"Both Hierodeacon Simeon's lovely translation and Abbot George's deeply insightful commentary do great justice to this most ancient and exquisite work. It will rightfully hold an honored place in any seriously spiritual library." -
Brother Julian-Ozana
With penetrating insight, Abbot George Burke illumines the practical value of the
Odes of Solomon
for spiritual seekers, and the timelessness of these ancient writings. With a unique perspective of a lifetime of study and practice of both Eastern and Western spirituality, Abbot George mines the treasures of the
Odes
and presents them in an easily intelligible fashion for those wishing to put these priceless teachings into practice.
The
is a great work of mystical depth, divine insight, and spiritual illumination and is, like the Dead Sea Scrolls, one of the truly great spiritual and literary discoveries of the Twentieth Century. But unlike the Dead Sea Scrolls which were dramatically discovered by shepherds in a desert cave, the Odes were prosaically found in neglected manuscripts gathering dust on the shelves of London libraries.
Who wrote the Odes, and when?
Although the identity of the author of the
remains a mystery, the closeness of the tone and content of the
to the tone and content of the writings of St. John the Evangelist, together with St. Ignatius' familiarity with and use of the Odes (St. Ignatius was a disciple of St. John) suggest that the
could have grown up in the spiritual soil prepared by St. John and his disciples, in or around Antioch.
Spiritual translation and commentary
More than a mere scholarly, cultural or historical interpretation of the
, both the translator and the author delve into their deep and practical spiritual content. The translator says of the
, "many of the scholars' difficulties arise from the fact that they do not grasp the levels of mystical experience the Odist is expressing. Their erudition belongs to the external and exoteric spheres, and the author of the Odes is writing out of the depth of a mystical experience which belongs to an entirely different realm."