Commentary on the Odes of Solomon – by Swami Nirmalananda Giri

The Changeless God and Ever-changing Man

     No man O my God changeth Thy Holy Place, nor can he change it and put it in another place.
     Because he hath no power over it, for Thy sanctuary Thou hast designed before Thou didst make other places.
     That which is the elder shall not be altered by those that are younger than Itself; Thou hast given Thy heart O Lord to Thy believers.
      Never wilt Thou fail, nor be without fruits.
      For one hour of Thy faith, is more precious than all days and years.
      For who is there that shall put on Thy grace and be rejected?
      For Thy seal is known, and Thy creatures are known to it.
      And Thy hosts possess it, and the pure archangels are clothed with it.
      Thou hast given us Thy fellowship; it was not that Thou wast in need of us, but that we are in need of Thee.
      Distill Thy dews upon us, and open Thy rich fountains that pour forth to us milk and honey.
      For there is not regret with Thee, that Thou shouldest regret anything which Thou hast promised.
      And the end was revealed before Thee.
      For what Thou gavest Thou gavest freely, so that no longer wilt Thou draw back and take them again.
      For all was revealed before Thee as God, and ordered from the beginning before Thee.
      And Thou O Lord hast made all.
                            
                                          (The Fourth Ode of Solomon)

Man versus God

About 1960 a book of prayers that people really say in their hearts was shown to me by a friend. She particularly liked the very short one that simply said: “Oh, God, won’t You stop this awful experiment of trying to make men like Christ?” These words embody the age-old struggle between God and man: the struggle of God to make man into god and the struggle of man to make God into man–or at least to make Him give up and accept man as man and nothing more. In most instances the concept of divine incarnation or avatara is little more than man’s pretence that God has become human and thereby somehow ratified and validated humanity and all its conditions and weaknesses. This is why the religions that worship supposed divine incarnations are such a mess, sinkholes of perverted intellect and emotion masquerading as “devotion” and “dedication” and “service” to the liberated Sons of God whose example and wisdom are completely shoved into the background as the worship, adoration, and theologizing goes on in a frenzy.

True devotion is part of man’s ascent to union with God, but the subversion of piety that is commonly passed off as devotion drags man into further bondage and ignorance and even canonizes and deifies it. That is why in the mythologies of all religions the “gods” are utterly enslaved to anger, greed, jealousy, lust, and the hunger for power and adulation. The holy scriptures abound in accounts of most unholy deities–accounts that are claimed to be “profoundly symbolic” and “misunderstood” when people of good sense question or object to them. Indian religion, being the most ancient religion of the world and therefore having had countless thousands of years to develop this aberration, is the prime offender. Mythologies and teachings of “gods” that can only be based in psychosis–very likely drug-induced–are bullyingly promoted and defended Those who question this madness are denounced as atheists, blasphemers, ignoramuses, and subversives. Thinking seems to be the prime offence in nearly all religion.

Looking back to India, however, we also see the freedom from this corruption in relation to great masters of wisdom such as Shankara, Ramanuja, and Madhavacharya. Since they were not made into deities or saviors, their teachings are of paramount importance, and their personalities are even less than secondary. No one plays the game of “taking refuge” in these great teachers, of “trusting” in them, “surrendering” to them or hoping to die and go to a heaven of which they are the presiding deity. Anyone who spoke such garbage would be laughed at and rightly considered a fool and a fake. Either a person studies, accepts, and follows their teachings or he does not. It is as simple and direct as that. In contrast, look at the “devotees” of Krishna or other avatars or the various deities who have supposedly given spiritual instruction (though most of “the gods” have no teachings whatsoever, just promises of material gain for their flatterers). Their words are flagrantly abrogated while temples, worship, and festivals dedicated to them mushroom. “Ignore the message and adore the Messenger” is the slogan. “Theism” in this form is the ego-produced curse that blights the world. And what to say of the holy wars in which such “theists” engage? Religion is usually a cloak under which the basest of human passions proliferate in devotional exuberance.

It cannot be done

Yet, however much this degradation goes on and prevails, it ultimately does not work: human beings cannot debase God. The moment good sense and honesty arises in the questing mind the truth is seen: “No man O my God changeth Thy Holy Place, nor can he change it and put it in another place.” The Holy cannot be made unholy, the True cannot be made false, the Infinite cannot be made finite, the Unchanging cannot be made changeable, the Divine cannot be made human. “Because he hath no power over it, for Thy sanctuary Thou hast designed before Thou didst make other places.” Although discouraged by the old saying, it is possible to teach your grandmother to suck eggs–but not your God. Do not try. “That which is the elder shall not be altered by those that are younger than Itself.”

What can be done

“Thou hast given Thy heart O Lord to Thy believers.” The unholy can be made holy, the ignorant can be made wise, the finite can be elevated to infinity, the changeable can be made unchanging, the human can be made divine. For all that is done by God. How? By giving His “heart,” His Consciousness, to those who seek Him. It is not God’s grace, love, kindness, or mercy we need. We need God. We are not God’s pets to be fussed over, provided for, groomed and fed, to be called “Daddy’s little darling” and such tripe. We need to merge with Divinity and become divine. God’s “gifts” are trash compared with this, barriers between us and Him.

And on it goes…

Another shameless ploy of the ego is to whine about how sinful and weak it is, just a poor mortal in fear of the awesome judgment of the Holy God Who has somehow become the offender in all this, the cause of all mankind’s ills. When followed out to its logical and insane conclusion such an attitude makes God the Sole Sinner. But how devoted the sinner can be! How assiduous in worship and praise of such a merciful God that expects nothing but helplessness and sin from His devotee. Poor little doggie, Daddy loves you anyhow.

This is how shameless humans can be. “Since we are so weak and disordered, nothing of any worth can be expected from us. We just love and are loved in return.” O, how sweet. Tears come to the eyes. But the heart stays hard. “Yes, it is true: Sally is a bitch. But think what she would be without Christ?” I have heard that a lot–have you? But the author of this Ode–very likely Jesus Himself–continues: “Never wilt Thou fail, nor be without fruits.” So if God is really involved in a person’s spiritual life, it will not fail or be without positive effect. Only when God has been excluded will there be the failure and fruitlessness so reveled in by the trustful “devotee.” That is why Jesus said: “By their fruits ye shall know them.”1

Time of transformation

“For one hour of Thy faith, is more precious than all days and years. For who is there that shall put on Thy grace and be rejected?”

Seeds thousands of years old were found in an Egyptian tomb. When planted they sprouted and grew into healthy plants. The darkness that prevailed for ages was dispelled in a moment at the entry of light. It is the presence of God that gives light and life–not the general all-pervading presence, but the Living Presence that is encountered in the depths of our being by those who turn inward and persevere. When the seed in the ground is moistened by rain and warmed by sunlight, life stirs within it and upward growth out of darkness and into the light begins. In the same way those who continually place themselves in the active presence of God through invocation of the Divine Name and meditation will be silently and subtly changed. Because of misunderstanding and outright false information most people think that meditation is supposed to be some kind of spectacular display of lights, sounds, and sensations. When this does not take place they find fault with their practice. But actually we are like the seed in the ground. We need only sit in the right conditions and growth will occur spontaneously. Our task is to provide the right conditions, the right inner environment, and then sit and wait. That is all.2 That is plenty, as those who do it know full well. “But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.”3

Part of the idea of this Ode is that when we put ourselves in the Presence our spiritual unfoldment is inevitable. We need only take thought for how to ever be in the Presence and how to so order our life that nothing can prevent our spontaneous transformation. “Can a man take fire in his bosom, and his clothes not be burned?”4 asked Solomon regarding this. God is like King Midas–whatever He touches turns divine. We cannot sit in water without being wetted, we cannot sit in the air without being dried, and we cannot sit in the fire without being burned. In the same way we cannot “sit” in God without being deified.

Shaped by God

“For Thy seal is known, and Thy creatures are known to it.”

A master sculptor takes wax, wood, stone, or clay and shapes it into the form that exists within his mind. So God by His acting Presence shapes us into His “form.” “Seal” does not mean closing something like an envelope, but seal in the sense of a soft substance being impressed by a seal and make to take on a distinctive shape. The seal of God is that which causes us to recover our original form–and more. And this is accomplished by His being near us, by touching us.

“And Thy hosts possess it, and the pure archangels are clothed with it.
“Thou hast given us Thy fellowship; it was not that Thou wast in need of us, but that we are in need of Thee.
“Distill Thy dews upon us, and open Thy rich fountains that pour forth to us milk and honey.
“For there is not regret with Thee, that Thou shouldest regret anything which Thou hast promised.
“And the end was revealed before Thee.”

This last statement tells us why God has so much care for us: He sees the final result, the attainment, the perfect state, that shall in time be ours eternally. And He acts on that, whereas we react only to the brief moment in which we erroneously think we are caught. Erroneous religion attributes the same error to God and proclaims that He shall react to our sins, our weakness, and our ignorance rather than to our ultimate divinity–and we are to fear and try to avoid this reaction. But the truth is otherwise, which is why Saint Paul, a former persecutor and killer of Christians, could say: “Forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.”5 Hence the odist says in conclusion:

“For what Thou gavest Thou gavest freely, so that no longer wilt Thou draw back and take them again.
“For all was revealed before Thee as God, and ordered from the beginning before Thee.
“And Thou O Lord hast made all.”
“Cast not away therefore your confidence, which hath great recompence of reward.”6

Therefore we need neither doubt nor fear.More on the Odes of Solomon:

Odes of Solomon – text

Commentary on the Odes of Solomon:
1. The Crown of Life
2. Clothed in Love
3. The Changeless God and Ever-changing Man
4. Love, Hope, and Joy
5. Avoiding Evil
6. The Song of the Holy Spirit
7. Rejoice in the Lord!
8. The Meeting of the Two

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1) Matthew 7:20 [Go back]

2) “In your patience possess ye your souls” (Luke 21:19). “Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning; And ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their lord, when he will return from the wedding; that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open unto him immediately.” (Luke 12:35,36) [Go back]

3) II Corinthians 3:18 [Go back]

4) Proverbs 6:27 [Go back]

5) Philippians 3:13,14 [Go back]

6) Hebrews 10:35 [Go back]