Physics as Spiritual Exercise

Poetry as Spiritual Exercise

Reviewed by: A World on Fire: Sharing the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises with Other Religions by Erin M. Cline Elizabeth Liebert SNJM (bio) A World on Fire: Sharing the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises with Other Religions. By Erin M. Cline. Washington D.C. Catholic University of America Press, 2018. 284 pp, $29.95 A thoughtful and active Hindu committing the time and discipline to make the full Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola? A dedicated practitioner of Zen? How would such persons ever come to this point? And, once they arrive at the door, how does the director of the Spiritual Exercises provide a hospitable welcome and suitable adaptations? Furthermore, why should those of us who love (or practice, or direct, or teach) the Spiritual Exercises or Ignatian spirituality even care about this dilemma? These are the questions that Erin Cline tackles systematically and precisely in this volume. We should care about these questions, she says, because the Spiritual Exercises have something unique to contribute to interfaith exchanges at the level of spiritual experience. Cline does not address the now well-trod path of Protestants to the Spiritual Exercise, but rather, focuses on the situation of non-Christians, especially Hindus in their variety, Buddhists, and the multitude of persons whose Confucian cultures frame the way they see the world. Aspects of Ignatian spirituality, such as the newly expanded understandings of Examen, can somewhat readily be adapted across religious traditions. But the centerpiece of Ignatian spirituality, the Spiritual Exercises, with their intense focus on the figure of Christ and our discipleship with him? The path through the full Spiritual Exercises is neither easy, nor is it self-evident how one might proceed, or, as many would argue, that we should we proceed at all. First, Cline takes up the question "Should the Exercises be adapted?" Ignatius clearly assumed so (Annotations 18, 19, 20); indeed they must be adapted in light of each individual (Annotation 15 and many other places). However, given Ignatius's setting, the theological density of some of the parts of the Exercises, and the history of early Jesuit practice, it is clear that Ignatius's imagination did not extend as far as the situation Cline is addressing. Many of Cline's principles will be familiar to directors of the Exercises: Always begin where the individual is and consider how to help that person get the most from the Exercises; allow the Creator to deal immediately with the Creature, but help her to weave her own life narrative into the story of Jesus in a way that becomes more vivid and connected; check to see that the necessary dispositions are present, including the desire to come to know Jesus personally and the willingness to engage the prayer and exercises as fully [End Page 371] as possible; wrestle with the question about what can be removed or changed before the Exercises cease to be the Exercises. One principle seemed surprising at first read: keep the theology thin and, instead, focus on experience. The theology could be almost impossible to unsnarl for someone who does not share it, but the experience of the Exercises occurs at a different level. It is here that the value of the Spiritual Exercises for interfaith sharing lies. Chapter 2 was the most useful for me as teacher and director of the Exercises. In it, Cline carefully constructs general principles of adaptation. These principles directly impact work with other traditions, but are also useful for other kinds of adaptations. First, however, the director must consider who is ready to make the full Exercises—a question that faces a director when anyone asks to make the Exercises. Not surprisingly, the Exercises give the essential conditions: the potential retreatant should exhibit great generosity and desire to deepen relationship with the Creator and Lord—that is, at least be open to encountering God even if uncertain about what that belief entails; a willingness to explore following Christ; and a willingness to offer desires and freedom to God and to learn from one's desires how to serve graciously in the circumstances of one's life (Annotation 5). There is also a pragmatic condition: Can the director and the retreatant form a...

This paper proposes that resources from philosophy as a way of life (PWL), in particular the prescription of targeted 'spiritual exercises' (Hadot) can be used in palliative counselling, addressing Alexandrova's critique that philosophy as 'big picture' theories alone are insufficient. Part I shows how the disciplines of philosophy and medicine for a long time intersected, in particular in competing prescriptive notions of 'regimen' or 'way of life' (diaitês) in the ancient world, in which philosophy was considered widely as PWL. Part II applies PWL work on the ancient philosophical spiritual exercises to contemporary clinical settings. We show how six ancient spiritual exercises respond to patients' needs as persons, whose quality of life is importantly shaped by their beliefs and sense-making, as they face profound existential or spiritual challenges, as well as forms of physical disability and diminished capabilities which they may never have previously countenanced.

In this paper, we will present Rinzai practices from Zen Masters Ikkyū Sōjun (一休宗純, 1394–1481) and Hakuin Ekaku (白隠 慧鶴, 1686–1769) as offering a distinctive kind of spiritual exercise: disruptive reorientation to transcendence (enlightenment) through immanence (a return to the world in all its ugly distractions, beauty, and insight). This paper seeks to explore Hadot’s philosophy as a way of life (PWL) through Rinzai Zen’s unique and often bizarre spiritual exercises. In so doing, this paper hopes to explore new grounds for PWL spiritual exercises in the eccentricities of Japanese Rinzai Zen masters whose approaches wander and diverge yet remain distinctively Rinzai in nature. In the first section, we provide some background on treating spiritual exercises in an intercultural context and explore the exemplarily disruptive spiritual exercises that Rinzai Zen offers PWL practice, especially through poetry, kōans, and meditation in the midst of everyday activity. We then turn to particular examples found in the lives and spiritual practices of Ikkyū and Hakuin. We conclude with reflections on how Rinzai Zen and PWL inform one another through the exploration of “spiritual exercise” and disruption not only as scholarly pursuits but also in terms of our own arts of mindful living today.

The aim of this thesis is to provide a new interpretation about the role played by spiritual exercises in Epictetus’ program of moral therapy, in response to Brennan (2003) who holds that they may potentially conflict with Epictetus’ intellectualism. I argue that spiritual exercises are intended to cause us to assimilate theory by causing one to form specific beliefs that are in accordance with theory. Understood this way, any sort of tension seems to resolve itself. I rely upon the work that Braicovich (2012) has done on this question, and go further, ultimately demonstrating that all three of Epictetus’ spiritual exercises can be explained coherently when understood as aiding in the assimilation of theory. I conclude by proposing that Epictetus thought of Stoics like athletes in training for whom spiritual exercises are essential to staying fit and ready to perform.

Chapter ”xiangdang” 鄉黨 in Lunyu 論語 (the Analects) has always been overlooked. Previous studies of this chapter have almost totally concentrated on ritual as a social institution from a perspective of philology and evidential studies. This article, however, probes the spiritual and philosophical implications of this chapter from a practical perspective. In my view, this chapter is a record of Kongzi 孔子's ”body teaching”. This ”body teaching” is featured by two points: one is integrating ritual practice and daily life into a continue process; the other is taking ritual practice as a bodily and spiritual exercise. It is through ”xiangdang”, a detailed record of Kongzi's ritual practice in various situations in his daily life, that ritual practice as a bodily and spiritual exercise is vividly focused by Kongzi himself as a paradigmatic personality, not an abstract idea any more. In this chapter, we can find that every situation of daily life is actually permeated with ritual practice, how Kongzi as a ”timing sage” carries out the situated principle of ”timing” in his everyday ritual practice, and, particularly, how ritual practice is performed as a bodily and spiritual exercise that entails a psychosomatic way of thinking. It is through this ritual practice as a bodily and spiritual exercise that an exemplary person or a sage can be shaped. And an exemplary person or even a sage is exactly a paradigmatic personality who can make a suitable response to any complicated situation of our daily life. ”Following my heart-mind without overstepping the line”, is just the description of this consummate achievement of the ritual practice as a bodily and spiritual exercise.

The present article seeks to address an important point of contact between early Christian ascetic practice and the heritage of Platonism through the end of the fourth century AD. In short, I find marked similarities between Pierre Hadot’s reading of Plato's Phaedo, for example, and that of St Augustine’s personal prayer book, the Confessions. After outlining essential characteristics of Hadot’s take on spiritual exercises and Augustinian anthropology, I subject the text of the Confessions to critical examination in order to determine whether an emphasis on ‘spiritual exercises’ is indeed present. I argüe that similar spiritual practices may be clearly discerned. First, I discuss the distinct ‘Christian’ and Augustinian character of ‘spiritual exercises’ which incorporate biblical typology of Adam and Christ as paradigmatic for the spiritual life. Next, in terms of concrete practices, I then discern from the first four books of the Confessions a series of exercises through which such a path of spiritual progress (i.e., from ‘Adam’ to ‘Christ’) may occur. Of note, I consider the dialectic praxis of 1) contemplative reading, 2) prayer-writing and 3) prayer itself, or ‘pure’ prayer - distinct from Augustine’s written reflections; 4) the role of lectio divina or meditation on Scripture; and, finally, 5) meditation on death. In addition to developing these individual practices, it is the traditional Augustinian anthropology (rooted as it is in a theology of divine grace) that reveals the essential ‘Christian’ contribution of Augustine.

This paper discusses poetry as a site of what Pierre Hadot calls “spiritual exercises,” with particular reference to China's greatest poet, Du Fu (712–70 C.E.). While Hadot's work has bridged gaps between (i) philosophy and religion and (ii) theory and practice, this paper suggests that spiritual exercises can also blur the modern separation between form and content. It argues for the possibility of poetry as philosophy; that is, philosophy in a less‐recognized form. If poetry can be spiritual exercise and if spiritual exercise with its goal of self‐transformation is the core of philosophy, then we may be able to treat poetry as one form of philosophy. The paper also demonstrates the relevance of Hadot's work for ancient Chinese and comparative philosophy more broadly.

This chapter argues that in the Spiritual Exercises , Ignatius of Loyola relies on a Christian ideal of attention that, though a predecessor of modern secular notions of attention, is also fundamentally different from them. The Spiritual Exercises is primarily a devotional ideal: the capacity of the mind to turn away from the world and towards God. The ideal included a notion of attention as focusing on a phenomenon within the world, but this everyday experience was not independent of the notion of attending to God but rather a sign and trace of the latter. The chapter suggests that the modern notion of attention as a neutral power of the mind emerged only after this spiritual ideal had received a new articulation due to the post-Reformation debates about grace and human agency. Keywords: Christian ideal; divine grace; human agency; Ignatius of Loyola; Spiritual Exercises

URING THE EARLY PART of August 1922, Kazantzakis wrote from Vienna to his first wife, Galateia, he was rushing to finish whatever he was writing, that I may give myself completely to new work, clearly my theology.' Toward the end of December, five months later in Berlin, he started writing The Saviors of God: Spiritual Exercises which was completed in April 1923 and published in Greece in the July-August 1927 issue of the Athenian periodical Renaissance (p. 6). Before attempting to refer to the possible theological and philosophical influences on this work, it is worth while to consider the activities of Kazantzakis before he embarked on its composition. In May 1922 Kazantzakis, then living in Vienna, had concentrated intensely on understanding Buddha and on writing verse drama about him, and he experienced such an unusual ascetic and mystical struggle rare psychosomatic condition developed. Upon the advice of the famous psychopathologist, Dr. Wilhelm Stekel, he left Vienna for Berlin, where a month and half later he had torn up all the three thousand verses he had written on Buddha.2 He began, however, to rework the same theme, abandoning the imitation of the Great Negator of the senses and to write his Spiritual Exercises. In 1956, year before his death, he was finally able to publish his play Buddha in its complete form-a project had obsessed him most of his life on philosophy haunted him from early youth and on teacher whom he admired and mentioned in many of his works. In the Report to

One night in 1939 while Jung was preoccupied by his seminar on Saint Ignatius of Loyola’s Spiritual Exercises… he saw at the bottom of his bed a green-gold Christ, magnificently awesome but frightening… This green gold, which resembles the natural and organic viriditas (or greenery)… expresses (the alchemical) concept of a saviour who is not purely spiritual but actually lives in metal or stone or in matter. (Gaillard, 2006, p.356)In his war-time lectures on the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola, Jung portrayed them as a Western Christian account of the active imagination, aiming for transformation and unification of the exercitant. Empirical work on the Exercises has focused on the nature of the transformation of the exercitant.However, in 1992, the present author attempted research on the workings of the active imagination in the Exercises.A questionnaire relating to the way in which people might (or had) set about doing the specific ‘First Week’ Spiritual Exercises was given to a group of 10 exercitants and a contrast group of 10 psychotherapists and psychologists. Results suggested that ‘visualisers’ found the Exercises more accessible and helpful than ‘verbalisers’, irrespective of religious position.In 1997, the data from the study were reflected on in the light of recent work on the Ignatian imagination, the meaning of the Richardson measure, and guided imagery in education. Today (2012) particular attention is given to similarities between Loyola and Jung, who were (arguably) not only ‘visualisers’ but sufferers from childhood trauma, and affected by three archetypes (alchemist, healer, shaman) in the light of current work on the inner world of trauma and shamanism.

For Karl Rahner, the prominent German of Loyola's immediate experience of God in the Spiritual Exercises marks the beginning of the modern era in the church. In an article titled Ignatius of Loyola Speaks to a Modern Jesuit, Rahner uses Ignatius's first person voice to present what is allegedly Ignatius's theology but is obviously Rahner's own interpretation of this theology. Rahner argues that Ignatius, together Luther and Calvin, is one of the great figures at the beginning of Christian modernity. Ignatius's Spiritual Exercises are modern because they enhance, to use radical and non-Rahnerian language, a potential priesthood of all believers, and because they offer to everyone an immediate encounter of the individual with God. The history of Loyola's Spiritual Exercises is a history of both the emergence of a new sense of modern individual subjecthood and of the anxiety this novelty brought with it. Keywords: Christian modernity; German Jesuit; of Loyola; Spiritual Exercises

This research makes initial endeavor to elucidate the intrinsic and essential relationship between election and imagination within Ignatius of Loyola's Spiritual Exercises. Election is investigated as the primary goal of the whole progress of spiritual exercise as well as a section of the Second Week. It discovered through this investigation the significance of imagination, which includes meditation and contemplation. It delineates that authentic election inevitably entails imaginative contemplation. An analysis of imagination is presented for two of Ignatius's works. That is, Ignatius's encounter with the divine image and visions portrayed in his autobiography is described with imaginative languages, which considerably influenced Ignatius's core idea in the Spiritual Exercises. Deliberate analysis of the historical text suggests that imagination is considered as the most essential human faculty not only for experiencing God. But it also fosters the desires and indifference for seeking the will of God, which is the critical process known as Election. The last section attempts to demonstrate the way in which those two crucial components have the vital dynamic and interdependent relationship with other constitutive components in spiritual exercises: indifference and desire. This examination uncovers that imaginative contemplation is the formative and essential means for election, which is the goal of the Spiritual Exercises, and further applicable for most spiritual practices in Christian tradition.

In The Weight of the World, sociologist Pierre Bourdieu describes his work as a spiritual exercise. Not known for his religious convictions, his admission is worthy of exploration. In this paper, I build on the conclusion of my book, ‘Fieldwork in Theology’, by drawing on my own interviews with clergy in spaces of social marginality in the usa as a means for evaluating Bourdieu’s claims. I draw upon theologian Kathryn Tanner to claim how God might be present in and through such spiritual exercise. Exactly because of the work entailed to give up oneself for another, and to critically engage in learning about the other, even across multiple divides, this work acts simultaneously as spiritual exercise and social protest against the divisions – racial, economic, religious, and so on – which so often are the source of harm today. Such theological engagement with research method offers a new direction for theological researchers.

Summary The Jesuits have paid a notably large amount of attention to Blondel's Action (1893), because many of them recognized some affinity between Blondel's thesis and Ignatius' Spiritual Exercises. Blondel's first diaries reveal that he assimilated Ignatius' spirituality into his own personal life. The project of VAction is his response to the ‘Appeal’ (‘De Regno’). Like G. Tyrrell, H. Brémond, A. Loisy, L. Laberthonière and others, he demonstrated that it is possible for christian faith to stand the test of the legitimate demands imposed by reason in their time. Blondel calls on philosophical rationality for this. Unlike a number of his friends ‘in the crisis of the modernism’, Blondel, throughout all difficulties, keeps to what Ignatius named: “the true conviction we have to share within the Church militant”. Blondels Action is also fundamentally related to Ignatius' Spiritual Exercises in three ways. First and foremost, Ignatius gave his disciples the advice to live in actione contemplativus. Similarly the philosophy of l'Action is not aimed at the contemplan et contemplata tradere of Thomas but at action as the means for dynamic self-transcendence. Next there is some analogy in the composition of both works. Ignatius' “principle and foundation” is mirrored by Blondel's fundament of faith, viz. the element within which the entire line of thought evolves. The central place of choice in the Spiritual Exercises finds its counterpart in the double option of the Blondelian thesis. Both for Ignatius and for Blondel the only necessary element which is mentioned in election and option is stated in christological terms. Finally, Blondel's exposition on the synergy between grace and free will and on the task of the will to mobilize imagination and emotion in order to spiritualize them is strongly reminiscent of Ignatian psychology and its voluntaristic characteristics.