Of Blind Obedience

OUR holy Father Ignatius used to say that, as in the Church Militant God our Lord has opened two roads for men to be able to attain to salvation, the one common, which is the observance of the commandments; the other which adds the evangelical counsels, proper to religious, so in religion itself there are two sorts of obedience, the one imperfect and common, the other perfect and complete, in which is displayed the power of obedience and the perfect virtue of a religious man. Imperfect obedience, he said, has eyes, but to its own hurt; perfect obedience is blind, but in that blindness wisdom lies. The one forms its own judgment on what is commanded; the other does not. The former inclines more to one side than to the other; the latter neither to one side nor the other—it is always level, like the beam of a balance, equally disposed and prepared for all orders to be given. The former obedience obeys with the hand, and resists with the heart, and so deserves not the name of obedience; the latter does what is ordered, and subjects its judgment and will to the will and judgment of the superior, taking for granted all that is ordained by superiors without seeking reasons why it should obey, nor acting on the reasons that occur to that effect, but obeying rather on this sole consideration that such is obedience. This is blind obedience, so much practised and commended by the saints and masters of spiritual life. It is not called blind in the sense that we are to obey in anything and everything commanded us, sin or no sin, which would be a serious error—and so is expressly declared by our Father in his Constitutions—but it is called blind because in all things in which there is seen no sin we are to obey simply and flatly, without inquiring or seeking reasons for the command, presupposing that what is ordered is holy and according to the divine will, and being satisfied with this reason alone, that such is obedience and so the superior commands.

So Cassian calls this ‘obedience without discussion and without examination,” because you are not to discuss, or ask questions, or want to know the reason why, but do simply what you are told. St. John Climacus says: ‘‘Obedience is action without examination and without discussion, a voluntary death, a life without curiosity, a resignation of one’s own will and discretion, yet not without a high measure of discretion.” St. Basil, commenting on Christ our Redeemer’s commendation to St. Peter, and in him to all superiors, Feed my sheep, says that, as sheep obey their shepherd and go the way that he wishes, so the religious must obey his superior and go the way he wishes, with much plainness and simplicity, like a good sheep, without inquiring into or scrutinizing the order. St. Bernard says: “Perfect obedience, especially in a beginner, is void of discernment”—Perfecta obedientia est, maxime in incipiente, indiscreta. ‘Do you know,” he says, “what I call ‘void of discernment’? On your part it should be void of discernment. That is, you should not seek to discern or examine the reason why and wherefore the command is given; shut your eyes, and obey with humility and confidence, without further concern as to why you are ordered to do it. A thing for which our first parents paid heavily was their seeking to investigate and examine the motive of the command laid upon them. By that avenue the devil entered in and overthrew them; that was the beginning of all their woe and ours. He said to them: Why hath God bidden you not to eat of all the trees in paradise? Eve replied: Lest perchance we die (Gen. iii. 1, 4). God had said definitely that by eating of that tree they would die. In whatever day thou shalt eat thereof thou shalt die; and Eve throws doubt upon it, thinking that God’s sentence would prove not to be absolute, but only a threat, thus manifestly laying herself open to be deceived, as indeed she was. The devil said to her: “Go to, you shall not die; but rather, if you eat of this tree, you shall be as gods, knowing good and evil; that is why God has commanded you not to eat of it, that you might not come to know as much as He knows.” Eve let herself be carried away with the desire to mount up and be more than she was, so she ate and made Adam eat. They set about inquiring and examining into the reason of that command, and thereby they came to eat and disobey, and be cast out of Paradise. They died on the spot a spiritual death because they sinned mortally, and a bodily death afterwards. And because the devil succeeded so well here, and threw such a good throw, he assails us oftentimes in the same way. And of this the Apostle St. Paul warns us beforehand, saying: J fear lest the old serpent may deceive you, as he deceived Eve, and make you fall from your holy simplicity (II Cor. xi. 3). Beware of that serpent; take him not by the head, for he will bite you. Take hold of the thing commanded you by the first grip you can get of it, executing it without inquiry or examination as to the why and wherefore, and in this way obedience will be to you the rule and standard of what you have to do.

Especially at the beginning, says St. Bernard, it is very important to accustom oneself to obey in this manner, blindly and without any questioning; because “it is impossible, morally speaking, for him to stay in religion who from the outset puts up for being very wide-awake and knowing the reason of everything”—Novitium prudentem, incipientem sapientem, in cella diu posse consistere, in congregatione durare, impossibile est. Then what is one to do? How is one to behave? You have to make yourself a fool and a stupid to be wise. Stultus fiat ut sit sapiens (I Cor. iii. 18). “This should be all your discernment, in matters of obedience to have no discernment nor judgment; for this discerning and looking at reasons, why and wherefore, is the office of the superior, not of the good subject; his it is to embrace with much simplicity, humility, and confidence whatever the superior ordains. Discretion should be in the superior, execution in the subject”—Et haec omnis sit eius discretio, ut in hoc nulla sit ei discretio; et haec omnis sapientia eius sit, ut in hac parte nulla ei sit. Discretio superioris est, subditorum est obedire (St. Bernard).

The glorious Apostle St. Paul makes a good reflection to this effect on the blind obedience of the patriarch Abraham in sacrificing his son Isaac (Rom. iv. 18-22). God had promised him to multiply his generation as the stars of heaven and as the sands on the seashore, and to make him father of many nations (Gen. xv. 4; xvii. 4); and he had only this son Isaac in whom this promise could be accomplished; nor had he any hope of more sons, because he was old and his wife also; and even if he had, it was on this same Isaac that God had made the promise: In Isaac shall thy seed be called (Gen. xxi. 12). None the less, God bade him sacrifice this only, this so cherished, son Isaac. He hesitated not over the obedience, and as little did he hesitate in his faith of the fulfilment of the promise that God had made him; but in blind obedience he started to put God’s command in execution, and had already lifted up his knife to cut Isaac’s throat. Against natural hope he kept his hope that he could be father of many nations (Rom. iv. 18). Supernatural hope overcame natural distrust, arising from what his eyes saw; he saw that by sacrificing him he was left without a son, and, nevertheless, he doubted not of the promise of God, but remained in full assurance that it must be accomplished either by raising his son from the dead afterwards, or in some other way that he did not understand or know. This obedience pleased God so much that He made on the spot the promise that Christ should be born of him, and in that way his generation should be multiplied as the stars of heaven. “By Myself have I sworn that because thou hast done this deed, and for love of Me hast not spared thine only son, I will bless thee and multiply thy posterity as the stars of heaven and as the sands that are on the seashore; thy posterity shall hold the gates of their enemies, and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because thou hast obeyed My voice” (Gen. xxii. 16-18). St. Jerome says: “See how pleasing to God was Abraham’s blind obedience, since He gives it such a reward and recompense. For one son that he was ready to sacrifice to God, God bade him count the stars of heaven; and so He said that He would multiply his posterity’— Cum unico filio non parcit in terris, stellas pro filiis enumerare iubetur in coelis. Hence those ancient Fathers came to set so much value on blind obedience, and so much to practise it and exercise others in it. We have books full of instances of this, many of them confirmed by miracles, to give us to understand how pleasing to God this manner of obedience is.

Our Father, following this common doctrine of the saints, illustrates it by two very proper and profitable comparisons. “Let everyone,” he says, “of those who live under obedience make up his mind that he is to let himself be carried and ruled by Divine Providence through his superior as though he were a dead body, which lets itself be carried where you will and treated as you like.” St. Francis used to use this comparison, and repeated it many times. We are dead to the world and to the things of the world (Col. iii. 3). Being a religious means being dead to the world; and, therefore, they call entry into religion “a civil death,” since we are thereby made as dead men. The mark of a man’s being dead is his not seeing, not answering, not feeling, not complaining; we, then, have no eyes to see, no opinion to pass upon what belongs to the superior; we have no “answering back,’ no replies to make upon what obedience enjoins; we do not complain, we do not resent our being given orders that are not to our taste. For the dead body, the worst that the house affords is sought out and brought, the oldest linen to clothe and lay it out; so the religious should seek the oldest and most cast-away clothing. Let each one persuade himself that the worst things in the house will be given him in point of dress, food and lodging, and everything else; and if he does not accept this, but resents it, he is not dead nor mortified.

Our Father further says that we should let ourselves be carried and guided by Divine Providence by means of the superior like the staff or stick of an old man, that serves him who holds it in his hand wherever and for whatsoever purpose he wills to make use of it. As the stick goes where it is taken, and settles down where they put it, and has no movement of its own, but only that which the user of it gives it, so the religious should have no “proper motion” of his own, but let himself be guided and governed by his superior. Where they carry him, there he should go; where they set him down, there he should halt, now in the mud, now on the dry ground, now on high, now in a lowly place, without any resistance or contradiction whatever. If the stick that should be to you an aid and comfort in walking should resist you, and refuse to set itself down where you wanted to put it, but chose some other situation, it would be a nuisance and an obstacle instead of an aid, and you would fling it away. In like manner, when the superior wishes to make use of you and put you in such a place, in such an office and occupation, if you resist the superior’s hand and set up a movement contrary to his in deed, will, or judgment, then instead of helping you will be in the way. You will be a burden and afford your superiors matter of reflection; they will want to get rid of you, and throw you over and discharge you somewhere else; and so they will go playing battledore and shuttlecock with you, from house to house, because you are not a good staff, and they cannot make use and avail themselves of you as they wish. A staff used for sport and recreation is a thing that the owner can take in hand, do with it what he likes, and play with it as he wills. Such should be the religious. It should be a pleasure to take you in hand and command you, and for the superior to do with you what he likes and glory with the centurion: J have under me soldiers; and I say to this man, Go, and he goeth; and to that other, Come, and he cometh; and to another, Do this, and he doth it (Matt. viii. 9).

St. Basil brings another good comparison to this purpose. As a workman employed on a building or any other construction uses his tools at his will, nor ever was there tool that did not readily obey him, to serve him as he wished, so the religious must aim at being a useful instrument in his order, that the superior may make use of him as he thinks fit for the spiritual building, without his offering any sort of resistance to the use they wish to put him to. Further, as the tool does not choose the work for which it is to serve and be useful, so neither must the religious choose, but leave all to the will and judgment of the workman, that is, his superior. Further still, to go on with the comparison, as the tool does not stir in the absence of the workman, nor has any proper motion of its own, but only that which he communicates to it, so the religious must not take in hand nor do any business but by the judgment and order of his superior. Not even in the least things must the religious be his own master, not for an instant—ne ad punctum quidem temporis; but always and in all things he must be moved and guided by the superior. This is the form and style of obedience that we have to keep to in religion.

I remember what a very grave father [Anthony Araoz] used to say—and he had been a long time superior in the Society—that he had spent fifteen years in it, and had never found it necessary to give a reason for any order of obedience. He thought it an insult to the subject to give a reason for anything commanded him. They all lived in such simplicity and abandonment of self that no one set himself to argue about the things that the superior ordered; but as soon as they knew this, “It is an order of obedience,” they submitted their judgment and concluded at once: “It is good, it is the better course; he will know the reason why.” We should try to carry out this principle; and the senior men amongst us should be foremost and conspicuous in doing so, and not think that they have more license than others to criticize and examine the obediences given and the things ordained by superiors. We read of our blessed Father Ignatius that, when he was General of the Society, he said time after time that, if the pope ordered him to start from the port of Ostia, which is near Rome, going on board the first vessel he found, though it were without mast, without rudder, without sail, without oars, and without other things necessary for navigation or sustenance, and to traverse the sea, he would do so and obey, not only in peace, but in contentment and joy of heart. And when a nobleman, hearing this, wondered and said: “And what prudence would there be in that?” he replied: “Prudence, sir, must not be asked so much of him who obeys and executes as of him who commands and ordains.”