Dharma for Awakening
The Odes of Solomonfor Awakening
A Commentary on the Mystical Wisdom of the Earliest Christian Hymns and Poems
The Odes of Solomon are among the most remarkable surviving expressions of early Christian mystical experience. Written in the language of praise, illumination, divine love, and direct encounter with God, these ancient hymns speak with a freshness that can seem startlingly immediate nearly two thousand years after their composition.
Unlike writings concerned primarily with doctrine, history, or ecclesiastical authority, the Odes repeatedly turn inward to the transformation of consciousness. Their unknown author writes from experience: of divine light, the indwelling Spirit, spiritual rebirth, freedom, knowledge of God, and the soul’s participation in divine life.
In The Odes of Solomon for Awakening, Swami Nirmalananda Giri (Abbot George Burke) approaches these writings not merely as artifacts of early Christianity but as practical mystical teachings. Drawing upon a lifetime of study and practice in both Eastern and Western spiritual traditions, he illuminates the inner meaning of the Odes and relates their insights to the universal principles of spiritual awakening.
The translation by Brother Simeon Goldstein likewise approaches the Odes from within their mystical world. As he observes, many difficulties encountered by purely academic interpreters arise because the Odist is describing levels of spiritual experience that cannot be understood solely from an external or historical perspective.
Together, translation and commentary reveal a Christianity intensely concerned with direct realization of the Divine. For readers interested in Christian mysticism, Original Christianity, comparative spirituality, or the universal experience underlying the world’s great spiritual traditions, the Odes offer an extraordinary voice from Christianity’s earliest centuries.
A book to live with
Why Read This Book?
Encounter one of early Christianity’s mystical treasures through forty-one ancient hymns and poems of divine light, spiritual rebirth, love, freedom, and direct knowledge of God.
Read the Odes from within their spiritual world through Brother Simeon Goldstein’s translation and Swami Nirmalananda’s commentary on the testimony of a mystic.
Discover the universal language of mystical experience through illuminating connections with Christianity, Sanatana Dharma, and other traditions without erasing their distinctive character.
Turn an ancient text into living spiritual practice by asking what the Odist’s experience means for seekers of illumination, transformation, and direct realization today.
Experience the writing
From the Book
From the Book
The Crown of Divine Light
The Lord is on my head like a crown, and I shall not be without him.
They wove for me a crown of truth, and it caused Thy branches to bud in me.
For it is not like a withered crown which buddeth not.
But Thou livest upon my head, and Thou hast blossomed upon me.
Thy fruits are full-grown and perfect; they are full of Thy salvation. Alleluia.
The Lord is on my head like a crown.
“In that day shall the Lord of hosts be for a crown of glory, and for a diadem of beauty, unto the residue of his people” (Isaiah 28:5).
The halo upon the head, which we find in the depictions of holy ones in all religions, is the Glory of the Presence of God which rests upon all holy things and persons. It is the cloud of light that rested upon Mount Sinai and upon the tabernacle when God spoke with Moses, and out of which God spoke on the Mount of Transfiguration. It is the Lord himself, for Saint John tells us: “God is Light” (I John 1:5). Jesus simply called It “the Light of Life” (John 8:12).
From the BookThe Spirit Moves Across the Harp+
As the wind moves over the harp, and the strings speak, so speaks in my members the Spirit of the Lord, and I speak by his love.
For it destroys whatever is foreign, and everything that is bitter.
For thus it was from the beginning, and will be to the end.
That nothing should be contrary, and nothing should rise up against him.
The Lord has multiplied the knowledge of himself, and is zealous that these things should be known which by his grace have been given to us.
And the Praise of his Name he gave us, our spirits praise his Holy Spirit.
And there went forth a stream and became a river great and broad, for it flooded and broke up everything and it shattered and brought it to the Temple.
And the restraints of men were not able to restrain it, nor the arts of those whose business it is to restrain waters.
For it spread over the face of the whole earth, and filled everything.
Then all the thirsty upon the earth drank, and thirst was relieved and quenched.
For from the Most High the drink was given.
Blessed then are the ministers of that drink, who are entrusted with that water of his.
They have refreshed the parched lips, and have aroused the paralyzed will.
And souls that were near departing, they have held back from death.
And the limbs which had fallen, they straightened and set up.
They gave strength for their coming, and light to their eyes.
For everyone knew them in the Lord, and by the waters they lived an eternal life. Alleluia.
As the wind moves over the harp, and the strings speak, so speaks in my members the Spirit of the Lord, and I speak by his love.
Just as “the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters” (Genesis 1:2) in the beginning of creation, so the Holy Spirit, the Holy Breath, moves upon the inner constitution of the progressing individual and “speaks” within him. From that proceeds inner development (evolution), as well as intuitive illumination of his intellect to guide him in the ways of continual unfoldment of his spiritual potential. Eventually he in his turn “speaks” by the power of the Holy Spirit, the Love of God.
From the BookThe Rising of the Divine Sun+
As the sun is the joy to them that seek its daybreak, so is my joy the Lord.
Because he is my Sun, and his rays have lifted me up, and his light hath dispelled all darkness from my face.
In him I have acquired eyes, and have seen his holy day.
Ears I have acquired, and I have heard his Truth.
The thought of knowledge I have acquired, and I have been delighted by him.
The way of error I have left, and I went towards him and have received Salvation from him abundantly.
And according to his bounty he hath given to me, and according to his excellent beauty he hath made me.
I have put on incorruption by means of his Name, and I have put off corruption by his grace.
Death hath been destroyed before my face, and Sheol hath been abolished by my word.
And there hath gone up deathless life in the Lord’s land, and it hath become known to his faithful ones, and hath been given without stint to all those that trust in him. Alleluia.
As the sun is the joy to them that seek its daybreak, so is my joy the Lord.
To how many people is God really a joy, though he is said to be bliss (ananda) itself? He may be awesome and inspiring reverence and gratitude, but do people really rejoice in the Lord as their rising sun? Certainly many people rejoice in what God gives them and even in the exalted feeling occurring in worship or the “high” produced by certain “yogic” techniques, but who rejoices in God and not just in what he gives?
But this ode shows us that when for us God is the joy above all others, his advent in our consciousness is like the dawning of the sun beside which all else is darkness and emptiness. Then we have some relation with God and are on the path to liberation.
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