Speaker

Dr Sig Sønnesyn

Chair

Dr David Leech

Abstract

This talk will challenge the widespread claim in scholarship that ‘mysticism’ is focused on a distinct way of knowing, different in kind from sense experience and human reason. As medieval mystical texts have become important subjects of study over the last three decades, the otherness of mystical knowing has been fundamental to how scholars have approached these texts. I will argue that many medieval mystical texts describe mystical experience in ways that presuppose exactly the same faculties of knowing and thinking that were involved in acquiring knowledge through sense experience or the use of reason.  

The talk will be followed by a Q&A and a small reception of drinks and nibbles. 

All are welcome!