Louis-Claude de Saint-Martin the Way of Prayer

Louis-Claude de Saint-Martin and the Way of Prayer. The path to the Imperishable Temple.

It is very difficult to write about Louis-Claude de Saint-Martin (1743-1803), as the teaching that emerges from his writings is a medicine for the soul that is very indigestible for the mind of man and, above all, of the initiate contemporary.

This discrepancy, between the need for such a liniment and the revulsion it arouses in many, is fundamentally dictated by two sets of reasons. The first lies in the exquisitely Christian nature of the narrative, the symbols, the morals and the teaching that Louis-Claude de Saint-Martin instills, without sparing himself, in his writings. The second is to be found in the particular cognitive presbyopia that seems to afflict many contemporary "initiates" and esotericists, who always look for what is more complicated and subtly artificial, compared to what is simple and useful for the laborious work to which they should undergo.

Here then, as practices such as the prayer and the meditation (which is nothing but an intensive and essential form of praying), are considered passive, useless and the fruit of a devotionalism that must not even touch the shadow of their pretenses.

Obviously there is a great error of method and concept in this. The methodological error consists in not evaluating how, necessarily, even the most sublime theurgic act finds propaedeutics in prayer, meditation and purification. The conceptual error lies in considering prayer a non-instrument linked to religious devotionalism.

Although this book has as its object the way of prayer in the popular work of Louis-Claude de Saint-Martin, I would like to offer in this introduction a clarifying digression around the repudiation of theurgy by the Incognito Philosopher. Many have credited him with choosing prayer and meditation as a path to the divine, a critique of Cohen's teachings and practices. Undoubtedly he abandons the complex rituals learned in the Order of Freemason Knights Elect Cohen, no longer seeks the help of instruments of power and command, does not draw circles, does not utter magical commands to angels and demons and renounces fine clothes and colorful collars . Nonetheless, all this is not attributable to condemnation, but only to considering how the tools, science and art used up to that moment, should be put away and replaced with others. However, this was valid for that Louis-Claude de Saint-Martin, who had reached the peak of his spiritual and intellectual maturation.

There are seasons in the perennial cycle of Nature, and there are seasons in man's becoming: each season has its own fruits, but not for this reason they are superior to the others, they are only different and together they aim to nourish the body and the soul of man.

The Book in numbers:
ISBN: 9791280418012
Pages: 168
Author: Philip Goti
Edition: 2021
Format: 14.8x21cm

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