Our mother hen
He will overshadow you with his shoulders, and under his wings you shall find hope (Ps 90:4). He says this so that you will not think that you can protect yourself. He will protect you and rescue you “from the snare of hunters and from the harsh word.” He will overshadow you with his shoulders–this could be understood either of his back or of his breast…. But because he says, And under his wings you shall find hope, it is clear that he means that the protection of outstretched wings brings you between God’s shoulders so that on both sides God’s wings place you in the middle and you are not afraid that anyone can harm you so long as you do not leave a place where no enemy dares to approach. If a hen protects her chicks under her wings, how much safer will you be beneath God’s wings, away from the devil and his angels, those “powers of the air”(see Eph 6:13) that like hawks circle above to carry off the helpless chick?
And there is reason to compare God’s Wisdom to a hen, for Christ our Lord and Savior himself said that he was like a hen: Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how many times did I wish to gather your children as a hen gathers her chicks, and you were unwilling (Mt 23:37). Jerusalem then was unwilling; let us be willing. Even though she was helpless, she presumed on her own strength; fleeing the wings of the hen, she was carried away by the powers of the air. Let us instead admit our helplessness and flee beneath God’s wings, and he will be for us like a hen protecting her chicks. It is no insult to call him a hen. Look at other birds; many of them hatch their chicks and keep them warm out in the open. None of them is so weakened with her chicks as is the hen. Think of it: we see swallows, sparrows, and storks away from their nests and do not know if they have little ones. But in the case of a hen, we know it by her lowered voice and drooping feathers. She is completely changed by her care of her chicks: because they are weak, she becomes weak. Because we too were weak, God’s Wisdom made herself weak: the Word became flesh and dwelt among us so that we can find hope beneath his wings. (Augustine, Enar. in Ps 90, 6; PL 38, 1152-53)
Let us flee beneath the wings of mother Wisdom, because Wisdom herself became weak for our sakes when the Word became flesh. (Augustine, Enar. in Ps 90-2, 2)
I wonder if these passages could be too easily misunderstood as promoting quietism. Certainly Augustine’s point is “stay close to God, because it’s impossible for you to save yourself.” But the emphasis on weakness could be taken as an invitation to sloth regarding the acquisition of virtues.
A Dominican friend was joking at the beginning of Lent that he wouldn’t want to be too ascetical because he wanted to leave plenty of room for the doctrine of grace!!
I just wanted to say thank you for this wonderful blogging of St. Augustine during Lent. It has been a tremendous gift.
St. Augustine is talking about God as Wisdom here. I wonder about the context — is Augustine referring to the weakness of our intellects in their search for truth, or is he talking about our weakness of will?
Kathy:
If I, or, more importantly, Augustine had given any indication of support for quietism, you might have a point, but we’ve seen enough of his images in the last weeks to know that no one of them pretends to tell the whole story, but each image may yield its own insight. Forgive me for saying it, but you’re being overly protective here: a little clucking?.
Ann: There is no great philosophical or theological context to these remarks, which were suggested as Augustine went through this Psalm verse by verse. But, of course, he asserted both of the weaknesses you mention. I wonder if the appeal to Wisdom here wasn’t suggested by the feminine image of the mother hen, and not because he was thinking of coming to the aid of the intellect in particular.
Fr. Komonchak,
No, I know I’m not the hen. But I do believe there is a strain of quietism in modern preaching. I can think very readily of 3 preachers who regularly (2 of them consistently) preach of the virtue of weakness. What we really need is to hit rock bottom in our quest for self-mastery, and then we will know that we are sinners and desparate sinners and cast ourselves on the Lord.
Then all our problems are solved.
I’m not exaggerating.
Thanks, JAK, And thanks again for all the translations. They’re splendid.
Kathy –
Our problems *all* solved? Hmm. Sounds a bit like being saved once and for all. I agree with you that Jesus message is not a call to weakness — it’s a call to love. But we need help to love.
I agree, the translations are splendid!
Ann, if I take your comment one step further, it seems that quietism is a kind of evangelical Pelagianism. Surrender, and you’re saved. By Jesus, of course.
Augustine must be interpreted. If he were clear we could have skipped the 16th century.
I can still hear clucking. There’s nothing in this passage that suggests quietism; I think you’re importing other concerns. Just enjoy the passage. End of my clucking!
Fr. Komonchak,
I forgive you.
Kathy,
The only Quietists I know anything about are the 17th century French ones whose views about their own form of contemplative prayer were condemned as heretical. One conclusion deriving from their theory was that active lives of charity were inferior to their own. Did they also think that they could pray in their manner without the grace of God?