Beyond words, without fighting words

Words can help us enter prayer. They can also become an attempt to prevent the relationship from escaping our control.

We explain because we fear forgetting. We repeat because we fear that silence will undo what the sentence established. We add qualifications because we fear that an imperfect formulation will break the connection.

These impulses deserve tenderness. Language is one of our ways of caring for what matters. The problem begins when language is asked to keep God available as an object we can summon.

Beyond words means allowing address to continue after explanation has done its work.

It does not mean forcing the inner voice into silence. A person can be full of thought while remaining prayerfully oriented. Another can achieve a quiet mind and remain entirely occupied with possessing that quiet.

The measure proposed here is the direction of the offering, rather than the quantity of mental noise.

Sefer Yetzirah 1:8 counsels restraint of speech and thought and tells the heart that runs to return. Its surrounding discussion also includes inquiry and understanding. The text offers a limit and a return within contemplation, rather than a blanket condemnation of thinking.¹⁷

Take that invitation into a simple exercise. Begin with a sentence of address. Let it finish. During the next few breaths, do not deliberately repeat it. If other words appear, let them be recognized and offered. Remain in the relationship the first sentence expressed.

The interval may feel unfamiliar because nothing is being continuously narrated. Resist the urge to turn unfamiliarity into a problem. You have stepped out of commentary for a moment; you have not necessarily stepped out of prayer.

Sometimes the thought I am beyond words will appear. It is still a thought. Offer it with the same simplicity as any other. No announcement of transcendence is required.

Writing can remain part of your life. So can study, conversation, and theology. After prayer, you may record a helpful insight. The discipline is to stop treating the record as a vault in which the relationship is stored.

A notebook can remember a sentence. It cannot be asked to receive your offering on God’s behalf.

Practice: after reading one paragraph of this book, close it for a minute. Allow the meaning to become orientation without trying to preserve its wording. Later, reopen the book if useful. Returning to words is permitted; dependence on their uninterrupted presence is what you are learning to release.