CONTRIBUTIONS OF MYSTICISM TO THEOLOGY

The Contributions of Mysticism to Theology

K D Skehan

The people who know God well—the mystics, the hermits, those who risk everything to find God—always meet a lover, not a dictator. God is never found to be an abusive father or a tyrannical mother, but always a lover who is more than we dared hope for. How different than the “account manager” that most people seem to worship. God is a lover who receives and forgives everything.[1]

Popular Culture promotes a kind of feel-good spirituality which has as little to do with true mysticism as Mills and Boone romances have to do with real literature. But the end of the last century and the beginnings of the twenty-first century have seen resurgence in a search for new ways of experiencing the interior spiritual life. Many have drawn from Eastern philosophic traditions, others from increasing development of the psychological sciences. However, while these trends have provided many with positive paths to self-understanding, this essay will examine; mysticism in the Christian context, some aspects of the history of mysticism, and some contemporary contributions to the development of Christian theology which mysticism is providing.

When non-theologians hear the word mysticism, Buddhism or some form of New Age spirituality might come to mind, but mysticism is at the very heart of our Christian spirituality. Evelyn Underhill [2] writes that each religious tradition has its unique approach to mysticism but the end goal of Spiritual Union with God remains the same. [3]

Mysticism may be defined as the direct experience of God in a spiritual union beyond understanding, beyond belief, beyond normal human emotional states of being. It is such a profound experience that analogous words must be employed to offer some description. Even so, language cannot cope and explaining what the experience is not is often employed. Such experience is not an end in itself but the means to a more profound end point of transformative union with the Christ. According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy [4] “Thus, in general, ‘mysticism’ would best be thought of as a constellation of distinctive practices, discourses, texts, institutions, traditions, and experiences aimed at human transformation, variously defined in different traditions.” The Christian transformative experiences and their descriptions will be a focus of this paper. The analogous language used by mystics is important in any discussion of the contributions provided by mysticism. As Gellman [5] goes on to state, “Christian mystics have variously described union with the Divine. This includes Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153) describing unification as “mutuality of love,” Henry Suso (1295–1366) likening union with God to a drop of water falling into wine, taking on the taste and color (sic) of the wine…”

Dogmas and Doctrines, while being a necessary part of our Christian religion, do not give us a direct knowledge of God. Neither do the scriptures, nor devotions, nor liturgies. We can have intellectual analogous knowledge of God, but the very nature of God means we can never fully ‘know’ God. We are created. Creatures cannot ever fully know the Creator, except in so far as the Creator reveals God-self.  God is revealed to us in the Old Testament by God’s actions and in the New Testament in the person of Jesus, truly human and truly divine. St. Augustine[6] states that the human condition is one of restless incompletion until the soul rests in mystical union with God. As to the Revelation upon which the Christian religion is founded, namely the person of Jesus, how much can we understand Jesus as a mystic?  The Fourth Gospel reveals a spiritual, mystical Jesus, [7]who is probably an Christological development by the author rather than an account of historical accuracy.  St. Paul also has been called the first Christian mystic. [8] Indeed recent biblical scholarship suggests that for St. Paul “you cannot be a Christian without being a mystic”[9]

Underhill [10] gives an excellent account of the historical development of Mysticism in the Christian context in her Appendix to the twelfth edition. She considers that Christian Mysticism in Europe shows periods of intense mystical activity which she suggests coincides with the high-points of cultural, aesthetic, and intellectual development in European civilisation.  The world of post-Renaissance Europe saw a veritable procession of mystics lead by St. Teresa of Avilla whose poetic attempts at describing the mystical union are so sensual and replete with Eros.[11] Indeed, relational language is ubiquitous in mystic’s writing. Augustine declares he has fallen in love completely[12] with divine truth.[13]

Dionysius the Areopagite [14]introduces the analogies of “secret silences” and “brilliant intensity of darkness”, examples of the Via Negativa[15].

Scaramelli [16]orders the stages of mystical experience. Spiritual Marriage expresses the sensuality of such a relational spiritual union with the Godhead.  All these states are effected by contemplation. Hildegard von Bingen (1098-1179) is another visionary whose mysticism has given us another language, that of the most pure and glorious music, to reveal the fruits of her contemplation of the Divine.[17] James Harpur writes that a direct encounter with God can be illuminated by the lives and words of the many hundreds of women and men mystics of the Christian tradition.[18] In this essay it is not possible to elaborate on the contributions to the understanding of God of so many great numinous souls.  Elizabeth Johnson[19] explains the mystics’ contribution, especially that of Aquinas, to the Doctrine of Incomprehensibility. We cannot know God. We can experience God and this is by no means through our own efforts. God reveals God-self as an act of Grace, undeserved and yet ineffable. Realization that since God is not a creature or knowable in any human sense, ‘God’ is not open to inspection or categorisation. It follows that God can only be spoken of analogically or poetically; and that we can only say what God is not rather than what God is. This is apophatic, as opposed to cataphatic theology. Even the ideas our human intelligence can deduce by reason and observation of the created universe serve to obscure rather than reveal the true limitless, omnipotent, infinite, omniscient, omnipresent God[20]. Not “knowing’ God does not mean that we cannot experience God in a supernal way. The experience of God that mystics have revealed is one of being utterly known by the deity, completely transcending the normal sensory and rational apprehension of God’s action in the material realm.

The traditional Catholic spiritual journey is described as Purgation, Illumination and Union.[21] Few of the historic mystics fall outside this pattern of spiritual attainment, however some mystics of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries offer new insights and new paths to the search for the Divine. Matthew Fox,[22] for one, has chartered a road towards the ineffable through Creation itself, the consummate action of God.  Fox focuses on the immanence of God within all creation. The correlation with the approach of Teilhard de Chardin [23] is fortuitous. In his essay on the Spiritual Journey, Le Milieu Divin, he sees a cosmos in evolution progressing to the spiritualisation of matter and the materialisation of spirit. Le Milieu Divin is both the divine heart of the Universe and the divinised noosphere[24] where God graces us. This is panentheism[25] not pantheism. God is in all things, and all things are in God. Chardin experiences the Via Negativa[26] , the suffering, within which he sees the hand of Christ, and Hildegard of Bingen[27] expresses it beautifully, “Everything that is in the heavens, on the earth, and under the earth, is penetrated with connectedness, penetrated with relatedness.” This is an example of the wisdom which mystics bring to theology.

Mystics are navigators into the unknown and unknowable territory which is the infinity where God is. Their maps are guides for each new traveller, but each journey is unique and new analogous descriptions of the experience are coined by each sojourner.  What the Church and the world need now, in the face of the coming Via Negativa of war, pestilence, over-population, and climate fluctuations that will undoubtedly impact on generations of we hubristic humans, is new pathfinders who will guide us through the Via Creativa of birthing, creativity, to the Via Transformativia of compassion, justice, healing, celebration. But this journey is not necessarily for the lone traveller, his and her way will come to each pilgrim through[28] “Scripture and Eucharist, tradition and table, community and justice” or else “divine presence might remain unrecognized and human eyes remain unopened.” The wisdom attained will be humility before the depths and heights of Mystery.

Bibliography

Aeropagite, Dionysius the. "The Mystical Theology: Chapter 1." Esoterica. Edited by Arthur Versluis. 2007. http://www.esoteric.msu.edu/VolumeII/MysticalTheology.html (accessed June 1st, 2011).

Augustine. The Confessions of Saint Augustine. Modern English Version. Grand Rapids. Mi.: Baker Book House, 2008.

Avila, St Teresa of. Autobiography of St Teresa of Avila. Rockford Ill.: Tan Books, 1997.

Bowker., John. "Via negativa.". in Encyclopedia.com 1997. http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O101-Vianegativa.html (accessed May 3rd, 2011).

Chardin, Teilhard de. Le Milieu Divin. Eighth. London: William Collins and Sons, 1970.

Crossan, John Dominic. The Birth of Christianity. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1998.

Fox, Matthew. Christian Mystics. Novato, California: New World Library, 2011.

—. The Coming of the Cosmic Christ. North Blackburn, Victoria: Collins Dove, 1988.

Gellman, Jerome. ""Mysticism"." The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2011 Edition). Edited by Edward N. Zalta. February 9, 2010. <http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2011/entries/mysticism/> (accessed May 26, 2011).

Grant, Frederick C. "St. Paul's Mysticism." JSTOR. University of Chicago Press. Vol 44 No 6 1914. http://www.jstor.org/stable/i357709 (accessed May 22nd, 2011).

Harpur, James. Love Burning in the Soul: The Story of Christian Mystics from Saint Paul to Thomas Merton. Boston: New Seed Books, 2005.

Johnson, Elizabeth. Classical Theology. New York: Crossroad, 1996.

Johnston, William, ed. The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book of Privy Counseling. New York: Doubleday, 1973.

Knight, Kevin. "Neo-Platonism." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Edited by Kevin Knight. New Advent. 2009. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10742b.htm (accessed May 22nd, 2011).

Larkin, Earnest E. "The Three Spiritual Ways." Carmel Net. 2011. http://carmelnet.org/larkin/larkin092.pdf (accessed June 3, 2011).

Lerman, Kristina. The Life and Works of Hildegard von Bingen. May 24, 1995. http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/med/hildegarde.html (accessed May 26th, 2011).

Philo. "Philo of Alexandria: Online Text for Philo of Alexandria: On the Contemplative Life." Early Jewish Writings. Edited by Peter Kirby. Peter Kirby. 2010. http://www.earlyjewishwritings.com/text/philo/book34.html (accessed May 23rd, 2011).

Rohr, Richard. Everything Belongs: The Gift of Contemplative Prayer. New York: Crossroad Publishing Company, 2003.

Scaramelli, Giovanni Battista. A Handbook of Mystical Theology. Edited by Allan Armstrong. Lake Worth, Florida: Ibis Press, 2005.

Thornhill, John. “The Christ-Event as Gift or Grace” in Christian Mystery in the Secular Age. Maryland: Christian Classics, 1991.

Underhill, Evelyn. "Mysticism: A Study in Nature and Development of Spiritual Consciousness." Christian Classics Ethereal Library. Christian Classics Ethereal Library. 2005. http://www.ccel.org/ccel/underhill/mysticism.iv.ix.html (accessed May 25, 2011).

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[1] Richard Rohr. Everything Belongs: The Gift of Contemplative Prayer (New York: Crossroads Publishing Company, 2003), 131.

[2] Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism: A Study in Nature and Development of Spiritual Consciousness (2005), available from < http://www.ccel.org/ccel/underhill/mysticism.iv.ix.html> (accessed 22 May 2011). Although originally published in 1911, Mysticism remains a classic in its field as a secondary text.  I have used the revised edition published in print in 1930, and published online in 2005.

[3] Ibid. Underhill says, ”Attempts, however, to limit mystical truth -- the direct apprehension of the Divine Substance--by the formula of any one religion, are as futile as the attempt to identify a precious metal with the die which converts it into current coin. The dies which the mystics have used are many. Their peculiarities and excrescences are always interesting and sometimes highly significant. Some give a far sharper, more coherent, impression than others. But the gold from which this diverse coinage is struck is always the same precious metal: always the same Beatific Vision of a Goodness, Truth, and Beauty which is one. Hence its substance must always be distinguished from the accidents under which we perceive it: for this substance has an absolute, and not a denominational, importance.”

[4] Jerome Gellman, “Mysticism” in  The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy(Summer 2011 Edition) available from< http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/mysticism/ >(accessed 26 May 2011)

[5] Ibid. 

[6] St. Augustine, The Confessions of Saint Augustine. Modern English Version.  (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 2008)  

[7] Jey J. Kanagaraj,"Mysticism" in the Gospel of John: An Inquiry into Its Background (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998) As to Jesus being a mystic, I question whether the term can be ascribed to Jesus in any sense, as the mystery of the Incarnation implies a union of man with the Divine infinitely far beyond any union attained by any mystic.

[8] Frederick C. Grant, St. Paul's Mysticism. (JSTOR. University of Chicago Press. Vol 44 No 6. 1914), 376-377. 

[9] John Dominic Crossan, The Birth of Christianity. (New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1998).

[10]Underhill, Appendix. She posits that the zenith of medieval civilisation in the thirteenth century was a precursor to the flowering of contemplative mysticism of the fourteenth century. Then she states that the sixteenth century was a time of unprecedented revolutionary change. We see in this time the roots of the modern era. No part of human endeavour was as the medieval scholars would have either expected or, in many cases, recognised.

[11] St. Teresa of Avila, Autobiography of St Teresa of Avila (Rockford Ill.: Tan Books, 1997).In her most famous vision, Teresa experienced a piercing of the heart. She said an angel appeared on her left side. His face was burning. "He had in his hand a long spear of gold, and at the iron's point there seemed to be a little fire. He appeared to me to be thrusting it at times into my heart, and to pierce my very entrails; when he drew it out, he seemed to draw them out also, and to leave me all on fire with a great love of God."

[12] My emphasis

[13] John Thornhill “The Christ-Event as Gift or Grace” in Christian Mystery in the Secular Age. (Maryland: Christian Classics, 1991), 193.

[14] Dionysius the Areopagite,” The Mystical Theology: Chapter 1” (2007) available from <http://www.esoteric.msu.edu/VolumeII/MysticalTheology.html > (accessed 1 June 2011)

[15] John Bowker. "Via negativa." in The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions. (1997), available from <http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O101-Vianegativa.html> (accessed 1June 2011).

[16] Giovanni Battista Scaramelli , A Handbook of Mystical Theology (Lake Worth, Florida: Ibis Press, 2005), 5-15 “The prayer of recollection; the prayer of spiritual silence; the prayer of quiet; the inebriation of love; the spiritual sleep; the anguish of love; the mystical union of love, and its degrees from simple to perfect union and spiritual marriage”.

[17]  Kristina Lerman, The Life and Works of Hildegard von Bingen, available from <http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/med/hildegarde.html> (accessed 22 May 2011).

She wrote, “And it came to pass ... when I was 42 years and 7 months old, that the heavens were opened and a blinding light of exceptional brilliance flowed through my entire brain. And so it kindled my whole heart and breast like a flame, not burning but warming... and suddenly I understood of the meaning...”

[18] James Harpur, Love Burning in the Soul: The Story of Christian Mystics, from Saint Paul to Thomas Merton (Boston: New Seed Books, 2005). Harpur examines the contributions of Clement of Alexandria, Gregory of Nyssa, John Scotus Eriugena, Bernard of Clairvaux, Hildegard of Bingen, Francis of Assisi, Mechtild of Magdeburg, Meister Eckhart, John Tauler, Jan van Ruysbroeck, Gregory Palamas, Richard Rolle, Julian of Norwich, Catherine of Siena, Jacob Boehme, George Fox, Teresa of Avila, Frangois Finelon, Jean Pierre de Caussade, William Blake, Pierre Teilhard de Chardinand Thomas Merton.

[19] Elizabeth Johnson, “Classical Theology” in She Who Is: The Mystery of God in Feminist Theological Discourse (New York: Crossroad, 1996), 104-120, 291-293.

[20] The term ‘God’ itself does a disservice because it comes replete with cultural, historical and anthropogenic baggage. 

[21] Earnest E. Larkin. O.Carm. The Three Spiritual Ways, available from <http://carmelnet.org/larkin/larkin092.pdf>) (accessed 3 June 2011) Larkin explains this trio as “According to St. Bonaventure and the Franciscan school the three ways are “hierarchical actions,” i.e., different orientations given spiritual exercises in order to achieve the elements that make up Christian perfection. Each way fulfils a particular role; and the three ways, followed more or less simultaneously, lead to interior order and loving union with God. Thus the three ways are not successive stages of spiritual development, but parallel methods of action at every stage.”

[22] Matthew Fox. Christian Mystics. (Novato: New World Library, 2011).  By Creation Spirituality, Fox means amongst other things, a fourfold path he discovered in his reading of biblical tradition, both Christian and Jewish, and the Christian mystics: 1) Via Positiva, delight, awe, wonder, revelry, 2) Via Negativa, darkness, silence, suffering, letting go, 3) Via Creativa, birthing, creativity, and 4) Via Transformativia, compassion, justice, healing, celebration.

[23] Teilhard de Chardin, Le Milieu Divin, (London: William Collins and Sons, 1960)

[24] Chardin’s term for ‘The sphere of Human Consciousness’. Possibly extended into the meme which is the World Wide Web, an artefact not invented in Chardin’s lifetime? His expression encompasses a Via Positiva; in his a love of the created world, his revelry in the sciences of which he was a prominent archaeologist, and his profound faith in a God of infinite and unconditional love. This is the God of the Divine Milieu in which all creation and each soul dwells.

[25] Panentheism is distinguished from pantheism, which maintains that God is all, and all is God.

[26] Ibid., 88.

[27] Hildegard von Bingen quoted in Matthew Fox, The Coming of the Cosmic Christ, (North Blackburn: Collins Dove, 1988), 19.

[28] John Dominic Crossan, The Birth of Christianity,(New York: HarperCollins Publishers,1998), Preface.