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Mysticism: A Study and an Anthology PDF

410 Pages·1990·17.61 MB·English
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Mysticism A STUDY AND AN ANTHOLOGY F. C. Happold PENGUIN BOOKS PENGUIN BOOKS MYSTICISM F. C. Happold was born at Lancaster in 1893 and educated at Rydal and Peterhouse, Cambridge. He served in the First World War and was awarded a D.S.O. while still a second-lieutenant. After the war he started his career as a schoolmaster at the Perse School, Cambridge, where the foundations of his reputation as an educational pioneer were laid. In 1928 he became Headmaster of Bishop Wordsworth's School, Salisbury, from which post he retired in i960. In the midst of a very active life as a schoolmaster he wrote a considerable number of books and articles on education, history, social studies, religion, and philosophy. These included The Approach to History, Towards a New Aristocracy, The Adventure of Man, and Adventure in Search of a Creed. He also published a nativity play, The Finding of the King. In 1937, in re cognition of his educational work, he was made an Hon. Ll.D. of the University of Melbourne. After his retire ment he wrote three Pelican Originals, Mysticism, a Study and an Anthology, Prayer and Meditation and Religious Faith and Twentieth-Century Man; as well as The journey Inwards. He died in 1971. PENGUIN BOOKS Published by the Penguin Group Penguin Books Ltd, 27 Wrights Lane, London W8 5TZ, England Penguin Books USA Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA Penguin Books Australia Ltd, Ringwood, Victoria, Australia Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 10 Alcorn Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4V 3B2 Penguin Books (NZ) Ltd, 182-190 Wairau Road, Auckland 10, New Zealand Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England First published in Pelican Books 1963 Reprinted (with additions) 1964 Revised edition 1970 Reprinted in Penguin Books 1990 5 7 9 10 8 6 Copyright © F. C. Happold, 1963,1964,1970 All rights reserved Printed in England by Clays Ltd, St Ives pic Set in Monotype Garamond Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser TOT. S.ELIOT poet o( Four Quartets this book is dedicated Contents ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS II THE STUDY i The Nature and Scope of this Book 15 2 The Perennial Philosophy 18 3 The Astronomer's Universe 22 4 The Problem of Knowledge 24 5 The Nature of Scientific Truth 30 6 The Evolution of Life: An Interpretation 3 3 7 What we shall understand by the term Mysticism 3 $ 8 The Mysticism of Love and Union and the Mysticism of Knowledge and Understanding 40 9 Nature-Mysticism, Soul-Mysticism, and God-Mysti cism 43 10 Characteristics of Mystical States 4$ 11 The Nature of Mystical Experience JI 12 The Mystic Way 56 13 The Purgation of the Self 58 14 Man's Knowledge of God 62 1 j The State of Contemplation 68 16 The Degrees of Prayer 73 17 The Mystical Element in Buddhism 77 18 The Higher Stages of Contemplation 84 19 The Contemplation of Immanence 88 20 The Unitive Life 94 21 The Lesser Mystic Way: The Mysticism of Action 100 22 Mysticism and Dogma: The Insights of India, Pales tine, and Greece 104 8 CONTENTS 23 Mysticism and Dogma: The Christian Revestj on IIO 24 The Coinherence of Spirit and Matter . XI 25 The Validity of Mysticism y tl 26 Conclusion: The Mystic's Universe o IX THE ANTHOLOGY INTRODUCTION » I2 i Prologue: The Timeless Moment n I2 2 There is Nothing that is not Spirit: The Up^shaJs 145 3 The Tao which can be Spoken is not the True Tao: Tao Te Ching 149 4 The Mysticism of Loving Faith and Selfle$ Action: s The Bbagavad Gita r* 3 j Emptiness and Compassion: Buddhist MystjQsm IJO 6 The Father of Christian Mysticism: Plato yj I 7 Christo-Mysticism: St John and St Paul gj x 8 The Kingdom of Heaven is Within You: Th Oxy- e rhynchus Sayings of Jesus IOJ 9 Departure and Return: The Hymn of the Robt, of Glory 107 10 The One and the Many: Plotinus, the Ennea^ 203 11 The Divine Darkness: Dionysius the Areopgi The a te Mystical Theology II 2 12 Theosis: the Deification of the Creature: Th Mysti e cism of the Eastern Orthodox Church 218 13 The Mysticism of the Intellect: St Augustine Tbe Con fessions 8 22 14 The Mysticism of Love: St Bernard of Clah-^aux 235 15 The Four Degrees of Passionate Love: Ricl j f St lar 0 Victor 241 16 The Sufi Path of Love 249 17 Intellectual Vision: Dante 264 18 Godhead, God, and the Soul: Meister Eckhju-t 260 CONTENTS 9 19 The Active, Inward, and Superessential Lives: The Blessed John Ruysbroeck 280 20 Nothing Burns in Hell but Self-will: The Theologia Germanica 29 4 21 The Royal Road of the Holy Cross: Thomas a Kempis, The Imitation of Christ 299 22 God May Well be Loved but not Thought: The Cloud of Unknowing 306 23 Practical Directions for the Following of the Spiritual Life: Walter Hilton, The Ladder of Perfection 314 24 The Homeliness of God: Julian of Norwich, Revela tions of Divine Ijjve 322 25 The Coincidence of Opposites: Nicholas of Cusa 333 26 The Degrees of Prayer: St Teresa of Avila 342 27 The Way of Absolute Detachment: St John of the Cross 355 28 Nature-Mysticism and Christo-Mysticism: Thomas Traherne 367 29 The Divine Indwelling: William Law 376 30 Nature-Mysticism and Soul-Mysticism: Richard Jef- feries 384 31 The Mysticism of the Divine Milieu: Pierre Teilhard de Chardin 394 INDEX 403 Acknowledgements SEVERAL have helped me considerably in the making of this book and I should like to thank them most sincerely here. First, I should like to thank Mr A. S. B. Glover, to whom it fell to read the first draft of my Study for Penguin Books, and who also, out of the goodness of his heart, read the revised book, including the Anthology, before it finally went to the printer. I owe much to his sound criticism and wide learning. I am also particularly grateful for the great interest taken in the book at all its stages by Mr Geoffrey Watkins, publisher and bookseller. He not only advised me on sources of information but also lent me books which I should not otherwise have been able to get. He also read and criticized my Study. Not content with that, so great was his interest that he declined to accept the normal publisher's fees for allowing me to use passages from the Works of Meister Eckhart, from Evelyn Underbill's edition of Tbt Cloud of Unknowing, and from Wilmhurst's Contemplations, all published by his firm, as well as from The Hymn of the Robe of Glory, for which he held the copyright. I would also like to thank the Shrine of Wisdom for its interest, which was expressed by its allowing me to print the whole of its edition of The Mystical Theology of Dionysius the Areopagite without charge. I also owe a debt of gratitude to Professor A. J. Arberry, who not only helped me in the section in the Amhology on Sufism, but also allowed mc to draw freely on his beautiful translations of the Sufi poet-mystics. And not least, I would thank my old friend Dr A. L. Peck for translating for me the passages I needed from St Bernard's Sermons on tie Song of Songs. I would also gratefully acknowledge the numerous permissions given mc by publishers to print passages, often very long ones, from books of which they hold the copyright. I have shown publishers, authors, editors, and translators at the appropriate places, in the Anthology usually in the introductions to the several sections, the most convenient place for readers who might wish to refer to the works. In section i j on Sufism, however, this could not conveniently be done. The names of translators are printed immediately below the prose or verse passages for the transla tion of which they were responsible. May 1 make formal acknowledge ment to the holders of copyrights here: to the Cambridge University Press for two translations by R. A. Nicholson in sub-sections i and 2; to the Royal Asiatic Society for translations by E. H. Whinfield in sub sections 2 and 5 and by R. B. Macdonald and W. H. T. Gairdner in sub-section 6; to John Murray for the translation by Margaret Smidi in sub-section 5; to Luzac and Co. for the translation by E. J. Gibb in sub-section 2; to Professor Arberry himself for his own translations of poems by Iraqi, Iqbal, and Rumi in sub-sections 1, 3, and 4; the passage 12 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS from Waiting on God by Simone Weil on p. 141 and the passage from The Vision of God by Nicholas Cusa on p. 535, are reprinted by permission of G. P. Putnam's Sons (copyright 1951 by G .P. Putnam's Sons) and E. P. Dutton and Co. Inc. respectively, as well as the English publishers men tioned in the text. In addition to the above may I add formal acknowledgement to Mrs Yeats and to the Macmillan Company of New York for the use of W. B. Yeats's translation of The Ten Principal Upanisbads, to the Tweedsmuir Trustees for the use of a passage from John Buchan's Memory Hold-tbe-door, and to Miss Vera Brittain for the use of a passage from Testament of Friend ship. 196} F. C HAPPOLD The necessity of a new printing has given me the opportunity to include in the anthology a section on Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. In the new section the extracts from The Wind and the Rain are printed by permission of the Seabury Press Inc., as well as the publishers men tioned in the text. 1964 P.C.H. In this third edition I have left the Study in its original form, except that I have rewritten the opening paragraphs of Chapter 9 and have revised Chapter 17, "The Mystical Element in Buddhism'. The numbering of pages is the same as in previous editions. In order to make it as complete as possible, three new sections have been added to the Anthology, on the mystical philosophy of ancient China, on Buddhist mysticism and on the mysticism of the Eastern Orthodox Church. I wish to acknowledge my immense debt to Mr Christmas Humphreys, Q.C, to Brother George Every, S.S.M., and to Mr Geoffrey Watkins, without whose advice and expert assistance I would not have been able to do this work. I also wish to acknowledge my debt to the following publishers who have so generously allowed me to quote from books which they have published, John Murray, J. M. Dent & Sons (and also to E. P. Dutton & Co. Inc.), James Clarke & Co., and John M. Watkins, as well as to my fellow Penguin Books author, Edward Conze. 1969 p.c.a.

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