Gate 191: מצ — SILENCE

מצ

Pillar 7: THE RETURN

[191:1] "Be still, and know that I am God."

[191:2] --- Psalm 46:10

[191:3] "But the LORD is in his holy temple:

[191:4] let all the earth keep silence before him."

[191:5] --- Habakkuk 2:20

[191:6] "Silence is the language God speaks,

[191:7] and everything else is a bad translation."

[191:8] --- Thomas Keating

[191:9] [191:1] Silence is the womb of the Word and the Word's

final home.

[191:10] [191:2] All sound arises from silence and returns to

silence. Between words, silence. Beneath words, silence. Beyond words,

silence. Language floats on an ocean of silence; music is patterns in

silence; thought is ripples on a still mind. Silence is not absence but

presence---the presence from which presence comes.

[191:11] [191:3] "Be still, and know." The knowing that arises

from stillness is different from knowing that arises from thought.

Conceptual knowing grasps, labels, categorizes. Silent knowing receives,

opens, allows. "Be still" is not merely a posture but a mode of

being---the mind resting, the heart open, the soul receptive.

[191:12] [191:4] "Let all the earth keep silence before him."

In the presence of the Holy, the appropriate response is silence. Not

because speech is forbidden but because speech is inadequate. Before the

ineffable, words fail; what remains is the silence that honors what

cannot be said.

[191:13] [FIGURE 191.1: A vast empty temple hall---no statues, no

decorations, only space and light and stillness. Caption: "Silence: the

temple that contains all temples."] [191:5] "Silence is the

language God speaks." Keating's teaching inverts expectation. We seek

God in words---scripture, theology, prayer. But God's native tongue is

silence, and all our words about God are translations---useful,

necessary, but approximate. To hear God directly, be silent.

[191:14] [191:6] There are layers of silence. First, outer

silence: cessation of speech, reduction of noise, retreat from

stimulation. Second, inner silence: quieting the mental chatter,

stilling the internal monologue. Third, deep silence: the silence

beneath silence, where even the sense of being silent disappears into

pure presence.

[191:15] [191:7] Silence is not easy. The mind resists; it

generates thoughts as a generator generates power---automatically,

continuously. To enter silence requires practice---meditation,

contemplation, deliberate withdrawal from the stream of stimulation. The

noise within is harder to quiet than the noise without.

[191:16] [191:8] From silence, true speech arises. The prophet

speaks from the silence of the desert; the poet speaks from the silence

of listening; the teacher speaks from the silence of understanding.

Words born of silence carry power; words born of noise are noise

themselves.

[191:17] [191:9] Silence is the ground of all the gates. Beneath

every concept this book presents, beneath every distinction it draws,

lies the silence from which concepts arise. The gates are words; behind

the words is wordlessness. To read the book rightly, read into the

silence between the lines.

[191:18] [191:10] Be silent. Not always---speech has its place,

noise has its function---but often enough to remember what lies beneath.

In silence, you discover you are not the noise. In silence, the Witness

(Gate 53) is most clearly known. In silence, God speaks. Be still. And

know.

[191:19] See Also: • Gate 9: אי (Ee, "Island") --- The Gate of

Absolute Rest (stillness beneath silence) • Gate 12: אמ (Em, "Mother")

--- The Gate of the Unnamed Mother (what silence protects) • Gate 152:

טפ (Taph, "Children") --- The Gate of Meditation (practicing silence)

• Gate 231: שת --- The Gate of Foundation (silence as foundation) End of

Gates 189-191 Batch 34 Complete --- Pillar VII: The Return (Continued)

LIBER TIGRIS Gates 192-194