CHAPTER 1
THE BEAUTY OF HOLINESS[1]”
O Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.”
Psalm 96:9
* * * *
In the springtime of impressionable youth, I lived with my family in southwestern Oregon, where we attended a small church whose members were committed to the perfectionist persuasion that had emerged from the American Wesleyan movement. On the wall just behind the platform was a lovely banner, painted by my artistic father, which carried the words of the Psalmist, “O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.” Those words, so beautifully inscribed, remain yet in my deepest consciousness and impel me in the effort better to understand and appreciate their meaning in a day so far removed from an earlier time in my religious life.
The expression, “the beauty of holiness,” occurs in several places in the Psalms, as well as in the Chronicles. These latter works, drawn from the Psalms, paint a picture of the past as a way of conveying an Hebraic philosophy of history. But the original inspiration of the expression is found peculiarly in the Psalms.
Psalm 29:2 reads: “Give unto the Lord the glory due unto his name; worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.” The same thought is found in Psalm 96:8-9. After the “families of the people” are enjoined to “give unto the Lord the glory due unto his name,” they are called to worship “in the beauty of holiness.” Psalm 110:3 employs the plural, “the beauties of holiness”: “Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power, in the beauties of holiness from the womb of the morning: thou hast the dew of thy youth.”
In all of this lovely, and significant, poetry, not only are the ideas of holiness and beauty associated together; these are also associated with the idea of glory, along with other kindred ideas of strength, honor and majesty.
Now the expression “beauty of holiness” (behadrath kodesh), which is found both in Psalm 29:2 and Psalm 96:9, means literally “holy array.” Thus Adam Clarke translates Psalm 29:2 as holy ornaments, and Psalm 96:9 as the beautiful garments of holiness. The plural form, “the beauties of holiness,” as found in Psalm 110:3, is behadrey kodesh, which Clarke translates as the splendid garments of holiness.
All of these passages allude to the sacerdotal garments that the High Priest wore in carrying out his ministrations. They were given to him for beauty and glory‑-qualities indispensable in the high priestly function of intercession before the Divine Majesty. Now there is the question of the contemporary meaning of the ancient association of the ideas of holiness and beauty. What is the significance of “the beauty of holiness” for the Christian today? And how may that significance be ascertained?
Some progress has been made already in the direction of an answer to these questions. The terms used in these verses are, of course, Hebrew terms. “Holy array” is array that exudes beauty and glory. There is thus a certain justification for reading the original expression, “holy array,” as “beauty of holiness,” since the holy array is, inevitably, also splendid and beautiful.
Among biblical scholars there is some disagreement as to whether or not the root-idea of the term “holiness,” or kodesh, is negative or positive. The term may be associated with the Sumerian kadistu, which means “free from defect.” On this interpretation the term is connected with sacrifice, and connotes separateness‑-the separateness of the sacrificial offering, thus its holiness. The view that the term is positive is supported by the suggestion that the term is derived from a root that is kindred to “newness,” hadhash. What “newness” may connote is the uniqueness of essential character‑-the character of fresh, vital, self-contained purity. On this reading, holiness is “that which belongs to God and is devoted to God.”
Regardless of the origin of the word, the Old Testament fixes the usage of the term: it means “separateness” as the basis of relation to God. And this because God’s separateness is, positively, God’s uniqueness. God’s holiness is His divinity. God is holy because He is God. Thus God’s separateness, as His uniqueness, requires of us a comparable separateness in our service before Him.
Now why is holiness beautiful? How can “holy array” be properly translated as “beauty of holiness?” What legitimizes the association of holiness, as separateness, with beauty? The fact that the term “glory” is used by the Psalmist as that which is appropriate to God’s name is significant. The term “glory” is kebob, which means “splendor,” “excellence.” Coming back to the ritual meaning of the passages, then, we have this: the holiness, or the separateness and uniqueness of God, is the ground of that glory, or splendor and excellence, which is due unto his name. Or put somewhat differently, although with the same import, the glory of God is His disclosed holiness. And it is the comparable holiness, or separateness, of the people of God that confers upon them a splendor and excellence, a glory, which shines forth with beauty. So it is, then, with justification that “holy array” is also “the beauty of holiness.”
If we look at the question from a more contemporary point of view, however, what we find is this: the expression “the beauty of holiness” associates together two quite distinct ideas, the moral idea of holiness and the aesthetic idea of beauty. What, now, is meant by bringing two such seemingly divergent categories, the moral and the aesthetic, into union? More precisely, what is there about the category of the aesthetic, of the idea of the beautiful, that permits the qualification, or characterization, of the moral quality of holiness as possessing the aesthetic quality of beauty? We have thus far shown that the root meanings of the ancient Hebrew notions support this association, but can we look to more contemporary considerations to lend further support to this association? That is our present question.
It is helpful, first, to consider the term “holiness” with respect to its moral connotation. And it is instructive at this juncture to look into the writings of Wesley, whose writings contain a great deal of discussion of this particular subject.
There are, Wesley writes (Sermon CXXXIV, vii. 455-56)[2], two branches of holiness: negative and positive. Thus,
All the Liturgy of the Church is full of petitions for that holiness without which, the Scripture everywhere declares, no man shall see the Lord. And these are summed up in those comprehensive words which we are supposed to be so frequently repeating: “Cleanse the thoughts of your hearts by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love thee, and worthily magnify thy holy name.” It is evident that in the last clause of this petition, all outward holiness is contained: Neither can it be carried to a greater height, or expressed in stronger terms. And those words, “Cleanse the thoughts of your hearts,” contain the negative branch of inward holiness; the height and depth of which is purity of heart, by the inspiration of God’s Holy Spirit. The remaining words, “that we may perfectly love thee,” contain the positive part of holiness; seeing this love, which is the fulfilling of the law, implies the whole mind that was in Christ.
It may be well, at this point, to say something concerning Wesley’s view as to how inward holiness is obtained. The “holiness movement” of the 19th and up into the 20th centuries, at least certain aspects of that movement, stressed the instantaneous obtainment of holiness. In placing such absolute stress upon instantaneous sanctification, a certain artificiality came to characterize the doctrine of holiness.
Wesley is clear that justification and sanctification are distinct works of grace. In the preface of his second volume of hymns, he wrote:
- Neither, therefore, dare we affirm (as some have done) that this full salvation is at once given to true believers. There is, indeed, an instantaneous (as well as a gradual) work of God done in the souls of his children; and there wants not, we know, a cloud of witnesses, who have received, in one moment, either a clear sense of forgiveness of their sins, or the abiding witness of the Holy Spirit. But we do not know a single instance, in any place, of a person’s receiving, in one and the same moment, remission of sins, the abiding witness of the Spirit, and a new, a clean heart (xiv. 326).
Yet the distinctness of the two experiences, justification and sanctification, does not signify, for Wesley, that sanctification is wholly instantaneous. It has, to be sure, an instantaneous phase, but this along with its gradual phase. Sanctification begins with justification, proceeds in a line of development, but then, at some time, is brought to qualitative completion in an instantaneous bestowal of the Holy Spirit, and then, further, progresses, quantitatively, throughout life. All this is clearly and unmistakably set forth in Sermon LXXXV (vi. 509):
- Afterwards we experience the proper Christian salvation; whereby, “through grace,” we “are saved by faith;” consisting of those two grand branches, justification and sanctification. By justification we are saved from the guilt of sin, and restored to the favour of God; by sanctification we are saved from the power and root of sin, and restored to the image of God. All experience, as well as Scripture, shows this salvation to be both instantaneous and gradual. It begins the moment we are justified, in the holy, humble, gentle, patient love of God and man. It gradually increases from that moment, as “a grain of mustard-seed, which, at first, is the least of all seeds,” but afterwards puts forth large branches, and becomes a great tree; till, in another instant, the heart is cleansed from all sin, and filled with the pure love to God and man. But even that love increases more and more, till we “grow up in all things into Him that is our Head;” till we attain “the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.”
This passage, too, points up the negative and positive aspects of inward holiness. The negative aspect is stated in the phrase, “the heart is cleansed from all sin.” The positive aspect is found in the words, “filled with the pure love to God and man.”
It is the positive aspect, as Wesley defined it, which is particularly important in our developing the association of holiness with beauty. Several further references to Wesley are helpful at this point. In his Journal of Thursday, September 13, 1739 (i. 225), he wrote:
“I believe it [sanctification (or holiness)] to be an inward thing, namely, the life of God in the soul of man; a participation of the divine nature; the mind that was in Christ; or the renewal of our heart, after the image of Him that created us.
Throughout his writings there are other phrases that express the same idea of inward holiness: “the image of God stamped on the heart” (iii. 341), “the renewal of the soul ‘in the image of God wherein it was created'” (vii. 316). From inward holiness springs outward holiness: “perfection is another name for universal holiness: Inward and outward righteousness: Holiness of life, arising from holiness of heart” (vi. 414). “In a word, holiness is the having ‘the mind that was in Christ,’ and the ‘walking as Christ walked'” (vii. 317).
Now there are passages in Wesley in which he characterizes the content of positive holiness. It embraces, he said, “every holy and heavenly temper‑-in particular, lowliness, meekness, gentleness, temperance, and longsuffering” (vii. 316). In the Extract from the Difference between the Moravians and the Methodists, he wrote:
Scriptural holiness is the image of God; the mind which was in Christ; the love of God and man; lowliness, gentleness, temperance, patience, chastity (x. 203).
And, referring to Paul’s words to the Galatians, Wesley further listed the qualities of inward holiness: “It is the one undivided fruit of the Spirit, which he describes thus: ‘The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, fidelity (so the word should be translated here), meekness, temperance'” (vi. 413).
Immediately following the reference to Galatians, Wesley went on to say:
What a glorious constellation of graces is here! Now, suppose all these to be knit together in one, to be united together in the soul of a believer, this is Christian perfection (vi. 413-14).
In Sermon XXIV (v. 294-95), Wesley used the expression, concerning which we are particularly concerned in this discussion, “the beauty of holiness.” He wrote:
- The beauty of holiness, of that inward man of the heart which is renewed after the image of God . . . . The ornament of a meek, humble, loving spirit . . . . This inward religion bears the shape of God so visibly impressed upon it . . . . We may say of this, in a secondary sense, even as the Son of God himself, that it is the “brightness of his glory, the express image of his person;” . . . “the beaming forth of his” eternal “glory;” and yet so tempered and softened, that even the children of men may herein see God and live; . . . “the character, the stamp, the living impression of his person,” who is the fountain of beauty and love, the original source of all excellency and perfection.
Wesley encouraged others to testify to the obtainment of Christian perfection, and the Journal records many instances in which they professed the experience. But he was disinclined to reveal matters concerning his own religious life. Yet there are occasions when he did so. In 1725, at the age of twenty-two, Wesley read Jeremy Taylor’s discussion of purity of intention. Forty years later he wrote in his Journal, May 14, 1765, of the profound impact Taylor’s discussion made upon him:
I was struck particularly with the chapter upon intention, and felt a fixed intention ‘to give myself up to God.’ In this I was much confirmed soon after by the ‘Christian Pattern,’ and longed to give God all my heart. This is just what I mean by Perfection now: I sought after it from that hour.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
In 1730 I began to be homo unius libri [a man of one book]; to study (comparatively) no book but the Bible. I then saw, in a stronger light than ever before, that only one thing is needful, even faith that worketh by the love of God and man, all inward and outer holiness; and I groaned to love God with all my heart, and to serve Him with all my strength (iii. 212-13).
The question is now raised as to whether Wesley himself reached the experience that he sought. Is there any indication in his writings that he found “the Great Salvation?”
Dr. Olin Curtis believes that he has found the passage in the Journal where Wesley records his own obtainment of Christian perfection. In the Journal entry of December 23-25, 1744, Wesley writes:
Sun. 23.–I was unusually lifeless and heavy, till the love feast in the evening . . . .
Yet the next day [December 24] I was again as a dead man; but in the evening, while I was reading Prayers at Snowsfield, I found such light and strength as I never remember to have had before. I saw every thought, as well as action or word, just as it was rising in my heart; and whether it was right before God, or tainted with pride and selfishness. I never knew before (I mean not as at this time) what it was “to be still before God.”
Tues. 25.–I waked, by the grace of God, in the same spirit; and about eight, being with two or three that believed in Jesus, I felt such an awe and tender sense of the presence of God as greatly confirmed me therein: So that God was before me all the day long. I sought and found him in every place; and could truly say, when I lay down at night, “Now I have lived a day” (i. 478-79).
Dr. Curtis sums up the subject:
To anyone familiar with John Wesley’s careful, realistic manner of speech, it is evident that we have here the same sort of testimony to the experience of holiness that we have in his Journal, May 24, 1738, to the experience of conversion. If the one is not quite so near a full definition as the other, it surely is just as expressive of the fact. I find it almost impossible to read Wesley’s words in the light of all his later utterance about the doctrine of Christian perfection, and not consider this date, December 24, 1744, as the probable time when he began to love God supremely.[3]
Viewed from the side of the term “holiness,” which is one of the terms in the title of this discussion, we are now in a position to grasp the import of the association of the idea of holiness with the idea of beauty. The beauty of holiness, as Wesley himself suggested, consists in the “glorious constellation of graces,” their being “knit together in one, . . . united together.” Christian perfection is the harmony of the graces of inward holiness. It now remains, to complete this study, to view the association of holiness and beauty from the viewpoint of beauty. What is there in the idea of beauty that serves properly to characterize holiness as beauty?
Although none is employed in the passages in the Psalms that we have considered above, the Hebrew vocabulary does contain words that are properly translated as “beauty.” Thus, in Psalm 27:4:
One thing have I desired of the Lord, that I will seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to enquire in his temple.
And in Psalm 50:2,
Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined.
The word “beauty” in Psalm 27:4 is no`am, which means agreeableness, and, by implication, delight, suitableness, splendor, or grace. It can also be translated as “pleasantness.” The word has its root in nawame, which means to be agreeable. This particular form of the term “beauty” is appropriately used in the Psalm, since here beauty‑-the beauty of the Lord‑-is the object of our desire and is thus suited to that desire agreeably. Thus we find delight in the Lord.
But in Psalm 50:2 the word “beauty” is yofee, which is translated simply as “beauty.” The word is derived from the primitive root yawfaw, which means to be bright. And, it may be readily seen, it is the appropriate word in this Psalm, since the reference is to the shining forth of the Lord.
Thus, in terms of these two forms of the term “beauty,” the Old Testament sense of beauty is agreeableness, or pleasantness, and brightness.
We are now at the place where we may approach the question of beauty from the viewpoint of aesthetic theory. And here caution is well-advised. First, care must be taken not to force a contemporary aesthetic theory, in an ad hoc fashion, upon the biblical expression. To do this is but to come up with something artificial and thus irrelevant to the tenor of the ancient literature. Second, there is‑-as is the case with most of the things that occupy philosophers‑-no agreement upon an aesthetic theory. That is, there are varied and even radically differing views as to the nature of beauty.
Aesthetic theories are, usually, arrived at on the basis of an already-held theory of reality. A given philosopher will develop a theory of beauty based upon his theory as to the nature of things. For example, Etienne Gilson’s theory of beauty is founded upon the philosophy of Aquinas, and through Aquinas goes back to Aristotle. A philosophical naturalism, as in George Santayana, is developed as the basis for a quite different theory of beauty.
Now it seems to me that one cannot proceed in this fashion. Thus, the question is raised as to just how is it that one can come up with an aesthetic theory that does not depend upon a given metaphysical prejudice. Is an alternative possible?
There is, I think, such an alternative. The alternative comes to view when we raise the question, from the standpoint of our human experience of beauty and art, as to what that experience evidently is and involves. We know this for sure: we do experience beauty, both beauty in nature and beauty in the creation and response to art.
We will narrow our investigation to the sphere of beauty in art. This will, it is hoped, give us a platform upon which to come to some understanding of beauty, not only in art, but in nature. Since, now, the majority of us are not artists who create the art object, we will have to begin at the only point where we have the requisite acquaintance with the aesthetic sphere; and that is the response to beauty in art.
We respond to many stimuli. In the process of everyday living, this response is carried out, in the main, through what are called signs. Some datum of perceptual experience, for example, is named, taken as a sign for some further datum of experience, acted upon with either agreeable or disagreeable results. The tissue of our perceptual experiences, the connections among them in which some signify others, is the makeup of our practical living.
The same sort of sign-function is at work at the level of theory and science. A theoretical construct, or scientific concept, has meaning because it refers to some aspect of the world. The reference can be put to an appropriate test and be verified, if, that is, the reference does indeed hold.
Now this characteristic of both the perceptual and cognitive‑-in the sense of scientific‑-consciousness is what is known as transitive. By that term it is meant that the sign, whether a perceptual item or a conceptual item, points to something beyond its own occurrence in consciousness, refers to something else transcendent to it.
The response to beauty is wholly unlike the response to a sign, either as perceptual or conceptual sign. In the response to beauty, as in a work of art, the response is locked into the beautiful object. One’s attention is fixed upon the beauty that is beheld, and thus does not move away to something else‑-as an emotion or some happening in the real world–,does not take the beauty as a sign for something outside of that beauty itself. In sum, the response to beauty is what is known as intransitive.
This brief description of the aesthetic response, the response to beauty, raises the question, it will be readily seen, as to just what there is about beauty, as in a work of art, which causes this unique kind of response, this intransitive response, that focuses its attention in an all-consuming fashion upon the object of beauty. Or, to pick up on the language of the Psalms, what is it about beauty that is responsible for that absorption of consciousness in which delight is taken in the brilliance of beauty in and for itself?
There are two, inseparable, elements of a work of art; hence, there are two inseparable elements in artistic beauty. These are form and content. An adequate theory of art must do justice to both of these elements; must not overemphasize one at the neglect of the other.
Thus art is about something. There is a material content that is contained in the art object. In music, for example, there is sensuous, and pleasing, sound. In a poem there is some reference to an element of the experienced world.
But there is also the element of form. In music, again, the sensuous sound is organized, patterned, so that, for example, a symphony is developed, in the organization of which the complex of sound moves through phases of fulfillment and completion. And in a poem the material of experience is expressed through the forms of cadence and rhythm.
What occurs, now, is that in the art object both the content and the form are changed from what they are outside of that object of beauty. The form is not now the abstract form of logic or mathematics, and the content is not now the content of actual experience. In the grip of beauty, the form is transformed and the content is transubstantiated. We can, to be sure, state what, e.g., a poem is about, or paraphrase the poem, but in so doing we miss the content that is within the language of the poem. Ordinary and scientific language is transparent, the object meant comes through the language. For example, a scientific statement can be made in many different languages and the same content, or meaning, is disclosed without any loss. Here the object meant is independent of the language and thus comes through the language. The content of the poem, what the poem, as a poem, is about, however, is not something that exists independently of the poetic language. On the contrary, poetic content exists, exclusively, within the language, with the result that something of the meaning of a poem is lost in the attempt to translate the poetic language. Poetic language is untranslatable. Poetic language is thus opaque. The meanings and values that the poem carries are disclosed in the language of the poem. This restriction of poetic content to the language of the poem is the result of the organic fusion of form and content, which, as we have observed, is characteristic of all art. Immanent meaning rules the art object in the fusion of form and content.
It may be helpful to give a couple of illustrations of the immanent meaning of a poem, resulting from the organic fusion of form and content.
Take the statement: “I love you and always shall.” This statement asserts a subject matter, that of pledged love. This subject matter, as we have just done, can be asserted in a factual statement. The factual statement is the paraphrase. But now the poetry:
As fair as thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in love am I;
And I will love thee still, my dear
Till a’ the seas gang dry.
What the poem is about, now, is different from what can be stated propositionally. The choice of words, their organization, yield something entirely new. In contrast to the words of the paraphrase, the logical proposition, “the words of the poem . . . are handled for their own sakes, and with that strangeness which enters into the proportion of beauty.”[4]
In the book of Ruth, Ruth expresses the devotion of an alien daughter to her husband’s mother. This subject matter, too, can be stated in the form of a factual proposition. But how different is the poetic content:
And Ruth said, Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God: where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: the Lord do so to me, and more, if aught but death part thee and me (Ruth 1:16-17).
In these lines the emotion of love overflows into a perfection of words beyond description in other terms.
The organizing principles that are at work with subject matter, or content, are those of harmony, balance, and centrality. Harmony, which achieves unity by recurrence and complex unification of temporal and spatial items, is especially significant in the temporal arts, as music. Balance achieves unity by contrast, by a close and complex juxtaposition of similar and dissimilar items, especially spatial items. It is particularly important in painting. The combination of harmony and balance yields rhythm. Centrality obtains when items are so arranged in a complex that one item, or group of items, dominates the others. It is these principles, then, that work up the content of experience into beauty, the meaning of which is immanent in the object of beauty and which is beheld intransitively for the sake of beauty itself.
Beauty then, whether created or natural, obtains as the order and unification of the elements of content. Beauty is the proportionality of the material of experience. It is for this reason, when viewed from the viewpoint of the nature of beauty, that it can be said, with accuracy, that there is the “beauty of holiness.” In the disposition and life of the Christian, there lie the graces of the Spirit of God, and they lie within the matrix of proper proportionality. For this reason, Christian holiness is a form of beauty. “What a glorious constellation of graces is here,” Wesley said. As “knit together in one,” as “united together in the soul of a believer,” these graces yield Christian perfection, which is, precisely, the beauty of holiness. Inward holiness is beautiful because, within the soul of the Christian, there works the leaven of Godliness: harmony, balance, and centrality. With harmony and balance, centrality lifts the human spirit, with all of its inner resources and powers, into passionate focus upon the clarity and brightness of divine holiness and divine beauty.
Christian holiness is also, as Wesley always insisted, outward holiness. Not only is holiness the having the “mind that was in Christ,” it is also the “walking as Christ walked.” Christian perfection is, he said, “universal holiness: Inward and outward righteousness: Holiness of life, arising from holiness of heart” (vi. 414). Just as is inward holiness, as we have tried to show, a form of beauty, so is outward holiness marked by the proportionality of beauty. I want to bring this discussion to a close by some mention of this dimension of the “beauty of holiness.”
I want to begin this part of the discussion by referring, again, to Psalm 110:3, where the Psalmist sings of “the beauties of holiness.”
Thy people shall be willing
in the day of thy power,
in the beauties of holiness
from the womb of the morning:
thou hast the dew of thy youth.
Here we find a marvelous example of the immanent meaning of beauty that defies translation into literal terms. Somehow, although we cannot say just how, we yet “know” what the psalmist is saying, although we have no ordinary, or usual, words into which to put the import of the passage. As we dwell upon these words, we see that there are forms and levels of meaning which are combined in a strange, mysterious, manner. These forms and levels reach down into the depth of our earthly experience, yet take those primordial nuances of our intimate humanity and lift them into the idealized world of spirituality. There is talk of the morning with its dew; there is talk of the womb and of youth. But there is more, for the womb is strangely combined with the morning, and the dew is not the dew of the morning, but the dew of youth. And, further, with all this there is talk of the day of divine power and of the willingness of the people of God. What does all this mean‑-this gem that glitters with such a wondrous mixture of nuances of significance?
It is the power of grace that saves and brings Christian holiness. “The splendid garments of holiness” are the possessions of the children of God, their holiness of heart and life. These are the noble dispositions and the noble patterns of conduct. It is these splendid garments that become the children of the majestic Lord. The work of inward and outward holiness is the work of God. There is “the womb of the morning,” suffused with freshness and purity, from which issue the godly in heart and life. There is the “the dew of thy youth,” the divine nativity whose years are ageless in eternal youth and whose offspring, as the dew radiates the brilliance of the morning light, radiate in heart and life the divine splendor.
In the day of power, God’s people are willing. The carrying out of that willingness in the conduct of life yields the beauty, the proportionality, of outward holiness. What this means, essentially, is that the unity that brings the inward graces into harmony serves to bring unity and harmony within the fabric of humanity. To live outwardly the “glorious constellation of graces,” as these are “united together in the soul” of the Christian, is to see one another, not as many and mutually conflicting creatures, but as gathered into a unity of all human life encompassed within the enclosure of supernatural and divine embracement. The beautiful embodies, as we have seen, harmonious relations. In the harmony of all life, there is, then, beauty. In the beauty of holiness, there lies the promise that all human life can be linked in genuine spiritual unity. The harbinger of the redemption of all peoples is the redeemed Church, the ekklesia of God. In the mystic union of the faithful in the Church, in the very beauty of that harmony, is found the hope of healing and redemption for the world. Holiness is the beauty of harmony, the harmony of the graces of the spirit, the harmony of the people of God, and the final and decisive promise, in the unity with the Lord of all, of the harmony of the children of men.
Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.
That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us; that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.
I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me (John 17: 17, 21, 23).
[1]Published in The Asbury Theological Journal
(Fall, 1997), 52:2.
[2]All quotations are from The Works of John Wesley. 14 vols. Kansas City: Nazarene Publishing House.
[3]Olin Alfred Curtis, The Christian Faith (Grand Rapids: Kegel
Publications, 1956), p. 376.
[4]Samuel Alexander, Beauty and Other Forms of Value (London:
Macmillan & Co., Ltd., 1933), p. 55.