>>> Gordon Fisher <[log in to unmask]> 09/01 3:48 PM >>>
At 03:12 PM 9/1/99 EDT, Kgrant1 wrote
>In a message dated 09/01/1999 2:02:45 PM Central Daylight Time,
>[log in to unmask] writes:
>
>> A young scholar asked me about it pertaining to 17thc.
>> >pietism,
>
>
>The possibility would be tricky to show in Pietism. There is a
tendency to
>move away from a mystical point of view in this tradition. There is
a link
>toward greater emotionalism within pietism, but like its
counterparts,
>English Evangelicalism (Puritanism) and American Evangelicalism
(the great
>awakenings) , it focuses most especially on the Bible and its effect
on the
>heart of the listener, and not so much on mysticism. Apocalypticism
is
>probably a better avenue.
>
>Ken A. Grant
>South Bend
The Continental Pietists were immensely interested in medieval
mysticism. Gottfried Arnold (fl. around 1700) edited anthologies and
wrote introductions to medieval mysticism. The best book on this is
by Peter C. Erb, _Pietists, Protestants, and Mysticism_ (Metuchen,
N.J., 1989) with references to the large literature on this subject.
Arnold cites the now relatively little known Carthusian mystic,Hugh of
Balma, more extensively than Bernard of Clairvaux (whom he cites
extensively enough),which indicates that Arnold's reading in medieval
mysticism was not minimal. Of course Hugh of Balma was well known in
Spanish spirituality in the 16th and 17th centuries, so this mainly
indicates that he had his ear to the ground in contemporary Catholic
circles. But Arnold is only one, probably the best, example, of this
interest among Pietists in medieval mystical writers.
I don't have at hand citations to the basic literature on the
interaction between Continental Pietists and English Puritans, but it
was highly significant.
As hinted at in my comments on Gottrfied Arnold, the area of mystical
spirituality was perhaps the only area where Protestants were willilng
to freely read and draw from Catholics at this time. In France, the
Netherlands and Germany they were reading each others' writings on
spirituality. Erb, however, argues that Arnold, at least, did
appropriate medieval mystics in a distinctly Protestant manner.
Dennis Martin
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