Mystics of the Christian Tradition - Shroomery - Magic Mushrooms

300 Pages·2001·2.07 MB·English

by  Steven Fanning

Color profile: Disabled
Composite Default screen
MYSTICS OF THE
CHRISTIAN TRADITION
From divine visions to self-tortures, some strange mystical experiences have shaped
theChristiantraditionasweknowit.Fullofcolorfuldetail,MysticsoftheChristian
Tradition examines the mystical experiences that have determined the history of
Christianity over two thousand years, and reveals the often sexual nature of these
encounters with the divine.
Inthisfascinatingaccount,FanningrevealshowGod’sdirectrevelationtoSt.Fran-
cisofAssisiledtohislivingwithlepersandkissingtheirsores,anddescribesthemystical
lifeofMargeryKempewho“tookweepingtonewdecibellevels.”Throughpresenting
thelivesofalmostahundredmystics,thisbroadsurveyinvitesustoconsiderwhatit
meanstobeamysticandtoexplorehowpeoplesuchasJoanofArchadtheirlivesdeter-
minedbydivinevisions.
Mystics of the Christian Tradition is a comprehensive guide to discovering what
mysticismmeansandwhothemysticsoftheChristiantraditionactuallywere.This
livelyandauthoritativeintroductiontomysticismisavaluablesurveyforstudentsand
the general reader alike.
StevenFanningisAssociateProfessorofHistoryattheUniversityofIllinoisatChicago.
HeistheauthorofABishopandHisWorldBeforetheGregorianReform,HubertofAn-
gers,1006–1047(1988),aswellasalmostadozenarticlesonlateantiquityandthe
Middle Ages.
Mystics of the Christian Tradition
22 February 2001 09:18:47
Color profile: Disabled
Composite Default screen
Mystics of the Christian Tradition
22 February 2001 09:18:47
Color profile: Disabled
Composite Default screen
M Y S T I C S O F T H E
C H R I S T I A N
T R A D I T I O N
Steven Fanning
London and New York
Mystics of the Christian Tradition
22 February 2001 09:18:48
Color profile: Disabled
Composite Default screen
First published 2001
by Routledge
11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005.
“To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s
collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.”
© 2001 Steven Fanning
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic,
mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented,
including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from
the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the
British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Fanning, Steven
Mystics of the Christian tradition / Steven Fanning
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Mysticism–History. 2. Mystics. I. Title.
BV5075 .F36 2001
248.2’2–dc21 00–068358
ISBN 0-203-99584-8 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN 0–415–22467–5 (hbk)
ISBN 0–415–22468–3 (pbk)
Mystics of the Christian Tradition
22 February 2001 09:18:48
Color profile: Disabled
Composite Default screen
CONTENTS
List of plates and timelines vii
Acknowledgements viii
Plates ix
Prologue 1
I Origins 6
Mysticism in the Greco-Roman world 6
Mysticism and the foundation of Christianity 14
The Post-Apostolic Church 20
II The Eastern Church 22
The Alexandrian Ascetics 22
The Desert Fathers 27
The Byzantine Church 30
The Russian Church 45
III The Western Church in the Middle Ages 75
The earlier Middle Ages 75
The New Mysticism 85
The Beguines 94
TheageofrepressionandthemysticsoftheRhinelandandtheLowCountries 101
English mystics of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries 119
Mystics in Italy in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries 128
IV Mystics in Early Modern Europe: the Reformation, the effloresence
of mysticism in Spain and France 139
Anabaptists and Lutherans 140
Spanish mystics of the Golden Age 149
French mystics of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries 158
v
Mystics of the Christian Tradition
01 March 2001 12:27:32
Color profile: Disabled
Composite Default screen
— Contents —
V Post-Reformation mystics in England and America: the
twentieth-century revival of mysticism 175
English mysticism 175
American Protestant mysticism 190
Twentieth-century Catholic mysticism 202
Twentieth-century mystical writers on mysticism 209
Epilogue 216
Notes 221
Glossary 253
Timelines 257
Bibliography 259
Index 272
vi
Mystics of the Christian Tradition
22 February 2001 09:18:48
Color profile: Disabled
Composite Default screen
PLATES AND TIMELINES
1 The Desert Fathers as depicted in a fifteenth-century Italian painting
by Gherardo Starnina (The Thebaid: Hermits in the Wilderness; Uffizi,
Florence) x
2 View of Mount Athos by Edward Lear, 1857 (Mount Athos and the
Monastery of Stavroniketes) xii
3 A Russian monk’s cell (cell of Nicholas of Valaam) xii
4 St. Sergius and the Bear xiii
5 Hildegard of Bingen receives the Holy Spirit, illumination from a
twelfth-century manuscript xiv
6 St. Francis renounces his worldly goods, detail of fresco in the Cappella
Bardi, S. Croce, Florence, by Giotto di Bondone xv
7 Julian’s cell at the church of St. Julian, Norwich, rebuilt after bomb
damage in 1942 xv
8 Detail of Gian Lorenzo Bernini’sThe Ecstasy of St. Teresa, Cornaro
Chapel, S. Maria della Vittoria, Rome xvi
9 View of Crucifixion of Jesus by St. John of the Cross xvii
10 William Blake, The Ancient of Days, fromEurope: A Prophecy(1794),
Plate i xviii
11 William Blake, The Soul in the Mystical Embrace of God, from
Jerusalem(1804), Plate 99 (Jerusalem: ‘All Human Forms identified…’) xix
Timeline 1 Timeline of mystics before the eleventh century 257
Timeline 2 Timeline of mystics, eleventh–twentieth centuries 258
vii
Mystics of the Christian Tradition
22 February 2001 09:18:48
Color profile: Disabled
Composite Default screen
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Iamgreatlyindebtedtoanumberofpeopleformakingthisbookpossible.Thedeans
of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences of the University of Illinois at Chicago
underwhomIserved,SidneyB.Simpson,Jr.,EricA.GislasonandStanleyE.Fish,
kindly allowed me research time in the midst of my administrative duties, without
whichIcouldnothavewrittenthisbook.Iamgratefultothelibrarystaffmembersof
theRichardJ.DaleyLibraryattheUniversityofIllinoisatChicagofortheirinvalu-
ableassistanceinacquiringbooksfromlibrariesintheIllinetOnlinesystemandon
InterlibraryLoan.Iamalsoveryindebtedtothosewhoreadthemanuscriptinthevar-
iousstagesofitsincarnationandprovidedmewiththeirmosthelpfulcomments,crit-
icisms and encouragement: Annette Chapman-Adisho, Suzanne A. Wells, Carlene
Thissen, and my friend and colleague at UIC, Dr. Mary Sinclair. I am especially
indebtedtomywifeSarah,whonotonlyreadtheentiremanuscriptbutalsocheer-
fullycarriedhomemanybooksformyusefromtheCudahyLibraryofLoyolaUniver-
sity Chicago.
viii
Mystics of the Christian Tradition
22 February 2001 09:18:48
Color profile: Disabled
Composite Default screen
PLATES
CREDITS FOR ILLUSTRATIONS
Plates 1 (and front cover), 6: Scala/Art Resource, NY.
Plates2,10,11:YaleCenterforBritishArt,PaulMellonCollection,NewHaven,
CT.
Plate 3: Valamo Society, Helsinki, Finland.
Plate 4: Brotherhood of St. Herman of Alaska, Platina, CA.
Plate 5: Art Resource, NY; plate 8: Alinari/Art Resource, NY.
Plate 7: The Julian Centre, Norwich
Plate 9: Institute of Carmelite Studies Press, Washington, DC from The Collected
WorksofSt.JohnoftheCross,translatedbyKieranKavanaughandOtilioRodriguez,
copyright © 1979, 1990 by Washington Province of Discalced Carmelites, ICS
Publications,2131LincolnRoad.,N.E.,Washington,DC20002-1199USA.
ix
Mystics of the Christian Tradition
01 March 2001 12:30:07