Flowering of Mysticism: Men and Women in the New Mysticism (1200-1350). Vol. 3 of The Presence of Gos: A History of Western Christian Mysticism, The

Wiseman, James A

The Flowering of Mysticism: Men and Women in the New Mysticism (1200-1350). Vol. 3 of The Presence of God: A History of Western Christian Mysticism. By Bernard McGinn. Crossroad Publishing Co.: 370 Lexington Ave., New York, NY 10017,1998. Pp. xvi + 526. Hardback: $60. Paper: $29.95.

With this volume, Bernard McGinn has come approximately to the midpoint of his monumental study of Western Christian mysticism. While rightly adhering to the understanding of mystical experience that he enunciated in the earlier volumes-namely, an experience characterized by a deep and immediate awareness of God's presence-McGinn emphasizes that the way this awareness manifested itself beginning around the year 1200 was so different from the past that it merits the appellation "new mysticism." Among its major characteristics were: (1) a move away from the motif of withdrawal from the world to a conviction that a direct encounter with God is possible for all Christians and not just those living a cloistered existence, (2) an increasing prominence of women in the mystical tradition, and (3) a growing use of vernacular languages which allowed mystical experience to be expressed in remarkably new ways.

To be sure, these characteristics did not appear to an equal degree in all the figures or movements treated in this volume. The first three of the book's six chapters deal largely with Francis and Clare of Assisi and their immediate successors in the Franciscan tradition, such as Bonaventure, Jacopone of Todi, and Angela of Foligno. Much in this movement retained clear continuity with the past. Clare, for example, both in her cloistered way of life and in her teaching, looks back to the preceding centuries with their heavily monastic overtones at least as much as she shares in some of the developments of her own era. With Francis, the element of newness is more evident, as in his vernacular "Canticle of Brother Sun" with its expression of a specifically Christian nature-mysticism in which God's presence is experienced in many different elements of the created world. The new mysticism is also very evident in Jacopone of Todi, who was among the very first to insist that in order to attain the highest state, the soul must get beyond all willing, shown when he writes, "Both willing and not willing are annihilated in you" (Laud 91).

McGinn's final three chapters deal almost exclusively with women mystics, beginning in chapter four with mulieres religiosae (religious women), the term used in the Middle Ages for women living devout lives that were less structured than the way of life followed in ecclesiastically approved orders. Prominent among these mulieres were those known as beguines, that is, women living outside the cloister and apart from any established religious legislation. Three of these beguinesHadewijch of Antwerp, Mechthild of Magdeburg, and Marguerite Poreteare so important in the history of Christian mysticism that McGinn devotes chapter five exclusively to an examination of their works. Very different is his approach in the sixth and last chapter, where he focuses not on a few women mystics but on a very large number from various religious orders: Cistercian, Premonstratensian, Vallombrosan, Carthusian, and especially Dominican.

One of the strengths of this volume is the way in which McGinn highlights the emergence of certain new themes while at the same time pointing out ways in which these were rooted in the past. Especially fine is his treatment of the "exemplary or virtual preexistence of the soul in God," a theme that appears frequently in the writings of Hadewijch and serves "as at least part of the foundation for new modes of conceiving unio mystica" (mystical union) (p. 214). In this same section of his work, McGinn discusses Hadewijch as one of the first witnesses to a major turning point in Western Christian mysticism, namely, conceiving union with God not as one between our finite spirit and the divine infinite Spirit but rather as a union of indistinction, as reflected in this writing by Hadewijch:

And that kiss will be with one single mouth,

And that fathoming will be of one single ground,

And with a single gaze will be the vision of all

That is, and was, and shall be.

McGinn is also most helpful in his elucidation of the mystical teaching of Mechthild. This beguine regularly taught that the deepest form of union with God in this life consists in "sinking away" from ecstasy into pain, humility, and even estrangement from God, as when she writes in The Flowing Light of the Godhead: "If you want to have love, you must leave love." An uninitiated reader might see nothing but masochism in such a text, but McGinn shows that in fact it is an expression of Mechthild's deep love for the kenotic Christ-suffering, dying, and emptying himself of all things. Moreover, this love led her to compassionate concern for her fellow human beings, for she knew that her beloved Christ was to be met not only in emptiness but also in humble service of others:

You should unbind the captives

And compel the free.

You should refresh the sick

And should still have nothing for

yourself

You should drink the water of pain

And ignite the fire of love with the

wood of virtue.

Then you are living in the true

desert.

McGinn's judicious selection of passages such as the ones quoted above, together with his clear style and abundant notes (the endnotes and bibliography comprise more than one-third of the book), make this volume, like the first two in the series, a work to treasure. In this reviewer's opinion, the only weak part of the book is its final chapter where McGinn may have tried to treat too many mystics of relatively minor significance and thereby lost the forest for the trees. He expresses this fear in a two-page Postscript.

But even if he had omitted most of the figures treated in chapter six, he would still not have been able to solve another problem, namely, that in covering a mere 150 years (far fewer than in either volume one or two) he nevertheless did not have space to deal with the major current of more speculative mysticism that we associate with Meister Eckhart, John Tauler, Henry Suso, and John Ruusbroec. These mystics, together with such women as Catherine of Siena and Julian of Norwich, will be covered in the next volume, to be entitled Continuity and Change in Western Mysticism. How far McGinn will be able to get in it and whether he will even be able to complete his project in what are now promised to be five volumes in all, remains to be seen. Perhaps a sixth volume will be needed to bring the history up to the twentieth century. This, however, would in some ways be a blessing, so outstanding is the work of this scholar.

-James A. Wiseman

James A. Wiseman, O.S.B., is an associate professor in the theology department at The Catholic University of America and is also the claustral prior ofSt. Anselm's Abbey in Washington, D.C.

Copyright Spiritual Life Summer 1999
Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights Reserved