Book Notices

Studies in Spirituality 30, 269-292. doi: 10.2143/SIS.30.0.3288722 © 2020 by Studies in Spirituality. All rights reserved. BOOK NOTICES Henk Rutten, the librarian and information manager of the Titus Brandsma Insti- tute, lists about sixty titles with short descriptions. The intention of these book notices is to draw attention to new spirituality books that could be of interest to readers of Studies in Spirituality. They are not meant to be comprehensive and in- depth book reviews. Alam, Sarwar (Ed.), Cultural Fusion of Sufi Islam. Alternative Paths to Mystical Faith, London; New York, NY: Routledge, 2019 (Routledge Studies in Religion), XIII, 255 pages, ISBN: 9781138615038. It has been argued that the mystical Sufi form of Islam is the most sensitive to other cultures, being accommodative to other traditions and generally tolerant to peoples of other faiths. It readily becomes integrated into local cultures and they are similarly often infused into Sufism. Examples of this reciprocity are commonly reflected in Sufi poetry, music, hagiographic genres, memoires, and in the ritualistic practices of Sufi traditions. This volume shows how this often-side-lined tradition functions in the societies in which it is found, and demonstrates how it relates to mainstream Islam. The focus of this book ranges from reflecting Sufi themes in the Qur’anic cal- ligraphy to movies, from ideals to everyday practices, from legends to actual history, from gender segregation to gender transgression, and from legalism to spiritualism. Consequently, the international panel of contributors to this volume are trained in a range of disciplines that include religious studies, history, comparative literature, anthropology, and ethnography. Covering Southeast Asia to West Africa as well as South Asia and the West, they address both historical and contemporary issues, shed- ding light on Sufism’s adaptability. This book sets aside conventional methods of understanding Islam, such as theological, juridical, and philosophical, in favour of analysing its cultural impact. Sarwar Alam is visiting assistant professor at the King Fahd Center for Middle East Studies of the University of Arkansas, USA. Alvis, Robert E., A Science of the Saints. Studies in Spiritual Direction, Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2020, 240 pages, ISBN: 9780814688045; 9780814688298. Throughout the church’s long history, Christians have sought out wise mentors to guide them on the journey toward God. This book explores the dynamics of spiritual direction as revealed in the lives and writings of a wide array of exemplary disciples, from the Desert Fathers and Mothers to Thomas Merton, and from St. Teresa of Avila to St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein). This work sheds new light on an essential dimension of the Christian experience, yielding timeless wisdom to inform the practice of spiritual direction in our own day. 270 BOOK NOTICES Robert E. Alvis is professor of church history and academic dean at Saint Meinrad Seminary and School of Theology. Angelici, Ruben, Semiotic Theory and Sacramentality in Hugh of Saint Victor, London; New York, NY: Routledge, 2019 (Contemporary Theological Explorations in Mysti- cism), XVIII, 246 pages, ISBN: 9781351106337; 9781351106306; 9781351106320; 9781351106313. This book offers Hugh of Saint Victor’s early scholastic thoughts on sacrament in order to re-discover the pre-modern theological understanding of ontological signification. The Christian understanding of sacrament through the category of ‘signs’ results in a theology that inherently shares in the philosophical notion of semiotics. Yet, through the advent of post-structuralism, current sign-theory is effectively shaped by post-Kan- tian, ontological foundations. This can lead to misinterpretations of the sacramental theology that predates this intellectual turn. The book works within a context of Chris- tological, realist mysticism. Such an approach allows mutually informing debates in semiotic development and studies on sacramental theology to sit side-by-side. In addi- tion, as a work of ressourcement, influenced by the methodology and concerns of the historical, French Ressourcement, this study seeks to continue an engagement with some of the most promising sacramental positions that have emerged throughout twen- tieth-century theology, particularly with the revival of interest in Victorine theology. By providing an examination of sacramentality and theories of signification in the early scholastic theology of Hugh of Saint Victor, this book gives fresh impetus to the theology surrounding sacrament. Arblaster, John, & Rob Faesen (Eds.), Mystical Doctrines of Deification. Case Studies in the Christian Tradition, London; New York, NY: Routledge, 2019 (Contemporary Theological Explorations in Christian Mysticism), 192 pages, ISBN: 9780815393245; 9781351189118. The notion of the deification of the human person (theosis, theopoièsis, deificatio) was one of the most fundamental themes of Christian theology in its first centuries, espe- cially in the Greek world. It is often assumed that this theme was exclusively developed in Eastern theology after the patristic period, and thus its presence in the theology of the Latin West is generally overlooked. The aim of this collection is to explore some Patristic articulations of the doctrine in both the East and West, but also to highlight its enduring presence in the Western tradition and its relevance for contemporary thought. The collection thus brings together a number of capita selecta that focus on the development of theosis through the ages until the Early Modern Period. It is unique, not only in emphasising the role of theosis in the West, but also in bringing to the fore a number of little-known authors and texts, and analysing their theology from a variety of fresh perspectives. Thus, mystical theology in the West is shown to have profound connections with similar concerns in the East and with the common patristic sources. By tying these traditions together, this volume brings new insight to one of mysticism’s key concerns. John Arblaster is a postdoctoral researcher at the Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies, KU Leuven and the Ruusbroec Institute, University of Antwerp. Rob Faesen BOOK NOTICES 271 S.J. is professor of the history of spirituality and mysticism at the Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies, KU Leuven, the Ruusbroec Institute, University of Antwerp, and the School of Catholic Theology, Tilburg University. Astell, Ann W., Saving Fear in Christian Spirituality, Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2019, XII, 419 pages, ISBN: 9780268106218; 9780268106249. Hailed in Sacred Scripture as the ‘beginning of wisdom’ (Ps 111:10), the ‘fear of the Lord’ is seldom mentioned and little understood today. A gift of the Spirit and a moral virtue or disposition, the ‘fear of the Lord’ also frequently entails emotional experiences of differing kinds: compunction, dread, reverence, wonderment, and awe. Starting with the Bible itself, this collection of seventeen essays explores the place of holy fear in Christian spirituality from the early church to the present and argues that this fear is paradoxically linked in various ways to fear’s seeming opposite, love. Indeed, the charged dynamic of love and fear accounts for different experiences and expressions of Christian life in response to changing historical circumstances and events. The writings of the theologians, mystics, philosophers, saints, and artists studied here reveal the rela- tionship between the fear and the love of God to be profoundly challenging and mys- terious, its elements paradoxically conjoined in a creative tension with each other, but also tending to oscillate back-and-forth in the history of Christian spirituality as first one, then the other, comes to the fore, sometimes to correct a perceived imbalance, sometimes at the risk of losing its companion altogether. Given this historical pattern, clearly evident in these chronologically arranged essays, the palpable absence of a dis- course of holy fear from the mainstream theological landscape should give us pause and invite us to consider if and how - under what aspect, in which contexts – a holy fear, inseparable from love, might be regained or discovered anew within Christian spirituality as a remedy both for a crippling anxiety and for a presumptive recklessness. Bhreathnach, Edel, Magorzata Krasnodebska-D’Aughton, & Keith Smith (Eds.), Monas- tic Europe. Medieval Communities, Landscapes, and Settlement, Turnhout: Brepols Publish- ers, 2019 (Medieval Monastic Studies; 4), XX, 553 pages, ISBN: 9782503569796. Monasticism became part of Europe from the early period of Christianity on the con- tinent and developed into a powerful institution that had an effect on the greater church, on wider society, and on the landscape. Monastic communities were as diverse as the societies in which they lived, following a variety of rules, building monasteries influenced by common ideals and yet diverse in their regionalism, and contributing to the economic and spiritual well-being inside and outside their precincts. This interdis- ciplinary volume presents the diversity of medieval European monasticism with a par- ticular emphasis on its impact on the immediate environs. Geographically it extends from the far west in Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, to the east in Romania and the Balkans, through the north of Scandinavia to the south of the Iberian Peninsula. Draw- ing on archaeological, art and architectural,

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