The Dark Night of the Soul

Although I received some insight from reading this treatise on spirituality, I feel I am too much of a beginner to comprehend many of the interior experiences that are touched upon here, particularly in the latter part of the work. I suspect my own darkness and aridity--which is at times considerabl......more

I took this book up on my 10-day Mount Shasta retreat and it became the reverberating background of my whole experience. In the translation by mystic scholar Mirabai Starr, St. John of the Cross's description of the phases of the soul as she ('el alma') nears unity with God far transcends any tradit......more

There are two ways of thinking and speaking of God. The first is the apophatic way, or the via negativa, the way of negation. This way of thinking and speaking focuses on the transcendence of God and the inability of human language and experience to encompass all that God is and does. The second is......more

To be truthful, I think I was not “spiritually advanced” enough to read this book. I will need to reread in five or ten years.......more

This is a difficult book but certainly a valuable book in discerning your spiritual journey. Once someone explains the concepts, they are not very hard to grasp: there is a denial of sensual consolations and then there is a higher order of denial, the denial of spiritual consolations. Both are steps......more