Platonic Mysticism

Arthur Versluis

Description

In Platonic Mysticism, Arthur Versluis clearly and tautly argues that mysticism must be properly understood as belonging to the great tradition of Platonism. He demonstrates how mysticism was historically understood in Western philosophical and religious traditions and emphatically rejects externalist approaches to esoteric religion. Instead he develops a new theoretical-critical model for understanding mystical literature and the humanities as a whole, from philosophy and literature to art. A sequel to his Restoring Paradise, this is an audacious book that places Platonic mysticism in the context of contemporary cognitive and other approaches to the study of religion, and presents an emerging model for the new field of contemplative science.

Acknowledgments
Introduction

1. Platonic Mysticism

2. Mapping Mysticism

3. The Eclipse of Platonic Mysticism

4. The Externalist Fallacy

5. On Literature and Mysticism

6. Transcendence

7. Contemplative Art, Contemplative Science

Conclusions
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Sujets

• Philosophie
• Philosophie de la religion
• Philosophy of religion
• Philosophy
• Mysticism

Informations

• Publié par: State University of New York Press
• Date de parution: 16 août 2017
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781438466347
• Langue: English

Extrait

Platonic Mysticism
Series in Western Esoteric Traditions

David Appelbaum, editor
Platonic Mysticism
Contemplative Science, Philosophy, Literature, and Art
ARTHUR VERSLUIS
Cover image: Thomas Cole, View from Mount Holyoke, Northampton, Massachusetts, after a Thunderstorm—The Oxbow. 1836. Oil on canvas.
Published by State University of New York Press, Albany
© 2017 Arthur Versluis
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.
For information, contact State University of New York Press, Albany, NY
www.sunypress.edu
Production, Eileen Nizer
Marketing, Fran Keneston
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Versluis, Arthur, 1959– author.
Title: Platonic mysticism : contemplative science, philosophy, literature, and art / by Arthur Versluis.
Description: Albany, NY : State University of New York, 2017. | Series: SUNY series in western esoteric traditions | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016044213 (print) | LCCN 2017033130 (ebook) | ISBN 9781438466347 (ebook) | ISBN 9781438466330 (hardcover : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Plato. | Mysticism.
Classification: LCC B398.M77 (ebook) | LCC B398.M77 V47 2017 (print) | DDC 204/.22—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016044213
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter One: Platonic Mysticism
Chapter Two: Mapping Mysticism
Chapter Three: The Eclipse of Platonic Mysticism
Chapter Four: The Externalist Fallacy
Chapter Five: On Literature and Mysticism
Chapter Six: Transcendence
Chapter Seven: Contemplative Art, Contemplative Science
Conclusions
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Acknowledgments
Platonic Mysticism , a sequel to Restoring Paradise: Western Esotericism, Literature, Art, and Consciousness (SUNY Press, 2004), is dedicated to the memory of my father, who would have very much enjoyed reading it in its final form. I am grateful to colleagues with whom I have shared parts of the book, for their suggestions and ideas. I’d like to thank the colleagues associated with Hieros [ www.hieros.world ], as well as Dr. David R. Fideler for his perceptive observations, and Dr. John Richards, who forecast that esoteric studies would become part of consciousness studies. That in turn made this book possible. Part of chapter 4, “ The Externalist Fallacy ,” appears in Esoterica, www.esoteric.msu.edu . The article’s copyright belongs to the author, but our thanks to Michigan State University for hosting the journal.
Introduction
T his book is intended to fill a signal absence in the literature on mysticism. Scanning the titles published on the subject of mysticism over the past several decades, and those scheduled as forthcoming titles, one is startled by how few there are, and how tangential, in many cases, their relationship often is to the way the term “mysticism” was historically understood in the academic world. What a tangle one finds when reading over the literature on mysticism of the past century, and especially of the past several decades! Mysticism, it sometimes seems, could be almost anything, in any religion, at any time. By contrast, the purpose of this book is to refocus the discussion on mysticism and to restore an important context for understanding the term. That context, taken for granted a century ago, must be reconsidered in a new light. The argument in this book is that “mysticism” as a descriptor becomes intellectually incoherent if we don’t recognize and acknowledge its Platonic history and context.
Of course, there are few religious terms more anathematized than “mysticism.” It is not uncommon to find the word used for denigration, as when an economic analyst is condemned because his predictive work is based on nothing more than “mysticism,” or when an analytical philosopher makes the word synonymous with confusion and wooly-mindedness. Typically these dismissals include a phrase like “nothing more than,” because after all, mysticism is, as it were, the very bottom of the barrel. In contemporary scholarship on religion, one finds relatively little being published on the topic, and one might wonder why that is.
The current drift of contemporary scholarship is well away from an unfashionable subject like mysticism. Scholars are no less subject to the biases or inclinations of the age, after all. Hence one finds considerable emphasis on the study of “material culture,” which by its nature tends to discourage questions of meaning, purpose, cosmology or metaphysics. Instead, one can stay safely ensconced in areas that allow one to creep over the surface of things. “Essentialism” is an epithet often used to set aside questions of higher meaning. 1 Many seem to have bought into a prevailing assertion that “nothing is true,” even if for some reason or another everything is not permitted, or alternatively, that there is no truth in any absolute sense. Behind such perspectives is typically a shallow materialism, as visible in Marxism as it is in other forms of reductionism. In brief, we live in an era of extreme relativism, and one in which subjects like mysticism or transcendence are not in vogue, to say the least.
One hundred years ago that was not the case: then, mysticism was broadly understood to represent the center and apex of religious experience. Authors such as William James and Evelyn Underhill viewed mysticism as the touchstone for understanding religious experience because it represented direct inner realization of transcendent reality or the Divine. Authors prior to and after James and Underhill in the early twentieth century—often based on very wide and deep reading in the classic mystical texts from late antiquity to that time—saw mysticism as the immediate spiritual intuition of truth or truths believed to transcend reason, or as a deep linking (sometimes, uniting) of the soul with God through contemplative or ecstatic illumination. 2
Of course typical definitions of mysticism often include a secondary definition as varied as “wooly-minded speculation” or “obscure thought” or “belief not based on evidence” or “belief not subjected to criticism,” as well as “subjective experiences” that include “séances” and “astral projection [!].” And indeed, not every experience alleged to be mystical is necessarily so, but these kinds of secondary definitions go beyond that point to, in essence, dismiss the very notion of mysticism as worthy of one’s attention. Bundling mysticism up with spiritualism (channeling what are held to be the spirits of the dead), séances, or astral projection only confuses the matter further.
It may be best, in the end, simply to jettison the word “mysticism” in favor of a term perhaps more precise, like B. Alan Wallace’s preference, “contemplative science.” 3 Certainly terms like “contemplative science,” “mindfulness,” or “contemplative practice” carry less baggage than the word “mysticism.” I confess that I have thought quite seriously about giving this book a different title and a different terminology, perhaps one drawn from Neoplatonism. 4 But “contemplative practice” or “contemplative studies,” by engaging the word “contemplation,” implies all that goes under that term, and so dilutes the subject under consideration. There are advantages to terms derived from “contemplative,” but also disadvantages, the chief of which is that whereas “mysticism” emphasizes direct inner spiritual knowledge of the transcendence of subject and object, “contemplation” is more diffuse, and emphasizes process over result.
“Mysticism,” like it or not, has a long history; it’s the accepted term; and confusion about what it means doesn’t invalidate it, but rather calls for a more precise definition. Etymology often helps clarify meaning. The word “mysticism” derives from the Greek mystikos (μυστικός), meaning secret or esoteric path of the mysteries, and derives from mystes (μύστης), meaning an initiate into the mysteries, or more literally, one who has seen directly for himself or herself into the mysteries. Given its accumulated meanings over millennia, “mysticism” can be understood to refer more broadly to religious experiences corresponding to the direct cognition of a transcendent reality beyond the division of subject and object.
Defining mysticism as “direct cognition of a transcendent reality beyond the division of subject and object” has numerous advantages. First, it makes clear that mysticism is a type of cognition. Second, it recognizes that this kind of cognition is beyond instrumentalizing rationality that infers what is true; it is, rather, direct cognition of a “transcendent reality,” without thereby limiting what that term means except to say that it is “beyond the division of subject and object.” Hence, third, while precise, this definition is also broad enough to include both apophatic and visionary mysticism. The transcendence of subject and object can be understood as taking place on a continuum. The heart of this transcendence is known as via negativa , or apophatic experience, meaning the fundamental or primordial reality beyond any conceptual and sensory representation. But the same definition also holds for visionary experiences that take place hierophanically, in an inner dimension where the observing subject is not separate from the revealing object, but rather where the divine “other” reveals itself to “me.”
This terminology derives from the source for mysticism, Dionysius the Areopagite, who probably lived in the fifth century AD. Dionysius represents the confluence of Platonism with Christianity, and some have speculated that