The Aspen Grove

Enscribe It on Your Heart

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tags😁strongly-agree, 🟢conviction

43 min read

The Big Idea

A practical guide on how to memorize Scripture based on the classical advice of Quintilian and other early sources.

Larger source list: Annotated Bibliography in Rhetoric and Memory

Similar notes:
Memorizing the Psalms
Memorizing the Lords Prayer
Memory, the Things We Keep with Us
Core Memory Principles
Luther, Memory and Languages
Telescope of Scripture, the Law and Doctrine

Preface

This project can be summarized very briefly: Figure out how to memorize the whole book of Psalms.

In Seminary, Dr. Elowsky introduced me to the Letter to Marcellinus by Athanasius where I first began to think about the deep interconnectedness of the Psalms. Likewise, Dr. Saleska taught be about the poetic depth and beauty of the Psalms. For years after that, my admiration of them stopped there other than reading them on and off. Then rather by accident, I began this project.

I have always been someone who has disliked memorization. In school it was boring and repetitive. Not to mention it can quickly become overwhelming and disappointing. There is not experience worse than spending hours repeating something to only have it fly away the second you need it.

And so it was with a great amount of bewildered curiosity that I heard the Storyteller Martin Shaw describe memorizing the entire book of Homer’s Odyssey. He described how retelling the whole story does not just take a few hours but multiple days! That kind of scale just boggled my imagination. Yet this was a living breathing human, not some figure locked in the halls of history. How was it possible?

Living and past attitudes toward memory like this seem increasingly baffling to a world that moves at a machine pace. For example, how have we come to live in a world that sees the Second Council of Nicaea’s (787 AD) requirement for bishops as near impossible:
“Candidates for a bishop’s orders must know the Psalter by heart and must have read thoroughly, not cursorily, all the sacred Scriptures.”1 Or how about according to the Rule of Rerreolus monks were required to learn by heart all the Psalms: “This task’…commonly took two to three years, though gifted individuals could manage it in six months.’”2
Or what about Luther’s opinion that the whole book of Psalms is really just: “one little book”3

In an average conversation today, the Psalms are far from “one little book” anymore. More often than not, they are a kind of cryptic heap of songs and poetry. In Seminary, began to realize the value, deep, comprehensive comfort, and perspective of the Psalms. Having an impression of this is wonderful. Yet how can one fully bring those strong words into the everyday moments of life if they do not accompany us in memory? Therefore, the Psalms and memory became a dual project of mine. I was very naive beginning this journey, thinking that there must be a clear path marked somewhere. There is, but it has become much overgrown and seldom trod in recent history. This project is but a beginning in clearing some of that brush away to show the path to treasuring God’s word in living memory, rather than the dreaded bludgeoning of rote memorization.

Brief Historical Overview

As we begin thinking about the prospect of retaining a full book of Scripture in memory - especially one with such variety and complexity - it has become increasingly apparent to me that our modern presuppositions and resources on memory are wholly insufficient for such a task. Just search “how to memorize scripture” or something similar and you will get loads of tips and tricks. But most advise is piecemeal and aimed at memorizing short verses in what ends up being a haphazard approach.

The closest guide in existence I have been able to find is How to Memorize Scripture: 7 Proven Approaches by Anthony Metivier. I have learned a lot from his material online. However, I will warn that he is a proponent of “demystified” hermetic memory methods (which we will explain below). The main warning to be had around that is he does not view Scripture as the sole source of truth. This belief is obviously directly contrary to the major aim of this project. And as I have learned in my research up to this point, the line between neutral practices and philosophical assumptions can get very narrow and fuzzy the farther you press into things. Clearly, this should be enough to warrant careful filter of any advice we may receive from him or other memory experts. For as Jesus warns: “what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?” - Matthew 16:26

The primary source for this brief overview is Francis Yates The Art of Memory which has been immensely helpful in orienting me to the overall flow of history as it surrounds the practices and attitudes toward memory across time. Here is a short synopsis as it surrounds the Reformation and consequently comes down to us.

Memory in Classical Greco-Latin Writers

Memory as a subject finds its source in western literature all the way back around the time of Christ within the context of the Roman Empire. There are three writings still in existence that ended up becoming core sources for all writers on memory who follow:

  • Quintilian’s Institutio Oratoria. Written circa 95 AC. Directly recommended in a letter from Luther.
  • Cicero’s De Oratore. Written in 55 BC. Long considered the gold standard of education in antiquity.
  • Rhetorica ad Herennium (Anonymous Author). Written circa 80 BC. Falsely attributed as Cicero’s second work on education in the middle ages. Making it a highly valued text for many centuries.

In these sources Memory is nested within the trivium (Grammar, Logic, and Rhetoric) as one of the five parts of rhetoric: Invention, Arrangement, Style, Memory, and Delivery. The basic classical approach seeks to use our natural memory of places (homes, streets, etc.) to mentally store images (vivid pictures and associations) by placing that image in a specific mental location. This strategy essentially seeks to harness the power of memory tips like “Where were you when you lost it?” or “Retrace your steps” to intentionally remember things.

Memory Coming out of the Medieval Age and into the Reformation

During the Medieval age, memory continued to be treated as a part of Rhetoric (speaking well and persuasively) but also began to be merged with Aristotelian and Platonic Philosophy (a clear example of this being in the works of Thomas Aquinas). The end result of this was that memory in Scholasticism became tightly tied to works based righteousness. The most important things you could memorize were long lists of virtues and vices to avoid hell and get into heaven. Memory itself was seen as a part of practicing the virtue prudence. Dominican preaching carried this understanding out to the people all the way up until Luther’s day. In this style of preaching, the sermon was all about a virtue to follow or a vice to avoid with the message of Scripture used more like a secondary, rather than primary, source. 4 Luther was clear in his Disputation Against Scholastic Theology what he thinks about these influences: “Indeed, no one can become a theologian unless he becomes one without Aristotle… It would have been better for the church if Porphyrus with his universals had not been born for the use of theologians.”5 The primary problem being that all this philosophy and focus on virtues and vices distract from (and for many replaced) the core Gospel message.

Memory During the Reformation and Renaissance

During and after the Reformation, memory was treated in two distinct ways by Renaissance Humanists (many of whom were Lutheran) and Hermeticists.

The Hermeticists’ interest in memory went hand in hand with an interest in Egyptian mystery cults, alchemy, astrology, and magic. Leading to neoplatonic and occultic “arts” of memory like the memory theater of Guilio Camillo (1480-1544), or the memory seals of Giordano Bruno (1548-1600). The basic goal of these systems was to reach some form of divine enlightenment through holding a representation of the cosmos within memory. Interestingly, earlier systems of memory along these same magical lines were condemned even by scholastics like Thomas Aquinas himself!6

Around the same time as the “art” of memory was being taken in a clearly dangerous direction in the 1500 to 1600s by the Hermeticists, Philip Melanchthon (1497-1560) began walking down the same path as his contemporary Petra Ramus (1515-1572) to absorb memory into the practical categorical logic of Renaissance humanism. The convoluted Aristotelian syllogistic logic was for the most part discarded along with the classical approach to memory. This resulted in a simplified and unified view of logic with memory absorbed within it. This major change shifted from viewing memory as a separate skill and mental faculty (as a part of Rhetoric) to treating it as a “side-effect” of sound reason and organization during study (moving it to belonging to Logic). This led to the idea of “method.” In its most basic form, the idea of method is to study according to a particular set of practices that, if followed well, would lead to naturally remembering and organizing the thing learned. This concept of method would continue to evolve over the next three hundred years to eventually becoming the “scientific method” we hear so much about today.7 To summarize, for the Renaissance Humanists, the basic process of remembering was no longer its own art but was a natural side-effect of carefully organizing and categorizing the thing to be learned according to a clear method. Encyclopedias are one example of this way of “remembering.”

This logical-memory approach continued to find sympathy in many Lutheran circles through high Lutheran Orthodoxy (1580 to late 1600s). This increasingly lead to a general distancing from any kind of explicit treatment of memory as a stand alone subject. Ramist influences continued to push some Lutherans toward complete reliance on simplified categorical logic to the point of full blown Rationalism. Much more research is needed in this area. But it seems that the use of commonplace books and general promotion of “method” by Melanchthon (in works such as his Loci Communes) and later prominent Lutherans (such as Johann Gerhard’s Method of Theological Study, or Chemnitz’s Loci Theologici) descend from the logical-memory approach that had absorbed memory into simple categorical logic. Which means that, if true, would represent the location of memory and how it was trained by Lutherans during that time.

During this same period, memory as a stand alone subject gets taken up by Descarte (1596-1650) in the generally Ramist/Rationalist strain with some classical influences and Francis Bacon (1561-1626) in a bit of an amalgamation of Classical, Scholastic, Rationalist influences. Both move forward forms of early scientific perspectives. They discuss memory as a strictly utilitarian tool to be used for research and learning. In this way memory is further cemented as being a subsidiary of the larger goals of learning. Basically meaning that knowledge on the whole is the primary goal with personal memory being merely a means to that more grand end. While slightly different, this sounds very similar to the Lutheran Rationalists treatment of memory.

The famous Rationalist vs Pietist controversies of the 1700 and 1800s seem to be a point at which, as Yates would say, the memory tradition goes through another “transformation.” At this point I have only vague impressions of the fullness of what this transformation was. But from the small historical pieces I have picked at so far, it seems that the Pietists attempted to “rescue” memory from its increasingly mechanical-logical place in Rationalism and restore it to a place belonging to more than just the head of a person. Potential places for further research in this are are especially the catechetical instructions of Pietists like Philip Jakob Spener.

Trying to avoid getting into too many weeds we then come to C.F.W. Walther (1811-1887) who came out of that great Rationalist vs Pietist conflict to attempt to find a middle path. It seems that he addresses memory briefly in his Pastoral Theology especially in his Chapters on preaching and confirmation. At the time of writing I need to verify this, but it seems that he draws on another Pietist source (Hermann Francke’s Short and Simple Instruction on How Children Are to Be Led to True Godliness) to argue against rote memorization and advocate for a more full bodied kind of memory.

Memory up to Present Time

Continuing to trace the treatment of memory up through the enlightenment, industrial revolution, and beyond would no doubt continue to help us see the reason memory as a stand alone subject has fallen into such disuse or confusion today. However, that kind of survey is best saved for another setting. The purpose of this project is far more practical. We have seen enough history to have an appreciation for the variety and complexity of this subject and how it has often been tied quite closely with underling philosophical commitments.

Where do we go from here? If you desire to continue down the historical road, you can consult helpful resources to get you started like:

  • The Art of Memory by Francis Yates
  • Mnemonics in History and Applicability in Catechesis by Blair Kasfeldt8
    Within Lutheranism, memory seems to surface most readily around the subject of preaching and catechesis. Therefore making historical writings on those subjects profitable places to begin.

Let us, however, be content with this background and move on to framing the project at hand.

Introduction

Our modern minds are becoming increasingly claustrophobic. The cycle of change ever more chaotic. Digital amnesia along with a host of other concerns about weakening minds attend us like the crows in a pumpkin patch. We think less and less of our internal world in favor of more and more external technology. We have forgotten basic lessons about how our memory works that previous generations took for granted.

Yet as briefly outlined above, the history, philosophy, and practical application of memory is far from straightforward. The twists and turns of history and practice are far more than this small project can handle. Even after much pondering, St. Augustine himself noted: “the force of mine own memory is not understood by me; though I cannot so much as name myself without it.” 8

Therefore, this project does not set out to assemble any grand philosophy or theory of memory. It rather sets out to find a practical path back to memory, away from the fatalism we now so quickly inhabit. We will take seriously the advise of Luther in the Large Catechism:

Know, therefore, that you must be concerned not only about hearing, but also about learning and retaining it {Scripture} in memory, and do not think that it is optional with you or of no great importance, but that it is God’s commandment, who will require of you how you have heard, learned, and honored His Word. 9

What follows is partially a journal, research notes, and an invitation, to begin to rethink the way we treat our memory in teaching and studying Scripture. In a world ever more flooded with distractions and noise, our understanding and practice of memory has become a storehouse collapsing in on itself. May we learn how to treasure up the word of God once again.

Proverbs 7:1,3

My son, keep my words and treasure up my commandments… write them on the tablet of your heart.

Where to Begin?

The question of how to get started with a project of this scale, with a complex history to boot, has led me through my fair share of false starts. A whole mountain of books could be written about history and potential approaches alone. Therefore, in order to avoid analysis paralysis, we will restate the goal of this project once again: Figure out how to memorize the whole book of Psalms.

In order to actually accomplish this, we will narrow our focus to a few trustworthy sources to help sketch the path toward our goal. Let us start with Luther who by his own account accomplished memorizing far more than just the Psalms by the year 1519 (which makes him 36 years old): “I had then already read and taught the sacred Scriptures most diligently privately and publicly for seven years, so that I knew them nearly all by memory.”10

Interestingly, in a letter from Luther to Spalatin (dated that same year) we get a clue that Luther did not accomplish this completely through some mystical memory, or force of will. He has read and approves of one of the classical sources that discuss memory techniques:
“Secondly, if both Quintilian and Aristotle cannot be read on natural history, it is better to omit Aristotle, especially as Pliny will easily supply his place. Quintilian is the only author who will make the best youths, or rather men. But above all I beg that whether Fach or Hess is made teacher of this subject, at least they should have the same method. For myself, I prefer Quintilian to almost all authors, because, while instructing, he also teaches eloquence; that is, he teaches the subject and style most happily. Everything else is all right. Farewell.”11

We will therefore limit ourselves to thoroughly acquainting ourselves with what Quintilian has to say about learning and memory. He will be our initial guide into this subject as we seek to reclaim an understanding of how to train memory and memorize at scale.

Walk through of Quintillian advice for memory

basic framework of how he approaches things

basic techniques He describes

General working strategy for memorizing large portions of scripture

Psalm Specific Memory Sources

  • Letter to Marcellinus Further notes found in link.
  • Luther’s Preface to the German Psalter
  • Jerome psalm 1 like entrance to a big mansion and each psalm a chamber they all have a key
  • Need Augustine quote talking about memory spatially

Talk through using Luther and Athanasius as helps in how to put things together.

Psalms as special focus on remembering and forgetting:
“83 times in the Book of Psalms”12
why the Psalter - Luther and many other’s recommendation of it

Let’s Finally be Practical

Roadblocks

I grew up most of my life thinking of memorizing as a singular kind of process. Summed up by the advise: “repeat it until it sticks.” This approach to memorization is often referred to as rote memorization. Using this basic brute force method I was able to remember speeches, the Apostles Creed, the Lord’s Prayer and a variety of other smaller excerpts. While functional, it was a boring and tedious method of memorization. It also suffers from two huge handicaps:

  1. Things to be memorized need to be small enough to repeat over and over. Large scale text tend to quickly becomes overwhelming and unattainable.
  2. The quality of rote memory is fragile, hard to access, and work with later.

We can clearly see these dynamics in the scale of this project’s goal to memorize the whole Psalter. There are many many people who have memorized a handful of Psalms, or even maybe thirty or forty, but ALL of them? That scale quickly exceeds ones ability to recite all of them within a short amount of time (and definitely not in one sitting). Therefore retaining a text of this size requires the most stable form of memory possible.

We will address in more detail the deficiencies of text memorized by rote as we go, but for know think about the last time you had to completely restart a prayer or Bible verse because you got jumbled in the middle. That kind of restriction to a single path through memory is a side effect of rote memorization. It is a dynamic that makes large scale memorization almost impossible. If you make the long journey to verse 71 of Psalm 78 but then stumble and have to have to go aaaaall the way to the beginning you will never realistically make it to that final 72nd verse.

Examples of accidental memory techniques  

  • Remember parishioner by pew 
  • Remember verse by imagining page
  1. first roadblock is thinking it is not possible:

We have also to varying degrees internalized the mechanistic metaphors with which our machines are organized. In doing so we have increasingly started to understand ourselves in terms of computers and the paradigms that define digital data storage. This tends to encourage a one to one comparison of what we can “store” in a hard drive on a computer versus what we can “store” within our memory. This instantly puts us in a place of discouragement as we wade through the sea of information around us. But memory has been with humans far longer than computers.

I was raised on the computer metaphor of memory. Learning is like “downloading” information that you store on the “hard drive” of your mind. The memories in your mind are therefore a kind of collection of random bits and pieces you hope to find enough space to store. Surely somewhere along the road you will run out of space just like that old broken down laptop shoved in the closet. But even if you have “good memory” and won’t run out of space, then surely something as massive as a whole book will get fuzzy and forgotten quickly?

Proverbs 6:21 and Deuteronomy 6:8-9 both picture memory as a kind of strapping on and binding together. In many ways this is a freeing conception of memory in that it removes the perennial concern of “running out of space” and replaces it with a more accurate account of the living act of memory and recall.

  1. Second roadblock memory at scale. Methods that work okay for short things will burn you out if you have a long trek. rotes is just not even possible and also produces memory that is unhelpful

  2. Third roadblock getting stuck in modern or historical advice so many modern sources aimed at different goals than scripture memory

  3. getting stuck trying to make up ones own approach to memorizing the whole book of psalms

Basic Memory Philosophy and Vocabulary

There are two basic questions we will not give full anwsers to but enough to get started:

  • How can you work with or improve memory?
  • What is the content of memory?

The How to of Memory

Classical distinction of Natural vs Artificial Memory. This does not give us enough information to work with practically.

To help us filter other advise we may see or hear about memory we can group advise into three main categories:

  • Fatalistic Attitude- sad and depressing
  • Brute force or Rote Attitude- painful and ineffective
  • Industrious Attitude - core of where we should be
  • Artistic or Artificial Attitude- take notes from here with caution and clear idea of what you are trying to do.

find Quintilian quote on being industrious

Melanchthon quote on not addressing memory art:
From De Rhetorica Libri Tres 2.2.2 pp. 48
Memoriam ac pronunciationem natura suppeditat, et in eis, quid ars possit, ex aliis autoribus disces.13

Rough Translation: Nature provides memory and delivery, and regarding what art can achieve in these areas, you will learn from other authors.

The Contents of Memory

In his discourse on teaching (or Dialectices) Philip Melanchthon lays out a clear no nonsense understanding of what lives inside our minds. He states that the representation of ideas in our mind are not some kind of universal or eternal thing. Rather: “This form is not a thing outside of the intellect, but the intellectual act itself depicting this image. Plato’s lofty style, which often speaks of ideas figuratively, and makes personifications, gave occasion to later persons to think of ideas as being common natures fluttering around I know not where.”14

We will build off of this clear and simple philosophical foundation
Attitudes to memory 

What are you storing in memory 

Platonic, mystic,

as drawn from Quintilian

Core Scripture on Memory Probably move to intro

Deuteronomy 4:9, 6: and 11: 
Proverbs 3:, 6: and 7:

Luther on Deuteronomy 6:9: “You will note that Moses places this admonition, not with other Commandments but with the first one alone and with his declaration that they be in the heart, be impressed, spoken, written and inscribed”15

Deut 6:6-9 pictures placing words in or upon the heart as the practice of remembering.

“There is a corporate and congregational understanding of how these words will be placed upon the hand and heart”16

The Artistic or “Artificial” Memory According to Quintilian

Palace and Images

The Industrious Memory According to Quintilian

Page Palace
rules and exercises
different from rote note the key things that make it more functional

🏛️ The Main Treatise on Mnemonic Technique

Book 11, Chapter 2

  • Core Focus: Dedicated entirely to Memory and Memory Systems.
  • Key Themes: Detailed analysis of the Method of Loci (Memory Palaces); relates the origin story of Simonides of Ceos (the father of mnemonics); compares the effectiveness of visual symbols (like anchors or weapons) against verbatim text memorization; provides practical advice on how to split speeches into digestible segments for easier retention.

👶 Early Development & Cognitive Growth

Book 1, Chapter 1

  • Core Focus: Cradle-to-early-childhood education.
  • Key Themes: Establishes memory as the primary indicator of a child’s natural intellect (ingenium). Quintilian emphasizes that a child’s ability to learn quickly and retain information accurately is the truest baseline sign of promising academic and rhetorical potential.

Book 1, Chapter 3

  • Core Focus: Assessing and managing a student’s natural disposition.
  • Key Themes: Asserts that a boy’s chief cognitive capacity at a young age is receptive memory. He argues that early teachers must continuously exercise this faculty to expand mental capacity before complex, original creative thinking has fully matured.

📐 Theoretical Framework & Structure

Book 3, Chapter 3

  • Core Focus: The core anatomy and divisions of rhetorical theory.
  • Key Themes: Formally classifies Memoria as one of the five fundamental canons of classical rhetoric (alongside Invention, Arrangement, Style, and Delivery). Beautifully describes memory as the “guardian” or “treasure-house” of the entire craft, arguing that without it, all previous preparation falls completely flat.

👥 Audience Psychology & Processing

Book 6, Chapter 1

  • Core Focus: The Peroration (conclusion) of a speech.
  • Key Themes: Shifts focus from the speaker’s mind to the judge’s memory. Quintilian details how a strategic recap must condense the core elements of a sprawling case into a single, punchy summary. This is done explicitly to refresh a distracted judge’s mind and cement critical facts right before deliberation.

🧠 Deep Mental Absorption & Internalization

Book 10, Chapter 1

  • Core Focus: The reading lists and processing of literature for aspiring orators.
  • Key Themes: Focuses on how to process text deeply. Quintilian warns against superficial reading, arguing that literature must be chewed, digested, and “reduced to a pulp” (in succum et sanguinem) so that the material moves out of short-term recollection and transforms into a deep, subconscious rhetorical instinct.

Book 10, Chapter 3

  • Core Focus: The mechanics and environment of written composition.
  • Key Themes: Explores internal mental mapping. Quintilian advises against speaking aloud or dictating frantically to a scribe while trying to formulate complex arguments. He argues that silent, deliberate composition forces the mind to reflect deeply, analyze its own thoughts, and properly arrange ideas internally.

Book 10, Chapter 7

  • Core Focus: The practice and execution of improvisation (extempore speech).
  • Key Themes: Redefines improvisation as a feat of swift cognitive retrieval. He argues that a well-trained memory stores a vast internal “wealth of matter and words” which a sharp mind can dynamically deploy in fractions of a second during live, unpredictable debate.

⚖️ Practice, Delivery, and Mental Presence

Book 11, Chapter 3

  • Core Focus: Actio (voice, delivery, and physical gesture).
  • Key Themes: Highlights a profound cognitive link between somatic behavior and memory. Quintilian points out that if an orator’s physical gestures are jerky, unnatural, or overly anxious, it actively disrupts the internal flow of memory, causing the speaker to lose their train of thought or stumble.

Book 12, Chapter 5

  • Core Focus: The physical and psychological equipment required by an experienced orator.
  • Key Themes: Outlines the critical need for presence of mind and firmness. Quintilian explains how stage fright, lack of self-confidence, and sudden panic can completely paralyze memory retrieval, causing even the most flawlessly prepared speech to suddenly vanish under pressure.

Memory in Luther’s Preface to the German Psalter

Finger Printing Psalms with Luther
connect with ten commandments and lord’s prayer
basically hooking back the small catechism as basis

Memory in Letter to Marcellinus

Placement of Psalter within Scripture as a Whole

“Everything that is in our Scripture, my child, is both old and new. (Matthew 13:52?) It is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, as it is written (2 Tim 3:16). But the book of Psalms has, in addition, a certain persuasive observation for those who devote themselves to it.” - para 2.

Psalter is like a Garden

He firmly places Psalms in the midst of this thumbnail sketch of the Old Testament:

Letter to Marcellinus, para. 2
Book of Psalms is like a garden which besides bearing fruit in it that is found elsewhere—which it sets to music—brings to light its own special fruit which it accompanies in song along with the words.

The Unique Style of the Psalms

“the book of Psalms also has a certain grace of its own and an elevated style. For in addition to the other things it has in common with the other books, it has this amazing aspect - that within it the movements of each soul with all its changes and chastisements are detailed and worked out. The result is that anyone who really wants to receive or to understand from its limitless possibilities finds himself formed in just the way we find written there in the Psalms. ” - para. 10

Next section moves to the Psalms forming and shaping and teaching us how to live our inner and outer lives:

Letter to Marcellinus, para. 10

in the Psalms you are also told how to keep away from evil…

the book of Psalms also tells how to repent and what is necessary to say for repentance to actually take place…

In the Psalms too you are told how it is necessary to bear afflictions, and what you should say to someone who is suffering and what to say after the suffering has occurred…

the Psalms also teach what you should actually say when giving thanks…

from the Psalms we are also taught what to cry out when fleeing and what words should be offered to God while we are being persecuted, as well as what to say after the persecution when we have been delivered…

in the Psalms we are even informed how one ought to praise the Lord and what words to say in order to confess him rightly. In fact, in every case we will find that these divine songs have been provided for us and the inner motions of our souls, and whatever condition we find ourselves in.

Main things Psalms teach how to do:

  1. Keep away from evil
  2. Repent of sin
  3. Bear afflictions and comfort those who suffer
  4. Give thanks
  5. Cry out under persecution and give thanks when delivered from it
  6. Praise the Lord and confess him rightly

He makes a distinction between Christological prophecy and personal psalms:

Letter to Marcellinus, para. 11

when they take up the Psalter and encounter the prophecies about the Savior in certain Psalms, they treat them, too, with the same awe and reverence as they did when the encountered them in other Scriptures. But the truly amazing thing is that when they come to the other Psalms they recognize them as being their very own words.

He then clarifies the proper use of these personal psalms.

Letter to Marcellinus, para. 12

It seems to me that these words often act like a mirror for the one who sings them. They allow him to see himself and the inner movements of his own soul in them. And when one recites them they produce that very effect.

He out lines eight basic Psalms for personal formation:

  • How to recognize one’s own afflictions in Psalm 3
  • How to speak with Boldness and Prayer in Psalms 12 and 17
  • How to personally confess sin in 51
  • How to handle being persecuted in Psalms 54, 56, 57, 142

Letter to Marcellinus, para. 12

each Psalm was dictated and composed by the Spirit, we find in them, as was said above, a better understanding of the inner movements of our own soul. All of what they say concerns us, and so their words come across as though they were our words. They serve as a reminder of the inner movements within us and as a corrective for our daily conduct.

Move to more detailed understanding of how Psalms speak to the inner movements of our soul:

Letter to Marcellinus, para. 14
If it is necessary to speak even more to the point,…
the book of Psalms contains the primary pattern for how souls are to be managed. For just as one who comes before a king carries with him a certain comportment and demeanor in what he says, so that he might not be thrown out as uneducated when he talks, in the same way for those striving toward virtue and wanting to comprehend the life of the Savior in the body, when they read this divine book it first of all brings to mind the inner movements of the soul and in this way further models and teaches petitioners such words as they should use. For it must first be observed that in this book there are Psalms that speak in narrative form, in exhortations, in prophecies, in the form of prayer, as well as in confession:
Finger Printing Psalms with Athanasius

Arrangement of Psalter by Form in Chains

from Para 14

Full Psalter Walk Through and Chaining

Beginning in Para 15 Athanasius begins a full walk through of the Psalter (almost). He is very selective to keep with the personal use of the Psalms in this walk through and seems to go by chain rather than strict psalm numerical order:

Private Psalms about Christ

He moves from the personal psalm category and lays out some chains around Christ.

His specific instructions are:

Letter to Marcellinus, para. 26
When you want to sing about the Savior on your own in private, you will find such thing about the Savior more or less in every Psalm, but…

Psalms to Music?

In Para 27 he moves to talking about the purpose of the psalms being set to music

  1. Music praises God
  2. Music harmonizes our being

Letter to Marcellinus, para. 29
For in the same way, when one sings well he becomes in tune with his soul just as one is led from being out of balance to being in balance. The result is that when one is well grounded in his nature he will not be distraught over something but instead takes a more positive attitude towards it and inevitably receives more of what he desires in the future. For when the melody is joined to the words you forget what you are suffering and find yourself rejoicing instead, seeing things with the mind of Christ and dwelling on what is best.

A unified approach and singular path to memorizing the whole Psalter

The Big Idea

I have been experimenting and slowly creating a memorization style that sees attending the the text and memory as a deeply connected cycle.

Basic Memory Principles

  1. “My precepts on the subject shall be of a simpler kind. If a speech of some length has to be committed to memory, it will be well to learn it piecemeal, since there is nothing so bad for the memory as being overburdened. But the sections into which we divide it for this purpose should not be very short: otherwise they will be too many in number, and will break up and distract the memory. I am not, however, prepared to recommend any definite length; it will depend on the natural limits of the passage concerned, unless, indeed, it be so long as itself to require subdivision. But some limits must be fixed to enable us, by dint of frequent and continuous practice, to connect the words in their proper order, which is a task of no small difficulty, and subsequently to unite the various sections into a whole when we go over them in order.” - Quintilian
  2. If certain portions prove especially difficult to remember, it will be found advantageous to indicate them by certain marks, the remembrance of which will refresh and stimulate the memory. For there can be but few whose memory is so barren that they will fail to recognise the symbols with which they have marked different passages. But if anyone is slow to recognise his own signs, he should employ the following additional remedy, which, though drawn from the mnemonic system discussed above, is not without its uses: he will adapt his symbols to the nature of the thoughts which tend to slip from his memory, using an anchor, as I suggested above, if he has to speak of a ship, or a spear, if he has to speak of a battle. For symbols are highly efficacious, and one idea suggests another: for example, if we change a ring from one finger to another or tie a thread round it, it will serve to remind us of our reason for so doing. Specially effective are those devices which lead the memory from one thing to another similar thing which we have got to remember; for example, in the case of names, if we desire to remember the name Fabius, we should think of the famous Cunctator, whom we are certain not to forget, or of some friend bearing the same name. This is specially easy with names such as Aper, Ursus, Naso, or Crispus, since in these cases we can fix their origin in our memory. Origin again may assist us to a better remembrance of derivative names, such as Cicero, Verrius, or Aurelius. However, I will say no more on this point.- Quintilian
  3. “if we attempt to learn by heart from another reading aloud, we shall find that there is both loss and gain; on the one hand, the process of learning will be slower, because the perception of the eye is quicker than that of the ear, while, on the other hand, when we have heard a passage once or twice, we shall be in a position to test our memory and match it against the voice of the reader. It is, indeed, important for other reasons to test ourselves thus from time to time, since continuous reading has this drawback, that it passes over the passages which we find hard to remember at the same speed as those which we find less difficulty in retaining. By testing ourselves to see whether we remember a passage, we develop greater concentration without waste of time over the repetition of passages which we already know by heart. Thus, only those passages which tend to slip from the memory are repeated with a view to fixing them in the mind by frequent rehearsal, although as a rule the mere fact that they once slipped our memory makes us ultimately remember them with special accuracy.” - Quintilian
  4. Goal is to have a “mental picture” of the literal words, sentences and paragraphs that make up a page.
    • Definition by Quintilian: “There is one thing which will be of assistance to everyone, namely, to learn a passage by heart from the same tablets on which he has committed it to writing. For he will have certain tracks to guide him in his pursuit of memory, and the mind’s eye will be fixed not merely on the pages on which the words were written, but on individual lines, and at times he will speak as though he were reading aloud.” - Quintillian Institutio Oratoria Book XI 546
  5. “Further, if the writing should be interrupted by some erasure, addition or alteration, there are certain symbols available, the sight of which will prevent us from wandering from the track. This device bears some resemblance to the mnemonic system which I mentioned above, but if my experience is worth anything, is at once more expeditious and more effective.” - Quintilian
  6. “Both learning by heart and writing have this feature in common: namely, that good health, sound digestion, and freedom from other preoccupations of mind contribute largely to the success of both.” - Quintilian
  7. “But for the purpose of getting a real grasp of what we have written under the various heads, division and artistic structure will be found of great value, while, with the exception of practice, which is the most powerful aid of all, they are practically the only means of ensuring an accurate remembrance of what we have merely thought out. For correct division will be an absolute safeguard against error in the order of our speech, since there are certain points not merely in the distribution of the various questions in our speech, but also in their development (provided we speak as we ought), which naturally come first, second, and third, and so on, while the connexion will be so perfect that nothing can be omitted or inserted without the fact of the omission or insertion being obvious. We are told that Scaevola, after a game of draughts in which he made the first move and was defeated, went over the whole game again in his mind on his way into the country, and on recalling the move which had cost him the game, returned to tell the man with whom he had been playing, and the latter acknowledged that he was right. Is order, then, I ask you, to be accounted of less importance in a speech, in which it depends entirely on ourselves, whereas in a game our opponent has an equal share in its development? Again, if our structure be what it should, the artistic sequence will serve to guide the memory. For just as it is easier to learn verse than prose, so it is easier to learn prose when it is artistically constructed than when it has no such organisation. If these points receive attention, it will be possible to repeat verbatim even such passages as gave the impression of being delivered extempore.” - Quintilian
  8. “My own memory is of a very ordinary kind, but I found that I could do this with success on occasions when the interruption of a declamation by persons who had a claim to such a courtesy forced me to repeat part of what I had said. There are persons still living, who were then present to witness if I lie. However, if anyone asks me what is the one supreme method of memory, I shall reply, practice and industry. The most important thing is to learn much by heart and to think much, and, if possible, to do this daily, since there is nothing that is more increased by practice or impaired by neglect than memory.” - Quintilian
  9. “Therefore boys should, as I have already urged, learn as much as possible by heart at the earliest stage, while all who, whatever their age, desire to cultivate the power of memory, should endeavor to swallow the initial tedium of reading and re-reading what they have written or read, a process which we may compare to chewing the cud. This task will be rendered less tiresome if we begin by confining ourselves to learning only a little at a time, in amounts not sufficient to create disgust: we may then proceed to increase the amount by a line a day, an addition which will not sensibly increase the labor of learning, until at last the amount we can attack will know no limits.” - Quintilian
  10. “We should begin with poetry and then go on to oratory, while finally we may attempt passages still freer in rhythm and less akin to ordinary speech, such, for example, as passages from legal writers. For passages intended as an exercise should be somewhat difficult in character if they are to make it easy to achieve the end for which the exercise is designed; just as athletes train the muscles of their hands by carrying weights of lead, although in the actual contests their hands will be empty and free.” - Quintilian
  11. “Whatever the cause, things which could not be recalled on the spot are easily co-ordinated the next day, and time itself, which is generally accounted one of the causes of forgetfulness, actually serves to strengthen the memory.” - Quintilian
  12. “For this reason I regard it as a mistake to permit the student to be prompted or to consult his manuscript, since such practices merely encourage carelessness, and no one will ever realize that he has not got his theme by heart, if he has no fear of forgetting it.” - Quintilian
  13. “If, however, our memory be naturally somewhat dull or time presses, it will be useless to tie ourselves down rigidly to every word, since if we forget any one of them, the result may be awkward hesitation or even a tongue-tied silence. It is, therefore, far safer to secure a good grasp of the facts themselves and to leave ourselves free to speak as we will. For the loss of even a single word that we have chosen is always a matter for regret, and it is hard to supply a substitute when we are searching for the word that we had written.” - Quintilian
  14. “For the rest there are many historical examples of the power to which memory may be developed by natural aptitude and application. Themistocles is said to have spoken excellently in Persian after a year’s study; Mithridates is recorded to have known twenty-two languages, that being the number of the different nations included in his empire; Crassus, surnamed the Rich, when commanding in Asia had such a complete mastery of five different Greek dialects, that he would give judgement in the dialect employed by the plaintiff in putting forward his suit; Cyrus is believed to have known the name of every soldier in his army, while Theodectes is actually said to have been able to repeat any number of verses after only a single hearing. I remember that it used to be alleged that there were persons still living who could do the same, though I never had the good fortune to be present at such a performance. Still, we shall do well to have faith in such miracles, if only that he who believes may also hope to achieve the like.” - Quintilian
  15. Therefore, the goal of getting things into long-term memory is to have densely packed and vivid associations “hooking in” the thing you are trying to remember.
  16. Strong associations to a new thing need to be made from a collection of different types:
    1. Spatial Placement. Can be memory of tangible space or abstract space.
    2. Connection to an Image. Can be person, object, character, etc.
    3. Action and Movement. Imagining the associated images moving and interacting helps layer in more associations.
    4. Audio and Visual associations. Can be that something sounds similar, or that the shape of a letter or number look similar.
  17. Memory is directional you have to travel from place to place to remember things. Be intentional about how you want to travel.
    1. Where are your entry points into a text? How can you make them clear and vivid? How can you place them intentionally in relation to the rest of the text?
    2. What are the boundaries, shape, or rails of the text?
    3. Practice working the text in as many directions as possible not just liner word to word. This again makes more associations and anchors things more firmly. I.e. Up and down first words, Up and down last words, Up and down center words, leap frog words, middle to out, middle to back, back to front. But if a direction mixes you up try a different one. I think back to front is the least helpful for text. But is very helpful for numbers or “loose” information.
  18. Approach things from Shape and Syntax (Big picture and Small picture). Think of working from each side toward the middle.

Pass 1 

Hand write the section and read it out loud as you do. Read it out loud a few more times after if you really want to.

Pass 2 

Go line by line and find the center word. Then find the center of the first half (quarter point) and then find the back quarter point.

Pass 3 

Line up the center and quarter points line over line. Then start grouping short small groupings of words. Like connecting “the” or “in the” to its referent. 

Pass 4 

Come up with a striking image for each grouping of words. Then think of how the images can interact with each other across the lines and even up and down lines. 

Pass 5 

Draw shapes around patterns that stick out within and across lines

Athanasius and Artificial memory style super structure

Quintilian style page palace with Luther’s Psalm fingerprinting

Footnotes

  1. Leclercq, Henri. “The Second Council of Nicaea.” The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 11. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1911. ↩

  2. Mnemonics in History and Applicability in Catechesis. Masters Essay Submitted to Concordia Theological Seminary Fort Wayne, Blaeir Kasfeldt, p. 10 ↩

  3. Everyone’s Luther: Prefaces to the Books of the Bible. Preface to the Psalms, p. 21. Prefaces-to-the-Books-of-the-Bible-with-cover.pdf ↩

  4. Art of Memory, Francis Yates, Need Page number that is at the beginning of the chapter on the renaissance era. ↩

  5. Luther’s Works Vol 31, Disputation Against Scholastic Theology, p. 12-13 ↩

  6. Art of Memory, Francis Yates, Need Page number that is in chapter on Thomas Aquinas. ↩

  7. Art of Memory, Francis Yates, Need Page number that from chapter about Ramism. ↩

  8. Mnemonics in History and Applicability in Catechesis by Blair Kasfeldt ↩ ↩2

  9. The Large Catechism, Explanation of the Third Commandment ↩

  10. Luthers Works, Vol. 34: Career of the Reformebr IV, p. 334 ↩

  11. Luther’s correspondence and other contemporary letters, by Martin Luther 1483-1546 translated and edited by Preserved Smith, Letter from Luther to Spalatin Wittenberg before November 29, 1519. p. 253-254. Internet Archive Link ↩

  12. Mnemonics in History and Applicability in Catechesis. Blaeir Kasfeldt, p. 18 ↩

  13. Principal Writings on Dialectic and Rhetoric ↩

  14. Philip Melanchthon’s Erotemata Dialectices, p. 17 ↩

  15. Luther, Martin. Luther’s Works: Lectures on Deuteronomy (St. Louis: CPH, 1960), p. 70. ↩

  16. Mnemonics in History and Applicability in Catechesis. Blaeir Kasfeldt, p. 132 ↩

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