“Every breath you take is the breath of God.” Cynthia Bourgeault quoting Father Theophane, The Wisdom Jesus, p 162.

Cosmic Dialysis Through Breathing

“The willingness to breathe in the pain of all creation either specifically or generally and breathe out blessing, yes it is a form of intentional suffering because it allows your respiration to join the greater kind of what I call cosmic dialysis without any worry about my own being.” Cynthia, Claymont 2012 Gurdjieff for Christian Contemplatives, 23 Sunday Morning Teaching.

Horizontal and Vertical Respiration

“There are two kinds of respiration: horizontal respiration which takes place between ‘outside’ and ‘inside’, and vertical respiration which takes place between ‘above’ and ‘below’. The ‘sting of death’ or the essential crisis of the supreme agony is the abrupt passage from horizontal to vertical respiration. Yet he who has learnt vertical respiration whilst living will be spared from this ‘sting of death’. …

“The essence of vertical respiration is the alternation between prayer and benediction or grace. These two elements of vertical respiration manifest themselves in all domains of the inner life—mind, heart and will…. The law of correspondence between the column of prayer (problems, suffering, effort) and that of benediction (illumination, consolation, fruits) is found expressed by the Master in the beatitudes of the Sermon on the Mount. The nine (for there are nine, and not eight) beatitudes can thus be understood as the formula of vertical respiration. They teach it to us. This respiration is the state of soul that the apostle Paul designated as ‘freedom in God’. It is a new way of breathing. One freely breathes the divine breath, which is freedom.” Valentin Tomberg, Meditations on the Tarot, p100-101.

Three Levels of Each Respiration

“The three levels of horizontal respiration are:
love of Nature;
love of one’s neighbour;
love of the beings of the spiritual hierarchies (Angels, etc.).

The three stages of vertical respiration are:
purification (by divine breath);
illumination (by divine light);
mystical union (in divine fire).” Meditations on the Tarot, p101.

The Cross as United Respiration

“The cross is the vow and virtue of obedience, i.e. the sign and formula of faith, as horizontal human respiration and vertical divine respiration united together.” Meditations on the Tarot, p118.

Grace as Spiritual Air

“Is not the air which surrounds us a perfect analogy for the gratia gratis data—for gratuitously bestowed grace? Because to live in the spirit, vivifying spirit is necessary, which is the air of spiritual respiration. Can one produce artificially intellectual, moral or artistic inspiration? Can the lungs produce the air which they need for respiration?

“Now, the principle of grace underlies earthly life as well as spiritual life. It is wholly—below and above—ruled by the laws of obedience, poverty and chastity. The lungs know that it is necessary to breathe—and they obey. The lungs know that they are in want—and they breathe in. They love purity—and they breathe out. The very process of breathing teaches the laws of obedience, poverty and chastity, i.e. it is a lesson (by analogy) in grace. Conscious breathing in of the reality of grace is Christian Hatha-yoga. Christian Hatha-yoga is the vertical breathing of prayer and benediction—or, in other words, one opens oneself to grace and one receives it.” Meditations on the Tarot, p​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​134.

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Logion 51
His students asked him,
“When does ‘rest’ for the dead begin,
and when will the new cosmos arrive?
Yeshua replied,
“What you are looking for is already here.
You simply have not recognized it.”

Logion 111
Yeshua says…
Heaven and earth will completely disappear
in your presence,
and the one who lives by means of the Living One
will not see death,
because, as Yeshua says,
The cosmos is not worthy
of the one who discovers the true Self.’

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An Invitation to Visio Divina

Using the featured image at the top of this Impression, follow the traditional steps:

Visio (seeing) – Simply look, taking in the whole image
Meditatio (meditation) – Notice what draws your attention
Oratio (prayer) – Dialogue with God about what you’re seeing/feeling
Contemplatio (contemplation) – Rest in wordless presence with the divine through the image

Here are a few reflections that may be helpful:

• How does the large area of empty sky help to create a sense of “visual inhalation?”
• Tomberg describes breathing as a cycle of relationship or exchange between polarities of inside/outside or above/below. What other cycles are depicted or implied in the image?
• Do you sense any of the Beatitudes in the image?
• What might the waves represent?

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Valentin Tomberg, Meditations on the Tarot, Jeremy Tarcher, 1985

Cynthia Bourgeault, The Wisdom Jesus,  Shambhala Publications, 2008

Quotations from the Gospel of Thomas are from Lynn C Bauman, Ward J Bauman, Cynthia Bourgeault, The Luminous Gospels (Praxis 2008)

Read the Impression introducing the Gospel of Thomas.