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Summary
Summary
For the medieval mystical tradition, the Christian soul meets God in a "cloud of unknowing," a divine darkness of ignorance. This meeting with God is beyond all knowing and beyond all experiencing. Mysticisms of the modern period, on the contrary, place "mystical experience" at the center, and contemporary readers are inclined to misunderstand the medieval tradition in "experientialist" terms. Denys Turner argues that the distinctiveness and contemporary relevance of medieval mysticism lies precisely in its rejection of "mystical experience," and locates the mystical firmly within the grasp of the ordinary and the everyday. The argument covers some central authorities in the period from Augustine to John of the Cross.
Reviews (2)
Choice Review
Turner (Univ. of Bristol) presents in this provocative study a "philosophical history" of some theological metaphors centrally connected with the apophatic tradition (via negativa) in classical Western Christian spirituality: interiority, ascent, light and darkness, and oneness with God. Turner's principal sources are Denys the Areopagite, Augustine, Bonaventure, Eckhart, the anonymous author of The Cloud of Unknowing, Denys the Carthusian, and John of the Cross. His ultimate purpose is to retrieve the medieval tradition--that is, to rescue the "metaphors of negativity" from a post-medieval "experientialist" misreading. Historically, what has happened, he asserts, is that, although today's "theological positivists" have "retained the metaphors," they have also "evacuated them of their dialectics and refilled them with the stuff of experience." They have, i.e., "psychologized" them. Just what Turner means by this is far from self-evident and requires both close reasoning on his part and a correspondingly close, patient reading on ours. He has done the one and thereby helped facilitate the other, albeit a bit too densely at times. Throughout, he evinces a keen love of his subject that is contagious. A good seminar resource. Useful accessories include footnotes, a select bibliography, and an index. Graduate; faculty. C. MacCormick; emeritus, Wells College
Choice Review
Turner (Univ. of Bristol) presents in this provocative study a "philosophical history" of some theological metaphors centrally connected with the apophatic tradition (via negativa) in classical Western Christian spirituality: interiority, ascent, light and darkness, and oneness with God. Turner's principal sources are Denys the Areopagite, Augustine, Bonaventure, Eckhart, the anonymous author of The Cloud of Unknowing, Denys the Carthusian, and John of the Cross. His ultimate purpose is to retrieve the medieval tradition--that is, to rescue the "metaphors of negativity" from a post-medieval "experientialist" misreading. Historically, what has happened, he asserts, is that, although today's "theological positivists" have "retained the metaphors," they have also "evacuated them of their dialectics and refilled them with the stuff of experience." They have, i.e., "psychologized" them. Just what Turner means by this is far from self-evident and requires both close reasoning on his part and a correspondingly close, patient reading on ours. He has done the one and thereby helped facilitate the other, albeit a bit too densely at times. Throughout, he evinces a keen love of his subject that is contagious. A good seminar resource. Useful accessories include footnotes, a select bibliography, and an index. Graduate; faculty. C. MacCormick; emeritus, Wells College
Table of Contents
| Acknowledgements |
| Introduction |
| Part I Two Sources and a Synthesis |
| 1 The allegory and Exodus |
| 2 Cataphatic and the apophatic in Denys the Areopagite |
| 3 The God within: Augustine's Confessions |
| 4 Interiority and ascent: Augustine's De Trinitate |
| 5 Hierarchy interiorised: Bonaventure's Itinerarium Mentis in Deum |
| Part II Developments |
| 6 Eckhart: God and the self |
| 7 Eckhart: detachment and the critique of desire |
| 8 The Cloud of Unknowing and the critique of interiority |
| 9 Denys the Carthusian and the problem of experience |
| 10 John of the Cross: the dark nights and depression |
| 11 From mystical theology to mysticism |
| Further reading |
| Index |
| Acknowledgements |
| Introduction |
| Part I Two Sources and a Synthesis |
| 1 The allegory and Exodus |
| 2 Cataphatic and the apophatic in Denys the Areopagite |
| 3 The God within: Augustine's Confessions |
| 4 Interiority and ascent: Augustine's De Trinitate |
| 5 Hierarchy interiorised: Bonaventure's Itinerarium Mentis in Deum |
| Part II Developments |
| 6 Eckhart: God and the self |
| 7 Eckhart: detachment and the critique of desire |
| 8 The Cloud of Unknowing and the critique of interiority |
| 9 Denys the Carthusian and the problem of experience |
| 10 John of the Cross: the dark nights and depression |
| 11 From mystical theology to mysticism |
| Further reading |
| Index |