Heaven in Ordinary: George Herbert and His Writings, and: Working it Out: Growing Spiritually with the Poetry of George Herbert (review)

In his introduction to Heaven in Ordinary: George Herbert and His Writings, Philip Sheldrake reminds readers of the importance that private devotional materials had for early moderns. He lists Reformation works such as Bayley's The Practice of Piety, Taylor's The Rule and Exercise of Holy Living, and Hall's The Arte of Divine Meditation, works by the Counter-Reformation theologian St. Francis de Sales, and Laudian works such as John Cosin's A Collection of Private Devotions. He notes that, because of the centrality of Church liturgy to Reformed worship, "Many of the writings were in practice companion volumes to the Book of Common Prayer" (p. 5). Joseph L. Womack begins his book, Working it Out: Growing Spiritually with the Poetry of George Herbert, by noting that it is "directed to those who are seeking spiritual guidance and are open to the possibility of finding that guidance in poetry" (p. 3).

Both Sheldrake and Womack are engaging with Herbert's work in a way that is significantly and intentionally different from the scholarly. Indeed both writers clearly and repeatedly mark out their approach as explicitly non-scholarly, non-academic, and not interested in literary theory, manuscript variations, and so on. What they are interested in is using, and helping others to use, Herbert's poetry and prose as a version of the devotional manuals Sheldrake discusses. In reviewing these books, then, it is fair to take them only on their own terms and to consider how successful they are at what they have set out to accomplish.

Sheldrake's book provides significantly more historical context for Herbert's work. Because of his interest in positioning Herbert as an important voice in what is now called "Anglican spirituality," he necessarily spends some time in delineating the differences among Reformation, Counter-Reformation, and Laudian theology. That accomplished, he pairs fifty-one poems from The Temple with relevant excerpts from The Country Parson and from Herbert's correspondence and divides them into themed sections titled: Bible and Liturgy; God and Jesus Christ; Incarnational Spirituality; Sense of Place; Discipleship and Inner Struggle; Prayer: The Soul in Paraphrase; and Pastoral Care and Service. Each of these sections is preceded by a brief two- to five-page discussion of the theme as represented in Herbert's work.

One of the things at which Sheldrake is most successful is in conveying the importance of corporate prayer and worship to Herbert and other early moderns. While the Reformation had opened new opportunities for unmediated, individual, private worship, worship as a community of believers still remained the backbone of much religious practice. Equally well-presented is his discussion of Herbert's intimate and troubled relationship with God. The power and immediacy of that relationship as presented in Herbert's work is, for many Herbert scholars, the hallmark of his writing, and one of the reasons that his writing is such a compelling object of study. It is appealing, then, to see that aspect of his work highlighted for a non-scholarly audience. It is equally appealing to see The Country Parson discussed outside of an academic audience. A charming work in beautiful prose, The Country Parson gives a thorough picture of the ideal early modern country cleric, and has been sadly neglected.

Less successful is Sheldrake's discussion of the importance of music to Herbert. While he is correct to note how important music was to Herbert's spirituality, he chooses not to even mention the large number of Herbert's poems that have been, and are still, used as hymn texts.This seems to be precisely the sort of link between the seventeenth-century poet and the modern worshiper that would be compelling in a book whose goal it is to connect them...