Lectio Divina

Duncan Robertson (1944-2023), taught French and Latin, language and literature, at Augusta State University from 1990 until retiring in 2010. Previous publications include The Medieval Saints' Lives: Spiritual Renewal and Old French Literature (Lexington, KY: French Forum, 1995), and The Vernacular Spirit: Essays on Medieval Religious Literature, with Renate Blumenfeld-Kosinski and Nancy Warren (New York: Palgrave, 2002). His articles have appeared in Romance Philology, French Forum, Cahiers de Civilisation Médiévale, and other journals in the United States and abroad.

This is an excellent book quite suited to a serious reader and devotee of the subject. It is refreshing to see such a seminal book published in a market where the breezy and superficial so often garners attention. The author has worked with the leading authorities and resources on the subject, and articulated them in a very comprehensible and coherent manner. Nothing less than a must read for serious students of lectio divina.Karl A. Schultz, Author of How to Pray with the Bible

• ContentsList of Abbreviations   ixPreface   xiLectio Divina   xiIn the Monastery   xiiiReading and Exegesis   xvReading beyond Reading   xixChapter One: Scholarly Contexts: Ressourcement and Research   1Ressourcement   1Jean Leclercq   4Henri de Lubac   11Research and Practice   23Implications for Literary Theory   27Chapter Two: The Interpretation of the Scriptures   38Letter and Spirit   38Origen’s On First Principles   43Saint Augustine   50Saint Gregory the Great   57Chapter Three: Reading and Meditation   72Classical Education   72The Conversion of Reading   76Cassian’s Conferences   81Reading in the Monastery   88 Chapter Four: Reading into Writing   104Chapters on Reading   107Liturgy and Private Prayer   120Carolingian Libelli Precum   125Chapter Five: The Extension of Meditation   133John of Fécamp’s Confessio theologica   133Saint Anselm of Canterbury’s Orationes sive meditationes 145Chapter Six: Reading the Song of Songs   156Origen’s Commentary on the Song of Songs   158Origen’s Homilies on the Song of Songs   163Gregory’s Exposition on the Song of Songs  170Bernard of Clairvaux’s Sermons on the Song of Songs   175Bernard’s Reading Project   180Allegorical Analysis   184The Voice of the Bride   192Chapter Seven: The Twelfth-Century Integration   203Meditatio and Meditationes   204Hugh of Saint-Victor   212Guigo II  224Chapter Eight: The Book of Experience   231Select Bibliography   234Index   243