where he converted to Christianity and became a monk. He traveled to India in 1947, where he established the ashram of Shantivanam. An extensive biography can be found at the Bede Griffiths' website.
Fr. Thomas Matus, OSB Cam, is a member of the Camaldolese Hermitage in Big Sur, California, and presently resides at Incarnation Monastery in Berkeley. Before becoming a Benedictine monk he was initiated into Kriya Yoga by disciples of Paramahansa Yogananda. He has dedicated years to the search for analogies of experience between Tantric yogis and Christian mystics. He has traveled widely in India and taught in the Monastic Institute of Sant’Anselmo in Rome.