Thomas Merton seems to have published more books since he died than he did while he was alive. The Inner Experience is a set of notes on contemplation he effectively began in 1948, revised and expanded in 1959, but was never happy enough with to allow publication during his lifetime. After excerpts had been serialized over the years, the Merton Legacy Trust finally allowed complete publication in a single volume.

This is not, Merton warns at the outset, a self-help book. Contemplation, he says, is not a program whereby the false “I” can manipulate the true “I.” On the contrary, so long as the false self is busy with its projects, the inner self will remain hidden. And even when the inner self emerges, the final goal has not been attained. While some Eastern religions stop with the awakening of the true self, Christians continue on to know God. Solitude and seclusion may be necessary for long stretches of this journey, but the contemplative vocation finds its ultimate fulfillment in a love that reaches out to others.

Merton has an interesting perspective on active contemplation. He sees it as a progressive letting go of the agendas and plans of the false self in favor of an approach to life where we simply discern the way events are flowing. This flow he sees as God’s will. Self-seeking motivations have been abandoned to the point that the contemplative is not even aware that he is contemplating.

Infused contemplation is, of course, beyond the control of the individual. While Merton sketches a few characteristics of infused contemplation — a passive, intuitive, non-conceptual, and above all loving knowledge of God — he avoids the fruitless question of exactly where active contemplation ends and infused contemplation begins. Instead he cite passages from five authors that may be helpful in recognizing the beginnings of infused contemplation. These writers are St. John of the Cross, John Ruysbroeck, the author of The Cloud of Unknowing, Meister Eckhart, and St. Bernard of Clairvaux. To emphasize the need to abandon the programs and desires of the false self and to replace them with pure love, Merton devotes a further chapter to St. John of the Cross on this point.

Among the dangers for the contemplative to avoid, Merton mentions blanking out, seeking some kind of self-annihilation, a withdrawal from reality, and straining after mystical experiences. Monasteries, with their one-size-fits-all regulation of life, paradoxically present special difficulties. But life outside the monasteries presents other problems. Silence has become an expensive luxury. Most people need group support, and for these Merton proposes something along the lines of contemplative third orders, but without stifling organizational structures. Merton sees these relatively informal lay or priestly-lay groups as offering promise for the future. In particular he admires the Little Brothers of Jesus and the simple Christian ashram of Fr. Jules Monchanin (a co-worker of Fr. Henri Le Saux in India).

The cover photo is by Merton himself, and the introduction is by the book’s editor, William H. Shannon.


Thomas Merton. The Inner Experience: Notes on Contemplation. New York: HarperOne, 2004. Paperback. 192 pages. ISBN 9780060593629. $15.99.