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Title: Mystical Not-Knowing as a School of Thought
Author(s): BOCKEN, Inigo
Journal: Studies in Spirituality
Volume: 32    Date: 2022-2023   
Pages: 153-171
DOI: 10.2143/SIS.32.0.3292457

Abstract :
This article thematizes the tension between mysticism and theology that increasingly emerged in the Modern Age on the basis of a critical reading of Michel de Certeau. In particular, using Certeau’s critically edited letter from Jean-Joseph Surin, in which the latter reports on his encounter with an illiterate young man, the thesis is defended that Michel de Certeau’s work itself should be understood as a mystical theology. This is a thesis that is diametrically opposed to the dominant interpretation of Certeau’s work among major theologians and historians. It is the historical line from Nicholas of Cusa’s idiota (layman) on Surin’s shepherd boy to the poor in the liberation theology of the Late Modern Era that Certeau follows in his work and which provides a starting point for a contemporary mystical theology. The counterpointing of mysticism and theology is an inherent part of any discussion of religion in the Late Modern era.

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