sistineGod

Yesterday R.S. Thomas was searching for God - in a church.

And I commented that he was looking in the wrong place.

In today's poem he suggests a different approach.


VIA NEGATIVA

Why no! I never thought other than
That God is that great absence
In our lives, the empty silence
Within, the place where we go
Seeking, not in hope to
Arrive or find. He keeps the interstices
In our knowledge, the darkness
Between stars. His are the echoes
We follow, the footprints he has just
Left. We put our hands in
His side hoping to find
It warm. We look at people
And places as though he had looked
At them, too; but miss the reflection.

R.S. Thomas

Thomas frequently writes of God in terms of paradox… He is present in absence, knowable only in hiddenness… a God you hear in silence. He is an echo, a shadow, a hazy reflection for whom we wait and ache and search and hope. He is the God of mystery, a God about whom there are far more questions than answers.

Via Negativa (Latin for "Negative Way") is a theology that attempts to describe God by negation, to speak of God only in terms of what may not be said about God.

In brief, the attempt is to gain and express knowledge of God by describing what God is not, rather than by describing what God is.

Although Via Negativa is often associated with Christianity, it has also appeared in other religions. Names given to it include 'neti neti' in Hinduism, 'ein-sof' in Judaism and 'bila faifa' in Islam.