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The Seven Storey Mountain
One of the most famous books ever written about a man’s search for faith and peace.
The Seven Storey Mountain tells of the growing restlessness of a brilliant and passionate young man, who at the age of twenty-six, takes vows in one of the most demanding Catholic orders—the Trappist monks. At the Abbey of Gethsemani, "the four walls of my new freedom," Thomas Merton struggles to withdraw from the world, but only after he has fully immersed himself in it. At the abbey, he wrote this extraordinary testament, a unique spiritual autobiography that has been recognized as one of the most influential religious works of our time. Translated into more than twenty languages, it has touched millions of lives.
The Seven Storey Mountain tells of the growing restlessness of a brilliant and passionate young man, who at the age of twenty-six, takes vows in one of the most demanding Catholic orders—the Trappist monks. At the Abbey of Gethsemani, "the four walls of my new freedom," Thomas Merton struggles to withdraw from the world, but only after he has fully immersed himself in it. At the abbey, he wrote this extraordinary testament, a unique spiritual autobiography that has been recognized as one of the most influential religious works of our time. Translated into more than twenty languages, it has touched millions of lives.
467 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1948
About the author
Thomas Merton
694 books1,800 followersThomas Merton, religious name M. Louis, was an American Trappist monk, writer, theologian, mystic, poet, social activist and scholar of comparative religion. In December 1941 he entered the Trappist Abbey of Gethsemani and in May 1949 he was ordained to priesthood. He was a member of the convent of the Abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani, near Bardstown, Kentucky, living there from 1941 to his death.
Merton wrote more than 50 books in a period of 27 years, mostly on spirituality, social justice and a quiet pacifism, as well as scores of essays and reviews. Among Merton's most enduring works is his bestselling autobiography The Seven Storey Mountain (1948). His account of his spiritual journey inspired scores of World War II veterans, students, and teenagers to explore offerings of monasteries across the US. It is on National Review's list of the 100 best nonfiction books of the century.
Merton became a keen proponent of interfaith understanding, exploring Eastern religions through his study of mystic practice. His interfaith conversation, which preserved both Protestant and Catholic theological positions, helped to build mutual respect via their shared experiences at a period of heightened hostility. He is particularly known for having pioneered dialogue with prominent Asian spiritual figures, including the Dalai Lama XIV; Japanese writer D.T. Suzuki; Thai Buddhist monk Buddhadasa Bhikkhu, and Vietnamese monk Thich Nhat Hanh. He traveled extensively in the course of meeting with them and attending international conferences on religion. In addition, he wrote books on Zen Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism, and how Christianity is related to them. This was highly unusual at the time in the United States, particularly within the religious orders.
Merton wrote more than 50 books in a period of 27 years, mostly on spirituality, social justice and a quiet pacifism, as well as scores of essays and reviews. Among Merton's most enduring works is his bestselling autobiography The Seven Storey Mountain (1948). His account of his spiritual journey inspired scores of World War II veterans, students, and teenagers to explore offerings of monasteries across the US. It is on National Review's list of the 100 best nonfiction books of the century.
Merton became a keen proponent of interfaith understanding, exploring Eastern religions through his study of mystic practice. His interfaith conversation, which preserved both Protestant and Catholic theological positions, helped to build mutual respect via their shared experiences at a period of heightened hostility. He is particularly known for having pioneered dialogue with prominent Asian spiritual figures, including the Dalai Lama XIV; Japanese writer D.T. Suzuki; Thai Buddhist monk Buddhadasa Bhikkhu, and Vietnamese monk Thich Nhat Hanh. He traveled extensively in the course of meeting with them and attending international conferences on religion. In addition, he wrote books on Zen Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism, and how Christianity is related to them. This was highly unusual at the time in the United States, particularly within the religious orders.
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November 20, 2020
Last July, I read On the Brink of Everything: Grace, Gravity and Getting Old by Parker Palmer, in which he made frequent mention of Thomas Merton, his spiritual mentor. Last month, I read Richard Russo’s Chance Are…, in which Teddy, my favorite character, named his small university publication 'Seven Storey' owing to his great admiration for Merton and his writing. Thus, I was led to read The Seven Storey Mountain, an autobiography of Thomas Merton, a Trappist monk. It was published in 1948.
The Seven Storey Mountain is the story of Merton’s conversion to the Catholic faith. It is an important work and has been hailed as the twentieth century version of the Confessions of St. Augustine. Merton (1915 to 1968), whose religious name was Father Louis, was ordained as a priest at the Trappist monastery in Kentucky in 1949.
Merton was born in France to parents who were artists and not particularly religious. He had an illustrious education, being schooled in Clare College in Cambridge University in the UK and later Columbia University in the US. He was a literature major and had excellent tutelage in eighteenth century literature. He was a true blue scholar with a gift for writing.
As a young man, Merton led a life of confusion, an empty routine of drinking, staying up all night and wandering in the city in search of very unhealthy entertainments. Yet, there was in him a persistent nagging and restlessness that craved meaning and purpose. In his travels to Europe, he was attracted to churches and cathedrals, which lent him ‘a kind of interior peace.’
Literature was instrumental in Merton’s conversion. I found this to be wholly wondrous! His life was shaped largely by the work of William Blake, Gerald Manley Hopkins (a Jesuit priest), St Augustine, St John of the Cross, James Joyce, etc. Merton said, “I think my love for William Blake had something in it of God’s grace. It is a love that has never died, and which has entered very deeply into the development of my life.” Reading James Joyce’s Portrait of An Artist also contributed to his conversion to Catholicism at age 23. Who would have thought that literature had such power to transform an individual’s life and change its trajectory? His conversion was followed swiftly by his deepening conviction to be a priest. That journey was not easy, fraught as it was by self-doubt, uncertainty, and a sense of inadequacy. Sharing his journey, I became weary at times and was tempted to discontinue reading.
Merton was a good writer and his prose clean and accessible. His quest for a closer walk with God via communion with nature and the sweetness of the solitude he experienced was described with a touch of sanctity and beauty.
I read The Seven Storey Mountain while I was hospitalized and significantly ill. There is nothing quite like illness that makes one more aware than ever of one’s mortality. In some ways, reading this was a salve of sorts. There was something of the peace Merton described that was refreshing like spring rain upon parched earth.
Arguably, this autobiography is not for everyone and many will flee at the thought of reading a religious piece of writing. Yet for others, this may be inspiring and uplifting as it had been for me.
The Seven Storey Mountain is the story of Merton’s conversion to the Catholic faith. It is an important work and has been hailed as the twentieth century version of the Confessions of St. Augustine. Merton (1915 to 1968), whose religious name was Father Louis, was ordained as a priest at the Trappist monastery in Kentucky in 1949.
Merton was born in France to parents who were artists and not particularly religious. He had an illustrious education, being schooled in Clare College in Cambridge University in the UK and later Columbia University in the US. He was a literature major and had excellent tutelage in eighteenth century literature. He was a true blue scholar with a gift for writing.
As a young man, Merton led a life of confusion, an empty routine of drinking, staying up all night and wandering in the city in search of very unhealthy entertainments. Yet, there was in him a persistent nagging and restlessness that craved meaning and purpose. In his travels to Europe, he was attracted to churches and cathedrals, which lent him ‘a kind of interior peace.’
Literature was instrumental in Merton’s conversion. I found this to be wholly wondrous! His life was shaped largely by the work of William Blake, Gerald Manley Hopkins (a Jesuit priest), St Augustine, St John of the Cross, James Joyce, etc. Merton said, “I think my love for William Blake had something in it of God’s grace. It is a love that has never died, and which has entered very deeply into the development of my life.” Reading James Joyce’s Portrait of An Artist also contributed to his conversion to Catholicism at age 23. Who would have thought that literature had such power to transform an individual’s life and change its trajectory? His conversion was followed swiftly by his deepening conviction to be a priest. That journey was not easy, fraught as it was by self-doubt, uncertainty, and a sense of inadequacy. Sharing his journey, I became weary at times and was tempted to discontinue reading.
Merton was a good writer and his prose clean and accessible. His quest for a closer walk with God via communion with nature and the sweetness of the solitude he experienced was described with a touch of sanctity and beauty.
I read The Seven Storey Mountain while I was hospitalized and significantly ill. There is nothing quite like illness that makes one more aware than ever of one’s mortality. In some ways, reading this was a salve of sorts. There was something of the peace Merton described that was refreshing like spring rain upon parched earth.
Arguably, this autobiography is not for everyone and many will flee at the thought of reading a religious piece of writing. Yet for others, this may be inspiring and uplifting as it had been for me.
September 3, 2015
A Trappist monastery is a quiet place! In a Trappist monastery, monks typically have three motivations to speak to one another: to get a particular work project carried out efficiently, to engage in a community discussion, or to discuss one's spiritual progress with a director or confessor. Sometimes, too, Trappists will enjoy friendly conversations with each other in a conversation room or in nature. These different types of conversation are balanced with the discipline of fostering a general atmosphere of silence in the monastery. Trappists find the silence helps them to practice continual prayer.
This is an amazing biography of a man who did quite relatively normal things in his life such as becoming a member of a young Communist group as he was concerned over the social and economic injustices of modern life. However, a completely different change of direction occurred when he decided to become a Trappist monk at the age of twenty-six.
I’m surprised, and yet not surprised, that Merton did in fact turn out the way he did. His parents were artists (an English father and his mother was an American Quaker), who travelled extensively between America and France, between the First and Second World Wars and Merton as a child seemed to be continually on the move.
Also the difference between being a gregarious individual and then deciding to forsake that to go and live in a world of quiet contemplation did have me wondering I must confess. Nevertheless, Merton was being called, had made up his mind and that was the end of it.
We have here a deeply religious individual, who was a prolific writer, writing from his monk’s cell for the outside world which rather astonished me. He also had quite an international reputation. Never mind being witty and thoroughly enjoying life up to the full until his untimely death at the age of fifty-three, twenty-seven years after he entered the Abbey of Gethsemani in Kentucky.
I’ve always had a fascination for nuns and monks. Indirectly, I blame my father because he gave me a book to read The Nun of Monza. I couldn’t put it down and my interest grew from there. I don’t however believe that living in a monastery would suit my personality. Conversation is too important for me and to listen to other views.
As usual, I was intrigued by the title and it transpires that Merton uses the seven-tiered mountain (Dante’s image of Purgatory) as a symbol of the modern world.
The attention to detail throughout the book is remarkable and so you must trust me and read it. Believe me, I know that you will not only like this book but be enthralled by it.
This is an amazing biography of a man who did quite relatively normal things in his life such as becoming a member of a young Communist group as he was concerned over the social and economic injustices of modern life. However, a completely different change of direction occurred when he decided to become a Trappist monk at the age of twenty-six.
I’m surprised, and yet not surprised, that Merton did in fact turn out the way he did. His parents were artists (an English father and his mother was an American Quaker), who travelled extensively between America and France, between the First and Second World Wars and Merton as a child seemed to be continually on the move.
Also the difference between being a gregarious individual and then deciding to forsake that to go and live in a world of quiet contemplation did have me wondering I must confess. Nevertheless, Merton was being called, had made up his mind and that was the end of it.
We have here a deeply religious individual, who was a prolific writer, writing from his monk’s cell for the outside world which rather astonished me. He also had quite an international reputation. Never mind being witty and thoroughly enjoying life up to the full until his untimely death at the age of fifty-three, twenty-seven years after he entered the Abbey of Gethsemani in Kentucky.
I’ve always had a fascination for nuns and monks. Indirectly, I blame my father because he gave me a book to read The Nun of Monza. I couldn’t put it down and my interest grew from there. I don’t however believe that living in a monastery would suit my personality. Conversation is too important for me and to listen to other views.
As usual, I was intrigued by the title and it transpires that Merton uses the seven-tiered mountain (Dante’s image of Purgatory) as a symbol of the modern world.
The attention to detail throughout the book is remarkable and so you must trust me and read it. Believe me, I know that you will not only like this book but be enthralled by it.
October 13, 2020
Merton is a gifted writer, and his descriptions of growing up in Europe are interesting. Much less interesting are his spiritual/religious judgments of others. These judgments seem to break down along the following lines:
If you're a bad person, and are not Catholic, the reason you're bad is because you're not Catholic.
If you're a bad person, and are Catholic, the reason you're bad is because you're not Catholic enough.
If you're a good person, and are not Catholic, the reason you're good is because you hang around with so many Catholics.
If you're a good person, and are Catholic, the reason you're good is obvious.
I didn't expect anything but a pro-Catholic stance from Merton--he was a Catholic monk, after all--but some of his takes border on religious bigotry. In one passage he praises the prayer-work of a group of monks, stating outright that the reason the United States is a successful nation is because this small group of cloistered guys in upstate New York prays on a daily basis. And he means this not in some abstract "it takes all kinds to make the world go round" way, he means it literally. The monks pray, God hears their prayers and responds, and that's why our country is blessed. No other reason. Then, not two pages later, he has the gall to criticize someone else's religious practices as "obviously silly."
I would have found this book more enlightening if Merton had turned his perceptive talents on those aspects of Catholicism that are "obviously silly" and then described how in spite of them he was able to grow in his faith.
If you're a bad person, and are not Catholic, the reason you're bad is because you're not Catholic.
If you're a bad person, and are Catholic, the reason you're bad is because you're not Catholic enough.
If you're a good person, and are not Catholic, the reason you're good is because you hang around with so many Catholics.
If you're a good person, and are Catholic, the reason you're good is obvious.
I didn't expect anything but a pro-Catholic stance from Merton--he was a Catholic monk, after all--but some of his takes border on religious bigotry. In one passage he praises the prayer-work of a group of monks, stating outright that the reason the United States is a successful nation is because this small group of cloistered guys in upstate New York prays on a daily basis. And he means this not in some abstract "it takes all kinds to make the world go round" way, he means it literally. The monks pray, God hears their prayers and responds, and that's why our country is blessed. No other reason. Then, not two pages later, he has the gall to criticize someone else's religious practices as "obviously silly."
I would have found this book more enlightening if Merton had turned his perceptive talents on those aspects of Catholicism that are "obviously silly" and then described how in spite of them he was able to grow in his faith.
September 8, 2008
The first part of this book was painfully slow at times, yet interesting. Then in the second part, after Merton was baptized.... WHOOOOSHH!!! off we went! And I was spellbound til the end. Its impossible to summarize this book, and there are many reviews out there for everyone to peruse. So I'll simply quote a few of my favorite passages in the book.
As a newly baptized Catholic, I found this passage incredibly beautiful and accurate:
"I had come, like the Jews, through the Red Sea of Baptism. I was entering into a desert -- a terribly easy and convenient desert, with all the trials tempered to my weakness -- where I would have a chance to give God great glory by simply trusting and obeying Him, and walking in the way that was not according to my own nature and my own judgement. And it would lead me to a land I could not imagine or understand. It would be a land that was not like the land of Egypt from which I had come out; the land of human nature blinded and fettered by perversity and sin. It would be a land in which the work of man's hands and man's ingenuity counted for little or nothing: but where God would direct all things, and where I would be expected to act so much and so closely under His guidance that it would be as if He thought with my mind, and if He willed with my will. It was to this that I was called. It was for this that I had been created. It was for this Christ had died on the Cross, and for this that I was now baptized, and had within me the living Christ, melting me into Himself in the fires of His love. This was the call that came to me with my Baptism, bringing with it a most appalling responsibility if I failed to answer it." (p. 248)
"All that is necessary to be a saint is to want to be one. Don't you believe that God will make you what He created you to be, if you will consent to let Him do it? All you have to do is desire it." (p. 260)
"Our happiness consists in sharing the happiness of God, the perfection of His unlimited freedom, the perfection of His love. What has to be healed in us is our true nature, made in the likeness of God. What we have to learn is love. The healing and the learning are the same thing, for at the very core of our essence we are constituted in God's likeness by our freedom, and the exercise of that freedom is nothing else but the exercise of disinterested love -- the love of God for His own sake, because He is God. The beginning of love is truth, and before He will give us His love, God must cleanse our souls of the lies that are in them. And the most effective way of detaching us from ourselves is to make us detest ourselves as we have made ourselves by sin, in order that we may love Him reflected in our souls as He has re-made them by His love. That is the meaning of the contemplative life, and the sense of all the apparently meaningless little rules and observances and fasts and obediences and penances and humiliations and labors that go to make up the routine of existence in a contemplative monastery: they all serve to remind us of what we are and Who God is -- that we may get sick of the sight of ourselves and turn to Him: and in the end, we will find Him in ourselves, in our own purified natures which have become the mirror of His tremendous Goodness and of His endless love...." (p. 410-11)
As a newly baptized Catholic, I found this passage incredibly beautiful and accurate:
"I had come, like the Jews, through the Red Sea of Baptism. I was entering into a desert -- a terribly easy and convenient desert, with all the trials tempered to my weakness -- where I would have a chance to give God great glory by simply trusting and obeying Him, and walking in the way that was not according to my own nature and my own judgement. And it would lead me to a land I could not imagine or understand. It would be a land that was not like the land of Egypt from which I had come out; the land of human nature blinded and fettered by perversity and sin. It would be a land in which the work of man's hands and man's ingenuity counted for little or nothing: but where God would direct all things, and where I would be expected to act so much and so closely under His guidance that it would be as if He thought with my mind, and if He willed with my will. It was to this that I was called. It was for this that I had been created. It was for this Christ had died on the Cross, and for this that I was now baptized, and had within me the living Christ, melting me into Himself in the fires of His love. This was the call that came to me with my Baptism, bringing with it a most appalling responsibility if I failed to answer it." (p. 248)
"All that is necessary to be a saint is to want to be one. Don't you believe that God will make you what He created you to be, if you will consent to let Him do it? All you have to do is desire it." (p. 260)
"Our happiness consists in sharing the happiness of God, the perfection of His unlimited freedom, the perfection of His love. What has to be healed in us is our true nature, made in the likeness of God. What we have to learn is love. The healing and the learning are the same thing, for at the very core of our essence we are constituted in God's likeness by our freedom, and the exercise of that freedom is nothing else but the exercise of disinterested love -- the love of God for His own sake, because He is God. The beginning of love is truth, and before He will give us His love, God must cleanse our souls of the lies that are in them. And the most effective way of detaching us from ourselves is to make us detest ourselves as we have made ourselves by sin, in order that we may love Him reflected in our souls as He has re-made them by His love. That is the meaning of the contemplative life, and the sense of all the apparently meaningless little rules and observances and fasts and obediences and penances and humiliations and labors that go to make up the routine of existence in a contemplative monastery: they all serve to remind us of what we are and Who God is -- that we may get sick of the sight of ourselves and turn to Him: and in the end, we will find Him in ourselves, in our own purified natures which have become the mirror of His tremendous Goodness and of His endless love...." (p. 410-11)
August 3, 2015
Now this, I never knew about men:
This is the tone you get from this author as he tells of his life: a peculiar mix of contemplation, self-mutiliation, and philosophy. Losing both his parents to illnesses, you sense the underlying melancholy of a young man who is alone. Nonetheless, he was still raised privileged, attended Ivy League universities, traveled from Europe to America, was expected to be groomed for European diplomatic service, until...well, until he decided to become a monk.
It was a bit hard to rate this book. There was something inherently motivational about it; Merton's passion for books was alluring, but then again, there were moments where you felt like you were being lectured to by a priest. Merton writes in the classic style of some of the authors he admires: D.H. Lawrence and James Joyce. So it is an autobiographical piece that is as much about the author as it is about the experience for the reader; it stays true to the art and true form of the genre.
Oh, but the discourse:
When the book was first published, it became a bestseller. Yet the New York Times refused to include it on their list because they deemed it a "religious book." Despite that, the original cloth version sold over 600,000 copies in the first year and it has reached multiple millions since then. Hmm, surprise, surprise, a scorned book sells millions. Did I think it was a religious book? Well from the afore-mentioned quote (and many more within the book) I can see why it would be labeled as such. If you are not into Catholicism ( I'm not a Catholic but it didn't bother me) it could also be off-putting. It is not a book for everyone, that's for sure.
But I would have to agree with what Merton's editor said when he received hate mail saying, "Tell this talking Trappist who took a vow of silence to shut up!" He said: "writing is a form of contemplation"--when written well, memoirs say great things about the world. This is why I love to read them. And this is one that says a lot about what makes people do what they do.
Merton was a writer and poet. A literary critic. A scholar. To him, Hamlet, Coriolanus, Purgatorio, and Holy Sonnets are all commentaries on ethics and psychology. I would have to say yes to Hamlet and Holy Sonnets--the others I haven't read.
This is not a book about religious swaying. After all, this was a man who at first considered himself an atheist. So you can only imagine what a journey he embarks upon.
He was an avid reader so part of my fascination was with his thoughts on books: the Poems of William Blake, the Spiritual Quixote, and St. Augustine's Confessions. For him, it was either to live the rest of his life "in the relative peace of a college campus, reading and writing books," or to "live in a world that was charged with the presence and reality of God." Why could these two not coexist?
So how did he become a monk? He says: "It was something in the order of conscience, a new and profound and clear sense that this was what I really ought to do."
Really though, his love of books had an effect. He read James Joyce: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and voila--his transformation started. I kid you not. I had to dig through my shelves to find my copy because this reminded me of days of philosophical debate in college over this book.
If phrases such as this one seem ostentatious to you, this will be an off-putting read for you:
I, on the other hand, find such phrases thought-provoking.
Reading through certain portions of the book, you get a sense that the memoirist took a break and in waltzed the literary critic and article writer. At times it seemed as though he was critiquing his feelings. Then you get to the end, the epilogue, where you get this beautiful, introspective, lyrical, glimpse into his life as a monk:
And I'm like, more please? Now you see why it was a hard book to rate.
Is there any man who has ever gone through a whole lifetime without dressing himself up, in his fancy, in the habit of a monk and enclosing himself in a cell where he sits magnificent in heroic austerity and solitude, while all the young ladies who hitherto were cool to this affections in the world come and beat on the gates of the monastery crying, "Come out, come out!"
This is the tone you get from this author as he tells of his life: a peculiar mix of contemplation, self-mutiliation, and philosophy. Losing both his parents to illnesses, you sense the underlying melancholy of a young man who is alone. Nonetheless, he was still raised privileged, attended Ivy League universities, traveled from Europe to America, was expected to be groomed for European diplomatic service, until...well, until he decided to become a monk.
It was a bit hard to rate this book. There was something inherently motivational about it; Merton's passion for books was alluring, but then again, there were moments where you felt like you were being lectured to by a priest. Merton writes in the classic style of some of the authors he admires: D.H. Lawrence and James Joyce. So it is an autobiographical piece that is as much about the author as it is about the experience for the reader; it stays true to the art and true form of the genre.
Oh, but the discourse:
When a ray of light strikes a crystal, it gives a new quality to the crystal. And when God's infinitely disinterested love plays upon a human soul, the same kind of thing takes place. And that is the life called sanctifying grace.
When the book was first published, it became a bestseller. Yet the New York Times refused to include it on their list because they deemed it a "religious book." Despite that, the original cloth version sold over 600,000 copies in the first year and it has reached multiple millions since then. Hmm, surprise, surprise, a scorned book sells millions. Did I think it was a religious book? Well from the afore-mentioned quote (and many more within the book) I can see why it would be labeled as such. If you are not into Catholicism ( I'm not a Catholic but it didn't bother me) it could also be off-putting. It is not a book for everyone, that's for sure.
But I would have to agree with what Merton's editor said when he received hate mail saying, "Tell this talking Trappist who took a vow of silence to shut up!" He said: "writing is a form of contemplation"--when written well, memoirs say great things about the world. This is why I love to read them. And this is one that says a lot about what makes people do what they do.
Merton was a writer and poet. A literary critic. A scholar. To him, Hamlet, Coriolanus, Purgatorio, and Holy Sonnets are all commentaries on ethics and psychology. I would have to say yes to Hamlet and Holy Sonnets--the others I haven't read.
This is not a book about religious swaying. After all, this was a man who at first considered himself an atheist. So you can only imagine what a journey he embarks upon.
He was an avid reader so part of my fascination was with his thoughts on books: the Poems of William Blake, the Spiritual Quixote, and St. Augustine's Confessions. For him, it was either to live the rest of his life "in the relative peace of a college campus, reading and writing books," or to "live in a world that was charged with the presence and reality of God." Why could these two not coexist?
So how did he become a monk? He says: "It was something in the order of conscience, a new and profound and clear sense that this was what I really ought to do."
Really though, his love of books had an effect. He read James Joyce: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and voila--his transformation started. I kid you not. I had to dig through my shelves to find my copy because this reminded me of days of philosophical debate in college over this book.
If phrases such as this one seem ostentatious to you, this will be an off-putting read for you:
...The more you try to avoid suffering, the more you suffer, because smaller and more insignificant things begin to torture you, in proportion to your fear of being hurt. The one who does most to avoid suffering is, in the end, the one who suffers most: and his suffering comes to him from things so little and so trivial that one can say that it is no longer objective at all.
I, on the other hand, find such phrases thought-provoking.
Reading through certain portions of the book, you get a sense that the memoirist took a break and in waltzed the literary critic and article writer. At times it seemed as though he was critiquing his feelings. Then you get to the end, the epilogue, where you get this beautiful, introspective, lyrical, glimpse into his life as a monk:
The morning sun is shining on the gate-house which is bright with new paint this summer. From here it looks as though the wheat is already beginning to ripen on St. Joseph's Knoll. The monks who are on retreat for their ordination to the diaconate are digging in the Guest House garden.
It is very quiet. I think about this monastery that I am in. I think about the monks, my brothers, my fathers.
And I'm like, more please? Now you see why it was a hard book to rate.
January 3, 2015
Merton’s autobiography is the story of his quest to understand life and to give it some semblance of purpose. Not unlike each of us, in our own way, trying to develop a philosophy that will provide us the seeds of meaning to the infinite number of events that will assail us between now and the end of our days. If this was all that Merton accomplished in The Seven Story Mountain, then this would not be the book that it is. In my mind, Merton crosses the line. He selfishly places his quest above everybody else’s and makes his form of enlightenment one that the entire world should aspire to. The problem lies in the fact that no one’s quest to understand life is better or more righteous than the quests pursued by any one of us (except for the axe-murderers among us).
This central theme of selfishness is the issue that pushed this book away from me even though Merton’s selfishness may not have been of his own choosing. His mother died at the age of 8 and his father was more interested in his art than he was his son’s life until he died when Merton was 15. At about that time, Merton was turned loose on the world with a trust fund that allowed him to pursue his own interests without a need (or a desire) to contribute to anything or anyone.
During the next ten years Merton simply indulges himself in himself and he finds the emptiness that can develop from true selfishness. Then, rather than searching for a cause and cure for the emptiness in his life, he finds a justification and a substitution. Merton simply substitutes a faith in a higher power for the emptiness that encompasses his life, and with this transformation he is free to continue his self-indulgences with a sense of righteousness that is reinforced by the Catholic Church.
After Merton’s initial transformation, when threatened with the prospects of service to his surrounding community and when threatened with the possibility of military service in World War II, he yet again searches for an even deeper faith. This subsequent search results in his true calling to the Trappist monastery, where his continued ability to self-indulge in himself is permanently assured.
In the end, Merton may have found a way to convince himself that he has made atonements for his selfishness. However, at the same time, he continues to satisfy his own selfish desires. It's this deep-rooted and unresolved conflict in Merton’s character that shows itself as a bitterness that pervades the entirety of this book.
This central theme of selfishness is the issue that pushed this book away from me even though Merton’s selfishness may not have been of his own choosing. His mother died at the age of 8 and his father was more interested in his art than he was his son’s life until he died when Merton was 15. At about that time, Merton was turned loose on the world with a trust fund that allowed him to pursue his own interests without a need (or a desire) to contribute to anything or anyone.
During the next ten years Merton simply indulges himself in himself and he finds the emptiness that can develop from true selfishness. Then, rather than searching for a cause and cure for the emptiness in his life, he finds a justification and a substitution. Merton simply substitutes a faith in a higher power for the emptiness that encompasses his life, and with this transformation he is free to continue his self-indulgences with a sense of righteousness that is reinforced by the Catholic Church.
After Merton’s initial transformation, when threatened with the prospects of service to his surrounding community and when threatened with the possibility of military service in World War II, he yet again searches for an even deeper faith. This subsequent search results in his true calling to the Trappist monastery, where his continued ability to self-indulge in himself is permanently assured.
In the end, Merton may have found a way to convince himself that he has made atonements for his selfishness. However, at the same time, he continues to satisfy his own selfish desires. It's this deep-rooted and unresolved conflict in Merton’s character that shows itself as a bitterness that pervades the entirety of this book.
February 19, 2008
I finally read Thomas Merton’s Seven Story Mountain. Mostly out of obligation because if you tell anyone you’ve read Merton they ask if you’ve read Seven Story Mountain.
First, one neat story. Merton was at Cambridge, studying sociology, economics, history (196). On Merton’s first day of school, he accidentally seated himself in a class on the works of Shakespeare. So he got up, then sat back down, stayed. Later that day he went to the registrar and officially added the course. Here’s what he said about it:
"The material of literature and especially of drama, is chiefly human acts--that is, free acts, moral acts. And, as a matter of fact, literature, drama, poetry, make certain statements about these acts that can be made in no other way" (197).
Merton describes a sort of progressive conversion, first mind, heart, will, body, imagination. He sampled several religious orders, and eventually became a Trappist Monk. He explains about these monastic orders: Fransicians, Benedictines. Of course, the Trappists have a reputation for being most extreme in terms of penance and discipline—they grow their own food, make their own shoes, fast for more than half of every year. Second only to the Carthusians who are basically hermits. But there weren’t any Carthusians in North America so Merton had to settle for the Trappists.
Here's what I've learned about "the seven stories." It’s not a story of how he rose to higher ranks in the faith. The stories represent 7 layers of sinfullness and how he rose through them finally reaching the point where it was possible to be saved.
Of course when you read a Trappist monk say that he’s led a horribly undisciplined and shallow life, you start to feel pretty miserable. But I took away a few new ideas.
• Merton tells a story about his childhood. He had a little brother John Paul who always wanted to be with his older brother. Of course, being older, Merton would send him away. And he carried incredible guilt about this (26). Then there’s this great scene…neighbourhood gang is out front, the boys are kicked out the back door, they sneak to safety. Then John Paul comes bravely walking down the center—it’s disinterested love. Merton said, “We did not chase him away.” I love that he only implied the metaphor, the image of Christ, walking bravely toward the cross because we were on the opposite side.
• I don’t think this first point was said directly, but the implication was strong enough that it sent me back searching for a direct passage. It’s this: we sometimes talk about ourselves as being divided. We believe one thing, but act in another way. Don’t know why. Merton suggests that there’s no disagreement. We act according to what we believe. The seclusion of monastics is evidence that they believe prayer is more effective than works.
• Secondly, we have basic desires—not just sinful ones, but for comfort, food, success—and we act according to what we want. Merton says it’s an illusion that we can act without self-interest, we can act without serving our desires (224).
• What it boils down to is this: it’s all about converting your will, converting your intentions. Sometimes that means going without, fasting, etc.
• Here’s a cool idea. Union with God. How does that happen? Is that when you’re singing the worship song so hard there’s sweat dripping, and you acsend into some sort of spiritual euphoria? Merton says that from a physical point of view it’s impossible. We are matter and God is spirit. You can’t join those. Except when it comes to your intentions—basically, your will. If you can conform your will to God’s, that’s unity (253, 407).
• Which is better, the active life or the interior life? Which best serves God, activity: teaching, soup kitchens, delivering aid to Indonesia, building churches or a life cloistering yourself away from the world centred in contemplation and prayer—in isolation, mostly. The answer would seem obvious—that we’re called to be working. I’ve never understood the rationale of a monastery. How could my time spent along in reading, writing, thinking, prayer, help anyone else? Of course I’ve always felt a bit guilty because my preference is usually to be left alone and it’s pretty selfish and all. Anyhow—Merton presented a way to redeem my antisociallness.
• It works like this. If—and this is a weighty if—if we really believe in the mystical body of Christ—that in reality we are one person with many parts, then when one of us reads, thinks, learns, writes, prays, it does serve the rest. Merton claims that the reason God hasn’t destroyed the US is because a little Trappist monastery tucked away in the hills of Kentucky. I don’t think he’s far off (454).
It’s not a matter of trying to share each other’s joys and sorrows—unity isn’t something to achieve, it’s not a metaphor, it’s a spiritual reality. This tied-togetherness is what I love most about the faith. It’s what I love about Christian community and about the school where I teach. You see it in something as simple as curriculum sharing… It makes sense. Because if we do believe in the mystical body of Christ, there isn’t room for competition, jealousy, hoarding. Because if one person advances, if one of us does well, then it really does help the rest.
That one quality is so obviously lacking in the world. And it works both ways. (Here I’ll soap box for just a minute.) When Christian leaders kill 100,000 civilians in Iraq, it really does hurt the rest of the world. When a colleague ends her career amid scandal, it's not just sympathy pains, it's real pain.
First, one neat story. Merton was at Cambridge, studying sociology, economics, history (196). On Merton’s first day of school, he accidentally seated himself in a class on the works of Shakespeare. So he got up, then sat back down, stayed. Later that day he went to the registrar and officially added the course. Here’s what he said about it:
"The material of literature and especially of drama, is chiefly human acts--that is, free acts, moral acts. And, as a matter of fact, literature, drama, poetry, make certain statements about these acts that can be made in no other way" (197).
Merton describes a sort of progressive conversion, first mind, heart, will, body, imagination. He sampled several religious orders, and eventually became a Trappist Monk. He explains about these monastic orders: Fransicians, Benedictines. Of course, the Trappists have a reputation for being most extreme in terms of penance and discipline—they grow their own food, make their own shoes, fast for more than half of every year. Second only to the Carthusians who are basically hermits. But there weren’t any Carthusians in North America so Merton had to settle for the Trappists.
Here's what I've learned about "the seven stories." It’s not a story of how he rose to higher ranks in the faith. The stories represent 7 layers of sinfullness and how he rose through them finally reaching the point where it was possible to be saved.
Of course when you read a Trappist monk say that he’s led a horribly undisciplined and shallow life, you start to feel pretty miserable. But I took away a few new ideas.
• Merton tells a story about his childhood. He had a little brother John Paul who always wanted to be with his older brother. Of course, being older, Merton would send him away. And he carried incredible guilt about this (26). Then there’s this great scene…neighbourhood gang is out front, the boys are kicked out the back door, they sneak to safety. Then John Paul comes bravely walking down the center—it’s disinterested love. Merton said, “We did not chase him away.” I love that he only implied the metaphor, the image of Christ, walking bravely toward the cross because we were on the opposite side.
• I don’t think this first point was said directly, but the implication was strong enough that it sent me back searching for a direct passage. It’s this: we sometimes talk about ourselves as being divided. We believe one thing, but act in another way. Don’t know why. Merton suggests that there’s no disagreement. We act according to what we believe. The seclusion of monastics is evidence that they believe prayer is more effective than works.
• Secondly, we have basic desires—not just sinful ones, but for comfort, food, success—and we act according to what we want. Merton says it’s an illusion that we can act without self-interest, we can act without serving our desires (224).
• What it boils down to is this: it’s all about converting your will, converting your intentions. Sometimes that means going without, fasting, etc.
• Here’s a cool idea. Union with God. How does that happen? Is that when you’re singing the worship song so hard there’s sweat dripping, and you acsend into some sort of spiritual euphoria? Merton says that from a physical point of view it’s impossible. We are matter and God is spirit. You can’t join those. Except when it comes to your intentions—basically, your will. If you can conform your will to God’s, that’s unity (253, 407).
• Which is better, the active life or the interior life? Which best serves God, activity: teaching, soup kitchens, delivering aid to Indonesia, building churches or a life cloistering yourself away from the world centred in contemplation and prayer—in isolation, mostly. The answer would seem obvious—that we’re called to be working. I’ve never understood the rationale of a monastery. How could my time spent along in reading, writing, thinking, prayer, help anyone else? Of course I’ve always felt a bit guilty because my preference is usually to be left alone and it’s pretty selfish and all. Anyhow—Merton presented a way to redeem my antisociallness.
• It works like this. If—and this is a weighty if—if we really believe in the mystical body of Christ—that in reality we are one person with many parts, then when one of us reads, thinks, learns, writes, prays, it does serve the rest. Merton claims that the reason God hasn’t destroyed the US is because a little Trappist monastery tucked away in the hills of Kentucky. I don’t think he’s far off (454).
It’s not a matter of trying to share each other’s joys and sorrows—unity isn’t something to achieve, it’s not a metaphor, it’s a spiritual reality. This tied-togetherness is what I love most about the faith. It’s what I love about Christian community and about the school where I teach. You see it in something as simple as curriculum sharing… It makes sense. Because if we do believe in the mystical body of Christ, there isn’t room for competition, jealousy, hoarding. Because if one person advances, if one of us does well, then it really does help the rest.
That one quality is so obviously lacking in the world. And it works both ways. (Here I’ll soap box for just a minute.) When Christian leaders kill 100,000 civilians in Iraq, it really does hurt the rest of the world. When a colleague ends her career amid scandal, it's not just sympathy pains, it's real pain.
May 27, 2013
I listened to the abridged version of Merton's spiritual autobiography back in the 90's, loved it, and actually thought I'd read this book. Now I've read the unabridged book and learned all I missed.
However, given where I was 20 years ago, I doubt I would/could have appreciated so many of the things Merton described so well in his journey, especially his experience of being led from one Master to another, often via friends, travels and the many pitfalls of sin and shame. Speaking just about some of the mountain tops he climbed: Dante Alighieri, Étienne Gilson, William Blake and Jacques Maritain. His descriptions are so good they remind you of a Baedeker for the world of spiritual literature.
Reading the complete book is so much better than listening to the abbreviated audio version. I can't believe I waited this long to read it in full. Also, I'm glad I went on to read The Intimate Merton: His Life from His Journals and The Seven Mountains of Thomas Merton because these two works not only told the rest of the story which he was not allowed to include in his autobiography, but they also continued past the time when this book ended.
A fascinating read about an incredible man.
However, given where I was 20 years ago, I doubt I would/could have appreciated so many of the things Merton described so well in his journey, especially his experience of being led from one Master to another, often via friends, travels and the many pitfalls of sin and shame. Speaking just about some of the mountain tops he climbed: Dante Alighieri, Étienne Gilson, William Blake and Jacques Maritain. His descriptions are so good they remind you of a Baedeker for the world of spiritual literature.
Reading the complete book is so much better than listening to the abbreviated audio version. I can't believe I waited this long to read it in full. Also, I'm glad I went on to read The Intimate Merton: His Life from His Journals and The Seven Mountains of Thomas Merton because these two works not only told the rest of the story which he was not allowed to include in his autobiography, but they also continued past the time when this book ended.
A fascinating read about an incredible man.
November 25, 2024
Thomas Merton didn't just want to know all about God theologically and devotionally. He wanted the experience. In this book he bravely recounts some of his outrageously independent spiritual questing.
Maybe it doesn't sound like a big deal: In the 1950's Merton began exploring Buddhism, especially Zen Buddhism.
But are you kidding? No Trappist is a hobbyist.
While active in the TM Movement, I was friends with P.M., still officially a Trappist but studying with the same Hindu monk who had become my guru, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.
Generally speaking Trappists don't add or subtract anything to their perfect-and-spiritually-elite program. At least maybe none did until Thomas Merton went public in his quest to experience God, no matter what.
SPEAKING OF ASSUMPTIONS
One might assume that a long-time Trappist monk, one who's so committed to this path that he has taken monastic vows, would never dare to do something so outrageous as what Merton did. Compounding his outrageousness by writing so honestly.
Yet many people I've met, and maybe most people who have FIVE STAR-RATED this book, know the truth: When you love God more than anything or anyone, if you're on a beautiful path... after that has come to represent a dead end... You will sacrifice anything, anything.
How I loved this book!
Maybe it doesn't sound like a big deal: In the 1950's Merton began exploring Buddhism, especially Zen Buddhism.
But are you kidding? No Trappist is a hobbyist.
While active in the TM Movement, I was friends with P.M., still officially a Trappist but studying with the same Hindu monk who had become my guru, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.
Generally speaking Trappists don't add or subtract anything to their perfect-and-spiritually-elite program. At least maybe none did until Thomas Merton went public in his quest to experience God, no matter what.
SPEAKING OF ASSUMPTIONS
One might assume that a long-time Trappist monk, one who's so committed to this path that he has taken monastic vows, would never dare to do something so outrageous as what Merton did. Compounding his outrageousness by writing so honestly.
Yet many people I've met, and maybe most people who have FIVE STAR-RATED this book, know the truth: When you love God more than anything or anyone, if you're on a beautiful path... after that has come to represent a dead end... You will sacrifice anything, anything.
How I loved this book!
Read
April 18, 2015Reading Merton's autobiography almost tempts me to become a Catholic. As a Protestant, there are elements of Catholic theology that I could never affirm, but Merton, an excellent spokesman, gives the reader a sense of the aesthetic beauty and solemnity of the Catholic faith that us pragmatist Protestants sorely lack. We are casual and friendly with God where they are formal and filled with awe. There is probably a right balance in our response to God here, and Merton's book offered me the vicarious pleasure of receiving a communion with some sense of ritual gravity, or of reading the lives of saints that we can call our own.
Most of the book concerns Merton's life prior to entering Gethsemeni, a Trappist monastery. What is incredible about Merton is that his unbelieving life is sinful in only an average way, but his reaction to that life is to look on it with the dismissiveness a child might reserve for a broken toy. Though he doesn't put it in these exact terms, he finds sinfulness in the careless consumerism of American culture, in his own need to be recognized as a good writer, and in his own inherent laziness and aimlessness. It is refreshing to read a man so repentant over things that most of us would more or less take for granted. He did not, at least as he tells it, end up on drugs or with a million women. He was an ordinarily intelligent young man who realized that his life was a meaningless exercise in temporal existence without God.
Most of the book concerns Merton's life prior to entering Gethsemeni, a Trappist monastery. What is incredible about Merton is that his unbelieving life is sinful in only an average way, but his reaction to that life is to look on it with the dismissiveness a child might reserve for a broken toy. Though he doesn't put it in these exact terms, he finds sinfulness in the careless consumerism of American culture, in his own need to be recognized as a good writer, and in his own inherent laziness and aimlessness. It is refreshing to read a man so repentant over things that most of us would more or less take for granted. He did not, at least as he tells it, end up on drugs or with a million women. He was an ordinarily intelligent young man who realized that his life was a meaningless exercise in temporal existence without God.
February 15, 2023
Many years ago, one of my favorite literature professors talked incessantly about Thomas Merton. As a seeker, someone who loved studying comparable religion, mysticism, and the personal odysseys of others, I read this book and it absolutely pierced my heart.
This novel is NOT a religious novel, although it does talk about faith, community, friendships, hardships, love, loss, heartbreak, and a journey inward to find the path that had been his calling all along.
Every sentence is a song, yet not a difficult song to decipher and enjoy. Merton takes his readers on a shoulder to shoulder journey, with humility and an honorable kindness that is extremely precious.
If you enjoy reading beautiful literature- you will appreciate this novel. Regardless of if you are an atheist, an agnostic, a person who follows a religious path, or you are a spiritual soul unaffiliated with any one religion, your heart will crack open when reading Merton's masterpiece. All of his work is amazing. However, I have circled back to this novel over the years for different reasons.
I think quite often about the question all friends ask each other: If you could take a long walk and talk with someone who has passed away, who would you choose? I have a top ten list. Thomas Merton would absolutely be one of those ten people. I hope you thoroughly enjoy this as much as I have.
This novel is NOT a religious novel, although it does talk about faith, community, friendships, hardships, love, loss, heartbreak, and a journey inward to find the path that had been his calling all along.
Every sentence is a song, yet not a difficult song to decipher and enjoy. Merton takes his readers on a shoulder to shoulder journey, with humility and an honorable kindness that is extremely precious.
If you enjoy reading beautiful literature- you will appreciate this novel. Regardless of if you are an atheist, an agnostic, a person who follows a religious path, or you are a spiritual soul unaffiliated with any one religion, your heart will crack open when reading Merton's masterpiece. All of his work is amazing. However, I have circled back to this novel over the years for different reasons.
I think quite often about the question all friends ask each other: If you could take a long walk and talk with someone who has passed away, who would you choose? I have a top ten list. Thomas Merton would absolutely be one of those ten people. I hope you thoroughly enjoy this as much as I have.
September 25, 2018
Second Reading- The True Reading.
The first time I read this, I actually listened to an abridged audio version but didn't realize it was abridged. I am so glad I read this amazing autobiograhy! It is so inspiring and beautifully written.
This is a must read for anyone who loves the study of religion, personal testimonies, conversion stories and advice on how to live in this crazy world without losing your faith in God and humanity.
Thomas Merton lived in an Abbey just about 45min from my home so I grew up hearing about him. It wasn't until I was an adult though that I really began to study his writings.
The first time I read this, I actually listened to an abridged audio version but didn't realize it was abridged. I am so glad I read this amazing autobiograhy! It is so inspiring and beautifully written.
This is a must read for anyone who loves the study of religion, personal testimonies, conversion stories and advice on how to live in this crazy world without losing your faith in God and humanity.
Thomas Merton lived in an Abbey just about 45min from my home so I grew up hearing about him. It wasn't until I was an adult though that I really began to study his writings.
January 7, 2025
Impossible to understate the power and the importance of this 1948 book. Thomas Merton’s autobiography is not only the story of a flawed man who converted and decided to become a Trappist monk. It’s a crystal-clear look into our own soul, and above all, it asks a question: how can we integrate all the conflicting parts of ourselves? How can we make the fighter in us, the lover in us, the artist in us, the leader in us, the writer in us, the reader in us … how can we make them all coexist in peace?
The answer is a contemplative life. A very difficult life to live (even for a monk! As Thomas Merton explains) in these chaotic, empty, hyper-technological, disordered, stressful, immature, empty, always-too-busy, empty, empty, empty times.
The answer is a contemplative life. A very difficult life to live (even for a monk! As Thomas Merton explains) in these chaotic, empty, hyper-technological, disordered, stressful, immature, empty, always-too-busy, empty, empty, empty times.
October 20, 2009
Merton's quest for personal happiness leads him from a life of booze and women to a Trappist monastery. I read this book with an open mind, hoping that some of Merton's findings would translate into my own life. He abandons his secular life in favor of godly devotion, but along the way he trades analytical analysis for superstition, and logic for blind faith. He routinely blames saints and devils for mundane events in his life, and interprets the outcome of any situation to be a sign from God. Rather than convince me of the virtues of religious devotion, his book has left me feeling even more disallusioned and disappointed with organized religion.
May 31, 2009
Hugely disappointing. There were two main things about this book that turned me off:
First, I am irritated by the way that he seems to treat esoteric Catholic doctrines as clear and obvious, thus needing no explanation. For example, he presents Marian intercession as a universal principle that should be self-evident to any person capable of reason, despite the fact that (so far as I can tell) it has very little basis in Scripture and is not even a particularly important part of scholastic philosophy. Maybe this is a small thing, but I repeatedly found that Merton talked about his faith and beliefs in ways that did not make sense to me, and probably would not to anyone who was not already a Catholic. Perhaps this book is meant to, as they say, preach to the converted, but if so then that is a rather disappointingly narrow outlook.
Mostly, though, I had read this book because I hoped to read the words of a man who had found in his being a great affirmation. I wanted to hear him talk about beauty and joy and grace, and perhaps even holiness. Despite this dude's reputation as one of the preeminent religious figures of the 20th century, I found that his path to God seemed to have left him angry, bitter, self-righteous, and occasionally straight up mean. His whole heart seems consumed by a great rejection, and disgust, and ugliness, so that cloistering himself was the only way to escape. Leaving him with peace within four walls and a seething hatred for everything outside of them. And that is not what I am looking for.
First, I am irritated by the way that he seems to treat esoteric Catholic doctrines as clear and obvious, thus needing no explanation. For example, he presents Marian intercession as a universal principle that should be self-evident to any person capable of reason, despite the fact that (so far as I can tell) it has very little basis in Scripture and is not even a particularly important part of scholastic philosophy. Maybe this is a small thing, but I repeatedly found that Merton talked about his faith and beliefs in ways that did not make sense to me, and probably would not to anyone who was not already a Catholic. Perhaps this book is meant to, as they say, preach to the converted, but if so then that is a rather disappointingly narrow outlook.
Mostly, though, I had read this book because I hoped to read the words of a man who had found in his being a great affirmation. I wanted to hear him talk about beauty and joy and grace, and perhaps even holiness. Despite this dude's reputation as one of the preeminent religious figures of the 20th century, I found that his path to God seemed to have left him angry, bitter, self-righteous, and occasionally straight up mean. His whole heart seems consumed by a great rejection, and disgust, and ugliness, so that cloistering himself was the only way to escape. Leaving him with peace within four walls and a seething hatred for everything outside of them. And that is not what I am looking for.
April 24, 2023
This is the life story of Thomas Merton and how he came to the decision to enter a Trappist monastery and live a life of contemplation and religious work. It is one of those books that is modeled on the famous autobiography of St. Augustine, "The Confessions".
The first part of the book deals with Merton's youth, living in France and England. He lost his mother when he was very young. He and his father lived apart from the rest of his family often, with his younger brother and grandparents living back in the States. The middle section of the novel focuses on Merton's life after he moves back to the U.S. and his college work in New York City and later at St. Bonaventure, where he took a job as a professor teaching English. His conversion story is very gradual, as he feels the pulling of the Holy Spirit working on him to change his lifestyle from that of an intellectual to being someone who sees his life as a commitment to serving the Lord.
Merton shows us in this book that choices made to give over one's life in serving God are not always easily made. Merton struggled with being certain if this is what he should do. Even when he thought that he was doing God's will, he is turned away for a time from becoming a priest. This book was published in 1948 and shows a bit of the misunderstandings of the time between Catholics and Protestants, as Merton takes swipes at Protestant teaching and those who would follow them. To be fair to Merton, I have read that he later modified his antagonism towards Protestantism to a degree. I am reading through the 25 Essential Spiritual Classics, and this is one of them. It is interesting reading and I am glad that I read it, although I wouldn't say that it was a life changing work.
The first part of the book deals with Merton's youth, living in France and England. He lost his mother when he was very young. He and his father lived apart from the rest of his family often, with his younger brother and grandparents living back in the States. The middle section of the novel focuses on Merton's life after he moves back to the U.S. and his college work in New York City and later at St. Bonaventure, where he took a job as a professor teaching English. His conversion story is very gradual, as he feels the pulling of the Holy Spirit working on him to change his lifestyle from that of an intellectual to being someone who sees his life as a commitment to serving the Lord.
Merton shows us in this book that choices made to give over one's life in serving God are not always easily made. Merton struggled with being certain if this is what he should do. Even when he thought that he was doing God's will, he is turned away for a time from becoming a priest. This book was published in 1948 and shows a bit of the misunderstandings of the time between Catholics and Protestants, as Merton takes swipes at Protestant teaching and those who would follow them. To be fair to Merton, I have read that he later modified his antagonism towards Protestantism to a degree. I am reading through the 25 Essential Spiritual Classics, and this is one of them. It is interesting reading and I am glad that I read it, although I wouldn't say that it was a life changing work.
November 17, 2024
A decent and quick read
September 14, 2014
My first encounter with Thomas Merton (1915-1968). Orphan at the age of 16. Monk in the Trappist Abbey of Gethsemani in Kentucky, USA at the age of 26. This is his memoirs detailing the first half of his life when his family that originated in France had to move to England, Bermuda and United States. Born protestant, his parents were not avid followers of any religion, he got his first attraction to Catholicism by wandering around old deserted churches in France until his family moved to the US when he got enrolled in a Catholic university. The first part of his life had its highlight with the death of Merton's father from brain tumor.
Merton also had the talent in writing. Even at his young age, he thought that he would become an journalist instead of a religious person or a monk. In fact, the end part of the book detailed his day-to-day experience as a new monk. At this time, he was encourage by his abbot to compose his life story. The result is this book, his first. The Seven Storey Mountain came out in 1948 right after World War II and it became an instant hit because of the people's need to be inspired and reconnect with the spiritual beings torn by the savages and disillusionment brought about by the world war. This book was highly praised by notable Catholics Graham Greene, Evelyn Waugh, Clare Boothe Luce and Bishop Fulton J. Sheen who compared this to St. Augustine's Confessions (4 stars). Like Confessions, this has become one of the most widely read spiritual classics of all times.
Did I like the book? Yes. It is fascinating to know how an agnostic can turn into a contemplative monk. I am always interested to know how people can change religion into some kind of "awakening." More often than not, there is underlying reason: feeling of belonging (peer pressure) or pakikisama, just to be different or papansin, drama or para maiba lang, para mapagusapan or in an acquiantance's case, to despise his family whose members belong to different religions compared to him and that is because he secretly hates himself by failing them.
They say that God works in mysterious ways. Whatever is the reason for one's awakening, it is only God who knows what is our role here on earth. I know that this book has inspired many people to discover the Catholic faith or strengthen the faith of those who are steadfast to their belief.
This will not be my last Merton book. They say that this is only the beginning. One has to read his other works to appreciate how he evolved into a deeper spiritual mysticism.
Merton also had the talent in writing. Even at his young age, he thought that he would become an journalist instead of a religious person or a monk. In fact, the end part of the book detailed his day-to-day experience as a new monk. At this time, he was encourage by his abbot to compose his life story. The result is this book, his first. The Seven Storey Mountain came out in 1948 right after World War II and it became an instant hit because of the people's need to be inspired and reconnect with the spiritual beings torn by the savages and disillusionment brought about by the world war. This book was highly praised by notable Catholics Graham Greene, Evelyn Waugh, Clare Boothe Luce and Bishop Fulton J. Sheen who compared this to St. Augustine's Confessions (4 stars). Like Confessions, this has become one of the most widely read spiritual classics of all times.
Did I like the book? Yes. It is fascinating to know how an agnostic can turn into a contemplative monk. I am always interested to know how people can change religion into some kind of "awakening." More often than not, there is underlying reason: feeling of belonging (peer pressure) or pakikisama, just to be different or papansin, drama or para maiba lang, para mapagusapan or in an acquiantance's case, to despise his family whose members belong to different religions compared to him and that is because he secretly hates himself by failing them.
They say that God works in mysterious ways. Whatever is the reason for one's awakening, it is only God who knows what is our role here on earth. I know that this book has inspired many people to discover the Catholic faith or strengthen the faith of those who are steadfast to their belief.
This will not be my last Merton book. They say that this is only the beginning. One has to read his other works to appreciate how he evolved into a deeper spiritual mysticism.
June 24, 2022
Truly one of the greatest Christian autobiographies of the twentieth century. There some eye-rolling swipes at Protestantism typical of Catholic converts (which I am told he repudiates in later editions) but much more than that there are rich contemplations on God's ways with the human heart. Surprisingly little of the autobiography takes place after Thomas Merton's entrance into the life of a religious.
April 24, 2021
Wonderful.
April 21, 2019
#CathLit2019 - A Spiritual Memoir
I was really surprised at how much I loved this book. I was drawn into the details of Merton's life and conversion from the very first page, and I found it impossible to put the book down. I love the way he incorporates observations about the Holy Spirit's influence in his life throughout the biographical sections of text, and his sincerity in trying to discern his true vocation.
Since finishing the book, I have learned (from my current read, The Life You Save May Be Your Own: An American Pilgrimage) that the Trappist censors kept some key information out of The Seven Storey Mountain, which Merton had originally included. Once I understood what was removed from the book, certain odd moments of his story made a lot more sense to me. Though the story of his conversion is powerful as written, I don't think it's a good idea to rely solely on this book to gain a good understanding of who this man was as a human being, or as a Catholic, since a very serious misstep on his part is not included.
Overall, though, this was everything I could have asked for in a spiritual autobiography, and I found it to be inspiring reading for the Lenten season.
I was really surprised at how much I loved this book. I was drawn into the details of Merton's life and conversion from the very first page, and I found it impossible to put the book down. I love the way he incorporates observations about the Holy Spirit's influence in his life throughout the biographical sections of text, and his sincerity in trying to discern his true vocation.
Since finishing the book, I have learned (from my current read, The Life You Save May Be Your Own: An American Pilgrimage) that the Trappist censors kept some key information out of The Seven Storey Mountain, which Merton had originally included. Once I understood what was removed from the book, certain odd moments of his story made a lot more sense to me. Though the story of his conversion is powerful as written, I don't think it's a good idea to rely solely on this book to gain a good understanding of who this man was as a human being, or as a Catholic, since a very serious misstep on his part is not included.
Overall, though, this was everything I could have asked for in a spiritual autobiography, and I found it to be inspiring reading for the Lenten season.
June 22, 2014
It's probably a sin to cast aspersions on the writings of a monk, but I get the feeling Merton would have had a few things to say about my spiritual failings. Like so many people who are called to a religious life, Merton spends almost as much time judging others as he does himself, and compassion isn't one of his virtues. I had heard that he was first rejected from the priesthood because he fathered a child, and I kept waiting for that part of the story--he must have felt love and affection for someone at some point--but it turns out that his superiors censored many of the "worldly" details. The result is a long, monotonous slog (okay, honest: skimmed) through Merton's "wasted youth," but with little explanation of what was so terrible about it, beyond his self-absorption. Merton's search for meaning was what kept me reading, though. I wanted him to find peace in the end. Even in the monastery, he can't help finding fault with the other novitiates. He really does loves God. His fellow man, not so much.
May 3, 2019
I didn’t like it but I respect the real conversion of Thomas Merton. Sometimes is confusing the way he explains things. I guess I will never read it again
June 6, 2022
With clear, beautiful, honest language, and set amid the wars of the early twentieth century, a deeply affecting account of one man's spiritual journey.
January 30, 2022
I loved this book, and I honestly expected to be bored silly by it. I'm so happy to be wrong. Reading this reminds me how much I love a well-written memoir. I read a lot more memoirs in my 20s and somehow I've fallen off reading them in recent years. Merton's writing is so good, his voice so distinct. The narrative flows along so effortlessly and compellingly. There's a quality to a well-written memoir that I don't know how to describe. It's a feeling I get, a kind of joy to be in the hands of an author who can write so deeply and feelingly and cogently of his or her own life story. There's mystery, too, in how one idiosyncratic life (Merton's) can speak into the lives of any number of idiosyncratic individuals who read his memoir. It's the beauty of the particularity and yet the commonality of each human life.
Another thing I loved about Merton is how serious he is about God's grace as a vital and active force in the world and in individual lives. Merton's parents both died when he was relatively young, and he had an incredibly periapetetic life, really until he settled into the monastery in his late 20s. It makes for fascinating reading (especially when he writes about France, oh, I loved those sections!), but it really did a number on Merton's soul. He is really hard on himself about how lost he was, and I believe it. He could have ended up in some scary places, spiritually and physically.
This makes his story of converting to Christianity and to Catholicism specifically all the more powerful--it was a homecoming and gave him a profound sense of being at peace in the world and in his own self. It's lovely to read about his very gradual transformation from a wandering boy and young man to a Christian with a vocation to be a monk who takes on vows of stability, poverty, silence. He is very aware of the thread of grace in his life that was ever-present, drawing him slowly but surely to the embrace of Love. Reading this reminded me so much of Brideshead Revisited and The End of the Affair, both written by Catholic writers who share Merton's powerful understanding of grace. I feel that my own view of grace is impoverished and has been bolstered by reading this work. In a world that is often sick at heart, believing that God's redemptive work is the most powerful force at work in the world takes faith, a leap into darkness to find that "even darkness is not dark to You".
Reading this in January was a special grace to me personally since January 2022 is the 13th anniversary of a three-week monastic retreat I took during Jan Term in college at Tall Timber Lodge near Leavenworth, Washington. We studied the history of Christian spirituality with a theology professor named Jerry Sittser, which has sparked so many things in my life of faith, including joy in reading the work of men and women of faith who have lived before us. There is such richness to be found here, and I know this first reading of Merton's work is only the beginning for me.
Another thing I loved about Merton is how serious he is about God's grace as a vital and active force in the world and in individual lives. Merton's parents both died when he was relatively young, and he had an incredibly periapetetic life, really until he settled into the monastery in his late 20s. It makes for fascinating reading (especially when he writes about France, oh, I loved those sections!), but it really did a number on Merton's soul. He is really hard on himself about how lost he was, and I believe it. He could have ended up in some scary places, spiritually and physically.
This makes his story of converting to Christianity and to Catholicism specifically all the more powerful--it was a homecoming and gave him a profound sense of being at peace in the world and in his own self. It's lovely to read about his very gradual transformation from a wandering boy and young man to a Christian with a vocation to be a monk who takes on vows of stability, poverty, silence. He is very aware of the thread of grace in his life that was ever-present, drawing him slowly but surely to the embrace of Love. Reading this reminded me so much of Brideshead Revisited and The End of the Affair, both written by Catholic writers who share Merton's powerful understanding of grace. I feel that my own view of grace is impoverished and has been bolstered by reading this work. In a world that is often sick at heart, believing that God's redemptive work is the most powerful force at work in the world takes faith, a leap into darkness to find that "even darkness is not dark to You".
Reading this in January was a special grace to me personally since January 2022 is the 13th anniversary of a three-week monastic retreat I took during Jan Term in college at Tall Timber Lodge near Leavenworth, Washington. We studied the history of Christian spirituality with a theology professor named Jerry Sittser, which has sparked so many things in my life of faith, including joy in reading the work of men and women of faith who have lived before us. There is such richness to be found here, and I know this first reading of Merton's work is only the beginning for me.
November 19, 2020
The Seven Storey Mountain is the telling of Merton's conversion against the backdrop of the Depression and World War II. It is honest, deeply human, and moving. A true classic.
May 5, 2017
There is so much to be gained from this book. I will need to read it again.
January 6, 2008
(from notes in my journal, Nov. 9, 2007)
Why did I wait so long to read Thomas Merton? I've known so many fans of his work and had so many opportunities to get to know him. In my mid-twenties I lived for a few years in Lexington, Kentucky, just about an hour from Gethsemani, the Trappist monastery where Merton spent the second half of his life. I had a lover who made regular pilgrimages and once brought me seeds from Merton's garden, carefully folded inside a dollar bill. But I never visited Gethesmani myself, and in all these years I'd never even opened one of Merton's books.
Tonight I started "The Seven-Storey Mountain," because it was assigned for class next week. Merton is a philosopher as well as a damn good writer, and his reflections are vivid, complex, and rich.
Why did I wait so long to read Thomas Merton? I've known so many fans of his work and had so many opportunities to get to know him. In my mid-twenties I lived for a few years in Lexington, Kentucky, just about an hour from Gethsemani, the Trappist monastery where Merton spent the second half of his life. I had a lover who made regular pilgrimages and brought me seeds from Merton's garden, carefully folded inside a dollar bill. But I never visited Gethesmani myself, and in all these years I'd never even opened one of Merton's books.
Tonight I started "The Seven-Storey Mountain," because it was assigned for class next week. We've gone through several major spiritual autobiographies (Thoreau, King, Gandhi, Day) They've all been fascinating, but none were written with such skill and power as this one. Merton is a philosopher as well as a damn good writer, and his reflections are vivid, complex, and rich.
I was a bit disappointed that young the Merton in this work is not much like the older ecumenist and peace activist of the 1960s. I'm perplexed by any spiritual quest (and there are so many) that lead through renunciation or retreat from the world. I'm also not able to wrap my brain around the ideas of original sin and the need for salvation. But if I try to empathize with Merton and understand his journey within his world-view, there's a lot to be gained from this early autobiography.
A passage that hit me with particular force is Merton's adult explanation of his youthful scorn for his adoring little brother, who followed him everywhere only to be dismissed and rejected.
"And in a sense, this terrible situation is the pattern and prototype of all sin: the deliberate and formal will to reject disinterested love for us purely for the arbitrary reason that we simply do not want it. We will to separate ourselves from that love. We reject it entirely and absolutely, and will not acknowledge it, simply because it does not please us to be loved. Perhaps the inner motive is that the fact of being loved disinterestedly reminds us that we all need love from others, and depend upon the charity of others to carry on our own lives. And we refuse love, and reject society, in so far as it seems, in our own perverse imagination, to imply some obscure kind of humiliation." (p. 26, Harcourt Brace ed.)
I'm no Christian, and certainly no monastic, but I do recognize myself in this description. By this definition, I'm a huge sinner. I've had a long habit of refusing love, perhaps more often when I was younger, but I still do it now. Simply because it does not please me to be loved. And probably even more because of my aversion to that "obscure kind of humiliation."
Recently I've been treated to the terrifying experience of loving deeply and fearing that I will be rejected. In a way it would be only fair. But so far my love has been welcomed and returned. It's a kind of beautiful agony to be suspended in mutual love, feeling joyful and vulnerable at the same time. It's a profound form of dependence, but rather than leaving one impoverished, it is immensely enriching.
Why did I wait so long to read Thomas Merton? I've known so many fans of his work and had so many opportunities to get to know him. In my mid-twenties I lived for a few years in Lexington, Kentucky, just about an hour from Gethsemani, the Trappist monastery where Merton spent the second half of his life. I had a lover who made regular pilgrimages and once brought me seeds from Merton's garden, carefully folded inside a dollar bill. But I never visited Gethesmani myself, and in all these years I'd never even opened one of Merton's books.
Tonight I started "The Seven-Storey Mountain," because it was assigned for class next week. Merton is a philosopher as well as a damn good writer, and his reflections are vivid, complex, and rich.
Why did I wait so long to read Thomas Merton? I've known so many fans of his work and had so many opportunities to get to know him. In my mid-twenties I lived for a few years in Lexington, Kentucky, just about an hour from Gethsemani, the Trappist monastery where Merton spent the second half of his life. I had a lover who made regular pilgrimages and brought me seeds from Merton's garden, carefully folded inside a dollar bill. But I never visited Gethesmani myself, and in all these years I'd never even opened one of Merton's books.
Tonight I started "The Seven-Storey Mountain," because it was assigned for class next week. We've gone through several major spiritual autobiographies (Thoreau, King, Gandhi, Day) They've all been fascinating, but none were written with such skill and power as this one. Merton is a philosopher as well as a damn good writer, and his reflections are vivid, complex, and rich.
I was a bit disappointed that young the Merton in this work is not much like the older ecumenist and peace activist of the 1960s. I'm perplexed by any spiritual quest (and there are so many) that lead through renunciation or retreat from the world. I'm also not able to wrap my brain around the ideas of original sin and the need for salvation. But if I try to empathize with Merton and understand his journey within his world-view, there's a lot to be gained from this early autobiography.
A passage that hit me with particular force is Merton's adult explanation of his youthful scorn for his adoring little brother, who followed him everywhere only to be dismissed and rejected.
"And in a sense, this terrible situation is the pattern and prototype of all sin: the deliberate and formal will to reject disinterested love for us purely for the arbitrary reason that we simply do not want it. We will to separate ourselves from that love. We reject it entirely and absolutely, and will not acknowledge it, simply because it does not please us to be loved. Perhaps the inner motive is that the fact of being loved disinterestedly reminds us that we all need love from others, and depend upon the charity of others to carry on our own lives. And we refuse love, and reject society, in so far as it seems, in our own perverse imagination, to imply some obscure kind of humiliation." (p. 26, Harcourt Brace ed.)
I'm no Christian, and certainly no monastic, but I do recognize myself in this description. By this definition, I'm a huge sinner. I've had a long habit of refusing love, perhaps more often when I was younger, but I still do it now. Simply because it does not please me to be loved. And probably even more because of my aversion to that "obscure kind of humiliation."
Recently I've been treated to the terrifying experience of loving deeply and fearing that I will be rejected. In a way it would be only fair. But so far my love has been welcomed and returned. It's a kind of beautiful agony to be suspended in mutual love, feeling joyful and vulnerable at the same time. It's a profound form of dependence, but rather than leaving one impoverished, it is immensely enriching.
August 3, 2009
This book came highly recommended but I can't recommend it in turn. Maybe if you skip forward to page 225 or so, when he's baptized and starts dithering about whether to enter a monastery. As someone who's never been at all interested in any sort of life of institutionalized contemplation, that part's pretty interesting. The first half of the book, though, is much too much like talking to an angsty teenager who insists on telling you about how "weird" and "crazy" he is when it's obvious to any casual observer that his real issues come from the fact that he is painfully normal.
May 23, 2019
I think I expected much more relatable spiritual insights than this book ended up providing. While the writing is in many places fabulous, it’s also extremely wordy and overwrought at times. While I appreciated his spiritual questioning and insight, the narrative didn’t feel as if it went far enough at times, and what must have been taken out might have met that need. While I don’t want to judge the work on what choices Merton made later in life, I’m wondering if this book “spoke” more to previous generations, and might not be the timeless classic those generations believed it to be.
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