Overview

Through the 'dark night of the soul' to the depiction of the erotically-charged union of the soul and God, the poetry and prose works of the Spanish friar John of the Cross (1542-1591) offer a striking account of the transformation of the individual in the course of the Christian life. John of the Cross: Desire, Transformation, and Selfhood argues that these writings are animated by John's own creative and subtly conceptualized notion of erotic desire. John's understanding of desire has the potential to enrich recent theological discussion of the subject, but it has been curiously neglected in past scholarship. To correct this lacuna, this study undertakes a detailed historical analysis in three parts. Firstly, it attends to the patristic, medieval, and sixteenth-century Spanish influences on John's writings, showing how John reworks a long tradition of biblical, Christian, and Platonic reflection on the concept. Secondly, it traces the importance of desire through John's writings, demonstrating how he develops the theme through his poetry, his anthropology of the soul, and his account of the spiritual ascent. Thirdly, it explores the reception of his writings in the twentieth century, demonstrating how particular modern philosophical and theological commitments have prevented scholars from recognising the rich and distinctive shape of John's theological vision. John's account of the transformation of the self, with its hopeful vision of the graced transformation of the soul's desires, has significance beyond the constrained modern categories of systematic theology, Christian spirituality, pastoral theology, and mysticism--it is a vision that is worthy of recovery today.

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9780198863069

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Reviews

This is an excellent book that bears frequent rereading and would be a worthwhile addition to any collection of serious works on John of the Cross. * Steven Payne, Teresianum * ...clear and a pleasure to read...this reviewer hopes that H. will continue the important work he has begun with this study, opening up fresh perspectives on John of the Cross. * Steven Payne, Theological Studies Journal * Bringing into attention an important Christian writer that has many things to say today both in the theological space, philological (to his poems, but also thorough his other writings), the philosophical or historical one, the work of Sam Hole that tries to deepen a key aspect of the work and work of Saint John of the Cross is not only an useful tool for the theologians that will try to understand better and to put into the context of different ages, the mystics, but also for the historians, other specialists from the sociological or humanistic area, and finally for each curious one. * Dr. Iuliu-Marius Morariu, Anuario de Historia de la Iglesia *

Bringing into attention an important Christian writer that has many things to say today both in the theological space, philological (to his poems, but also thorough his other writings), the philosophical or historical one, the work of Sam Hole that tries to deepen a key aspect of the work and work of Saint John of the Cross is not only an useful tool for the theologians that will try to understand better and to put into the context of different ages, the mystics, but also for the historians, other specialists from the sociological or humanistic area, and finally for each curious one. * Dr. Iuliu-Marius Morariu, Anuario de Historia de la Iglesia *

...clear and a pleasure to read...this reviewer hopes that H. will continue the important work he has begun with this study, opening up fresh perspectives on John of the Cross. * Steven Payne, Theological Studies Journal * Bringing into attention an important Christian writer that has many things to say today both in the theological space, philological (to his poems, but also thorough his other writings), the philosophical or historical one, the work of Sam Hole that tries to deepen a key aspect of the work and work of Saint John of the Cross is not only an useful tool for the theologians that will try to understand better and to put into the context of different ages, the mystics, but also for the historians, other specialists from the sociological or humanistic area, and finally for each curious one. * Dr. Iuliu-Marius Morariu, Anuario de Historia de la Iglesia *

Author Information

Sam Hole serves as a parish priest in the Church of England in Chelsea, London.

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