scholarly journals Teresa of Avila and Jonathan Edwards on Prayer and Spirituality

2021 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 219-235
Author(s):  
Jonathan Liem Yoe Gie
Keyword(s):  
Jonathan Edwards ◽  
Contemplative Prayer ◽  
Teresa Of Avila ◽  
Eastern Religion ◽  
Mystical Tradition ◽  
New Age Movement ◽  
Union With God ◽  
The Rich ◽  
Spiritual Union ◽  
Evangelical Theology

Contemplative prayer has been a major source of contention in evangelical spirituality. Contemplative prayer is frequently mentioned as one apparent spiritual activity that is foreign to the scripture and Christian worldview and more resembling the New Age Movement and pantheistic Eastern religion by people who are skeptical of the mystical Christian tradition. This article will examine Teresa of Avila’s thought on mystical prayer, which is sometimes misinterpreted as a notion incompatible with evangelical theology of prayer. Hence, Teresa’s ideas of mystical prayer will be examined and compared with Jonathan Edwards’ concepts of prayer, which is considered to reflect evangelical theology of prayer. The comparison suggests that the contemplative, mystical prayer of Teresa is compatible with evangelical theology of prayer in its progress and purpose. Teresa and Edwards both understood prayer as an experience and progress that leads to the complete union with God, mediated by Christ and his words in scripture. This spiritual union with God will transform the devoted one with tremendous passion and strength to love and help others in their struggle and suffering. This study of Teresa’s thought of mystical prayer is expected to reinvigorate evangelical theology and praxis of prayer by learning from the rich spirituality of the Christian mystical tradition.

The figurativeness of the language of St. Teresa of Ávila

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edita Klapicová
Keyword(s):  
Linguistic Analysis ◽  
Stylistic Analysis ◽  
Teresa Of Avila ◽  
Interior Castle ◽  
Union With God

This paper aims at analyzing The Interior Castle of St. Teresa of Ávila using a stylistic approach. The Interior Castle was inspired by the author’s vision of the soul as a diamond in the shape of a castle containing seven mansions, which she interpreted as the journey of faith through seven stages, ending with union with God. The stylistic analysis of the chosen text combines intuition and detailed linguistic analysis of the text. The form and style of the text are an integral part of the work’s meaning and value. In our analysis of The Interior Castle, lexical and syntactical expressive means and stylistic devices are discussed in order to explore the figurative meanings of the language employed.

Julian of Norwich, Mary Magdalene, and the Drama of Prayer

Horizons ◽  
1993 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-43
Author(s):  
Elisabeth K. J. Koenig
Keyword(s):  
Julian Of Norwich ◽  
Song Of Songs ◽  
Major Influence ◽  
Word Study ◽  
Contemplative Prayer ◽  
Mary Magdalene ◽  
Union With God

This article attempts to reveal how Julian uses imagery to make real and concrete for her readers the experience of affective union with God through contemplative prayer. Part of Julian's strategy involves an identification of herself with the figure of Mary Magdalene, in medieval times the seeker of Christ par excellence. I highlight imagery in the Book of Showings that Julian and her readers probably would have associated with the Magdalene. But the more important insight is that, through her use of Magdalene imagery, Julian emphasizes the dramatic elements in the soul's quest for God. In this, she is following the example of many medieval authors, including William of St. Thierry, her major influence, who stressed that the Song of Songs was, not allegory, but essentially a drama between the soul and God. In this study I try to uncover precisely what this drama is like through a word-study of Julian's term for her visions, schewynges, or showings. I also note striking similarities between Julian's individual showings and the actual drama performed in her time, with specific attention to the figure of the Magdalene.

Introduction

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Vincent Evener
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Martin Luther ◽  
The Self ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Mystical Tradition ◽  
Union With God

Sixteenth-century church reformers needed not only to define the content and sources of truth, but also to teach Christians how to discern between truth and falsehood and how to shape their lives accordingly. This study of Martin Luther and his first intra-Reformation critics, Andreas Bodenstein von Karlstadt and Thomas Müntzer, shows that each connected suffering and truth, drawing upon teachings about annihilation of the self and union with God found in the Eckhartian mystical tradition. At the same time, Luther, Karlstadt, and Muntzer understood the concepts of annihilation and union differently, and each worked to form Christians into distinct kinds of ecclesial-political actors. The reformers not only democratized mysticism, as some scholars have recognized, but they used mysticism in the service of division—to define true versus false faith and doctrine, and to teach discernment of true versus false teaching and teachers. Such arguments required a sophisticated conception of false suffering that dismissed opponents’ suffering as a mere show or as suffering in the service of falsehood. This book seeks to bridge a gap between classical Reformation scholarship and more recent studies of discipline, asking how reformers wanted to equip Christians for discernment and self-discipline. Suffering especially threatened to unmoor self-discipline and cloud discernment.

The Many Voices of Islam

2004 ◽  
Vol 11 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 331-342 ◽  
Author(s):  
Suleman Dangor
Keyword(s):  
Political Conflict ◽  
The Political ◽  
Islamic Culture ◽  
Political Factors ◽  
Rich Diversity ◽  
Mystical Tradition ◽  
The Social ◽  
Early Islam ◽  
The Rich ◽  
The Many

AbstractThis article traces the political, conflict in early Islam that led to the formation of the first theological sects, emergence of philosophical schools resulting from the translation of Greek writings, and development of the mystical tradition in response to the formalism of dogmatic theology. It analyse.s the social and political factors that contributed to the rich diversity of thought that permeated Islamic culture and society. Finally, it attempts to identify the major current debates among Muslim scholars ranging from the ultra-traditional to the ultra-secular.

Visions, Pictures, and Rules

1977 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 303-318
Author(s):  
Joseph Runzo
Keyword(s):  
Religious Tradition ◽  
Julian Of Norwich ◽  
Virgin Mary ◽  
Perceptual Awareness ◽  
Teresa Of Avila ◽  
Religious Significance ◽  
Mystical Tradition ◽  
The Devil

The Judeo-Christian mystical tradition is replete with accounts of visions. But the perceptual experiences reputedly involved in these visions are often problematic. The prophet Isaiah (of Jerusalem) is reputed to have seen God in a mystic vision; St Francis to have seen Christ and received the stigmata; Julian of Norwich to have seen Christ's passion; St Teresa of Avila to have seen Christ, the devil, seraphim, and various Saints. Yet at least two fundamental questions immediately arise concerning the perceptual awareness involved in such visionary experiences. First, how could Jewish or Christian mystics have any reasonable certitude of correctly identifying such extraordinary entities as God, angels, and deceased Saints, as figures in their visions? And second, while Catholics, for example, see the Virgin Mary during their visions, Muslims see Muslim saints and Hindus see Hindu deities: why then do mystics tend during their visions to perceive entities which accord with their expectations, entities which are usually regarded as possessing special religious significance exclusively within each mystic's own religious tradition?

The Image and Likeness of God

2020 ◽  
pp. 265-286
Author(s):  
John Arblaster
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Theological Anthropology ◽  
Human Person ◽  
Imago Dei ◽  
Central Theme ◽  
Mystical Tradition ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
The Subject ◽  
East And West ◽  
The Rich

This chapter examines the subject of humanity as created in the image and likeness of God, a central theme in the Christian mystical tradition. Indeed, the imago Dei forms the foundation of much if not all Christian theological anthropology, and questions of the ‘nature’ and ‘structure’ of the human person are evidently central to questions of the mystical encounter between human persons and God. This chapter first surveys the scriptural background of the imago Dei in both Genesis and the New Testament and then provides a brief survey of current systematic-theological and historical-theological approaches. After providing some background to patristic imago Dei theologies in both the East and West, the chapter focuses in-depth on three lesser-known medieval authors: John of Fécamp, William of St Thierry, and John of Ruusbroec, in an attempt to highlight the rich variation and theological sophistication of their mystical anthropologies.

The Cross of the Living Lord: The Theology of the Cross and Mysticism

1996 ◽  
Vol 49 (2) ◽  
pp. 131-146 ◽  
Author(s):  
Franceen (Vann) Neufeld
Keyword(s):  
Martin Luther ◽  
Theology Of The Cross ◽  
Hebrew Scriptures ◽  
Mystical Tradition ◽  
The Cross ◽  
Mystical Theology ◽  
John Of The Cross ◽  
Evangelical Theology

The theology of the cross, that ‘thin tradition’ stretching back through Luther and Augustine and Paul to find its origins in the Hebrew Scriptures themselves, has often been counterposed to the thicker, yet equally long, tradition of mysticism. In recent years, however, distinctions between these traditions have been expressed less categorically. It is now generally recognized that mysticism cannot be regarded as a single phenomenon. Rather, an understanding of diversity within the mystical tradition is foundational to an adequate appreciation of the richness, not only of mysticism, but of the theology of the cross as well. Ecumenical concerns have provided an incentive for discovering complexities in both traditions, and for breaking down the artificial barriers of long-held prejudices. This may make it possible to perceive ‘mystical theology in Martin Luther and evangelical theology in John of the Cross’.

Hagiography as a Platform for Internal Catholic Debate in Early Modern Europe: Francisco de Ribera's La Vida de la Madre Teresa de Iesus (1590) and the Defense of a Contemplative Way Inside the Jesuit Order

2020 ◽  
Vol 89 (2) ◽  
pp. 288-306
Author(s):  
Facundo Sebastián Macías
Keyword(s):  
Society Of Jesus ◽  
Early Modern Europe ◽  
Roman Catholicism ◽  
Open Spaces ◽  
Contemplative Prayer ◽  
Teresa Of Avila ◽  
Counter Reformation ◽  
Critical Prose ◽  
Jesuit Order ◽  
Great Scope

AbstractBy the end of the sixteenth century, the Society of Jesus was redefining its ever-growing organization. Starting with the generals Mercurian and Acquaviva, the order attempted to leave behind the open spaces devoted to retired forms of prayer so as to put the full weight of the institution on its practical ministries. However, such an advance against contemplative prayer did not lack challenges. The present work aims to rescue a hardly studied critical prose in the midst of those changes: the case of the Spanish Jesuit Francisco de Ribera. This article suggests that Salamanca's professor used his words to defend contemplative prayer. For this purpose, he utilized a device of great scope in the Catholic universe during the Counter-Reformation: the hagiographic narrative. It is proposed here that the vita appears as a mechanism of dispute not only outside but also inside Roman Catholicism. In this sense, the hagiography was a platform of debate within the order. Far from being a purely repetitive text, Ribera's biography of the Castilian visionary and reformer Teresa of Ávila shows the exaltation of a form of prayer that he gladly projected to the group of all believers and especially to the Society of Jesus.

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