Abstract
In addition to the unprecedented interest in spirituality in recent decades, both at a popular level and also as an academic discipline, there has also been a resurgence of research dealing with spirituality and scripture. It is readily acknowledged that the hegemony of the historical-critical method is no longer tenable. As a method which sees the text as an artifact of history, there is minimal, if any, attempt to understand the experience of those who produced the text; it concentrates on a literal interpretation, at the expense of the polysemous nature of scripture. Contemporary scriptural studies, however, have witnessed a sea-change in interpretive methods of such magnitude, that it is difficult to keep up with current scholarship in this field. Within this paradigm shift, the importance of a spiritual reading of scripture has now come to the fore. More specifically, reading scripture through a mystical lens, as originally seen, inter alia, in the works of Origen, has taken its place, if not centre stage, at least on the stage, and no longer in the wings. Utilising the insights of a French Carmelite, Elisabeth Catez, a mystical reading of Paul exemplifies this new, yet ancient, hermeneutical method.
Highlights
It is important to note that practically all training in biblical hermeneutics during the last three centuries concentrated on the purely intellectual, whereas preEnlightenment study of scripture combined intellectual knowledge with a spiritual sensitivity which could foster a mystical reading of scripture
Modernity, with its Newtonian-type mind set contributed to an atrophy of the spiritual faculties, and texts which were meant to resonate at many levels of meaning were reduced to the literal sense
As late twentiethcentury biblical scholars moved beyond exclusively historical critical approaches they focused first on the biblical writers as authors with theological and other agendas pursued by various rhetorical strategies
Summary
Contemporary biblical studies has witnessed a major shift from a mechanistic to a holistic paradigm, enabling the text to come to life as transformative and life-changing, and this has contributed to the rediscovery of the text as dynamic medium rather than static object. Against this background, the aim of the present paper is firstly, to look at current interest in spirituality and scripture; and secondly to offer a reading of scripture through a mystical lens, with particular reference to Origen’s (c.185-c.253) contribution and that of a relatively unknown modern mystic, Elisabeth Catez (1880-1906)
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