Living Flame

"O living flame of love
that tenderly wounds my soul
in its deepest center! Since
now you are not oppressive,
now consummate! if it be your will:
tear through the veil of this sweet encounter!

... How gently and lovingly
you wake in my heart,
where in secret you dwell alone;
and in your sweet breathing,
filled with good and glory,
how tenderly you swell my heart with love."

~St. John of the Cross, 'Living Flame of Love' 

Never underestimate the Christian mystics and their pathless path. Christian mysticism combines non-dualism and bhakti, the Zen of the "Via Negativa" with the rapture of union in the Bridal Chamber of the heart.

 Christian mystics called their wayless path, "Via Negativa: the Negative Way." Vedantins called it "Netti Netti: Not This, Not This." Buddhists called it "Sunya: emptiness." Yet in the Christian tradition we also find the nuptial mysticism of the soul's love affair with Christ. The love of Jesus for Mary Magdalene in the Easter garden is a reflection of the love of Krishna for Radha in the garden of Vrindavan. The "Bridal Chamber" was a sacrament referenced in the Gnostic Gospel of Philip, 2nd C., uniting Christ and the soul in the heart. Few traditions so gracefully combine "apophatic mysticism" (literally "without images") and "cataphatic mysticism" ("with images"), the empty mind with the overflowing heart. 

Christian mystics knew how to be Nothing, how to be One, and how to be Two for the sake of love. They knew how to die with Jesus at the center of the cross of paradox, in order to be reborn with each Spirit-Breath of now.