Front matter
The Puritan Practice of Meditation By Dr. Joel R. Beeke This article appears on the site by permission of the author.
The Puritan Practice of Meditation "Meditation applieth, meditation healeth, meditation instructeth." –Ezekiel Culverwell1
Spiritual growth is intended to be part of the Christian life of believers. Peter exhorts believers to "grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ"
(2 Pet. 3:18). The Heidelberg Catechism says that true Christians are members of Christ by faith and partake in His anointing. By Christ's power they are raised up to a new life and have the Holy Spirit given to them as an earnest; by the Spirit's power they "seek the things which are above (Col. 3:1). Spiritual growth is only to be expected, since "it is impossible that those, who are implanted into Christ by a true faith, should not bring forth fruits of thankfulness."2
One hindrance to growth among Christians today is our failure to cultivate spiritual knowledge. We fail to give enough time to prayer and Bible-reading, and we have abandoned the practice of meditation. How tragic that the very word meditation, once regarded as a core discipline of Christianity and "a crucial preparation for and adjunct to the work of prayer," is now associated with unbiblical "New Age" spirituality.
We rightly criticize those who engage in transcendental meditation and other mindrelaxing exercises because these practices are connected with false religions, such as Buddhism and Hinduism, and have nothing to do with Scripture. Such forms of meditation focus on emptying the mind to become detached from the world and to merge with the so-called Cosmic Mind, not to attach to, listen to, and to be active for a living, personal God. Yet, we can learn from such people the importance of quiet reflection and prolonged meditation.3
At one time, the Christian church was deeply engaged in biblical meditation, which involved detachment from sin and attachment to God and one's neighbor. In the Puritan age, numerous ministers preached and wrote on how to meditate.4 In this chapter, we will look at the Puritan art of meditation, considering the nature, duty, manner, subjects, benefits, obstacles, and self-examination of meditation.5 With the Puritans as mentors, perhaps we can recover the biblical practice of meditation for our time.
The Definition, Nature, and Kinds of Meditation The word meditate or muse means to "think upon" or "reflect." "While I was musing the fire burned," David said (Ps. 39:3). It also means "to murmur, to mutter, to make sound with the mouth…. It implies what we express by one talking to himself."6 Such meditation involved reciting to oneself in a low undertone passages of Scripture one had committed to memory.
The Bible often speaks of meditation. "Isaac went out to meditate in the field in the evening," says Genesis 24:63. Despite Joshua's demanding task of supervising the conquest of Canaan, the Lord commanded Joshua to meditate on the book of the law day and night so that he might do all that was written in it (Josh. 1:8). The term meditation, however, occurs more often in the Psalms than in all other books of the Bible put together. Psalm 1 calls that man blessed who delights in the law of the Lord and meditates on it day and night. In Psalm 63:6, David speaks of remembering the Lord on his bed and meditating on Him in the night watches. Psalm 119:148 says, "Mine eyes prevent the night watches, that I might meditate in thy word."7
Thinking, reflecting, or musing presupposes a subject on which to meditate.
Formal meditation implies weighty subjects. For example, philosophers meditate on concepts such as matter and the universe, while theologians reflect on God, the eternal decrees, and the will of man.
The Puritans never tired of saying that biblical meditation involves thinking upon the Triune God and His Word. By anchoring meditation in the living Word, Jesus Christ, and God's written Word, the Bible, the Puritans distanced themselves from the kind of bogus spirituality or mysticism that stresses contemplation at the expense of action, and flights of the imagination at the expense of biblical content.
For the Puritans, meditation exercises both the mind and the heart; he who meditates approaches a subject with his intellect as well as his affections. Thomas
Watson defined meditation as "a holy exercise of the mind whereby we bring the truths of God to remembrance, and do seriously ponder upon them and apply them to ourselves."8
Edmund Calamy wrote, "A true meditation is when a man doth so meditate of Christ as to get his heart inflamed with the love of Christ; so meditate of the Truths of God, as to be transformed into them; and so meditate of sin as to get his heart to hate sin." He went on to say that in order to do good, meditation must enter three doors: the door of understanding, the door of the heart and affections, and the door of practical living. "Thou must so meditate of God as to walk as God walks; and so to meditate of Christ as to prize him, and live in obedience to him."9
Meditation was a daily duty that enhanced every other duty of the Puritan's Christian life. As oil lubricates an engine, so meditation facilitates the diligent use of
means of grace (reading of Scripture, hearing sermons, prayer, and all other ordinances of Christ),10 deepens the marks of grace (repentance, faith, humility), and strengthens one's relationships to others (love to God, to fellow Christians, to one's neighbors at large).
The Puritans wrote of two kinds of meditation: occasional and deliberate. "There is a sudden, short, occasional meditation of Heavenly things; and there is a solemn, set, deliberate meditation," Calamy wrote. Occasional meditation takes what one observes with the senses to "raise up his thoughts to Heavenly meditation." The believer makes use of what he sees with his eyes, or hears with his ears, "as a ladder to climb to Heaven."
That's what David did with the moon and stars in Psalm 8, what Solomon did with the ants in Proverbs 6, and what Christ did with well water in John 4.11 Thomas Manton explained: "God trained up the old church by types and ceremonies, that upon a common object they might ascend to spiritual thoughts; and our Lord in the new testament taught by parables and similitudes taken from ordinary functions and offices among men, that in every trade and calling we might be employed in our worldly business with an heavenly mind, that, whether in the shop, or at the loom, or in the field, we might still think of Christ and heaven."12
Occasional meditation—or "extemporal" meditation13—is relatively easy for a believer because it may be practiced at any time, any place, and among any people. A spiritually minded man can quickly learn how to spiritualize natural things, for his desires run counter to the worldly minded who carnalize even spiritual things.14 As Manton wrote, "A gracious heart is like an alembic [distillation apparatus], it can distil useful meditations out of all things it meeteth with. As it seeth all things in God, so it seeth God in all things."15
Nearly every Puritan book on meditation mentions occasional meditation. Some Puritans, such as William Spurstowe, Thomas Taylor, Edward Bury, and Henry Lukin, wrote entire books of occasional meditations.16
Occasional meditation has its dangers, however. Bishop Joseph Hall warned that when left unbridled, such meditations could easily wander from the Word and become superstitious, as was the case in Roman Catholic spirituality.17 One's imagination must be reined in by sacred Writ.
Puritans differed among themselves in how far to go with such meditation. In The Pilgrim's Progress and Traditions in Puritan Meditation, U. Milo Kaufmann said there were two divergent traditions in Puritan meditation. He said that Joseph Hall, a moderate
Puritan in theological orientation though not in church polity, led the way in developing literature on meditation among the Puritans through his work, Art of Divine Meditation, first published in 1606. Hall reined in imagination in meditation by confining it to the content of the Word. That greatly influenced Isaac Ambrose and Thomas Hooker, who wrote in the 1650s, and John Owen and Edmund Calamy, who wrote a generation later.
Kaufmann asserted that, unlike Roman Catholic writers, most Puritans were "not likely to meditate upon events in the life of Christ but rather upon doctrines or specific propositions of Scripture."18
According to Kaufmann, Richard Sibbes and Richard Baxter broke out of this tradition in recommending meditation on the sacraments and heaven. Sibbes, particularly, asserted that though the soul can receive much hurt from unbridled imagination, it can also "have much good therby." Representing heavenly things in earthly terms, such as presenting the kingdom of heaven in terms of a banquet and union with Christ as a
marriage, offered "a large field for our imagination to walke in. . . with a great deal of spirituall gaine," Sibbes wrote.19 Kaufmann believed that Baxter, in emphasizing imagination by comparing objects of sense with objects of faith, was moved by Sibbes's
Soules Conflict. In turn, John Bunyan was encouraged to write The Pilgrim's Progress, in which he applied his imagination to a wide variety of topics affecting the believer's spiritual pilgrimage.20
Though Kaufmann's assessment has grains of truth, he has too little feeling for the Puritan fear of allowing imagination to have free reign beyond Scripture. The Puritans rightly feared the excesses of Anselm, Ignatius of Loyola, and other Roman Catholics in visualizing gospel stories—particularly the arrest, trial, crucifixion, and resurrection of Christ—to open imagination through the five senses.21 Moreover, Kaufmann's negative assessment of Hall and Ambrose failed to take into account the remarkable freedom that both writers gave to scriptural imagination and use of the senses.22 Hall's Contemplations and Ambrose's Looking Unto Jesus freely indulged in meditation without trespassing the boundaries of Scripture. That balance is critical in Puritan tradition, and as such, the Puritans serve as mentors on how we can use sanctified imagination.23
The most important kind of meditation is daily, deliberate meditation, engaged in at set times. Calamy said deliberate meditation takes place "when a man sets apart… some time, and goes into a private Closet, or a private Walk, and there doth solemnly and deliberately meditate of the things of Heaven." Such deliberation dwells upon God,
Christ, and truth like "the Bee that dwells and abides upon the flower, to suck out all the sweetness." It "is a reflecting act of the soul, whereby the soul is carried back to it self,
and considers all the things that it knows" about the subject, including its "causes, fruites,
[and] properties."24
Thomas White said deliberate meditation draws from four sources: Scripture, practical truths of Christianity, providential occasions (experiences), and sermons.
Sermons are particularly fertile fields for meditation. As White wrote, "It is better to hear one Sermon only and meditate on that, then to hear two Sermons and meditate on neither."25
Some Puritans divided deliberate meditation into two parts: meditation that is direct and focuses on the meditated object, and meditation that is reflective (or "reflexive") and focuses on the person who is meditating. Direct meditation is "an act of the contemplative part of the understanding," whereas reflective meditation is "an act of conscience." Direct meditation enlightens the mind with knowledge, while reflective meditation fills the heart with goodness.
Deliberate meditation can be dogmatic, having the Word as its object, or practical, having our lives as its object.26 Thomas Gouge combined several aspects of deliberate meditation in writing, "A set and deliberate Meditation, is a serious applying of the mind to some spiritual or heavenly subject, discoursing thereof with thy self, to the end thine heart may be warmed, thine affections quickened, and thy resolutions heightned to a greater love of God, hatred of sin, &c."27
Richard Baxter said that "set and solemn" meditation differs from "occasional and cursory" meditation much as set times of prayer differ from spontaneous prayers uttered in the midst of daily business.28 Both kinds of meditation are essential for godliness; they serve both the needs of the head and the heart.29 Without heart application, meditation is
no more than study. As Thomas Watson wrote, "Study is the finding out of a truth, meditation is the spiritual improvement of a truth; the one searcheth for the vein of gold, the other digs out the gold. Study is like a winter sun that hath little warmth and influence: meditation . . . melts the heart when it is frozen, and makes it drop into tears of love."30
The Duty and Necessity of Meditation The Puritans stressed the need for meditation. They said that, first, our God who commands us to meditate on His Word. That should be sufficient reason alone. They cite numerous biblical texts (Deut. 6:7; 32:46; Ps. 19:14; 49:3; 63:3; 94:19; 119:11, 15, 23,
28, 93, 99; 143:5; Is. 1:3; Luke 2:19; 4:44; John 4:24; Eph. 1:18; 1 Tim. 4:13; Heb. 3:1) and examples (Melchizedek, Isaac, Moses, Joshua, David, Mary, Paul, Timothy). When we fail to meditate, we slight God and His Word and reveal that we are not godly (Ps.
1:2).
Second, we should meditate on the Word as a letter God has written to us. "We must not run it over in haste, but meditate upon God's wisdom in inditing, and his love in sending it to us," wrote Thomas Watson.31 Such meditation will kindle our affections and love for God. As David said, " I will lift up my hands also to thy commandments, which I have loved, and I will meditate in thy statutes" (Ps. 119:48).
Third, one cannot be a solid Christian without meditating. As Thomas Manton said, "Faith is lean and ready to starve unless it be fed with continual meditation on the promises; as David saith, Ps. cxix. 92, 'Unless thy law had been my delight, I should then have perished in my affliction.'"32 Watson wrote, "A Christian without meditation is like
a soldier without arms, or a workman without tools. Without meditation the truths of God will not stay with us; the heart is hard, and the memory slippery, and without meditation all is lost."33
Fourth, without meditation, the preached Word will fail to profit us. Reading without meditation is like swallowing "raw and undigested food," wrote Scudder.34
Richard Baxter added, "A man may eat too much but he cannot digest too well."35
Watson wrote, "There is as much difference between the knowledge of a truth, and the meditation of a truth, as there is between the light of a torch, and the light of the sun: set up a lamp or torch in the garden, and it hath no influence. The sun hath a sweet influence, it makes the plants to grow, and the herbs to flourish: so knowledge is but like a torch lighted in the understanding, which hath little or no influence, it makes not a man the better; but meditation is like the shining of the sun, it operates upon the affections, it warms the heart and makes it more holy. Meditation fetcheth life in a truth."36
Fifth, without meditation, our prayers will be less effective. Manton wrote, "Meditation is a middle sort of duty between the word and prayer, and hath respect to both. The word feedeth meditation , and meditation feedeth prayer; we must hear that we be not erroneous, and meditate that we be not barren. These duties must always go hand in hand; meditation must follow hearing and precede prayer."37
Sixth, Christians who fail to meditate are unable to defend the truth. They have no backbone and little self-knowledge. As Manton wrote, "A man that is a stranger to meditation is a stranger to himself."38 "It is meditation that makes a Christian," said
Watson.39 "Thus you see the necessity of meditation," wrote Archbishop James Ussher,
"we must resolve upon the duty, if ever we meane to goe to heaven."40
Finally, it may also be added that such meditation is an essential part of sermon preparation. Without it, sermons will lack depth of understanding, richness of feeling, and clarity of application. Bengel's directive to students of the Greek New Testament captures the essence of such meditation: "Te totam applica and textum; rem totam applica ad te" (Apply your whole self to the text; the whole matter of it, apply to yourself).
The Manner of Meditation For Puritan authors, there were requisites and rules for meditation. Let us consider what they wrote about the frequency and time of meditation, preparation for meditation, and guidelines for meditation.
Frequency and Time First, divine meditation must be frequent—ideally, twice a day, if time and obligations permit; certainly at least once a day. If Joshua, as a busy commander, was ordered by God to meditate on His law day and night, shouldn't we also delight in meditating on God's truth every morning and evening? Generally speaking, the more frequently we meditate on the Triune God and His truth, the more intimately we will know Him.
Meditation will also become easier. 41
Lengthy intervals between meditations will hinder their fruit. As William Bates wrote, "If the bird leaves her nest for a long space, the eggs chill and are not fit for production; but where there is a constant incubation, then they bring forth: so when we
leave religious duties for a long space, our affections chill, and grow cold; and are not fit to produce holiness, and comfort to our souls."42
Second, set a time for meditation and stick to that time, the Puritans advised. That will put brackets around duty and defend you "against many temptations to omission," wrote Baxter.43 Let it be the most "seasonable time" for you, when you are most alert and not stressed by other obligations. Early morning is an excellent time, because your meditations then will set the tone for the remainder of the day (Ex. 23:19; Job 1:5; Ps.
119:147; Prov. 6:22; Mark 1:35). Still, for some, evenings may be more fruitful (Gen.
24:63; Ps. 4:4). The busyness of the day is behind them, and they are ready to rest in "the bosom of God by sweet meditation" (Ps. 16:7).44
Use the Lord's Day for generous doses of meditation time. In their Directory for the Publique Worship of God, the Westminster divines advised "that what time is vacant, between, or after the solemne meeting of the congregation in publique, be spent in reading, meditation, and repetition of sermons."45 Thomas Gouge admonished, "Had you ever tasted of the sweetness of this duty of Divine Meditation, you would finde little time for vain talk, and idle discourses, especially upon the Lords day."46 Baxter asked, "What fitter day to ascend to heaven than that on which our Lord did arise from earth, and fully triumph over death and hell, and take possession of heaven for us?"47
Use special times as well for meditation. According to the Puritans, those include the following: "1. When God doth extraordinarily revive and enable thy spirit. 2. When thou art cast into perplexing troubles of mind, through sufferings, or fear, or care, or temptations. 3. When the messengers of God do summon us to die; when either our grey hairs, or our languishing bodies, or some such-like forerunners of death, do tell us that
our change cannot be far off."48 4. "When the heart is touched at a Sermon or Sacrament, or observing of any judgement or mercy, or act of Gods providence, [for then] it is best striking when the Iron is hot (Ps. 119:23)."49 5. "Before some solemn duties, as before the Lord's supper, and before special times of deep humiliation, or before the Sabbath."50
Third, meditate "ordinarily till thou doest find some sensible benefit conveyed to thy soul." Bates said that meditating is like trying to build a fire from wet wood. Those who persevere will produce a flame. When we begin to meditate, we may first garner only a bit of smoke, then perhaps a few sparks, "but at last there is a flame of holy affections that goes up towards God." Persevere "till the flame doth so ascend," Bates said.51
There will be times when the flame does not ascend. You must not then carry on indefinitely. "Neither yield to laziness, nor occasion spiritual weariness: the devil hath advantage upon you both ways," Manton wrote. "When you torture your spirits after they have been spent, it makes the work of God a bondage."52
Most Puritans did not advise a specific amount of time to be spent on meditation.
However, James Ussher recommended at least one hour per week, and Thomas White suggested, "considering the parts of Meditation are so many, viz. Preparation,
Considerations, Affections, Resolutions, &c. and none of them are to be past slightly over, for Affections are not so quickly raised, nor are we to cease blowing the fire as soon as ever it beginneth to flame, until it be well kindled, half an hour [each day] may be thought to be the least for beginners, and an hour for those that are versed in this duty."53
Preparation