Aelred of Rievaulx on Friendship

Spiritual Friendship by Aelred of Rievaulx, the 12th century Christian mystic who lived as a Cistercian monk in Yorkshire, is a beautiful and well known tract which is well worth a read. It certainly qualifies, I think, as a 'classic' of Christian spirituality. I'm about half way through it (the book takes a dialogue form - in style it is in this respect not dissimilar to Plato - and the Aelred character is the centrepiece and a compelling discussant). I reproduce here one of my favourite lines from the text, where Aelred asks his discussant Ivo the following:

'Have you forgotten that Scripture says: 'He that is a friend loves at all times' (Prov. 17:17). Our [St.] Jerome also, as you recall, says: 'Friendship which can end was never true friendship' (Jerome, Letter 3.6 in Patrologia Latina 22:335). That friendship cannot endure without charity having been more than adequately established. Since then in friendship eternity blossoms, truth shines forth, and charity grows sweet, consider whether you ought to separate the name of wisdom from these three'.

The striking thing about the text is the essential link it insists upon between eternity and friendship, and with truth and charity, and finally with wisdom. All this links beautifully with at least two crucial biblical motifs: God as love/charity (1 Jn. 4:16) and Christ as truth (Jn. 14:6). And the link between wisdom and the presence of Christ (so e.g. Col. 3:16) is also clearly in view. It's a clarion call to remember that true love inextricably reflects and exists in the truth and love of God in Jesus Christ. Aelred, to repeat, is well worth a read.