The Gentlest Name

“And she shall bring forth a son, and you shall call his name Jesus.” ~Mat 1:21

As we explore the gentle power of the Name, let us read this verse of scripture, not as an event in historical time, but an event deep in our solar plexus, in eternity. The name of the Friend is a flame in the heart.

This practice of meditation is ancient, coming down to us from the early Desert Fathers of the 2^nd Century CE. Let Jesus be your breath. I will just share my experience of the prayer; you may enjoy your own.  

When I feel this flame inside, I don’t need to "believe,” I just feel the warmth. I get lost in the wilderness of the heart, where love can find me.

The name is a lantern in the forest. I don't know where the path might lead, but I can step into the next small pool of light. This is enough, this is Presence.

The name of Jesus is so subtle, yet substantial, that its essence outshines all other elements. For in the realm of essences, what is gentlest permeates earth, water, wind and fire.

I require no theology “about” the Friend, only his friendship. To breathe his name does not mean clinging to a concept in my intellect; for a concept is an idol of thought, and idols carved from thought are even heavier than idols of silver or gold. 

Therefore I do not think about the name of the Friend, I breathe its energy, and let the Holy Spirit have her way with me. I say “her” way, for the Holy Spirit is the feminine power of God, and the very breath of Jesus. She flows from my sacrum to my belly, to my rib cage and throat, to the pineal gland and fontanelle. She burst from my crown into the Milky Way. She is the very axis of my body, connecting earth and sky. She is a tower of hyssop and myrrh. When I prayer, there is only one commandment: Allow. She undulates and spirals upward, lighting the tree of my spine with Christic fire. 

The glow in my heart pervades the galaxies. The name of the Friend may be but a tremor of un-created silence, blossoming from the furrow beneath my breastbone. Yet its ripples flow into the world around me, the city, the forests and meadows, rivers and hills, filling the empyrean. How can this faint and mysterious sound embrace the whole cosmos so tenderly, so intimately? Because the breath of the Friend anoints us not from above, but from within, pouring out from the center of the creature, and that center is the source of creation.

Let me not ascend into "higher" realms, but fall inward, sinking through my terrestrial core, into the empty grail, this earthen vessel of beaten blood, the heart. Here I enter the portal of an infinitesimal Ayin Soph, a dark Bindhu smaller than a mustard seed. In Jewish mystical tradition, the Ayin Soph Or is the dimensionless point at the core of our Being. Ayin means "nothing." Soph means "point." Or is light. This is the point of nothingness from which the light of the universe is born. 

The same teaching is given in the Yogic scripture, Vijnana Bhairava. It says that, "at the point between the outbreath and inbreath is a space which seems to be nothing, yet from there the divine Mother creates all the worlds." As my mind surrenders its doubting, its questioning, its struggle to "know," and I fall into the heart's core, this tiny dot expands into eternity. For this tiny point contains all creatures in the radiance of their original Being. 

Here, in the starry vastness of my chest, I meet you, friend. For you are made of my fire, and I am made of yours. We encounter each other in this un-created flame, tasting intimate companioniship in the unity of the Godhead. This is how the name of the Friend dissolves both duality and non-duality.

Such oneness may be likened to a gemstone of countless sparkling prisms and facets. All who choose the way of love may gather in this bejeweled kingdom, to celebrate the perpetual feast of the birth of God. Of course, I speak not merely of an infant born at a moment of history in ancient Palestine. I speak of the Christ-all sun of the Almighty, birthed ceaselessly in the center of the soul, where this ineffably brilliant jewel emprisms eight billion souls, and many more, as facets of its singularity.

If you would enter into a dust mote, you would find that it contains this jewel in each of its atoms. Every photon of light, every neutrino, every quark and spark of matter, is this very jewel, the gem-like fullness of Christ. Yes, every dust mote is holy, never not redeemed. Your body is holy, and never not redeemed. And you may give this mystical diamond any name you please, but the name I cherish is Jesus.

Painting: Angel Gabriel from Simone Martini's Annunciation