Christian Mysticism and Incarnational Theology

This book examines the relationship between transcendence and immanence within Christian mystical and apophatic writings. Original essays from a range of leading, established, and emerging scholars in the field focus on the roles of language, signs, and images, and consider how mystical theology might contribute to contemporary reflection on the Word incarnate. This collection of essays re-examines works from such canonical figures as Eckhart, Augustine, Plotinus, Pseudo-Dionysius, Nicolas of Cusa, Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross, Julian of Norwich, along with the philosophical thought of Iris Murdoch, Jacques Lacan, and Martin Heidegger, and the contemporary phenomena of the Emerging Church. Presenting new readings of key ideas in mystical theology, and renewed engagement with the visionary and the everyday, the therapeutic and the transformative, these essays question how we might think about what may lie between transcendence and immanence.

Louise Nelstrop is a Lecturer in Christian Spirituality and Director of Spirituality Programmes in Sarum College Salisbury. Her research interests include the English Mystics, Theoretical and Philosophical approaches to Mysticism, Cistercian and Victorine Spirituality and the Emerging Church. Her recently publications include Christian Mysticism: An Introduction to Contemporary Theoretical Approaches and Evaluating Fresh Expressions: Explorations in Emerging Church with Martin Percy (eds). Simon D. Podmore is Lecturer in Systematic Theology at Liverpool Hope University. His research interests are in the areas of SÃ-ren Kierkegaard; Martin Luther; Jewish and Christian Mysticism; the Numinous and religious experience; sin and forgiveness; and the interface of theology, philosophy, psychotherapy and pastoral care. His recent publications include Kierkegaard & the Self Before God: Anatomy of the Abyss and Struggling With God: A Theology of Spiritual Trial (forthcoming).

Contents: Introduction: transforming presence: incarnation between transcendence and immanence, Simon D. Podmore; Plotinus: monist, theist, or atheist?, Mark Edwards; Seeing one's own face in the face of God: the doctrine of the divine ideas in the mystical theologies of Dionysius the Areopagite and Nicholas of Cusa, Benjamin DeSpain; The visibility of the invisible: from Nicholas of Cusa to late modernity and beyond, Johannes Hoff; Enhypostasia Mystica: contributions from mystical Christology for a tired debate in historical and systematic theology, Philip McCosker; How to read a mystical text: Meister Eckhart Sermons 5a and 5b, Ben Morgan; Neither money, nor delights, but daily bread: the extraordinary as spiritual temptation, Markus Vinzent; Between the Apophatic and cataphatic: Heidegger's tautophatic mystical linguistics, Duane Williams; Understanding Augustine's On the Trinity as a mystical work, Edward Howells; The apophatic potential of Augustine's De doctrina christiana: creatures as signs of God, Susannah Ticciati; To centre or not to centre: Ss Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross and the 'centre of the soul', Peter M. Tyler; Julian of Norwich's logophatic discourse, Louise Nelstrop; Mystical theology today: contemporary experiments in the making and breaking of images, Donna J. Lazenby; Index.