Meditations of John Muir: Nature’s Temple

A few weeks ago, I received a package in the mail from Amazon. Neither my husband nor I had ordered anything so this came as a pleasant surprise. As it turned out, a beloved friend had sent us Ken Burns’ new DVD series, The National Parks: America’s Best Idea. Since we are avid hikers and outdoor adventurers who happen to live on the side of a mountain, she thought we’d enjoy this wonderful, historical account of the country’s national parks. She was right!

Throughout the six-disk series, writers and historians recounted the words and sentiments of John Muir, a naturalist and patriarch of the American environmental movement. With every passage read, I became convinced that he was as close as I could come to finding a spiritual prophet. I knew John Muir was one of the founders of the Sierra Club and that he helped conceive the national park system, but I had no idea that he wrote such beautifully inspiring and poetic scripture. I was hooked. I had to have more.

For this Thanksgiving week, I thought it would be apropos to read some of his writings. Thankful that my friend had sent the series and thankful to rediscover this connection inspired me to devour Meditations of John Muir: Nature’s Temple by Chris Highland. This is a short book of passages of John Muir’s writing. Highland writes, “John Muir (1838–1914) made enticement a spiritual quality. His enthusiastic preaching for the natural world sprang directly from his joyful immersion in the soul of it all.”

Thankfully, Highland doesn’t spend too much time giving you his own impressions of Muir’s impact; instead he realizes that reading these passages will speak for itself. He does capture the essence of Muir by saying that, “Every spiritual lesson we need is subtly and spectacularly evident in Nature…mostly I have learned it in Muir’s teeming forest. He teaches that we can step out beyond the books, the traditions, the philosophies that restrict the free rivering of our minds and dam the creativity of our communities; we may follow our streams into forests yet to be found. “

This is a read for those who love nature and find peace and joy there. Muir captures in words what many find impossible to truly express when they peer upon such awe-inspiring sights as the Grand Canyon or Yosemite. He teaches us that in nature we can truly know ourselves in a way that only happens when you’re immersed in it. He writes, “Keep close to Nature’s heart, yourself; and break clear away, once in a while, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean from the earth-stains of this sordid, gold-seeking crowd in God’s pure air. It will help you in your efforts to bring to these people something better than gold.”

After you have your Thanksgiving feast, step outside and take a deep breath, feel the cool crisp autumn air on your skin, notice a tree mostly shed of its leaves, smell the change of season and the end of a cycle – you are part of the next beginning.