Remembering Breathing: Technologies of Prayer in Medieval Mysticism
Sponsoring Organization(s)
Romanian Institute of Orthodox Theology and Spirituality of New York
Organizer Name
Alina N. Feld
Organizer Affiliation
General Theological Seminary of the Episcopal Church
Presider Name
Fumiko Sakakibaru
Presider Affiliation
General Theological Seminary of the Episcopal Church
Paper Title 1
Symeon and Nikephorus on the Jesus Prayer in comparison to Ignatius of Loyola, Dogen, and Patanjali
Presenter 1 Name
Sean C. Stidd
Presenter 1 Affiliation
Wayne State Univ.
Paper Title 2
The West Shall Shake the East Awake: Sacred Breath Mindfulness: Orthodox and Catholic
Presenter 2 Name
Clair McPherson
Presenter 2 Affiliation
General Theological Seminary of the Episcopal Church
Start Date
12-5-2019 10:30 AM
Session Location
Schneider 1280
Description
We are witnessing a new turn in the phenomenology of the body and its spiritual senses. Besides the hermeneutics of the heart that has been familiar to mystics of all traditions from Meister Eckhart, Margarete Porete and the Byzantine hesychasts to Sankara, Ibn al-Arabi or Kabir, breathing itself is now emerging as having been paradoxically forgotten in Western thinking, even more so than Being.
This session will continue and take further the conversation on prayer, breathing, and the senses, initiated by Bruce Ellis Benson and Norman Wirzba, The Phenomenology of Prayer (New York: Fordham University Press, 2005) and Lenart Skof and Petri Berndtson, Atmospheres of Breathing (Albany: Suny Press, 2018).
A philosophy of breathing and a hermeneutics of the heart will provoke a radical transformation both of our thinking, cultural frame, and foundations. As a consequence, moving across religious and philosophical traditions will acquire unexpected and new relevance, while the study of comparative mysticism will emerge not only as the prime matter for inter-faith theo-poetics but also as valuable material for contemporary science. Alina N. Feld
Remembering Breathing: Technologies of Prayer in Medieval Mysticism
Schneider 1280
We are witnessing a new turn in the phenomenology of the body and its spiritual senses. Besides the hermeneutics of the heart that has been familiar to mystics of all traditions from Meister Eckhart, Margarete Porete and the Byzantine hesychasts to Sankara, Ibn al-Arabi or Kabir, breathing itself is now emerging as having been paradoxically forgotten in Western thinking, even more so than Being.
This session will continue and take further the conversation on prayer, breathing, and the senses, initiated by Bruce Ellis Benson and Norman Wirzba, The Phenomenology of Prayer (New York: Fordham University Press, 2005) and Lenart Skof and Petri Berndtson, Atmospheres of Breathing (Albany: Suny Press, 2018).
A philosophy of breathing and a hermeneutics of the heart will provoke a radical transformation both of our thinking, cultural frame, and foundations. As a consequence, moving across religious and philosophical traditions will acquire unexpected and new relevance, while the study of comparative mysticism will emerge not only as the prime matter for inter-faith theo-poetics but also as valuable material for contemporary science. Alina N. Feld