I entered into unknowing

I never get tired of reading this poem by St. John Of The Cross
It’s called Stanzas Concerning an Ecstasy Experienced in High Contemplation.
I thought i’d share it with everyone…

I entered into unknowing,
And there i remained unknowing,
Transcending all knowledge.

I entered into unknowing,
Yet when I saw myself there
Without knowing where I was
I understood great things;
I shall not say what I felt
For I remained in unknowing
Transcending all knowledge.

That perfect knowledge
Was of peace and holiness
Held at no remove
In profound solitude;
It was something so secret
That I was left stammering
Transcending all knowledge.

I was so whelmed,
So absorbed and withdrawn,
That my senses were left
Deprived of all their sensing,
And my spirit was given
An understanding while not understanding,
Transcending all knowledge.

He who truly arrives there
Cuts free from himself;
All that he knew before
Now seems worthless,
And his knowledge so soars
The he is left in unknowing
Transcending all knowledge.

The higher he ascends
The less he understands,
Because the cloud is dark
Which lit up the night;
Whoever knows this
Remains always in unknowing
Transcending all knowledge.

This knowledge in unknowing
Is so overwhelming
That wise men disputing
Can never overthrow it,
For their knowledge does not reach
To the understanding of not understanding,
Transcending all knowledge.

And this supreme knowledge
Is so exalted
That no power of man or learning
Can grasp it;
He who masters himself
Will, with knowledge in unknowing
Always be transcending.

And if you should want to hear;
This highest knowledge lies
In the loftiest sense
Of the essence of God;
This is a work of his mercy,
To leave one without understanding,
Transcending all knowlegde.

Although I was comfortably in bed, reading a book, in the early hours of the morning, about to doze off into sleep - I was surprised by something I came across. I could not resist putting it off in memory and hoping I would remember in the morning. I had to post…

Silver,
I couldn’t help but think of your poem when I came across this, and I thought that you, and hopefully others as well, will find the following of interest.

Source: Man: Computer, Ape, or Angel. Dr. Azar, Larry. 1989. Hanover, Mass: The Christopher Publishing House.

Sir Charles Sherrington, physiologist and 1936 Nobel Prize winner in Medicine, writes:

Aristotle “insisted that to know a thing its final cause must have been explained…Each cell, we remember, is blind; senses it has none. It knows not ‘up’ from ‘down’; it works in the dark…for instance, ‘finds’ even to the fingertips the nerve-cell with which it should touch fingers. It is as if an immanent principle inspired each cell with knowledge for the carrying out of a design…the whole story is not just physics and chemistry. There is a final cause at work…living structure is a mass of Aristotle’s final causes. All is remembered; no detail is forgotten, even to the criss-cross hairs at the entrance to a cat’s ear which keeps out water and flies…As Aristotle says, to know the end of a thing is to know the why of it.”

What’s your take?