Intellectual and Mystical Extremes

Started by Insanis, June 07, 2021, 04:54:05 PM

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Insanis

I have noticed that any publication that focuses heavily on either intellectual examinations or extremely mystical experiences seems "wrong" to many.

Intellectual

First, intellectual works, such as the Summa Theologica by Saint Thomas Aquinas are sometimes seen as extremely analytic and dry and barren works, just a bunch of intellectual arguments and points, without much spirit. I have seen criticisms of him from the less intellectual aspects of the Church (or schismatics and heretics who retain a lot of tradition) along these lines, whereas, they tend to forget or ignore the fact that this saint was well known for intense mystical experiences. He wasn't just an intellect: he was a soul extremely close to God in this world and a great model of virtue. In fact, the Summa is unfinished, and it is because of the experiences the saint experienced, and when asked to finish his work, he responded:

Quote...I cannot, because all that I have written seems like straw to me

So it is true: the intellect is limited in the light of God, but it still exists. Spirits are intellectual beings: they communicate thought to thought, intellect to intellect. Intellect is good, and perfect intellect is good. To set a limit to what is "good" is to set a limit on perfection. Intellectualism to the exclusion of other things is bad, inordinate, but we can know that only because of the intellect!

Many who protest intellectual works or arguments that the Church has accumulated through the thousands of years of Her existence, are from intellects that simply tried to use their intellect inordinately. As the Summa states:

Quote from: Summa Theologica, Second Part of the Second Part, Question 167
Article 1. Whether curiosity can be about intellective knowledge?

On the contrary, Jerome [Comment. in Ep. ad Ephes. iv, 17 says: "Is it not evident that a man who day and night wrestles with the dialectic art, the student of natural science whose gaze pierces the heavens, walks in vanity of understanding and darkness of mind?" Now vanity of understanding and darkness of mind are sinful. Therefore curiosity about intellective sciences may be sinful.

Note: this is in contrast to the virtue of studiousness.

Clearly, there is an issue here with the fallen nature of man: like all good things, we can have a disordered application and pursuit of them. In fact, sinful Curiosity is under Temperance, just like Lust and Gluttony. It is something we need to regulate and be careful about. It isn't that learning is bad, but inordinate learning is bad.

Mystical

The issue of Mysticism is easy: such intimate experiences are difficult to communicate, and strong mystical experiences described in words often fail to express that experience to a given reader, and thus, seem insane, weird, or simply wrong. It is a fact of our use of language: if we were angelic, we could communicate it directly to each other, but we cannot. In fact, this limitation of human communication is something philosophy and psychology examine quite a lot.

Mystical experiences can easily be shared if others have had similar experiences. This is the situation with all subjective experiences. You know that feeling you get when you lean back on your chair and you almost fall back but you catch yourself before you do? How can that be described to someone who never experienced it. I bet most people have, and it isn't a leap to imagine it probably.

But spiritual experiences require spiritual experiences to really appreciate. Mystics may use very abstract language, or very concrete language, but either way, it is only effective if the person receiving the words is able to properly frame them as intended.

So it is important not to view perceived "extreme" intellectual or mystical works as being disordered: they may be simply out of our understanding due to our intellectual state or spiritual awareness.

Of course, people can easily fall into sophistry and mistake psychological feelings for spiritual experiences, so it is important to discern the source, but that is a judgement that should not be made lightly because of appearances: especially for works that are time tested and highly esteemed by the Church through time.

The solution to encounters with the extremes that we cannot appreciate: stay within one's means and keep an ordered view of what you should do. If a good work, intellectual or mystical, leads you to doubt, confusion, or even sin, then you shouldn't be reading it. There are aspects of Moral Theology I don't delve into, because I don't need to know them and there is the risk of undue Curiosity about those things. Mystical works that I know I am not going to appreciate due to the language issue, I do not read in full. I simply look to emulate the examples of virtues, not the experiences that I don't have.