Preparing the Mind for Prayer: The Wanderer, Hesychasm and Theosis

Abstract

This article reads the celebrated Old English lament The Wanderer within the context of the early monastic tradition of hesychasm, the harnessing of meandering thoughts prior to approaching the stillness of prayer, and the doctrine of theosis, the belief that humankind can share in the divine nature of God through grace. In identifying new analogues and possible sources in scriptural and patristic writings, it suggests how the poem might have been understood within an Anglo-Saxon monastic milieu.

The Wanderer and the Legacy of Pathetic Fallacy

“…14 The poem's description of the dark and cold natural world in contrast to the joys of the hall is frequently compared to Bede's account of one pagan's view of life as the flight of a sparrow through a hall (see, e.g., Hurley, 2019;p. 31 Osborn, 1974, p. 125;Mitchell and Robinson, 2012, p. 276), but we can equally make a case for The Wanderer echoing the ruined scenes of feasting and merriment in Isaiah 24 (after Leneghan, 2016), or indeed the possible intellectual heritage of the poem in Boethius's meditations on 'the loss of social position and material goods' (see Anlezark, 2015, p. 84, summarising Horgan, 1987 but concluding these parallels may be coincidental). It is true that The Wanderer makes frequent mention of lords, halls, and exile, but it is hard to identify an Old English poem that does not, because such rhetoric is an intrinsic part of this poetic tradition's 'aesthetics of the familiar', as termed by Elizabeth Tyler (2006).…”

“…When approaching these opening lines, we can furthermore compare the idea of 'waiting for the Lord' in the Psalms, which have only in recent years been appreciated as a crucial context for The Wanderer and other Old English lyrics (Leneghan, 2016;Toswell, 2010Toswell, , 2014Zacher, 2021). Psalm 129.4-5 (De profundis), for example, reads '[…] sustinui te, Domine.…”

“…These conjunctions forcefully signal a sudden upheaval, but that is not what we find in The Wanderer. Instead, the poem suggests a gradual evolution of thought: a witnessing of loss and of tangible earthly destruction which may risk despair (see previously Anlezark, 2015;Leneghan, 2016), but which leads ultimately to spiritual growth.…”

“…On despair in the poem, see notablyLeneghan (2016) and previouslyAnlezark (2015). Arguing against the presence of dramatic characters in the poem, see notablyGreenfield (1969, p. 215), perceiving instead 'figures for a way of life [...,] valid poetic figures by virtue of the poetic diction that clothes them and the patterns of images that serve to unify their various temporal and moralistic stances'.…”