A. W. Tozer and Contemplative Prayer (Part 1)

[Excerpts from Crept In Unawares: Mysticism by Heath Henning is available for purchase here.]

David Cloud spoke of the emerging contemplative movement, saying, “This is pure mysticism, and The Cloud of Unknowing is a primary resource for the contemplative movement.”¹⁾David Cloud, What is the Emerging Church, Way Of Life Literature, Fourth edition 2009, p. 119 It becomes a grave concern when a man whose influence reaches beyond the apostate community of Christendom recommends such a book. A.W. Tozer wrote, “The quaint old English classic, The Cloud of Unknowing, teaches us how to do this.”²⁾A.W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God, Christian Publications Inc., 1982, 1993, p. 18 Yet the Cloud of Unknowing teaches us to practice contemplative prayer. “The Cloud of Unknowing has been described as Christianity with a Zen outlook. The practical prayer advice contained in The Cloud of Unknowing forms a primary basis for the contemporary practice of centering prayer, a form of Christian meditation developed by Trappist monks William Meninger, Basil Pennington and Thomas Keating in the 1970s.”³⁾http://justthebook.wordpress.com/2009/01/22/a-w-tozer-%E2%80%9Cthe-pursuit-of-god%E2%80%9D-von-hugel-bernard-of-clairvaux-and-cloud-of-unknowing/, accessed 6/22/11 Tozer’s reference of this “quaint old English classic” was in the context “make God our All”,⁴⁾A.W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God, Christian Publications Inc., 1982, 1993, p. 18 similar to Mary Baker Eddy’s recommendation of a silent prayer. “In order to pray aright, we must enter into the closet and shut the door. We must close the lips and silence the material senses. In the quiet sanctuary of earnest longings, we must deny sin and plead God’s allness.”⁵⁾Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health with Keys to the Scripture, Published by the Trustees under the Will of Mary Baker G. Eddy, 1934, p. 15 We will see this is a presentation of panentheism.

Ed Reese called Tozer a “Spiritual giant of the Christian and Missionary Alliance Church.”⁶⁾Ed Reese, Reese Chronological Encyclopedia of Christian Biographies, AMG Publishers, 2007, p. 850 “Tozer, as he was affectionately known during his lifetime, is widely regarded as one of the most perceptive writers in the 20th century. He served as pastor of Christian & Missionary Alliance churches in Chicago and Toronto, and was a popular speaker and prolific author who wrote with biblical insight and prophetic precision. In 1950, he became the editor of the Alliance Witness. His best-known books, The Pursuit of God and The Knowledge of the Holy, are perennial best-sellers, and most of his writings are still in print.”⁷⁾http://www.awtozerclassics.com/page/page/4891818.htm; accessed 8-23-2013 “Some of his 30 books were translated into 15 languages. His books range from Wingspread (1943) to Knowledge of the Holy (1961). The Pursuit of God (1948) was a classic.”⁸⁾Ed Reese, Reese Chronological Encyclopedia of Christian Biographies, AMG Publishers, 2007, p. 850

Further approving of the message of this mystic “classic,” Tozer states, “Again, he [the unknown author of The Cloud of Unknowing] recommends that in prayer we practice a further stripping down of everything, even of our theology.”⁹⁾ A.W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God, Christian Publications Inc., 1982, 1993, p. 18 How can praying to the God of the Bible be separated from theology (doctrine of God)? To strip theology from prayer is inevitably mysticism, subtracting any and all knowledge of the God being prayed to for an experiential communion. One author influenced heavily by Zen Buddhism, referring to The Cloud of Unknowing paralleled Tozer’s theology-less prayer, saying “the God who cannot be known by knowing, but only by unknowing.”¹⁰⁾Yves Raguin, SJ, “Deepening our Understanding of Spirituality,” Tosh Arai and Wesley Ariarajah, ed., Spirituality in Interfaith Dialogue, Orbis Books, 1989, p.84 As one of the contributors to the Spirituality in Interfaith Dialogue, this is only one of the many other authors that gave acknowledgement to The Cloud of Unknowing for the contemplative experience was heavily drawn upon for experience based interfaith relationships. Four different contributors remarked about The Cloud of Unknowing,¹¹⁾Tosh Arai and Wesley Ariarajah, ed., Spirituality in Interfaith Dialogue, Orbis Books, 1989, p. 26, 43, 52, 84 one going as far as quoting the Bhagavad-Gita,¹²⁾Mataji Vandana, “In Search of Being one with the One,” Tosh Arai and Wesley Ariarajah, ed., Spirituality in Interfaith Dialogue, Orbis Books, 1989, p. 26 the Hindu scripture as a parallel. Hindu Deepak Chopra also cites from The Cloud of Unknowing numerous times.¹³⁾Deepak Chopra, How to Know God: The Soul’s Journey into the Mystery of Mysteries, Harmony Books, 2000, p. 27, 94, 97, 98, 99

When Constance Cumbey first exposed the New Age, most Christians were startled to hear her accusations of it permeating the church and its various institutions, yet this experiential Christianity which subtracts theology is exactly what validated her concerns.

Christian seminary students are now widely and commonly told that to truly worship God, we must “do theology” instead of “parroting old theology written for another age, another continent, and another culture.” They are told that such “doing of theology” could well include finding Christ in the Bhagavad Gita, the Koran, the Vedas, the Upanishads and a variety of other Eastern, Hindu-based scriptures. They are told they may do honor to our Lord by calling him “Buddha,” “Shiva,” “Tao,” The Great Spirit” and by other pagan monikers.¹⁴⁾Constance Cumbey, The Hidden Dangers of the Rainbow: The New age Movement and our coming age of Barbarism, Revised edition, Huntington House, Inc., 1983, p. 40

This is what experiential religion leads to—interfaithism.

Warren W. Wiersbe offers a biographical sketch of A.W. Tozer in Living With The Giants: The Lives of Great Men of the Faith, stating: “Aiden Wilson Tozer… considered himself as ‘evangelical mystic.’”¹⁵⁾Warren W. Wiersbe, Living With The Giants: The Lives of Great Men of the Faith, Baker Book House, 1993, p. 226 Wiersbe also mentions “[David J.] Fant, at the end of his biography of Tozer, listed the books and authors that most influenced Tozer, and this list is something of a basic bibliography on the mystics.”¹⁶⁾Warren W. Wiersbe, Living With The Giants: The Lives of Great Men of the Faith, Baker Book House, 1993, p. 227 This list contains names such as Madame Guyon, George Fox, Soren Kierkegaard, and Meister Eckhart. Warren Wiersbe then warns, “Like poison, these matters should be ‘handled’ but not permitted into one’s system!”¹⁷⁾Warren W. Wiersbe, Living With The Giants: The Lives of Great Men of the Faith, Baker Book House, 1993, p. 229

Another example of Tozer confessing his mysticism is from an often repeated account of a conversation he had with Martin Llyod-Jones. Warren Wiersbe relates:

Martyn Llyod-Jones and I were discussing the mystics over dinner one evening, and he related an interesting experience. With his permission I repeat it here.

   “Dr. Tozer and I shared a conference years ago,” he said, “and I appreciated his ministry and his fellowship very much. One day he said to me, ‘Llyod-Jones, you and I hold just about the same position on spiritual matters, but we have come to this position by different routes.’

   “‘How do you mean?’ I asked.

   “‘Well,’ Tozer replied, ‘you came by way of the Puritans and I came by way of the mystics.’ And, you know, he was right!”¹⁸⁾As cited by James L Snyder, The Life of A. W. Tozer: In Pursuit of God, Regal, 2009, p. 153; also cited in Warren Weirsbe, 10 People Every Christian Should Know, Baker Books, 2011, no page number; accessed at https://books.google.com/

Tozer himself wrote, “I refer to the evangelical mystic who has been brought by the gospel into intimate fellowship with the Godhead…. He differs from the ordinary orthodox Christian only because he experiences his faith down in the depths of his sentient being while the other does not. He exists in a world of spiritual reality. He is quietly, deeply and sometimes almost ecstatically aware of the presence of God in his own nature and in the world around him.”¹⁹⁾A.W. Tozer, The Christian Book of Mystical Verse, Christian Publications, 1963, p. vi; as cited by Warren W. Wiersbe, Living With The Giants: The Lives of Great Men of the Faith, Baker Book House, 1993, p. 227 In other writings, Tozer considers “ordinary orthodox Christians” that have not mystically experienced God, vogue theoretical Christianity, for they have not experienced the “central fact of Christianity.” He says:

Similarly, the presence of God is the central fact of Christianity. At the heart of the Christian message is God Himself waiting for His redeemed children to push in to conscious awareness of his presence. That type of Christianity which happens now to be vogue knows this Presence only in theory. It fails to stress the Christian’s privilege of present realization. According to its teachings we are in the presence of God positionally, and nothing is said about the need to experience that Presence actually…. We are satisfied to rest in our judicial possessions and, for the most part, we bother ourselves very little about the absence of personal experience.²⁰⁾A.W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God, Christian Publications Inc., 1982, 1993, p. 34-35

According to Tozer the mystical experience was the sure cure for the anemic church. “The world is perishing for lack of the knowledge of God and the church is famishing for want of His presence. The instant cure of most of our religious ills would be to enter the Presence in spiritual experience, to become suddenly aware that we are in God and God is in us.”²¹⁾A.W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God, Christian Publications Inc., 1982, 1993, p. 36 Tozer’s entire view revolved around this experiential theology.

[Excerpts from Crept In Unawares: Mysticism by Heath Henning is available for purchase here.]