{"id":422,"date":"2011-03-18T08:01:41","date_gmt":"2011-03-18T15:01:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/?p=422"},"modified":"2011-03-18T08:02:17","modified_gmt":"2011-03-18T15:02:17","slug":"the-tao-of-the-word","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/the-tao-of-the-word\/","title":{"rendered":"The Tao of the Word"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"wpsdc-drop-cap\">D<\/span>uring Lent, I am reading the Desert Fathers. On occasion I will post sayings that strike me during my <i>Lectio<\/i>. This particular passage strongly reminds me of <em>Tao Te Ching<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>Abba John, who had been exiled by the emperor Marcian, said:<\/p>\n<p>We went to Syria one day to see Abba Poemen and desired to question him concerning purity of the heart. But the old man did not know Greek and no interpreter was to be found. <\/p>\n<p>And then, seeing how embarrassed we were, the old man began to speak Greek, saying, &#8220;The nature of water is soft, and the nature of stone is hard; but if a bottle is hung above the stone, allowing the water to fall down drop by drop, it wears away the stone. So it is with the Word of God: it is soft and our heart is hard, but the man who hears the Word of God often opens his heart to the fear of God.&#8221; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>During Lent, I am reading the Desert Fathers. On occasion I will post sayings that strike me during my Lectio. This particular passage strongly reminds me of Tao Te Ching. Abba John, who had been exiled by the emperor Marcian, said: We went to Syria one day to see Abba Poemen and desired to question him concerning purity of the [&#8230;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-422","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-wisdom"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1aGBK-6O","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":6552,"url":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/silence-prayer-work\/","url_meta":{"origin":422,"position":0},"title":"Silence. Prayer. Work.","author":"Thom","date":"19 July 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Both of my readers will recall that I often reread the Desert Fathers during Lent. Today is the feast day of one of them, Saint Arsenius. He was a wealthy, educated man who gave up everything to worship God in the desert. Quite a contrast with yesterday's feast of Saint\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Meditations&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Meditations","link":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/category\/meditations\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":427,"url":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/saint-benedict-abba-poeman-and-amenempoe\/","url_meta":{"origin":422,"position":1},"title":"Saint Benedict, Abba Poeman, and Amenemope","author":"Thom","date":"21 March 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Although it does not appear on the Universal (Roman) calendar, today is one of two feasts of Saint Benedict celebrated by Benedictines throughout the world. If it is true that the Irish saved civilization, it's worth remembering that they did so largely in Benedictine Monasteries. Today, I have three short\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Meditations&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Meditations","link":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/category\/meditations\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":87,"url":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/a-desert-father-for-lent\/","url_meta":{"origin":422,"position":2},"title":"A Desert Father for Lent","author":"Thom","date":"10 March 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"One day Abba Arsenius consulted an old Egyptian monk about his own thoughts. Someone noticed this and said to him, \"Abba Arsenius, how is it that you with such a good Latin and Greek education, ask this peasant about your thoughts?\"He replied, \"I have indeed been taught Latin and Greek,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Wisdom&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Wisdom","link":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/category\/wisdom\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":92,"url":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/abba-joseph-of-panephysis-for-pentecost\/","url_meta":{"origin":422,"position":3},"title":"Abba Joseph of Panephysis for Pentecost","author":"Thom","date":"22 May 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Abba Lot went to see Abba Joseph and said to him, \u2018Abba, as far as I can I say my little office, I fast a little, I pray and meditate, I live in peace and as far as I can, I purify my thoughts. What else can I do?\u2019Then the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Holy Days&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Holy Days","link":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/category\/holy-days\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":109505,"url":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/twenty-years-catholic\/","url_meta":{"origin":422,"position":4},"title":"Twenty Years Catholic","author":"Thom","date":"26 March 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"on the night of the 26th of March 2005, I was baptized into the Church at the great Vigil of Easter. It's odd to think that my baptism is now the midpoint of my spiritual journey thus far. Ten years ago, I shared some reflections of the tenth anniversary of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Meditations&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Meditations","link":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/category\/meditations\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/Baptism.jpg?fit=1200%2C901&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/Baptism.jpg?fit=1200%2C901&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/Baptism.jpg?fit=1200%2C901&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/Baptism.jpg?fit=1200%2C901&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/Baptism.jpg?fit=1200%2C901&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":453,"url":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/spiritual-warfare\/","url_meta":{"origin":422,"position":5},"title":"Spiritual Warfare","author":"Thom","date":"04 April 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"During Lent, I am reading the Desert Fathers. On occasion I will post sayings that strike me during my Lectio. Here's a little something in a martial theme, that strikes I think at the heart of our spiritual struggle: Abba John the Dwarf said, \"If a king wanted to take\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Meditations&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Meditations","link":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/category\/meditations\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=422"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":424,"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422\/revisions\/424"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=422"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=422"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/amateurmonk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=422"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}