Book Review: Balthasar on the Spiritual Senses: Perceiving Splendour

Abstract

Balthasar on the Spiritual Senses: Perceiving Splendour. By Mark McInroy. Changing Paradigms in Historical and Systematic Theology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. 217 pp. $99.00 (cloth).Mark McInroy's book Balthasar on the Spiritual Senses sets itself to the task of uncovering Balthasars use and modification of the doctrine of the spiritual senses-that is, the doctrine that human beings have senses in the spiritual realm that are analogous to those of the physical. McInroy focuses on the function of the spiritual senses in Balthasar's thought because he desires to fill a lacuna in Balthasar scholarship, as he observes that only a handful of scholars have observed that the spiritual senses are a noteworthy feature of Balthasars (p. 4). This lack of scholarly investigation is significant, for after all, At the very core of Balthasar's aesthetics lies the idea that our perceptual faculties must become ?spiritualized' if we are to perceive the splendour (Glanz) of the form through which God is revealed (p. 2). Another way to summarize McInroy's efforts here is as a serious attempt to pull together various threads or themes quite prevalent in Balthasar and yet not always articulated as a unity.One of McInroy's basic points is that Balthasar is quite aware of how important embodiment is in the spiritual life, so much so that the spiritual aspect of human beings has senses. We must avoid reducing spiritual perception to the merely metaphorical (p. 21). Why we must do so is not at first apparent, though McInroy increasingly unveils how-ultimately-Balthasar is defending and elevating beauty, which is closely tied to our senses. McInroy reveals Balthasar's logic by stressing specific elements of his thought. So, the chapters focus tightly on a handful of interlocking ideas: the very real sense-quality, or sensuality, of the spiritual senses (see especially the study of Origen, pp. 18-36); the precarious balance that must be kept between spiritual sight and the invisible God (as on pp. 125-129,154-160); and beauty as the sensible revelation of being (especially pp. 132-133,143-154).Balthasar, and so McInroy, binds himself firmly to the conviction that the spiritual senses do not perceive God's nature, God in se, which Balthasar terms the Deus nudus (pp. 126-127). We should not imagine that God has a body, or that Balthasar thinks God does. This has much more to do with a Christian's perception of God's call of each person to a mission in the world, with liturgical experience, with encountering our neighbor (pp. …