Author: George Pattison
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192542982
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 231
Book Description
A Phenomenology of the Devout Life is the first part of a three-part work, A Philosophy of Christian Life. Rather than approaching Christianity through its doctrinal statements, as philosophers of religion have often done, the book starts by offering a phenomenological description of the devout life as that is set out in the teaching of Francois de Sales and related authors. This is because for most Christians practice and life-commitments are more fundamental than formal doctrinal beliefs. Although George Pattison will address the metaphysical truth-claims of Christianity in Part three, the guiding argument is that it is the Christian way of life that best reveals what these beliefs really are. As the work is a philosophical study, it does not presuppose the truth of Christianity but assumes only that there is a humanly accessible meaning to the intention to live a devout life, pleasing to God. This can be said to find expression in a certain view of selfhood that emphasizes the dimensions of feeling and will rather than intellect and that culminates in the experience of the annihilation of self. This is a model of selfhood deeply opposed to contemporary models that privilege autonomous agency and the devout life is therefore presented as offering a corrective to extreme versions of the contemporary view.
A Phenomenology of the Devout Life
Author: George Pattison
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192542982
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 231
Book Description
A Phenomenology of the Devout Life is the first part of a three-part work, A Philosophy of Christian Life. Rather than approaching Christianity through its doctrinal statements, as philosophers of religion have often done, the book starts by offering a phenomenological description of the devout life as that is set out in the teaching of Francois de Sales and related authors. This is because for most Christians practice and life-commitments are more fundamental than formal doctrinal beliefs. Although George Pattison will address the metaphysical truth-claims of Christianity in Part three, the guiding argument is that it is the Christian way of life that best reveals what these beliefs really are. As the work is a philosophical study, it does not presuppose the truth of Christianity but assumes only that there is a humanly accessible meaning to the intention to live a devout life, pleasing to God. This can be said to find expression in a certain view of selfhood that emphasizes the dimensions of feeling and will rather than intellect and that culminates in the experience of the annihilation of self. This is a model of selfhood deeply opposed to contemporary models that privilege autonomous agency and the devout life is therefore presented as offering a corrective to extreme versions of the contemporary view.
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192542982
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 231
Book Description
A Phenomenology of the Devout Life is the first part of a three-part work, A Philosophy of Christian Life. Rather than approaching Christianity through its doctrinal statements, as philosophers of religion have often done, the book starts by offering a phenomenological description of the devout life as that is set out in the teaching of Francois de Sales and related authors. This is because for most Christians practice and life-commitments are more fundamental than formal doctrinal beliefs. Although George Pattison will address the metaphysical truth-claims of Christianity in Part three, the guiding argument is that it is the Christian way of life that best reveals what these beliefs really are. As the work is a philosophical study, it does not presuppose the truth of Christianity but assumes only that there is a humanly accessible meaning to the intention to live a devout life, pleasing to God. This can be said to find expression in a certain view of selfhood that emphasizes the dimensions of feeling and will rather than intellect and that culminates in the experience of the annihilation of self. This is a model of selfhood deeply opposed to contemporary models that privilege autonomous agency and the devout life is therefore presented as offering a corrective to extreme versions of the contemporary view.
A Phenomenology of the Devout Life
Author: George Pattison
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192542990
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 313
Book Description
A Phenomenology of the Devout Life is the first part of a three-part work, A Philosophy of Christian Life. Rather than approaching Christianity through its doctrinal statements, as philosophers of religion have often done, the book starts by offering a phenomenological description of the devout life as that is set out in the teaching of Francois de Sales and related authors. This is because for most Christians practice and life-commitments are more fundamental than formal doctrinal beliefs. Although George Pattison will address the metaphysical truth-claims of Christianity in Part three, the guiding argument is that it is the Christian way of life that best reveals what these beliefs really are. As the work is a philosophical study, it does not presuppose the truth of Christianity but assumes only that there is a humanly accessible meaning to the intention to live a devout life, pleasing to God. This can be said to find expression in a certain view of selfhood that emphasizes the dimensions of feeling and will rather than intellect and that culminates in the experience of the annihilation of self. This is a model of selfhood deeply opposed to contemporary models that privilege autonomous agency and the devout life is therefore presented as offering a corrective to extreme versions of the contemporary view.
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192542990
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 313
Book Description
A Phenomenology of the Devout Life is the first part of a three-part work, A Philosophy of Christian Life. Rather than approaching Christianity through its doctrinal statements, as philosophers of religion have often done, the book starts by offering a phenomenological description of the devout life as that is set out in the teaching of Francois de Sales and related authors. This is because for most Christians practice and life-commitments are more fundamental than formal doctrinal beliefs. Although George Pattison will address the metaphysical truth-claims of Christianity in Part three, the guiding argument is that it is the Christian way of life that best reveals what these beliefs really are. As the work is a philosophical study, it does not presuppose the truth of Christianity but assumes only that there is a humanly accessible meaning to the intention to live a devout life, pleasing to God. This can be said to find expression in a certain view of selfhood that emphasizes the dimensions of feeling and will rather than intellect and that culminates in the experience of the annihilation of self. This is a model of selfhood deeply opposed to contemporary models that privilege autonomous agency and the devout life is therefore presented as offering a corrective to extreme versions of the contemporary view.
Theological Fringes of Phenomenology
Author: Joseph Rivera
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000962687
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 283
Book Description
This book focuses on the relationships between phenomenology and theology, which have been varied and complex but seem currently in an inconclusive and loosely defined state. Methodological rigor is not much in evidence, and the two disciplines continue to defy any authoritative synthesis. While both disciplines grapple with questions concerning the fundamental structures of human experience, their relationship is troubled by the elusive roles of Revelation and faith, which threaten the scientific autonomy of philosophy on one side and disable theologians for consistent philosophical discourse on the other. This volume revisits that conundrum from various perspectives, as it at once repristinates some of the most vibrant points of encounter and opens possibilities for new beginnings. It begins with the theological musings into which leading phenomenologists have been drawn from the start, with special reference to Husserl, Heidegger, and Michel Henry, as well as backward glances to Fichte, Schelling, and Blondel. A second section takes up specific theological themes and examines how phenomenological approaches can refine thinking on them. These include the Incarnation, the Resurrection, the Eucharist, Grace, and Prayer. A dialogue between phenomenology and classical theologians is staged in the third section: Augustine, Pseudo-Dionysius, Eckhart, and Karl Rahner. The closing section ranges more widely, discussing atheism, non-realist theology, and Hinduism from phenomenological angles, and showing how these topics too come within the ambit of theology.
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000962687
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 283
Book Description
This book focuses on the relationships between phenomenology and theology, which have been varied and complex but seem currently in an inconclusive and loosely defined state. Methodological rigor is not much in evidence, and the two disciplines continue to defy any authoritative synthesis. While both disciplines grapple with questions concerning the fundamental structures of human experience, their relationship is troubled by the elusive roles of Revelation and faith, which threaten the scientific autonomy of philosophy on one side and disable theologians for consistent philosophical discourse on the other. This volume revisits that conundrum from various perspectives, as it at once repristinates some of the most vibrant points of encounter and opens possibilities for new beginnings. It begins with the theological musings into which leading phenomenologists have been drawn from the start, with special reference to Husserl, Heidegger, and Michel Henry, as well as backward glances to Fichte, Schelling, and Blondel. A second section takes up specific theological themes and examines how phenomenological approaches can refine thinking on them. These include the Incarnation, the Resurrection, the Eucharist, Grace, and Prayer. A dialogue between phenomenology and classical theologians is staged in the third section: Augustine, Pseudo-Dionysius, Eckhart, and Karl Rahner. The closing section ranges more widely, discussing atheism, non-realist theology, and Hinduism from phenomenological angles, and showing how these topics too come within the ambit of theology.
A Metaphysics of Love
Author: George Pattison
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 019881352X
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 270
Book Description
As the third part of a philosophy of Christian life, A Metaphysics of Love builds on a view of Christian life as shaped by the dynamic of call, response, and promise. It argues that love is the ultimate content of this dynamic and considers how far this claim extends. Taking its bearings from Dante's vision of divine love as 'the power that moves the sun and other stars', this study explores the requirement that love is both human and cosmic, uniting being and beings. Cognizant of much recent philosophy's desire to overcome or move beyond a metaphysics of being, it examines some of the formal structures that make love possible, including language, time, social being, forgiveness, and ultimacy. Following on from the earlier volumes, extensive use is made of the idea of the poetic as the eminent mode of Christian witness, contextualized within the prose of everyday life. Heidegger provides fundamental philosophical orientation, whilst key features of love are brought to the fore through dialogue with Kierkegaard. Dante and Dostoevsky are frequent points of reference, in addition to a range of literary and religious sources, including the Scottish poet Edwin Muir. Leading scholar George Pattison concludes that the phenomenon of love requires us to articulate a metaphysics that involves both being and nothingness, thereby taking a critical position vis-à-vis both classical theism and existential atheism.
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 019881352X
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 270
Book Description
As the third part of a philosophy of Christian life, A Metaphysics of Love builds on a view of Christian life as shaped by the dynamic of call, response, and promise. It argues that love is the ultimate content of this dynamic and considers how far this claim extends. Taking its bearings from Dante's vision of divine love as 'the power that moves the sun and other stars', this study explores the requirement that love is both human and cosmic, uniting being and beings. Cognizant of much recent philosophy's desire to overcome or move beyond a metaphysics of being, it examines some of the formal structures that make love possible, including language, time, social being, forgiveness, and ultimacy. Following on from the earlier volumes, extensive use is made of the idea of the poetic as the eminent mode of Christian witness, contextualized within the prose of everyday life. Heidegger provides fundamental philosophical orientation, whilst key features of love are brought to the fore through dialogue with Kierkegaard. Dante and Dostoevsky are frequent points of reference, in addition to a range of literary and religious sources, including the Scottish poet Edwin Muir. Leading scholar George Pattison concludes that the phenomenon of love requires us to articulate a metaphysics that involves both being and nothingness, thereby taking a critical position vis-à-vis both classical theism and existential atheism.
Kierkegaardian Essays
Author: Clare Carlisle
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 3110742489
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 232
Book Description
Søren Kierkegaard argued that the most essential truths come to light by asking "How...?" This innovative collection of essays by leading scholars focuses on this questioning "How?", asking how we should relate to ourselves, to others, and to God; how we should be in the world; how we can become human. The result is a searching, original colloquium on what it means to be Kierkegaardian in the 21st century. The adjective "Kierkegaardian" names many possibilities: ways of philosophizing, choosing, loving, looking, listening, reading, writing, teaching, making art, praying, going to church – or not going to church. "How" gestures to subjectivity, one of Kierkegaard’s most fundamental philosophical categories, while "What" signals an objectifying line of thought. The authors of these essays suggest that the crucial Kierkegaardian question is not what we are and ought to do, but how we can remain true to the finitude, passivity, and ambiguity of human existence. While this Kierkegaardian "how" is often acknowledged by scholars, it is rarely thematized directly. Attending to it elicits new kinds of argument and reflection. Kierkegaardian Essays proposes a fresh approach to Kierkegaard, and is essential reading for experts and students alike.
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 3110742489
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 232
Book Description
Søren Kierkegaard argued that the most essential truths come to light by asking "How...?" This innovative collection of essays by leading scholars focuses on this questioning "How?", asking how we should relate to ourselves, to others, and to God; how we should be in the world; how we can become human. The result is a searching, original colloquium on what it means to be Kierkegaardian in the 21st century. The adjective "Kierkegaardian" names many possibilities: ways of philosophizing, choosing, loving, looking, listening, reading, writing, teaching, making art, praying, going to church – or not going to church. "How" gestures to subjectivity, one of Kierkegaard’s most fundamental philosophical categories, while "What" signals an objectifying line of thought. The authors of these essays suggest that the crucial Kierkegaardian question is not what we are and ought to do, but how we can remain true to the finitude, passivity, and ambiguity of human existence. While this Kierkegaardian "how" is often acknowledged by scholars, it is rarely thematized directly. Attending to it elicits new kinds of argument and reflection. Kierkegaardian Essays proposes a fresh approach to Kierkegaard, and is essential reading for experts and students alike.
A Philosophy of Prayer
Author: George Pattison
Publisher: Fordham Univ Press
ISBN: 1531506844
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 188
Book Description
Exploring the silence of prayer in Post-Kantian philosophy and traditional spirituality A Philosophy of Prayer explores prayer within the perspective of post-Kantian philosophy. Against a background of traditional sources, including Augustine, The Cloud of Unknowing, and the seventeenth-century French school of spirituality, the book uses Schleiermacher, Kierkegaard, Dostoevsky, Heidegger, Berdyaev, Tillich, Marcel, Simone Weil, Emmanuel Levinas, and Jean- Louis Chrétien to provide an interpretation of what is meant by the passivity and self-annihilation of the praying self, suggesting an “apophatics of the personality.” Pattison pays particular attention to the question of language and the implications of the role given to silence in traditional texts, arguing that language remains a defining element of the human–God relationship and that silence is not to be construed as the negation of language but as the revelation of the depth of language itself. The basic structure of prayer is shown to be implicitly eschatological, oriented toward a coming kingdom of justice and peace while, at the same time, expressing a deep desire for ontological homecoming, a tension manifest in, respectively, Levinas and Heidegger. On Pattison’s reading, prayer calls for and develops a particular orientation of the self toward existence, corresponding to the virtue of humility, long understood as the basic Christian virtue. This is shown to be in tension with modernity’s commitment to strong versions of autonomy. However, the choice of humility is not presented as the reinstatement of religious heteronomy but as a free choice of the praying self.
Publisher: Fordham Univ Press
ISBN: 1531506844
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 188
Book Description
Exploring the silence of prayer in Post-Kantian philosophy and traditional spirituality A Philosophy of Prayer explores prayer within the perspective of post-Kantian philosophy. Against a background of traditional sources, including Augustine, The Cloud of Unknowing, and the seventeenth-century French school of spirituality, the book uses Schleiermacher, Kierkegaard, Dostoevsky, Heidegger, Berdyaev, Tillich, Marcel, Simone Weil, Emmanuel Levinas, and Jean- Louis Chrétien to provide an interpretation of what is meant by the passivity and self-annihilation of the praying self, suggesting an “apophatics of the personality.” Pattison pays particular attention to the question of language and the implications of the role given to silence in traditional texts, arguing that language remains a defining element of the human–God relationship and that silence is not to be construed as the negation of language but as the revelation of the depth of language itself. The basic structure of prayer is shown to be implicitly eschatological, oriented toward a coming kingdom of justice and peace while, at the same time, expressing a deep desire for ontological homecoming, a tension manifest in, respectively, Levinas and Heidegger. On Pattison’s reading, prayer calls for and develops a particular orientation of the self toward existence, corresponding to the virtue of humility, long understood as the basic Christian virtue. This is shown to be in tension with modernity’s commitment to strong versions of autonomy. However, the choice of humility is not presented as the reinstatement of religious heteronomy but as a free choice of the praying self.
The Bloomsbury Handbook of Existentialism
Author: Jack Reynolds
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1350227463
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 373
Book Description
This fully revised and updated 2nd edition provides a comprehensive reference guide to existentialism, featuring key chapters on key existentialist thinkers, as well as chapters applying existentialism to subject areas ranging across politics, literature, feminism, religion, the emotions, cognitive science, and poststructuralism. Contemporary developments in the field of existentialism that speak to issues of identity and exclusion are explored in 4 new chapters on race, gender, disability, and technology, whilst the 5th new chapter new chapter outlines analytic philosophy's complicated relationship to existentialism. Presenting the field of existentialism beyond the European tradition, this edition also includes a new key thinker chapter on Frantz Fanon, alongside Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre and de Beauvoir, as well as new engagement with the work of scholars on race and existentialism, including Lewis R. Gordon, George Yancy, and Richard Wright. The resources section at the end of the book includes an updated A to Z glossary, and timeline of key events, texts and thinkers in existentialism, as well as a list of relevant organisations, and an annotated guide to further reading, making this 2nd edition an invaluable text for scholars and students alike.
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1350227463
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 373
Book Description
This fully revised and updated 2nd edition provides a comprehensive reference guide to existentialism, featuring key chapters on key existentialist thinkers, as well as chapters applying existentialism to subject areas ranging across politics, literature, feminism, religion, the emotions, cognitive science, and poststructuralism. Contemporary developments in the field of existentialism that speak to issues of identity and exclusion are explored in 4 new chapters on race, gender, disability, and technology, whilst the 5th new chapter new chapter outlines analytic philosophy's complicated relationship to existentialism. Presenting the field of existentialism beyond the European tradition, this edition also includes a new key thinker chapter on Frantz Fanon, alongside Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre and de Beauvoir, as well as new engagement with the work of scholars on race and existentialism, including Lewis R. Gordon, George Yancy, and Richard Wright. The resources section at the end of the book includes an updated A to Z glossary, and timeline of key events, texts and thinkers in existentialism, as well as a list of relevant organisations, and an annotated guide to further reading, making this 2nd edition an invaluable text for scholars and students alike.
The Pulse of Sense
Author: Marie Chabbert
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000564800
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 270
Book Description
This volume stages a series of encounters between the French philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy and leading scholars of his work along four major themes of Nancy’s thought: sense, experience, existence, and Christianity. In doing so, the volume seeks to remind readers that Nancy’s sens has many meanings in French: aside from those that easily carry over into English, i.e., everything to do with "meaning" and "the senses"; it also includes the "way" they are "conducted," the "direction" they take, the "thrust" or "pulse" in which the circulation of sense exists. Faithful to this plural understanding of sens, the writings collected here aim to join Jean-Luc Nancy in the process of "making-sense" that animates his thinking, rather than to deliver a definitive summary of his position on any given issue. They are conceived of as notes "along the way," documenting "encounters" as moments of "(re)direction" and recording the "pulse" of sense that animates them. In that spirit, Nancy himself has provided each contribution with an "echo" in which he, in turn, responds to each author and thereby continues their mutual encounter. Aside from these echoes, this volume includes an original essay in which Nancy reflects upon the international trajectory of his thinking; a trajectory that is to be and undoubtedly will be continued, in many different directions, across and around the world. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of Angelaki.
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000564800
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 270
Book Description
This volume stages a series of encounters between the French philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy and leading scholars of his work along four major themes of Nancy’s thought: sense, experience, existence, and Christianity. In doing so, the volume seeks to remind readers that Nancy’s sens has many meanings in French: aside from those that easily carry over into English, i.e., everything to do with "meaning" and "the senses"; it also includes the "way" they are "conducted," the "direction" they take, the "thrust" or "pulse" in which the circulation of sense exists. Faithful to this plural understanding of sens, the writings collected here aim to join Jean-Luc Nancy in the process of "making-sense" that animates his thinking, rather than to deliver a definitive summary of his position on any given issue. They are conceived of as notes "along the way," documenting "encounters" as moments of "(re)direction" and recording the "pulse" of sense that animates them. In that spirit, Nancy himself has provided each contribution with an "echo" in which he, in turn, responds to each author and thereby continues their mutual encounter. Aside from these echoes, this volume includes an original essay in which Nancy reflects upon the international trajectory of his thinking; a trajectory that is to be and undoubtedly will be continued, in many different directions, across and around the world. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of Angelaki.
A Rhetorics of the Word
Author: George Pattison
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192543008
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 288
Book Description
A Rhetorics of the Word is the second volume of a three-part philosophy of Christian life. It approaches Christian life as expressive of a divine calling or vocation. The word Church (ekklesia) and the role of naming in baptism indicate the fundamental place of calling in Christian life. However, ideas of vocation are difficult to access in a world shaped by the experience of disenchantment. The difficulties of articulating vocation are explored with reference to Weber, Heidegger, and Kierkegaard. These are further connected to a general crisis of language, manifesting in the degradation of political discourse (Arendt) and the impact of new communications technology on human discourse. This impact can be seen as reinforcing an occlusion of language in favour of rationality already evidenced in the philosophical tradition and technocratic management. New possibilities for thinking vocation are pursued through the biblical prophets (with emphasis on Buber's and Rosenzweig's reinterpretation of the call of Moses), Saint John, and Russian philosophies of language (Florensky to Bakhtin). Vocation emerges as bound up with the possibility of being name-bearers, enabling a mutuality of call and response. This is then evidenced further in ethics and poetics, where Levinas and Hermann Broch (The Death of Virgil) become major points of reference. In conclusion, the themes of calling and the name are seen to shape the possibility of love-the subject of the final part of the philosophy of Christian life: A Metaphysics of Love.
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192543008
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 288
Book Description
A Rhetorics of the Word is the second volume of a three-part philosophy of Christian life. It approaches Christian life as expressive of a divine calling or vocation. The word Church (ekklesia) and the role of naming in baptism indicate the fundamental place of calling in Christian life. However, ideas of vocation are difficult to access in a world shaped by the experience of disenchantment. The difficulties of articulating vocation are explored with reference to Weber, Heidegger, and Kierkegaard. These are further connected to a general crisis of language, manifesting in the degradation of political discourse (Arendt) and the impact of new communications technology on human discourse. This impact can be seen as reinforcing an occlusion of language in favour of rationality already evidenced in the philosophical tradition and technocratic management. New possibilities for thinking vocation are pursued through the biblical prophets (with emphasis on Buber's and Rosenzweig's reinterpretation of the call of Moses), Saint John, and Russian philosophies of language (Florensky to Bakhtin). Vocation emerges as bound up with the possibility of being name-bearers, enabling a mutuality of call and response. This is then evidenced further in ethics and poetics, where Levinas and Hermann Broch (The Death of Virgil) become major points of reference. In conclusion, the themes of calling and the name are seen to shape the possibility of love-the subject of the final part of the philosophy of Christian life: A Metaphysics of Love.
The Mystical Sources of Existentialist Thought
Author: George Pattison
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 135160726X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 369
Book Description
At the time when existentialism was a dominant intellectual and cultural force, a number of commentators observed that some of the language of existential philosophy, not least its interpretation of human existence in terms of nothingness, evoked the language of so-called mystical writers. This book takes on this observation and explores the evidence for the influence of mysticism on the philosophy of existentialism. It begins by delving into definitions of mysticism and existentialism, and then traces the elements of mysticism present in German and French thought during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The book goes on to make original contributions to the study of figures including Kierkegaard, Buber, Heidegger, Beauvoir, Sartre, Marcel, Camus, Weil, Bataille, Berdyaev, and Tillich, linking their existentialist philosophy back to some of the key concerns of the mystical tradition. Providing a unique insight into how these two areas have overlapped and interacted, this study is vital reading for any academic with an interest in twentieth-century philosophy, theology and religious studies.
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 135160726X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 369
Book Description
At the time when existentialism was a dominant intellectual and cultural force, a number of commentators observed that some of the language of existential philosophy, not least its interpretation of human existence in terms of nothingness, evoked the language of so-called mystical writers. This book takes on this observation and explores the evidence for the influence of mysticism on the philosophy of existentialism. It begins by delving into definitions of mysticism and existentialism, and then traces the elements of mysticism present in German and French thought during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The book goes on to make original contributions to the study of figures including Kierkegaard, Buber, Heidegger, Beauvoir, Sartre, Marcel, Camus, Weil, Bataille, Berdyaev, and Tillich, linking their existentialist philosophy back to some of the key concerns of the mystical tradition. Providing a unique insight into how these two areas have overlapped and interacted, this study is vital reading for any academic with an interest in twentieth-century philosophy, theology and religious studies.