Description
Book SynopsisThe Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Christian Mysticism brings together a team of leading international scholars to explore the origins, evolution, and contemporary debates relating to Christian mystics, texts, and the movements they inspired.
- Provides a comprehensive and engaging account of Christian mysticism, from its origins right up to the present day
- Draws on the best of current scholarship by bringing together a collection of newly-commissioned readings by leading scholars
- Considers examples of mysticism in both Eastern and Western Christianity
- Offers a brilliant synthesis of the key figures and historical periods of mysticism; its core themes, such as heresy, gender, or aesthetics; and its theoretical considerations, including theological, literary, social scientific, and philosophical approaches
- Features chapters on current debates such as neuroscience and mystical experience, and inter-religious dialogue
Table of ContentsNotes on Contributors xi
Preface xix
1 A Guide to Christian Mysticism 1
Julia A. Lamm
Part I Themes in Christian Mysticism 25
2 The Song of Songs 27
Ann W. Astell and Catherine Rose Cavadini
3 Gender 41
Barbara Newman
4 Platonism 56
Willemien Otten
5 Aesthetics 74
Don E. Saliers
6 Heresy 89
J. Patrick Hornbeck II
Part II Early Christian Mysticism 103
7 Mysticism in the New Testament 105
Alan C. Mitchell
8 The Judaean–Jewish Contexts of Early Christian Mysticism 119
Ori Z Soltes
9 “Mysticism” in the Pre-Nicene Era? 133
Bogdan G. Bucur
10 Origen and His Followers 147
Augustine Casiday
11 Negative Theology from Gregory of Nyssa to Dionysius the Areopagite 161
Charles M. Stang
12 Syriac Mysticism 177
Brian E. Colless
13 Mysticism and Contemplation in Augustine’s Confessions 190
John Peter Kenney
14 Augustine’s Ecclesial Mysticism 202
J. Patout Burns
15 Benedictine Monasticism and Mysticism 216
Columba Stewart, O.S.B.
Part III Medieval Mystics and Mystical Traditions 235
16 Bernard of Clairvaux and the Cistercian Mystical Tradition 237
Brian Patrick McGuire
17 The Victorines 251
Boyd Taylor Coolman
18 The Mystery of Divine/Human Communion in the Byzantine Tradition 267
George E. Demacopoulos
19 Francis, Clare, and Bonaventure 282
Kevin L. Hughes
20 The Nuns of Helfta 297
Anna Harrison
21 Mysticism in the Spiritual Franciscan Tradition 311
Michael F. Cusato, O.F.M.
22 The Low Countries, the Beguines, and John Ruusbroec 329
Helen Rolfson, O.S.F.
23 Meister Eckhart, Johannes Tauler, and Henry Suso 340
Charlotte C. Radler
24 The Late Fourteenth-Century English Mystics 357
Christiania Whitehead
25 Late Medieval Italian Women Mystics 373
Armando Maggi
26 Nicholas of Cusa and the Ends of Medieval Mysticism 388
Peter J. Casarella
Part IV Mysticism and Modernity 405
27 The Protestant Reformers on Mysticism 407
Dennis E. Tamburello, O.F.M.
28 Spanish Mysticism and Religious Renewal: Ignatius of Loyola, Teresa of Avila, and John of the Cross 422
Edward Howells
29 Seventeenth-Century French Mysticism 437
Wendy M. Wright
30 The Making of “Mysticism” in the Anglo-American World: From Henry Coventry to William James 452
Leigh Eric Schmidt
31 “We Kiss Our Dearest Redeemer through Inward Prayer”: Mystical Traditions in Pietism 473
Ruth Albrecht
32 Nineteenth- to Twentieth-Century Russian Mysticism 489
Paul L. Gavrilyuk
33 Modern Catholic Theology and Mystical Tradition 501
Stephen M. Fields, S.J.
34 Mystics of the Twentieth Century 515
Mary Frohlich, R.S.C.J.
Part V Critical Perspectives on Mysticism 531
35 A Critical Theological Perspective 533
Philip Sheldrake
36 What the Saints Know: Quasi-Epistemological Reflections 550
James Wetzel
37 Mysticism and the Vernacular 562
Denis Renevey
38 The Social Scientific Study of Christian Mysticism 577
Ralph W. Hood, Jr. and Zhuo Chen
39 Neuroscience 592
Douglas E. Anderson
40 Christian Mysticism in Interreligious Perspective 610
Leo D. Lefebure
Index 626
