Ludwig Wittgenstein - Anti-Philosopher: Reflections on 20 years of Teaching Wittgenstein in the Class-Room

My good friend and colleague, Prof Jose Nandhikkara CMI of Bangalore, has kindly asked me to write an article for his excellent Dharmaram Journal on Wittgenstein and pedagogy. I am just nearing the final proofs but thought I would append some 'edited highlights' (as is usual on this site) for your amusement. It also ended up as a reflection on 20 years of teaching Wittgenstein... quite a thought!

Best wishes as always.

Peter

 

1. Introduction: ‘Showing the fly the way out of the fly-bottle’

Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889 – 1951) famously characterised the aim of his philosophy as showing ‘the fly the way out of the fly-bottle’.[1] Much ink has been spilt as to what exactly he meant by this phrase and, indeed, the major thrust of his philosophy tout court (as we shall see shortly). In this article I shall present one interpretation of the phrase. My argument will be that by working on the gossamer-light interface between what can and cannot be said, Wittgenstein’s philosophy gently coaxes each reader from the ensnaring prison of the discursive intellect to a wider, non-discursive, Blick or view on existence. In so doing the philosopher, rather like the therapist, cannot confine herself simply to words but must work on the subtle choreography between saying and showing.

            Recent commentators such as Alain Badiou have gone so far as to suggest that Wittgenstein is better considered as an ‘anti-philosopher’ who attacks the very roots of Western philosophy itself. Beginning, therefore, with a brief review of some of the problems of Wittgensteinian interpretation that have arisen in the half century since his death in 1951, I shall then turn my attention to two ways in which the Austrian encourages his readers to ‘work on themselves’, that is, through the development of the Übersichtliche Blick and a discourse that moves from thinking to seeing to acting. I shall conclude that although some of Wittgenstein’s unorthodox methods may trouble or disturb his readers, his ultimate aim stays deeply wedded to the ancient quest to root philosophy in wonderment. In this respect, I will argue, we can see his philosophy as much as therapy as pedagogy – a true working on the soul.

 

2. Reading Wittgenstein: Theory and Therapy

Surveying the reactions to Wittgenstein’s work nearly fifty years after his death, Rorty in his essay “Keeping Philosophy Pure” summed up the position thus:

Academic philosophy in our day stands to Wittgenstein as intellectual life in Germany in the first decades of the last century stood to Kant. Kant had changed everything, but no one was sure just what Kant had said – no one was sure what in Kant to take seriously and what to put aside.[2]

 

In this essay, Rorty suggests that Wittgenstein’s writings throw down a gauntlet to all who read them, especially professional philosophers. The challenge to enter the ‘transcendental standpoint’ of the Tractatus and the further challenge of the ‘twice born’ to resist this temptation and the challenge to both of the ‘pure of heart’ expounded in the Philosophical Investigations that transcends the need to ‘explain, justify and expound’. In tracing this distinction, which Hutto calls the ‘theoretical and the therapeutic’,[3] Rorty emphasises the importance of the Tractatus for those who have expounded Wittgenstein from the former point and the importance of the Investigations for those of the latter disposition. This distinction between the emphases of the work of the ‘earlier’ and ‘later’ Wittgenstein, and this possible distinction between a theoretical and an anti-theoretical approach to his writings, has been a constant since the voluminous Wittgensteinian secondary literature began to swell. As Pears puts it, in these later works “he is moving away from theorizing and towards plain description of the phenomenon of language.”[4]

Consequently, amongst the Wittgensteinian secondary literature we see a split between those commentators who see the work of the later Wittgenstein as continuing the work of the earlier Wittgenstein and those who see a new anti-theoretical shift in the post-Tractatus works. To add to the confusion, a recent book, The Third Wittgenstein: The Post-Investigations Works[5] has argued that the parts of the Nachlass that have appeared charting the latter period of Wittgenstein’s life, in particular On Certainty, suggest a third interpretation of Wittgenstein that transcends even the position developed in the Investigations.

We are thus left with four possible ways of viewing his works in the authors of the secondary literature:

1.      Those who remain with the traditional division between the ‘earlier’ and the ‘later’ Wittgenstein and see the later works, especially the Investigations, as a critique of the earlier works, especially the Tractatus. Representative of this trend would be Peter Hacker whose Wittgenstein: Connections and Controversies makes this point.[6]

2.      The so-called ‘new Wittgensteinians’ who see a theoretical union between the early and later Wittgenstein and reject any notion of a firm break between the two.[7]

3.      Those who regard the ‘third Wittgenstein’ of the ‘post-Investigations works’ (so-called) as presenting a third and more radical departure from the Wittgensteinian corpus.

4.      To these three interpretations, we could possibly add a fourth, a growing body of Wittgenstein scholars who, following Wittgenstein’s own remarks in the latter works of moving from the theoretical to the practical, or from saying to showing want to emphasise the importance of the biographical elements of Wittgenstein’s life and use them to gain a more complete picture of what his thought was trying to achieve. Again, a key collection of essays, Wittgenstein: Biography and Philosophy[8] has acted as a vessel for presenting this interpretative strand. Included in this group would be those (such as myself) who want to also emphasis the Wittgenstein’s role as a therapist as much as a theoretician or logician.

3.  Wittgenstein as Therapist

One of the first writers to emphasise the ‘therapeutic’ within Wittgenstein’s writing was Stanley Cavell.[9] By the time Alice Crary’s collection The New Wittgenstein came out in 2000 it seemed as though the notion had influenced a whole generation of Wittgensteinian scholars. The authors collected there, Crary suggested, shared an interpretation of Wittgenstein’s work as a) a unified whole and b) broadly ‘therapeutic’ in nature. This emphasises the shift in recent Wittgensteinian scholarship away from the understanding of his work as largely theoretical (or, in Rorty’s words, largely concerned with the reactions and concerns of fellow ‘professional philosophers’) to an understanding which is built around seeing his work as contributing to individual existential development.[10] For Crary this ‘therapeutic aim’ is largely around helping us to see the ‘sources of philosophical confusion’ we hold by replacing a need for a metaphysical view of language to a concern with the observation of the  running of language as a means to solving philosophical confusion. Thus, for Cavell, the aim of Wittgenstein’s philosophy is to bring us back from metaphysical speculation to the everyday discourse of ‘forms of life’ (Lebensformen) where language has its natural home. Whereas Cavell et al are primarily concerned with the purely philosophical consequences of a reading of Wittgenstein’s work other contemporary authors have gone further and ascribed to Wittgenstein a therapeutic agenda that goes beyond the purely philosophical. In this respect there has been a growing movement to connect Wittgenstein’s writings with psychotherapeutic literature, beginning of course with his fellow Viennese theorist, Sigmund Freud (1856 – 1939). Wittgenstein saw the value of Freud’s work not as a pseudo-scientist but in the function of Freudian analysis as ‘aspect-changing’:

When a dream is interpreted we might say that it is fitted into a context in which it ceases to be puzzling. In a sense the dreamer re-dreams his dream in surroundings such that its aspect changes…

In considering what a dream is, it is important to consider what happens to it, the way its aspect changes when it is brought into relation with other things remembered, for instance. (LC: 45 -46)Lectures and Conversatons on Aesthetics, Psychology and Religious Belief. Ed C. Barrett. Oxford: Blackwell 1989

 4. Teaching Wittgenstein's Anti-Philosophy 

Teaching Wittgenstein is, of course, notoriously difficult. Twenty years ago I was assigned a class of undergraduates and told to teach them Wittgenstein. Needless to say it was a disaster as I taught his texts ‘straight’ like any other classical philosopher such as Kant or Locke – trying to get the class to repeat and memorise his arguments by rote (perhaps I was unconsciously emulated Ludwig as a young man who ended up impatiently cuffing the school-children who couldn’t follow his ice-cold but brilliant thought processes...). Two decades later, following the interpretation I have developed in this article, I take an entirely different approach. Having given a preliminary lecture, not unlike the contents of this paper, I then get the students to read the texts themselves and reflect upon them. From the ‘form of life’ that develops in the group from the interaction of saying and showing the true message, and transformational work, of Wittgenstein begins to happen (much, indeed, as he taught philosophy himself in Cambridge towards the end of his life). By using language, similes and metaphors in unusual and provocative ways I have found that Wittgenstein brings us back to what we knew already but were unable to express in words. In conclusion, then, it may be worth recalling the work of Badiou whom I mentioned earlier, who termed Wittgenstein an ‘anti-philosopher’. The role of the ‘anti-philosopher’, says Badiou, has three key elements:[11]

1.      They present ‘a linguistic, logical, genealogical critique of the statements of philosophy... an unraveling of the pretensions of philosophy to constitute itself a theory’.

2.      They see that philosophy is ‘an act, of which fabulations about ‘truth’ are clothing, the propaganda, the lies.’ (cf. T 4.112 ‘Philosophy is not a body of doctrine but an activity’).

3.      They realise that the philosophical act “must install an active non-thought beyond all meaningful propositions, beyond all thought, which also means beyond all science... The antiphilosophical act consists in letting what there is show itself, insofar as ‘what there is’ is precisely that which no true proposition can say.”[12]

Badiou’s ‘anti-method’ is then, I conclude, the spirit with which we should approach Wittgenstein’s works as a guide to pedagogy – an approach that through the use of Übersichtliche Darstellung and astonishment will stimulate the move from thinking to seeing to acting that will lead to the position described finally at the end of the Tractatus: “There are indeed things that cannot be put into words. They make themselves manifest. They are what is mystical.”[13] But rather than ‘anti-philosopher’ I would rather conclude that Wittgenstein is the philosopher of wonderment par excellence.

 

 

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[1] Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, G. E. M. Anscombe and R. Rhees, Oxford: Blackwell, 1958, 309.

[2]R. Rorty, “Keeping Philosophy Pure,” in Consequences of Pragmatism (Essays 1972 – 1980), Brighton: Harvester, 1982, 20.

[3]D. Hutto, Wittgenstein and the End of Philosophy: Neither Theory nor Therapy, London: Macmillan, 2003.

[4]D. F. Pears, The False Prison: A Study of the Development of Wittgenstein’s Philosophy, Volume 1, Oxford: Clarendon, 1988, 218.

[5]D. Moyal-Sharrock, The Third Wittgenstein: The Post-Investigations Works., London: Ashgate, 2004.

[6]P. M. S. Hacker, Wittgenstein: Connections and Controversies, Oxford: Clarendon, 2001.

[7]A. Crary, and R. Read, The New Wittgenstein, London: Routledge, 2000.

[8]J. Klagge, Wittgenstein: Biography and Philosophy, Cambridge: CUP, 2001.

[9]S. Cavell, S. Must We Mean What We Say? Oxford: OUP, 1976; The Claim of Reason: Wittgenstein, Skepticism, Morality and Tragedy, Oxford: OUP, 1979.

[10]In this vein see, for example, J. Nandhikkara, Being Human after Wittgenstein: A Philosophical Anthropology, Bangalore: Dharmaram Publications, 2011.

[11]Badiou, Wittgenstein’s Antiphilosophy, 75-76.

[12]Badiou, Wittgenstein’s Antiphilosophy, 80.

[13](T 6.522).

Teresa of Avila's 'First Hand' Language of the Soul: International Conference, Avila, August 2015

Dear All

In preparation for next week's international conference at Avila please find below part of the paper I will be giving on Teresa's 'First Hand' language of the soul. During the conference the University of Avila will confer an honorary doctorate on Teresa ( I hope she passes the viva!), I shall post any photographs of this great event if I can get any.

All good wishes.

Peter

Teresa of Avila’s ‘First Hand’ Language of the Soul

 

Shortly before his death in 2002, the Irish Jesuit, Fr Joseph Veale SJ wrote:

 

 

 

The institutional Church in Western Europe is by and large written off, even by the devout. Its language is no longer being heard. The Church institution (and religion in general) invites yawns or condescension, indifference or contempt. As soon as you open your mouth about God you have the handicap of being associated with a discredited Church. (Veale 2003:107)

 

 

 

If this was true a decade ago when he wrote these words how much more so is it today. Yet, one of the attractive things about Fr Veale’s approach to spirituality was that he did not despair, but true son of Loyola as he was, he forensically examined the causes and origins of our present malaise and suggested a solution. For him, the cause was simply put:

 

 

 

The problem is that the language has gone stale. The only language that has any chance of getting through is first-hand language. The trouble with most attempts at religious communication is that they are couched in a language that is tired, in tired images, in a churchy idiom that is remote from life and has grown repulsive. (Do we not ourselves, honestly, find much religious talk repulsive? I do.) Many of our words about God are second-hand, third-hand, reach-me-down and ready-made. (Veale 2003:107)

 

 

 

As we have celebrated this wonderful 500^th anniversary of the birth of Santa Teresa, what has most impressed me (from a background in linguistic philosophy) is the ‘first hand’ nature of Teresa’s language and how if we are looking for twenty-first century models of a fresh language to encapsulate the encounter of the human soul with the Living Lord then Teresa’s own ‘language of the spirit’ offers a remarkable paradigm[1]. For, it will be my argument in this paper that rather than stale, second-hand language, a great and perpetually fascinating writer such as Teresa of Avila can give us the tools to craft the language of the encounter with the divine in its fresh originality once again.

Fr Veale suggested that this first hand language now needed to «come from a level of experience that is sensed to be in touch with God. Never mind how fragile, how filled with doubt or dread, how inadequate. People only hear words that are freshly minted, that come from intimacy and contact» (Veale 2003:108). It will be my contention here that exactly such «fragile» words, filled with «doubt or dread» are exactly what we find in the works of Teresa of Avila, despite five hundred years of attempts to mask them over with pieties and second hand language.

Being a psychologist as well as a theologian (and also versed in the dark arts of analytical philosophy) my aim in this paper is to re-present Teresa’s ‘language of the soul’ in an idiom and fashion applicable to the turbulent times we find ourselves living in today, in a fashion I hope that Fr Veale would approve of.

 

The Book of the Life

The strange babbling of Teresa of Avila’s Book of the Life (hereafter V) will be familiar to anyone who has ever attempted to articulate the action of spirit in their lives. The book, her first major writing, arises from particular social and ecclesiological pressures, not least the need to justify her actions as a reformer and also as someone who was clearly moving into the suspect territories of alumbradismo, recogimiento and dejamiento. As we listen to her voice we must also remind ourselves that this is the voice of a woman of converso origins – with its own particular resonance and timbre.

            She tells us in the preface to the book that it was written in response to requests from her confessors, in particular the Dominican García de Toledo. However, as she gets into her stride we hear the tumbling, half formed sentences of someone trying to articulate what is frankly unsayable. In this respect the closest I can find to her style is the half-opened/half-closed writing of Ludwig Wittgenstein who ‘shows’ in his writing by ‘not saying’ and ‘says’ by ‘not showing’[2].

Similarly, in Teresa’s Book of the Life, we hear a strange choreography of saying and not-saying as she comes close to the boundary of what is and isn’t expressible. At such moments (and there are several in this important work) the whole structure of her grammar and language begins to break down – for here we find ourselves on the very boundaries of language itself[3]. For Kristeva (2008) this will be the unspeakable semiotic breaking into the symbolic web of language (see also Kristeva 2009).

            Therefore, as we approach the Book of the Life, especially in English translation, we must do so knowing that, as much as the later Interior Castle, we are entering a multi-dimensional language-world within which we must be prepared to be challenged and our perceptions re-aligned. Her task in writing the Life , I would suggest, is not so much as an Apología de sua Vida (although this was clearly what motivated its origins) as the desire to change the point of view, or indeed, perspective, of her reader. With the advent of modernism the desire has always been to concretise or ‘pin down’ Teresa’s gossamer-light prose so that it fits into the dominating categories of whichever interpreter she happens to find herself in the hands of – whether they be psychological, sociological or literary. Such brutal concretisation will always, I suggest, end in failure, as her gentle contradictions reflect the spiritual life – forever just beyond categorisation. Teresa’s realm is the realm of ‘spiritual freedom’ – as vital today as it was five hundred years ago.

 

Teresa’s Map of the Soul

Within the book we can isolate twelve extra chapters she added to the original manuscript once García de Toledo had seen it and asked for more explanation of her experiences of prayer[4]. The resulting chapters eleven to twenty-two inclusive form a distinct ‘treatise within a treatise’ presenting Teresa’s view of the nature of prayer in a surprisingly masterful fashion. The over-arching narrative structure is her justly celebrated analogy of the ‘four waters’. However, Teresa never sticks smoothly to the narrative but employs her distinctive language of gustos, regalos, deleites and gozos to present her ‘savoury picture’ of the growth of the soul in God’s hands. She begins her treatise then in customary fashion:

 

 

 

So then, let us speak now about those who are beginning to be servants of love (for this doesn’t appear to me to be anything other than following the path of the one who loved us so much), when I think of this I am strangely caressed by a great dignity (que me regalo estrañamente), for servile fear vanishes at once if at this first stage we proceed as we have to. (V: 11.1)[5]

 

 

 

From the beginning she introduces us to her ‘way of love’ which is full of caresses, joys and delights:

           

 

 

We are so miserly and slow in giving ourselves entirely to God that    since His Majesty does not desire that we enjoy something as precious    as this without paying a high price, we do not fully prepare ourselves.           (V: 11.1)

 

 

 

Yet as the stirrings of love arise in our hearts, the intellect, or as she usually refers to it, the pensamiento, will also stir to suggest ways we should be wary of the spiritual path and resist its pull (V: 11.4): «so many dangers and difficulties are put before (the seeker) that no little courage, but much, is needed if they are not to turn back». In her last work, The Interior Castle, she brilliantly describes such thoughts:

 

 

 

We shall always be glancing around and saying: ‘Are people looking at me or not?’ ‘If I take a certain path shall I come to any harm?’ ‘Dare I begin such and such a task?’ ‘Is it pride that is impelling me to do this?’ ‘Can anyone as wretched as I engage in so lofty an exercise as prayer?’ ‘Will people think better of me if I refrain from following the crowd?’  ‘For extremes are not good’ they say, ‘even in virtue; and I am such a sinner that if I were to fail I should only have farther to fall; perhaps I shall make no progress and in that case I shall only be doing good people harm; anyway, a person like myself has no need to make             herself singular!’ (M: 1.2.10)[6]

           

 

 

This, as we shall see later, is the monkey mind[7] of the Buddhists – that which contemporary practices of mindfulness, for example, seek to bring into stability by means such as awareness exercises. From the very beginning of her writing career Teresa is aware of this internal conflict between stabilised awareness of the heart and the need to work with distracting pensamiento. In this respect I am not persuaded, as some commentators are, that the Life is an inferior work or somehow a preparation for the Interior Castle. The Castle is a brilliant work, but in many ways the Life is even more innovative and radical. At this stage Teresa had not put into place so many self-censoring mechanisms which she later discovered were necessary if her work was to survive in the tough spiritual climate of late sixteenth century Spain.

             Thus, she emphasises at this stage, that the most important thing is not so much to worry about the «work» being done in prayer, but «the most important thing is to enjoy it» / lo más es gozar (V: 11.5) whilst the Lord «grants the increase». The path of the saints, she believes, is impossible for us to follow, with all its trials and difficulties. However if we have what John of the Cross called the «otra inflamación major»  – the greater enkindling flame of God - then we will be able to proceed on the path. This is the love we should feel and enjoy on these first faltering steps.

            In Teresa’s writings we thus see a pull away from an over-active pensamiento to what she variously describes as the «soul» or «heart» (alma, corazón) in a practice for stablilising the heart which she terms «oración mental». This has usually been translated in English as «mental prayer», which to my ears at least suggests something concentrating on the pensamiento rather than what she actually describes which is movement to the heart or soul. Rather, I would like to suggest that this might better be related to contemporary talk of mindfulness to which I have already alluded.

 

Teresa on Contemplation and Mindfulness

Teresa’s first account of oración mental in her writings is an extended account in The Life, Chapters Eight to Ten. Here she contrasts the peace she receives from this activity with the «war so troublesome» where she would frequently «fall and rise» (V: 8.2 con estas caídas y con levantarme) as her passions came and left her. Her prayer, she says, «drew her to the harbour of salvation» (V: 8.4 a puerto de salvación). She refers to it here and later as her «trato con Dios: Que no es otra cosa oración mental, a mi parecer, sino tratar de amistad, estando muchas veces tratando a solas con quien sabemos nos ama’» / «For mental prayer/mindfulness is none other, it appears to me, than an association of friendship, frequently practised on an intimate basis, with the one we know loves us»[8]. The pivotal word «trato» that Teresa uses to convey the intimacy and immediacy of mindfulness causes the most variation in translation. Allison Peers, in his usual robust fashion stays with «intercourse», whilst Kavanaugh and Rodriguez opt for the «intimate sharing between friends». Of her older translators Matthew chose «straight commerce with God», Woodhead «conversing in prayer» and Cohen «communion»[9].

            Where Teresa’s method of prayer differs so clearly from Buddhist mindfulness is the role that visualisation and symbolic representation of Christ plays in her meditations (See, for example, V: 9 1-4). Even though the gustos and regalos will be a necessary part of her description the symbolic function plays an even more important role. However where Teresa’s account of mindfulness converges with Buddhist accounts is the importance of drawing attention away from intellectual and mental activity to the location of what she calls «the heart». This, I would like to suggest, is not an anti-intellectual move but rather a consequence of the strategy of the medieval mystical theology to which she is heir. To overcome the whirring discourse of the intellect we will need to concentrate on the mindful «trato» with the beloved. This is why I feel the term ‘mental prayer’ can be misleading and why I preference ‘mindfulness’, or even perhaps ‘heartfulness’ or ‘soulfulness’, as a translation of oración mental[10]. ‘Mental’ seems to have the contemporary association with the mind and intellectual activity whereas, I would suggest, Teresa is advocating something closer to the Buddhist practice of mindfulness outlined above, and certainly closer to the contemporary practice of mindfulness discussed by commentators such as Kabut-Zinn. As she says later in Chapter Thirteen: «Ansí que va mucho a los principios de comenzar oración a no amilanar los pensamientos, y créanme esto, porque lo tengo por espieriencia» / «Therefore it is of great importance, when we begin to practise prayer, not to be intimidated by thoughts, and believe you me, for I have had experience of this» (V: 13.7)[11]. Or as she later puts it in Chapter Seventeen, rather poetically translated by Matthew, the thoughts are like «unquiet little Gnatts, which buzze, and whizze by night, heer and there, for just so, are these Powers wont to goe, from one to another» (V: 17.6)[12].

            I would like to suggest here that as Teresa’s experience as a writer and pray-er progresses, she does not seem to alter the fundamental perceptions of the nature of the life as prayer as outlined in the early Life. What does change, however, is her ability to convey the exact subtle meaning regarding prayer-discourse in her writings. Indeed, as time goes on she seems to entrench the studied imprecision of The Life, enshrining in her writings the principle that the life of prayer/contemplation by its very nature most resist the hard edged analysing of the discursive intellect. In this respect, as I have argued here and elsewhere, her attempt to patrol the boundaries of the ineffable are as precise and subtle as any contemporary linguistic philosopher, or indeed analytical psychologist. 

 

Epilogue: Whither the Christian Soul?

I would like to conclude by returning to our opening interlocutor, Fr Veale. Towards the end of the article I began with, the Irish Jesuit has this to say about contemporary Christian discourse:

 

 

 

We may feel, rightly or wrongly that the word ‘God’ cannot be used any more, because it has been so cheapened by its pious users. We may feel the same about most of the language of our religious ghetto. That vocabulary may carry with it so black a cloud of attendant woes,

and remind recovering Catholics of so much intolerable guilt or

religious boredom, that we cannot stomach it ourselves. Do we listen,

ever, to contemporary religious talk and recognise how boring it is? (Veale 2003: 107)

 

 

 

It is no coincidence, I would like to conclude by suggesting, that latterly Teresa’s writings have once again made their appeal to feminists and New Age seekers alike: her concerns are our concerns and her studied language of the soul is as defiantly postmodern as anything by Lacan or Derrida. I have argued in this paper that her ‘language of the spirit’ is, in Fr Veale’s terms, ‘first hand’. She enlivens conversation and discourse of the transcendent in a way I aim to have demonstrated here. In particular her path of what we may call heartfulness or soulfulness opens up exciting new paths for pastoral, psychological and ministerial work. In this her quincentennial year, the sage of Avila is perhaps once again ahead of the curve in her critical analysis of the state of the soul and her way of mindfulness and soulfulness.

 

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[1] ‘Lenguaje de espíritu’ (V 12.5). Teresa’s own phrase for her programme to articulate the ineffable. For more on this see Tyler 2013.

[2]  See The Return to the Mystical (Tyler 2011).

[3] Alles Vergängliche ist nur ein Gleichnis; das Unzulängliche, hier wird's Ereignis; das Unbeschreibliche, hier ist es getan; das Ewigweibliche zieht uns hinan/ «Everything passing is only an image; the unattainable is here achieved; the undescribable is here done; the eternal-feminine draws us above». Goethe Faust Part Two, concluding chorus.

[4] The original draft of the Life is lost.

[5] Pues hablando ahora de los que comienzan a ser siervos de el amor (que no me parece otra cosa determinarnos a seguir por este camino de oración al que tanto nos amó) , es una dignidad tan grande, que me regalo estrañamente en pensar en ella; porgue el temor servil luego va fuera, si en este primer estado vamos como hemos de ir.

[6] I have used Allison Peers’ translation here as he brings out perfectly Teresa’s sense of an ‘inner dialogue’ which proceeds in the mind of one starting out on a path of prayer or contemplation.

[7] Or as Teresa calls it poetically in V: 15. 6 «the grinding mill of the intellect» - moledor/entendimiento. In the same passage she also refers to «restless bees» that «gad about» (Matthew’s translation).

[8] Again, a tricky passage to translate and preserve the sense of intimacy Teresa wants to convey here. Allison Peers retains this sense with his translation: «Mental prayer, in my view, is nothing but friendly intercourse, and frequent solitary converse, with Him Who we know loves us». Kavanaugh and Rodriguez give a more distant: «Mental prayer in my opinion is nothing less than an intimate sharing between friends; it means taking time frequently to be alone with Him who we know loves us». Perhaps the intimacy we would experience with a boyfriend or girlfriend is suggested.

[9] Matthew, for example, translates the passage above with: «For Mentall prayer, is no other thing, in my opinion, than a treatie, about making friendship with Almightie God; and a frequent and private Commerce, hand to hand, with him; by whome, we know, we are beloved».

[10] For more on what I understand by the term ‘soul’ see Tyler, forthcoming, The Pursuit of the Soul: Soul-making, Psychoanalysis and the Christian Tradition (T&T Clarke, 2016).

[11] Matthew: «It is therefore of great importance, for them, who beginn to hold Mentall Prayer, that they doe not subtilize too much, with their thoughts». Kavanaugh: «not to be intimidated by thoughts». Allison Peers: «not to let ourselves be frightened by our own thoughts».

[12] Que no parece sino de estas maripositas de las noches, importunas y desasosegadas: ansí anda de un cabo a otro.

Teresa of Avila - Doctor of the Soul: Dublin Avila Event, September 18th/19th 2015

Dear All

After the excitement of last week's conference I just received the conference poster for the next event - the 500th anniversary conference at the beautiful Avila centre in Dublin. Please find it below. Look forward to seeing you there!

Best wishes

Peter

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

‘An Unforgettable Experience’:Teresa of Avila 1515 – 2015: Mystical Theology and Spirituality in the Carmelite Tradition

 

 

'WHAT AN ABSOLUTELY AMAZING CONFERENCE!

Thank you so much for an incredible conference.  The angels themselves were jealous at the gathering.  Where to begin?  It was a fantastic line up of brilliant scholars and the humanity of everyone shone through.Teresa was beaming her wild wonders down from the beatific life. I had so many life affirming conversations and interactions all in the name of theology following God.  All our theologising at the conference was rooted in the God who is actually living and real, and for me it made a huge difference.  It showed that real theology is possible.' (A participant)

  

‘I thank you for this beautiful and unforgettable conference in Twickenham where so many (if not all) of us have been blessed in so many different ways. This has been the perfect combination of academic and mystic where our mind, heart and soul were made One in the Trinity. I have attended many conferences in my life but this one has been the most fruitful in so many different ways that I have not yet finished uncovering.’ (A participant)

 

On 18^th June 2015 over one hundred delegates from five continents – academics, contemplatives, clergy and lay people – gathered to celebrate the life and work of the great ‘Santa’ of Avila – Teresa of Jesus, whose 500^th birthday we celebrate this year. The aim of the conference was to create a space where the latest academic research on her writing might intersect with the contemplative lifestyle of those living out the Carmelite charism. This was achieved by a full programme that included academic presentations from the leading writers on Teresa, space for prayer, artistic exploration and, of course, chat and relaxation over meals and drinks.

The first day was taken up by placing Teresa in her context and seeing how the historical circumstances of 16^th Century Spain shaped her place in the pantheon of the Christian mystical tradition. This was begun by two leading interpreters of the tradition – Emeritus Prof Bernard McGinn of Chicago University and Fr Wilfrid McGreal of Aylesford Priory, Kent, one of the first Carmels founded in England after the Carmelites left the Holy Land. The afternoon witnessed a lively debate between Professors Sarah Coakley (Cambridge), Peter Tyler (St Mary’s) and Edward Howells (London University) over Teresa’s debt to the medieval mystical tradition. Finally the day concluded with a heart-centred reflection from the American mystic, James Finley, one time novice of Thomas Merton.

The second day began with a presentation from Archbishop Emeritus, Rowan Williams who chose as his subject the importance of the Eucharist in Teresa’s theology. He was followed by two Carmelite friars – Fr Matt Blake ODC of the Boar’s Hill Priory and Fr Iain Matthew ODC of the Teresianum in Rome who presented two important aspects of Teresa’s thought – her role as foundress and the place of Christ’s resurrection in her description of the soul. The day culminated with a magnificent Votive Mass of Teresa celebrated in the historic University Chapel. The principal celebrant here was Fr Tony Lester OCarm, UK Carmelite Provincial, and we were honoured to be joined by the Spanish Ambassador to the Court of St James – HE Frederico Trillo-Figueroa y Martínez-Conde – who took a particular interest in the travelling Teresa exhibition displayed at the back of the Chapel. The liturgy was celebrated to the accompaniment of music by St Teresa’s fellow Avilan, Tomás Luis de Victoria, brilliantly sung by Cherry-Willows Pauls and her choir.

 

Our final day began with a spirited video conference given by the celebrated French theorist and feminist Prof Julia Kristeva. Following her post-Lacanian deconstructivist approach to Teresa a dialogue was initiated by Prof Gillian Ahlgren and taken up by the Carmelite sisters, Sr Jo, Sr Philomena and Sr Mary on how Teresa’s 16^th Century experiences can be lived out in today’s postmodern world.

The opening comments from our delegate with which we began sum up the feeling at the end of the conference. We felt we had glimpsed the unending genius of this remarkable woman – mystic, foundress, thinker and saint – in a unique event which will stay in our hearts and minds for many years to come.

The proceedings of the conference will be published by Ashgate in 2017 and in the meantime papers from the conference and videos can be found on www.smuc.ac.uk/inspire and http://www.teresaofavila.org/multimedia.html

 

 

Teresa of Avila 1515 - 2015 Mystical Theology and Spirituality in the Carmelite Tradition. St Mary's University, Twickenham, 18th - 20th June 2015

Dear All

As we reach the last few days before our conference at the end of the week please find attached a poster detailing three public events in connection with the conference:

The first is the travelling Teresa of Avila exhibition which is touring the UK during this Teresian year. So far it has been to many British cathedrals and I think this may be its first visit to a British University.
The second event is the public lecture by James Finley on the evening of 18th June. James was a novice of Thomas Merton and brings great experience and insight to Teresa's writings.
Finally, we have our celebratory Votive Mass of St Teresa on the afternoon of the 19th June. The music will be drawn from that of 16th century Spain, especially the work of Teresa's fellow Avilan, Tomas Luis de Victoria.

You are very welcome to all of these.

With all good wishes

Peter

Jonathan Moore - Inigo - Review (Pleasance Theatre, London)

I had the great pleasure of attending the second run of this 'little gem' of a play in London's Pleasance Theatre this week. It is still running for another week and I would warmly commend it to anyone who can reach London. I attach the review below:

Inigo

 By Jonathan Moore

Pleasance Theatre, London

The life and struggles of St Ignatius Loyola – muscular Christian and all-round poster-boy for the Counter Reformation – do not immediately suggest themselves as a fit subject for a contemporary art-house play. Especially if the playwright is Jonathan Moore – radical director of great opera

premieres such as Mark-Anthony Turnage’s Greek and

one-time collaborator with Joe Strummer of The Clash (younger readers please refer to Google...). Yet here it is, played out in the Pleasance theatre a step away from the hipsterism and designer beer of the Caledonian Road. We walk into the theatre from all this activity outside to suddenly find ourselves immersed in the power politics and theological controversies of early 16^th Century Spain. Such a terse and multi-layered piece, given over to much theological and philosophical discussion, is enriched by the skill of the actors here performing it. They have been chosen well – a troupe of mainly young RADA graduates and seasoned professionals radiating all the energy, struggle and drama of this crucial turning point of European history as played out in the life of our eponymous hero (‘Inigo’ being the original Basque name of the saint who would later assume the title of ‘Master Ignatius’ after his studies in Paris). First amongst equals is Fayez Bakhsh (his first role after graduating from drama school) whose Inigo occupies a space of quiet intensity as if lit from behind – here surely is a great future actor in the making. Portraying the conversion of a libertine to a saint is no mean feat but I think Bakhsh pulls it off. Also worth mentioning are Reggie Oliver as the suave and sophisticated Figuero who turns, St Paul like, from persecutor of Ignatius to one of his strongest advocates and Paul Storrier, camping it up as a somewhat cartoonish Gian Carafa (later to become Pope Paul IV – the Pope who famously put the fig-leaves on Michelangelo’s work). Moore’s writing is at times expressive and lyrical alternating with the demotic life of 16^th Century Spain. The former is revealed in the subtle allegories and symbolism of the piece – not least the heavy anvil blows that punctuate the piece and recall the spectator’s attention to the central insistent hammering of Inigo’s drive. The latter is translated easily to the street language of Moore’s native London and the early fights, skirmishes and womanising appears uncannily like the London streets we have travelled through to get to the theatre. However, juxtaposed with these scenes are ones of quiet intensity where the struggles of the young spiritual seeker are movingly portrayed. In an age and society obsessed with ‘radicalisation’ and general fear of faith I am not sure what contemporary audiences will make of all this. We were a small but dedicated group (if somewhat eclectic) and I wonder whether our wider cultural amnesia regarding faith will prevent this piece becoming the critical success it deserves. Yet, with love and careful acting it is clearly a fine piece with some moving writing. I can see it as something young groups of people, especially in schools and colleges, could seize upon as an entirely workable drama production with a thinking reflection on the nature of faith. I cannot see it becoming the basis of an Andrew Lloyd Weber musical. Reading the full text after the performance I noticed that a number of stage directions and cuts were made (this is its second outing, initially staged at the Bear Theatre in London) – most pertinently the removal of the character of the young Inigo. It will be interesting to see what future directors make of this and hope we can look forward to a long and varied history of interpretation of this fascinating piece.