HISTORY
OF LECTIO DIVINA

+ Jewish Predecessors

The method of praying Scripture and using Scripture in prayer is attested throughout the Old Testament (Joshua 1:8, Psalms 1:2, 77:12, Sirach 6:37). This practice was described among first-century Jews in Alexandria and Palestine and often associated with an allegorical interpretation of the Bible.

+ Christian Beginnings

Christians embraced the Jewish example and continued to reflect on Scripture in the liturgy but also meditated on the Scripture for guidance, wisdom, teachings, refutation, and training in righteousness (2 Tim 3:14-17). The third-century Bishop Cyprian of Carthage summarized the Christian adoption of this Jewish practice in a single sentence: "Be constant as well in prayer as in reading: now speak with God, now let God [speak] with you." Later in the fourth century, Ambrose of Milan reworked this phrase into a proverb that the Catholic Church references in the Catechism under NO. 2653, The Word of God, "We speak to him when we pray; we listen to him when we read the divine oracles.”

+ St. John Cassian (360-435 AD)

In the early fifth century, the monk St. John Cassian (best known for his two written works: The Conferences and The Institutes) depicted Lectio Divina's fruit as apprehending multiple hidden levels within the sacred text. The most basic level is the literal or historical sense. Beneath it lies the more symbolic or Christological meaning. The third is the moral-ethical level, and the last is the spiritual discernment. St. Cassian had a significant influence on St. Benedict's view regarding the "Three Renunciations" and the role of "the thoughts and vices" and its contributions to the destruction of the Christian life. It was from St. Cassian that St. Benedict learned how effective Lectio Divina was in dealing with "the thoughts and vices.”

+ Three Renunciations

Monks were conscious of recurring devastating clusters of thoughts that were a barrier to the monastic Christian way of life. Scripture references three renunciations to overcome these barriers. First, we must renounce our former way of life and worldly wealth (Genesis 12:1). Second, we must reject our thoughts and vices (Galatians 5:13-26). Third, we must abandon our idea of God, freeing our minds from everything possible to contemplate the impossible (Philippians 4:7). St. Cassian identified eight desires within the second renunciation: gluttony, lust, greed, wrath, dejection, acedia, vainglory, and pride. St. Gregory the Great later collapsed these eight desires into seven and called them the seven deadly sins. The monastic method for training the three renunciations was to fill their minds with inspired and traditional prayer. The "inspired" prayer method was Lectio Divina - listening to the Scriptures with the ear of the heart to come into communion with the living God.

+ St. Benedict of Nursia (480-543 AD)

Relying primarily on the writings of St. Cassian and other monastic rules, St. Benedict composed a rule of life that balanced prayer, work, and reading. St. Benedict incorporated Lectio Divina explicitly into his rule (Chapter 48: The Daily Manual Labor). He noted that each monk was to receive a book for Lent that was to be read prayerfully straight from beginning to end. St. Benedict recommended that St. Cassian's The Conferences be read daily and that Lectio Divina be practiced twice each day by the monks who followed his rule. In the ninth century, this rule was made standard in western monasticism.

+ Scholasticism and the High Middle Ages

The transition of monastery life to academic life brought on a different scriptural focus. Christians favored intellectual methods for studying Scripture, such as quaestio (inquiry) and disputatio (disputation) over the prayerful practice of Lectio Divina. Thus, Scripture was no longer a place of prayer, but rather an object of intellectual debate. The sixteenth through the twentieth centuries witnessed Lectio Divina's eclipse and its gradual replacement in monastic timetables by structured meditation techniques recommended by the Counter-Reformation leaders (Catholic Reformation) St. Ignatius of Loyola, Peter of Alcantara, and St. Francis de Sales. What had previously been an exercise in prayer facilitated by biblical texts now became a series of rigorous studies intended to reinforce doctrinal orthodoxy.

+ The Renewal of Lectio Divina (1959)

It was with the renewal of religious life at the Second Vatican Council that Lectio Divina reclaimed its rightful place in monastic life. With a renewed emphasis on fruitful silence and time dedicated to mediation, the time was ripe for a return to Lectio Divina. Beginning in the nineteen-sixties the term Lectio Divina began to appear with increasing frequency in European monastic literature. By the nineteen-seventies and - eighties, it became more widely practiced in the Christian faith.

+ Pope Benedict XVI

In 2005, Pope Benedict XVI enthusiastically supported Lectio Divina. In a 2005 speech, he recommended this ancient method of prayer: "The diligent reading of Sacred Scripture accompanied by prayer brings about that intimate dialogue in which the person reading hears God who is speaking, and in praying, responds to him with trusting openness of heart. [cf. Dei verbum, n. 25]. If it is effectively promoted, this practice will bring to the Church – I am convinced of it – a new spiritual springtime."