Christian Mysticism Research Articles

Leveling Up: Gamification Pedagogy in the Hagiological Classroom

Gamification is a specific type of experiential learning theory (ELT) that emphasizes student choice and activities to transform mundane tasks into a desirable opportunity to learn. This pedagogical approach is particularly useful in information-heavy courses, such as courses that engage in the study of religious mysticism or “hagiology”. In hagiology classes, students are exposed to new hagiographic media and discuss methods that are particularly complicated because this content is not only heavy on data but also engages the affective dimensions of human experience. This article explores leessons learned from the successes and failures of gamification pedagogy in my “Masters and Mystics” course, where students comparatively study Christian mysticism and Muslim Sufism. In particular, this article analyzes gamifacation’s ability to promote intrinsic student motivation through “game mechanics and experience design”, which is particularly salient in the hagiological classroom. I end the article with a discussion of how I have reworked the course with new gamification practices into a “Comparative Mysticism: Christianity and Islam” course.

Ignatius Loyola: Christian Mystic, written by Brian O’Leary, S.J.

Ignatius Loyola: Christian Mystic, written by Brian O’Leary, S.J.

Practical Mysticism in Islam and Christianity: A Comparative Study of Rabia al-Adawiyya and Catherine of Genoa

Practical Mysticism in Islam and Christianity: A Comparative Study of Rabia al-Adawiyya and Catherine of Genoa

A Negative Way: Dionysian Apophaticism and the Experiential

The experiential bias in modern understandings of spirituality has led to readings of the pre-modern texts of Pseudo-Dionysius as referring to “negative experiences” of faith. Denys Turner, Bernard McGinn, and others have outlined the mistaken “spiritual positivism” of such readings and their contrast with the negative dialectics of the classical apophatic tradition. Indeed, the philosophical parameters of the Christian mysticism of the Dionysian tradition would deny “mystical experience” to be “experience” as such. Nevertheless, several modern theologians have attempted to integrate interpretations of the experiential in Christian mysticism into their theology. These include Sara Coakley in the idea of spiritual sense in her theology of the body, Karl Rahner in the conception of spiritual touch within his theology of grace, and Louis Dupré’s view that there is religious significance in the experience of “emptiness” in modern-day atheism. I shall contrast these attempted integrations with the critique of “mystical experience” within classical understandings of apophaticism.

Feminen Characterization of The God

This study investigates how monotheistic religions depict God with masculine or feminine attributes, considering historical context. The issue arises from questioning the portrayal of a masculine God within these religions, influenced by a patriarchal socio-cultural backdrop. Instances mainly from Christianity and lesser from Judaism and Islam, the study analyzes the characteristics of religious theological language used in the depiction of God. In this context, we explore the linguistic challenge encountered by religious traditions when employing anthropomorphic language. Since the core issue revolves around expressing and labeling the divine, the paper initiates with a conceptual examination of God’s characterization as either masculine or feminine. In this analysis, tracing back historically, archaeological and anthropological evidence indicates that language used to describe God was initially predominantly feminine. Feminist perspectives contend that over time, particularly within monotheistic religions, this language has become masculine and that this historical shift has been a major factor in the social and cultural exclusion of women. Against this claim, the study aims to substantiate the claim that despite the effective historical dominance of the theological masculine language, the feminine divine image persists in both theistic and non-theistic traditions. Both the Holy Scriptures and early theological writings occasionally employ feminine language when discussing God, although less frequently than masculine language. Within this context, anthropomorphic depictions of God in the Holy Books of monotheistic religions—where God is perceived as an immaterial being—are interpreted metaphorically, analogically, or symbolically. In particular, the mystical traditions of these religions have emphasized feminine qualities more intensely in their depiction of the divine. They portray God not only as a father or male figure but also with feminine attributes, such as a mother, lover, or friend. These traditions contend that qualities like divine beauty and mercy find their fullest expression in women and the feminine manifestation of existence. Notably, the Nag Hammadi tradition, rooted in Jewish mysticism, highlights the feminine dimensions of the divine, emphasizing love and compassion. Medieval Christian mystics such as Meister Eckhart and Julian of Norwich also emphasized the feminine dimension of God in their experience of the divine. Similarly, within Islamic Sufism, influenced by the Our’an’s balance and harmony of tanzih(exoneratin God from human attributes) and tashbih (drawing similitude) the Ibn Arabi tradition, emphasizing the feminine portrayal of the divine. They recognized the divine presence within the feminine elements of creation. Additionally, a lesser-known figure, Molla al-Jaziri, dealt extensively with the theme of woman as a divine mirror. This study aimed aligns with the feminist theological approach, advocating for the reinterpretation of theological and religious language in order to liberate it from the dominance of a patriarchal language and reveal its feminine aspect. Additionally, study also suggests further research by examining specific time periods, approaches and individual scholars’ perspectives.

Feminine Characterization of The God

This study investigates how monotheistic religions depict God with masculine or feminine attributes, considering historical context. The issue arises from questioning the portrayal of a masculine God within these religions, influenced by a patriarchal socio-cultural backdrop. Instances mainly from Christianity and lesser from Judaism and Islam, the study analyzes the characteristics of religious theological language used in the depiction of God. In this context, we explore the linguistic challenge encountered by religious traditions when employing anthropomorphic language. Since the core issue revolves around expressing and labeling the divine, the paper initiates with a conceptual examination of God’s characterization as either masculine or feminine. In this analysis, tracing back historically, archaeological and anthropological evidence indicates that language used to describe God was initially predominantly feminine. Feminist perspectives contend that over time, particularly within monotheistic religions, this language has become masculine and that this historical shift has been a major factor in the social and cultural exclusion of women. Against this claim, the study aims to substantiate the claim that despite the effective historical dominance of the theological masculine language, the feminine divine image persists in both theistic and non-theistic traditions. Both the Holy Scriptures and early theological writings occasionally employ feminine language when discussing God, although less frequently than masculine language. Within this context, anthropomorphic depictions of God in the Holy Books of monotheistic religions—where God is perceived as an immaterial being—are interpreted metaphorically, analogically, or symbolically. In particular, the mystical traditions of these religions have emphasized feminine qualities more intensely in their depiction of the divine. They portray God not only as a father or male figure but also with feminine attributes, such as a mother, lover, or friend. These traditions contend that qualities like divine beauty and mercy find their fullest expression in women and the feminine manifestation of existence. Notably, the Nag Hammadi tradition, rooted in Jewish mysticism, highlights the feminine dimensions of the divine, emphasizing love and compassion. Medieval Christian mystics such as Meister Eckhart and Julian of Norwich also emphasized the feminine dimension of God in their experience of the divine. Similarly, within Islamic Sufism, influenced by the Our’an’s balance and harmony of tanzih(exoneratin God from human attributes) and tashbih (drawing similitude) the Ibn Arabi tradition, emphasizing the feminine portrayal of the divine. They recognized the divine presence within the feminine elements of creation. Additionally, a lesser-known figure, Molla al-Jaziri, dealt extensively with the theme of woman as a divine mirror. This study aimed aligns with the feminist theological approach, advocating for the reinterpretation of theological and religious language in order to liberate it from the dominance of a patriarchal language and reveal its feminine aspect. Additionally, study also suggests further research by examining specific time periods, approaches and individual scholars’ perspectives.

AN INTIMATE DIALOGUE WITH GOD IN JOHN DONNE’S “HOLY SONNETS”: PETRARCHAN CONTEXT

The purpose of the paper is to study the images of the platonic and courtly in the protagonist’s personal relations with God in J. Donne’s “Holy Sonnets” in the context of the connection with the Petrarchan tradition. In order to accomplish this, a complex approach including elements of biographical, genealogical, typological, hermeneutic, comparative, and structural-semiotic methods of literary analysis has been used. The views of literary critics on the sources of the “Holy Sonnets” (Christian meditative practices, Bible books, traditions of English religious lyrics) have been reviewed, their connection with the Petrarchan poetic tradition has been pointed out and, in this context, one of the possible interpretations of J. Donne’s sonnet sequence has been proposed. It has been shown that three poems of the sequence – XIV, XVII and XIX – are especially important and conceptual for understanding the evolution of the protagonist’s relations with God in the “Holy Sonnets”. In the first of them, feeling his own weakness and impossibility to overcome the devil, J. Donne’s persona begs the Lord to win back his heart from the enemy, using a broad palette of military metaphors typical to the Petrarchan lyrics. However, the Lord, who in sonnets I – XIII is depicted in a Petrarchan manner as distant and completely deaf to the protagonist’s pleas, remains indifferent. In sonnet XVII, which looks similar to the lyrical texts of the “Canzoniere” dedicated to Laura’s death, a notable change in the relationship between the characters takes place. As in the Italian humanist’s poems, the life path of J. Donne’s persona finally turns to heaven after the death of his beloved, and he begins to feel that the loss of earthly love is compensated by the gaining of the Divine one. However, his further relations with God, once again, seem to be built according to the Petrarchan model, most fully described in the last text of the sequence. The sonnet XIX demonstrates all the complexity of the relationship between a human being and the Lord. J. Donne’s persona is constantly dominated by conflicting feelings and emotions, which generally correlates with Petrarchan understanding of the ambivalence of love, best shown by F. Petrarch in the sonnets CXXXII and CXXXIV. Moreover, the poetic vocabulary used by J. Donne in this poem indicates the specific character of his persona’s relations with God, which are supposed to have signs of courtly love, courtly bowing-service. It has been summed up that the protagonist’s relations with the Lord in the “Holy Sonnets” might be interpreted as generally built on the same principles that are immanent in the concept of love in the poetry of Petrarchism. The persona of the English poet, as well as the traditional hero of Petrarchan texts, also suffers from unrequited feelings, longs for reciprocity with all his heart, and, in addition, speaks in the specific metaphorical language. Even if the linguistic practice utilized by the author cannot be considered exclusively Petrarchan, since a similar rhetorical code, in which the experience of spiritual communication with the Lord was described with the help of erotic images, was widely used by the Christian mystics, the sonnet poetic structure is canonical for Petrarchan lyrical discourse and require following the established rules not only in terms of form, but also in terms of content.

«Здесь геометрия становится уже религией»: метафорика неэвклидовой геометрии в теоретических построениях Д.С. Мережковского

The article examines Dmitry Merezhkovsky’s tendency – previously unnoticed, but variously shown – to present his theoretical reasoning through images and concepts referring to non-Euclidean geometry, as well as through the concepts of multidimensional spaces, mystically interpreted. It is shown that such an approach is a stable figurative-theoretical method of Dmitry Merezhkovsky, to which he resorts in a large number of works – from the earliest to the lates. Geometric and spatial metaphorics dating back to Fyodor Dostoevsky and Vladimir Solovyov, and actively engaged by his contemporaries, is an essential feature of his worldview. It is emphasized that, in contrast to the authors who used the concepts of the “fourth dimension” and “non-Euclidean space” to illustrate occult, mediumistic or astral concepts, Merezhkovsky applies them to Christian mystics, describing the phenomena of “miracle”, “kingdom of God”, “eternal life” and so on. The evolution of the corresponding views of D. Merezhkovsky from 1907 to 1939 is traced, the sources that influenced their formation are established, among which are Fyodor Dostoevsky, Nikolai Bugaev, Anton Kartashev, Ernest Renan, Christian apocrypha. It is noted that in a number of cases the corresponding reasoning and images of Merezhkovsky were reflected in the works of Andrei Bely.

Psychedelic Mysticism and Christian Spirituality: From Science to Love

The scientific claim that psychedelic drugs like psilocybin reliably occasion mystical experiences was justified using the Mystical Experiences Questionnaire (the MEQ), a survey first developed in the 1960s by Walter Pahnke using W.T. Stace’s Mysticism and Philosophy. Scholars in Christian mysticism reject the adequacy of Stace’s work for Western theistic mysticism, especially Christianity. One objection is that Stace follows William James in focusing on intense and unusual moments of mystical experience rather than the somewhat more ordinary mystical life. A greater concern is that Stace more adequately reflects non-Western traditions than Western theistic traditions like Christianity. For Stace, mysticism centers on the concept of union with external reality or with the absolute, a union in which the human creature is absorbed or fused. Christian mysticism, by contrast, involves a sense of presence rather than union, experienced in a most intimate relationship as a felt loving closeness with the divine, but not as fusion or absorption into the divine. While love of God is central to the Christian view, it is ignored in Stace and the MEQ30. Finally for Christianity, mysticism is not found in the momentary experience, but in the lifelong interpretation that leads to transformation.

Mysticism and Black feminist resistance in the Vida of Úrsula de Jesús

ABSTRACT Úrsula de Jesús’s Vida puts her life story in dialogue with a broader Afrodiasporic feminist tradition and community. Úrsula’s discourse articulates her liberation through eloquent rage, defined by Brittney Cooper as Black women’s refusal to be relegated to an inferior position. Though imitatio is a common trope among Christian mystics, Úrsula uses the trope to represent her positionality as a moral authority because of her Blackness. In doing so Úrsula refuses to accept the inherent anti-Blackness of prevailing arguments that erase the possibility that she could be fully human because of her Blackness. As she repeats and inverts hegemonic interpretations of Christian doctrine, Úrsula achieves a nuanced critique of racial hierarchies. This paper highlights how Úrsula’s depiction of her suffering as a donada and her work as a healer is a Black feminist discourse that calls for a reimagining of racial hierarchies. Úrsula sustains a Black feminist critique in her discussion of suffering she faced individually and as part of a broader Afrodiasporic community, Black feminist imitatio and a rhetoric of healing rage that effects change within a system designed to deny Black women’s humanity.

TRES CAMINOS Y TRES ETAPAS

The purpose of this paper is to study the parallels between the three paths of Christian mystical experience, namely purgation, illumination and union, with the three stages of the alchemical work: nigredo, albedo and rubedo. Thus we resort to the notion of archetype within the tradition of Jungian scholars and, in relation to Christian mysticism, to the scholars of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola, which necessarily implies a deepening of the sources that directly or indirectly influenced his conception of spiritual exercises. We conclude that there is a direct relationship that is not about the influence of one current over another, but both share the same cultural environment that leads to this evident proximity between the three paths and the three stages: to purge, is equivalent to the nigredo; to enlighten, to the albedo, and to unite to the rubedo, as a rule symbolized by the "sacred marriage" between the king and the queen.

A Comparative Study of Medieval Religious Spirituality: Bonaventure’s Theory of Six Stages of Spirituality and Śaṅkara’s Sixfold Practice Theory of Advaita Vedānta

In medieval India, the desire for “the unity of Brahman and Self” was present in the Vedānta tradition of Hinduism. Adi Śaṅkara, the master of Vedānta philosophy, proposed the six-fold sādhana: mind control, sense control, mental tranquility, endurance, potential faith, and concentration. These six-fold practices can help Vedānta followers realize unity with Brahman. In medieval Christianity, mysticism was regarded as an important path for Christians to seek a closer relationship with God. Pursuing “the unity of God and man” became the goal and direction of Christians at that time, which could be achieved through spirituality. Bonaventure, known as the Seraphic Doctor, was a representative figure of medieval Christian mysticism. He proposed six stages of spirituality: Sense, Imagination, Reason, Intelligence, Understanding, and Spark of Conscience, through which one can achieve unity with God. This article attempts to compare Bonaventure’s theory of six stages of spirituality with Śaṅkara’s idea of six-fold practice and discover the similarities and differences between Eastern and Western religious spirituality in the Middle Ages. Through this comparison, we can further explore the medieval religious believers’ desire for ultimate reality and try to find the possibility of dialogue between Christianity and Advaita Vedānta.

POSSESSION AND CONSUMPTION: CLARICE LISPECTOR AND THE ETHICS OF MYSTICISM

Abstract Many critics have called Clarice Lispector a mystic. Lispector, however, was not a religious figure, but rather a 20th-century Brazilian writer who was influenced by both her Jewish background and her Catholic Brazilian context. There are various forms of Jewish and Christian mysticism that reject transcendent union with God and, by referencing them, I elucidate the complexity of Lispector’s mystical fiction. By looking at challenges to mystical union in these traditions, I aim to show the ethical complexity of this concept and how that complexity is deepened through Lispector’s writing as she problematises blurred boundaries between self and Other.

“Love will not be idle”: Non-Doing and Action in the English Mystical Tradition

This essay explores the dynamic of contemplative action, which I will refer to as ‘social mysticism’, or what from the perspective of comparative mysticism we might also want to term a form of ‘non-doing’. It focuses primarily on the medieval English mystical tradition, illustrating that two forms of action are discussion—ordinary actions and those which flow out of contemplation. It is noted that the latter constitute a detached form of action. To draw out the full ramifications of social mysticism within a Christian context a short coda is added that considers mysticism in the writings of three twentieth-century anglophone writers, all of whom were strongly influenced by medieval Christian mysticism. The essay sets out to show that focusing on the relationship between mysticism and action raises questions concerning the extent to which ineffability offers the most useful marker for Christian mysticism.

Athens and Jerusalem Redux

In this essay, I evaluate the extent to which some currents in classical Christian mysticism might count as properly ‘Christian’ against the rules of faith and theological methodology of thinkers like Tertullian, Irenaeus, and Justin Martyr. I begin by expounding this methodology as it relates to non-Christian philosophical traditions, and from there explore the rules these thinkers offer, suggesting that the beating heart of these rules is not a string of propositions to affirm so much as it is a commitment to a certain rendition of biblical narrative grammar. After exploring this grammar, I turn to a brief discussion of the foundations of Christian mysticism and the thought of Evagrius Ponticus. The aim here is to illustrate the theoretical foundations of much Christian mysticism, as well as to provide a test case to evaluate how far some prominent elements of this discourse might, or might not, cohere with the biblical narrative grammar elucidated above. I argue that there is ample room to question the legitimacy of Evagrius’s claim to properly Christian theorizing, and suggest this has serious implications for future Christian work in the philosophy of mysticism.

Georges Bataille’s «inner experience»: public self-execution for the sake of communication

The paper outlines the theoretical and methodological complexity of the historical-philosophi- cal study of Georges Bataille’s literary and philosophical heritage, In: particular «Inner Expe- rience», one of his key works, which is about to be released in Ukrainian. To this end, I analyze the biographical and historical-philosophical contexts of writing «Inner Experience». I observe the main events of the thinker’s life, which led to the writing of this work and testify to Bataille’s opposition to the most common artistic movements of the time (surrealism), philosophical theo- ries (existentialism), religious teachings, and, in fact, anti-systemic nature of his work. In addi- tion, the paper tends to identify sources of influence on the formation of philosophical views of Bataille in the period of «Inner Experience» writing. In particular, I analyze the theoretical and political relations of Bataille, especially with his critics (Belgian surrealists group, G. Marcel, J.-P. Sartre), but also allies (M. Blanchot, P. Klossowski, M. Leiris, H. Masson and others). Further, I study the genesis of the concept of «internal experience» formation, its inherent multi- faceted, multi-layered,and metaphorical nature, rooting in the tradition of Christian mysticism and reflecting the state after the loss of faith at the same time. Particularly, I study the image of the labyrinth as one of the most expressive synonyms of internal experience term, which empha- sizes the meaning of this fundamental word-concept of Bataille’s philosophy. To provide the in- tellectual context, I list main points of Bataille’s «Inner Experience» critique by representatives of the French intellectual communities of the 1940s, as well as the main Bataille’s arguments against this critique. Eventually, I analyze the main ideas of his «Inner Experience», as well as the ways how Bataille’s philosophy influenced the key representatives of the French poststruc- turalism (J. Derrida, M. Foucault, J. Kristeva, J.-F. Lyotard).

The crisis of mysticism. Quietism in seventeeth-century Spain, Italy, and France. By Bernard McGinn. (The Presence of God. A History of Western Christian Mysticism, 7.) Pp. xx + 378. New York: Crossroads Publishing Company, 2021. $74.95. 978 0 8245 0467 0

The crisis of mysticism. Quietism in seventeeth-century Spain, Italy, and France. By Bernard McGinn. (The Presence of God. A History of Western Christian Mysticism, 7.) Pp. xx + 378. New York: Crossroads Publishing Company, 2021. $74.95. 978 0 8245 0467 0 - Volume 74 Issue 1

“A spirit of strange meaning”: The Chinese Roots of Wordsworth’s Monism in The Ruined Cottage

ABSTRACT In both his life and poetry, The Ruined Cottage marked a decisive breakthrough for Wordsworth, which resulted from his daring adoption and sustained use of a monistic idea. Though hitherto mostly dismissed or construed as a derivative of Platonism, Stoicism, Christian mysticism, and/or other conventional English and European concepts and usually seen as part of his supposedly quietist retreat from radical politics, the philosophy of One Life which Wordsworth promoted was in reality a recognizably unconventional conceptual innovation, which indeed made possible his poetic and political innovations in The Ruined Cottage and beyond. In the larger context of ideas that extends well beyond England and Europe and involves in particular the Chinese cosmological belief in tianren heyi or humanity’s unity with heaven, this essay explores Wordsworth’s innovative use of monism in The Ruined Cottage and argues for a significantly different understanding of Wordsworth and the related rise of English Romanticism.

Neural correlates of memories of near-death and mystical experiences: Preliminary research

This study compares the critical neural correlates of two altered states of consciousness: near-death experience (NDE) and spiritual contemplative experience (SCE), a.k.a. mystical experience. For Centuries NDE and SCE have been reported by all faiths, including Abrahamic religious contemplatives: Christian mystics, Muslim Sufis, and Jewish Kabbalists. Their anecdotal reports show that both NDE and SCE have similar attributes: cognitive timelessness, affective peace, transcendent oneness, and paranormal out-of-body. Our Greyson Scale evaluation of these attributes shows a correlation between NDE and SCE. Contemporary first-person SCE leading to relived NDE provided the insight and incentive for this unique scientific study comparing the memories of NDE and SCE in separate subjects. We recorded and processed brain activity by quantitative electroencephalography tomography (QEEGt) methodology. There was a clear correlation of brain activation in delta, alpha, and gamma bands. We also found frontal lobe activation for both NDE and SCE subjects. However, there was a statistically greater activation for the SCE subjects. QEEGt allows a reformulation of QEEG techniques in a 3D anatomic framework using anatomical information provided by MRI to constrain EEG inverse solutions to the sites where primary currents might be generated. These constraints contribute to overcoming the nonuniqueness of the inverse solutions. This study has relevance to neuroscientists studying consciousness.

Race, Gender, and Christian Mysticism: The Life of Zilpha Elaw

Drawing on the spiritual autobiography of the nineteenth-century Black female preacher Zilpha Elaw, this article argues that it should be included in the canon of Christian mystical texts because it sheds light on questions about race and gender relevant to current conflicts in both church and society. Elaw’s story demonstrates that while the grace of divine union promotes social transformation, it may not immediately free one from structures of sin. Mystical spirituality requires ongoing critical discernment.