Reflections on O Oriens by Malcolm Guite

In his poem based on the fifth "O antiphon" - O Oriens, Guite plays on the word "Dayspring" as having the sense of "light" and "water". This is quite striking. Dayspring has always been one of my favorite words in the bible that refer to Christ. Guite's play on Dayspring is one that refers to essence or maybe form or maybe a state of being - "the eternal Prima Vera". Dayspring is something we can't see fully now but we will see it at our "waking" - Guite seems to be calling attention to an inversion of reality before and after death. Although we seem to be "alive" and "awake" this side of death, and death seems to be "sleep", in another sense, the other side of death is where we shall be fully "awake" when we shall be able to see Dayspring clearly because this very Dayspring has overcome death and it's darkness. This is not to say that the darkness we face on this side of death is not real or that death is not an enemy or that we can't be "awakened" to the reality of Grace. But it does offer advent hope for the time when Dayspring shall arrive in final victory over the powers of Sin, Death, and the Devil.

I must mention here that Fleming Rutledge in her book Means of Grace, in the chapter on the second Sunday of advent offers her thoughts on "Dayspring". Similar to Guite, this too is related to form or essence but of a different kind:

John's father, Zechariah, glorified the mission of the coming Messiah in these words:

"The dayspring from on high hath visited us, To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death." (Luke 1:78-79)

Now this doesn't mean "darkness and the shadow of death" in the general sense that "everybody has to die sooner or later." The images are much more textured than that. Darkness and the shadow of death are poetic images for our tragic, fallen human condition. "Dayspring" is also a poetic image, another name for the Messiah. "Dayspring" means something far more than just "dawn." It means the primordial source of day, God himself—the one who in the beginning said, "Let there be light." So when we read that the light dawns for those who suffer darkness and death (and that means all of us), it means that God is going to restore his original creation--but this time without the temptation of the serpent.

I love how Rutledge connects Dayspring (as the "primordial source of day") to the act of creation.

Personally, whenever I have thought of Christ as Dayspring, I've always thought of it not necessarily as form, but movement - as in Day springing forth. This is captured in the scene from the Lord of the Rings when Gandalf arrives at the battle of the Hornburg with the riders of Rohan to aid Theoden at Helm's Deep to defeat Saruman's army. The movie captures this beautifully - just before Gandalf arrives, his words to Aragorn before he left: "Look for my coming on the first hour of the fifth day. At dawn, look to the east." Gandalf the white has the riders of Rohan behind him and what seems to be enveloping them from behind them is the penetrating light of the "first hour". As they charge down the mountain into Saruman's army, the light goes before them into battle. Day springs forth to defeat the powers of darkness.

I know that in my own life, on my own, I have nothing within me that can lighten my darkness. I need a Power from outside of me to liberate me and break the chains that enslave.

"The dayspring from on high hath visited us, To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death." (Luke 1:78-79)