Article September 5, 1953 Issue

BLESSED SILENCE

[Original article in German]

MARIE OTTO

Much has been said and written about silence. Many wise individuals of all peoples have pondered the subject, and yet very few mortals have understood the blessing of true silence. In numerous places in the Bible we read about holding one's peace or being still. We find in Psalms (46:10), "Be still, and know that I am God." Only when we exclude all that is material and inharmonious and become quiet is the way to our Father-Mother God made evident.

Christian Science teaches us to practice and love true silence. In the writings of our Leader, Mary Baker Eddy, are many passages which refer to or explain the Scriptures. Here too guiding rules clearly show how to find the way to God, Spirit. In her work "No and Yes" Mrs. Eddy writes (p. 8): "We should endeavor to be longsuffering, faithful, and charitable with all. To this small effort let us add one more privilege—namely, silence whenever it can substitute censure." Our Leader here designates it a privilege to practice silence where we perhaps have believed we must censure. To maintain this silence may often seem impossible or very difficult. And yet how much soreness of heart and how many tears are spared those who follow this inspired, wise advice! How grateful would our neighbor be if, instead of censure, a stillness, a loving knowing that he is in reality God's child, were to bridge over an inharmonious situation! Such silence results from truly holding one's peace and finding one's unity with divine Principle.

The author recalls in this connection one of her most significant experiences, one in which she was richly blessed. One day she was assailed in a most unfair way and severely upbraided by a neighbor. This so overwhelmed her that she found it impossible to reply. Only when she was again in her own home did the enormity of this attack appear to her. Then she was sorry that she had made no reply and had not justified herself, for she felt very unjustly affronted. Antagonistic thoughts tried to harass her, and it cost her great effort gradually to bring some order into her thinking. Through daily study of that week's Lesson-Sermon in the Christian Science Quarterly and spiritual pondering she reached on the third day the state of mind where she could subordinate the thoughts of the discordant witness, mortal mind, to God's ideas, the angels of His presence.

Send a comment to the editors

NEXT IN THIS ISSUE

Article

"AND LOVE IS REFLECTED IN LOVE"