Promotions - Choice's Outstanding Academic Titles 2023 -

A Hidden Wisdom : Medieval Contemplatives On Self-knowledge, Reason, Love, Persons, And Immortality
 ISBN: 9780198861683Price: 41.99  
Volume: Dewey: 189Grade Min: Publication Date: 2023-01-27 
LCC: LCN: B721Grade Max: Version:  
Contributor: Van Dyke, ChristinaSeries: Publisher: Oxford University Press, IncorporatedExtent: 256 
Contributor: Reviewer: Brian T. HardingAffiliation: Texas Woman's UniversityIssue Date: October 2023 
Contributor:     

In this excellent book, Dyke (Columbia Univ. and Calvin Univ.) offers a philosophical reading of medieval mysticism and mystical theology. This focus shifts attention away from the more widely studied scholastic thinkers and toward figures outside the confines of the medieval university. This includes study houses associated with religious orders, convents and monasteries, and laypeople. Van Dyke's shift in turn creates space for the inclusion of more women than one normally finds in histories of medieval philosophy. The book consists of six chapters and five interludes addressing specific questions: e.g., Interlude Four, "Where does the erotic imagery of medieval mystics come from?" The chapters, on the other hand, address canonical questions in philosophy as treated by the mystics, questions about free will, knowledge and self-knowledge, the soul, and so on. Van Dyke is a learned guide and careful writer. Specialists in the field will profit from reading this volume as will newcomers and interested lay readers.Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.