I could not even suspect
the mystery enclosed in those words
SAINT AUGUSTINE

«Something kept him nailed over there, but he did not know what it was. All of a sudden, he realised that during that time he had kept his sight constantly fixed on the book. He could not succeed in detaching his eyes from it. It was just as if some extraordinary magnetic force emanated from that book, attracting him irresistibly. He neared the armchair, stretched his hand slowly, touched the book and at that very instant something “clicked” within him. He knew that he would no longer depart from that book. Now, it was clear for him that he had come here just for that book; it was the book that called him in that mysterious way, because he wanted to go to it, because it was already his, it had always belonged to him!”  

Touching that book

The first page of La Storia infinita by M. Ende comes to my mind whenever I have the occasion of reflecting on the Scripture. The Bible was for me a mysterious, indecipherable book. I knew its famous stories and listened attentively to the passages proposed by the liturgy in the church. However, I constantly had the sensation that “something more was there”. I was astonished every time I had the occasion –the grace- to listen to somebody who, even through the analysis of a Hebrew or Greek term, illumined words that had so far been for me a dead letter.  

The decision to dedicate my life to the Bible is rooted in the “mysterious” experience of an adolescent grappling with a famous yet unknown text. My tangles of feelings towards the Scripture come from the little protagonist of the book by M. Ende. my going close, the timid tentative of stretching myself and finally the courage of touching that book, which is different from all other books, feeling the “click” that triggers the perception of participating in a greater story given to me, but not only to me.

Touching by the hand and being touched in the heart, this is my experience. It is truly an encounter with Jesus in his Word. Fr. Elia Citterio firmly believes that this is possible. The reading of his book L’intelligenza spirituale delle Sacre Scritture¹  is a moment of grace that makes us re-discover the fire of God’s love in the letter of the Word (See: Gregory the Great,  Homilies on Ezekiel  II, X, 1-2).

«It is an nth book on the Bible”. Fr. Elia feels moved to explain why we should write more on the Sacred Scripture. Are the myriads of publications on this matter not enough? We are embarrassed to choose from the shelves of the libraries: starting from the commentary of specialists up to popular manuals, everybody can find valuable help to enter the knowledge of the Bible and to progress in its understanding.

Distance between the believer and the Bible

The re-discovery of the centrality of God’s Word in the life of the Church has been the best fruit of Vatican II. The experience of the Lectio Divina, once reserved only for monks, now is common to all the faithful who have the possibility of attending the Word assiduously in the Parish, in ecclesial groups and in religious communities. Yet, despite a praiseworthy lasting enthusiasm, we cannot hide our weariness and problems. The lectio, that should have come back to be –as it has been in the Church for a long time- the breath of our faith, has not yet given the hoped results and often it remains a practice that, like all other experiences, turns into habitude. Moreover, despite the precious knowledge made available by the Church for the Biblical science and disciplines related to it, many feel the impression of being still far from the Scripture.

The recent Synod of Bishops reflected on this difficulty.  Recalling the teaching of Dei Verbum 13, it now repeats to every reader, including the simplest one, the necessary commitment “to have a proportioned knowledge of the sacred text, remembering that the Word is clothed with concrete words to adapt Him to be audible and comprehensible by humanity”. This prevents us from falling into fundamentalism “that denies the incarnation of the divine Word in history. It does not believe that the Word expresses himself in the Bible according to our human language, which we must decipher, study and understand. It ignores that the divine inspiration has not cancelled the historic identity and the specific personality of the human authors”.  

However, the Synod re-states also the necessity of searching constantly the balance between the “carnal” and the “transcendental” dimension of the Bible that, being also the eternal Word, demands another comprehension, given by the Holy Spirit”. This balance, as it appears, is still far from being lived by the Christians as daily experience. The knowledge of the Bible has improved –Fr. Elia says in the introduction- but the perception of the distance between the Bible and the believer persists. It seems that “an intimate familiarity does not correspond to the increased knowledge: a disclosing of sense according to the expectation of the believer who read a written text for believers and by believers” (page 2).

The deep intuition

The problem of how to encounter truly the Lord in his Word remains. How can we welcome his revelation? How can we experience the power of the Word and the regenerating consolation that it contains? “All the Texts of spirituality repeat that the Word of God is the fundamental guidance to prayer, but there are many who tell us that they do not know how to put together prayer with the reading of the Bible” (page 8). Fr. Elia tries to find this “how”, and this is the reason of his book “born from what is alive”, fruit of a journey “grown under the eyes and in the heart, along thirty years of humble listening to great commentators of the Old and New Testament. A journey in the company of the Fathers, guided by extraordinarily wise Hebrews, illumined by the wise synthesis of the eastern and western liturgies, original space of reading the Bible in the Church.   

Fr. Elia does not propose a course of exegesis. He does not linger on philosophical and theological questions that the Biblical interpretation implies. A deep intuition supports his journey. “If God speaks to man in the Bible, it means that man is fit for God; if the Bible speaks of a God in search of man so that man may go back to Him, it means that God and man live the same nostalgia. Nostalgia is not a private affair of the soul; it is a reflex of God’s desire of being in the company of man, it gives interest to man in its deep roots and history, it characterises him as an open being: open not simply to God, but also to his vocation for humanity” (page 16). The Bible is not a book that proceeds with abstract concepts, speaking only to our intelligence. “It rather speaks to the heart and to the whole person, and it is in this sense that it asks the reader to be open, to put himself into question” (Page 10).

Fr. Elia organises his work in seven phases and subdivides each of them into two moments: the first is for reflection and deepening, the second gives practical suggestions. It shows the constant correspondence of “the infinite sense connections emerging from a play of mirrors between the Scripture and the human heart; these connections are capable of incorporating precise dynamics of faith and of life”. In fact, to reach the spiritual intelligence of the Scriptures it is not enough to know what God says, as much as to let oneself be seized by the movement that the Word arouses.  “Whatever is connected with the heart is a dynamic more than content: The content of a word is revealed in the dynamics that carries it between the two subjects of relation” (Page 17).  

1. E. Citterio, L’intelligenza spirituale delle Sacre Scritture, Edizioni Dehoniane, Bologna, 2008

2.  XII ASSEMBLEA GENERALE ORDINARIA DEL SINODO DEI VESCOVI, La parola di Dio nella vita e nella missione della Chiesa. Messaggio finale, II, 5.

Silvia Zanconato
Biblista
silvia.zanconato@fastwebnet.it