Isaac the Syrian, a famous seventh century bishop and theologian stated that a person who is genuinely humble gives off a certain scent that other people will sense and that even animals will pick up, so that wild animals, including snakes, will fall under its spell and never harm that person.
A humble person, Isaac believes, has recovered the smell of paradise and in the presence of such a person, one does not feel judged and has nothing to fear. And, this holds true even for animals. They feel safe around a humble person and are drawn to him or her. No wonder people like St Francis of Assisi could talk to birds and befriend wolves.
Humility, indeed, does have a smell, the smell of the earth, of the soil, and of paradise. But how? How can a spiritual quality give off a physical scent? Well, we are psychosomatic, creatures of both body and soul. Thus, in us, the physical and the spiritual are so much part of one and the same substance that it is impossible to separate them out from each other. We are one substance, inseparable, body and soul, and so we are always both physical and spiritual. So, in fact, we do feel physical things spiritually, just as we smell spiritual things through our physical senses. If this is true, and it is, then, yes, humility does give off a scent that can be sensed physically and Isaac the Syrian’s concept is more than just a metaphor.
The word humility takes its root in the Latin word, humus, meaning soil, ground, and earth. If one goes with this definition then the most humble person you know is the most-earthy and most-grounded person you know. Further still, to be humble is to take one’s rightful place as a piece of the earth and not as someone or something separate from it.
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, the renowned mystic and scientist, expressed this sometimes in his prayers. During the years when, as a paleontologist, he worked for long stretches in the isolated deserts of China, he would sometimes compose prayers to God in a form he called, A Mass on the World. Speaking to God, as a priest, he would identify his voice with that of the earth itself, as that place within physical creation where the earth itself, the soil of the earth, could open itself and speak to God.
As often is, humility should never be confused. Too common is the notion that a humble person is one who is self-effacing to a fault, who deflects praise, even when it is deserved, who is too shy to trust opening himself or herself in intimacy, or who is so fearful or self-conscious and worried about being shamed so as to never step forward and offer his or her gifts to the community. These can make for a gentle and self-effacing person, but because we are denigrating ourselves when to deny our own giftedness, our humility is false, and deep-down we know it.
In sum, the truly humble person is the one who is fully grounded, that is, the person who knows he or she is not the centre of the earth but also knows that he or she is not a second-rate piece of dirt either. And that person will give off a scent that carries both the fragrance of paradise as well as the smell of the earth.
