My translation is based on three Spanish editions of the Sayings of St John:

• Rodríguez 1993. Dichos de luz y amor, in San Juan de la Cruz, Obras completas, edited by José Vicente Rodríguez with notes and introductions by Federico Ruiz, 5th edition (Madrid: Editorial de Espiritualidad), pp. 91–112.

• Ruano 1994. Dichos de luz y amor, in San Juan de la Cruz, Obras completas, edited by Lucinio Ruano de la Iglesia, 14th edition (Madrid: Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos), pp. 153–73.

• Pacho 1997. Avisos espirituales, in San Juan de la Cruz, Obras completas, 5th edition, edited by Eulogio Pacho (Burgos: Monte Carmelo), pp. 89–116.

The three editions differ in their arrangement of the Sayings, and in their numbering; they vary sometimes too in their readings of the text, and often in its punctuation. I have followed the arrangement and sequential numbering in Rodríguez (1993); where there are different readings I have recorded the variants in a note; and in matters of punctuation I have followed my own judgement. (Print edition: The biblical quotations in the footnotes are from the Douay-Rheims translation of the Latin Vulgate Bible, the version St John used).

I have consulted also the versions of the Sayings in the two standard translations of St John’s works in English:

• The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Doctor of the Church, translated and edited by E. Allison Peers (London: Burns and Oates, 1964).

  • The Collected Works of St. John of the Cross, translated by Kieran Kavanaugh, O.C.D., and Otilio Rodríguez, O.C.D., 3rd edition (Washington, D.C.: ICS Publications, 2017).

The following is a valuable essay on the origin and content of the Sayings:

• José Vicente Rodríguez, ‘Avisos espirituales’, in Diccionariode San Juan de la Cruz, edited by Eulogio Pacho (Burgos:Monte Carmelo, 2009), pp. 137–145.

On the life, thought and writings of St John, see Colin Thompson, St John of the Cross. Songs in the Night (London: SPCK, 2002).