Mysticism and Space: Space and Spatiality in the Works of Richard Rolle, The Cloud of Unknowing Author, and Julian of Norwich

Epilogue

Epilogue Space in all its conceptual and perceptual possibilities is an essential aspect of our human experience. However, unlike time, which absorbs our attention to the extent that we mark off our lives in constructed increments of it, space is generally taken for granted. To date, the importance of space in the examination of all kinds of medieval and modern texts has been largely overlooked. In the case of medieval mystics in particular this is a surprising omission because mystics like Richard Rolle, The Cloud of Unknowing author, and Julian of Norwich demonstrate in their texts a clear awareness of the pervasiveness of the physical, social, and spiritual dimensions of their lives. For them, these spatial dimensions assumed a far greater importance than did chronology as they lived their lives with their intentionsfixedfirmlyoneternity .Atthesametime,too,God’simmanence was tangible to them and informed their everyday undertakings. This simultaneous recognition of God’s transcendence and immanence is possibly what the definition of mysticism as an unmediated apprehension of the Divine is really encapsulating. That is, mystical experience is unmediated by time and is therefore a transcendent experience even though the expression of that experience is immanent and reflective of contemporary social mores. Mystical space, then, is also transcendent and immanent, absorbing and reflecting physical, social , textual, and spiritual dimensions simultaneously. Just as Julian, the Cloud author, and Rolle were called to contemplate in the fourteenth century, so we in the twentieth-first century also contemplate the Divine through the texts and the lives of the mystics themselves. The mystics survive, contained in the space of 249 the text, but in addition the texts point backward to the authors as actual people. Simultaneously, the texts point beyond time and history to an experience that is beyond material containment. Thus, in committing their experiences to writing, the mystics fulfilled the requirements of their privileged experience, that they disseminate their “fruit” for all Christians. Notably, this dissemination did not only take effect within their own lifetimes but has continued to the present day. Their texts have provided a three-dimensional container for their mystical space, and as such have assured their transcendence. The reflective quality of the mise en abîme of mystical space transcends time, too, to remain active as a mirror, even today. That is, in reading the texts, modern readers encounter a space full of traces of lives lived in the pursuit of a spiritual ideal. Their texts thus reveal the mystics and their methods and, just as exemplars were important in the medieval society for the purposes of imitation and edification, so these same mystics become present day exemplars. Thus we add another layer to the mise en abîme by enclosing the mystical space within the framework of contemporary spiritual and theoretical inquiry. Within this space of theoretical inquiry, within the vast space of the cosmos, within the society of the Middle Ages, within an enclosed solitary space, within the physical body, within the soul, there exists a space of mystical experience that resonates with all the surrounding spaces and yet is located in none of them exclusively. The mise en abîme of mystical space is rendered infinite. 250 epilogue ...