Złoty wiek mistyki angielskiej

Abstract

The aim of the article is to present the general view of mystical experience which emerges from the group of four spiritual writers related to The Golden Age of English Mysticism. All of them lived during the 14th century representing affective mysticism and negative theology. The most significant representatives of the period in English spirituality are Richard Rolle, the anonymous author of The Cloud of Unknowing, Walter Hilton and Julian of Norwich. The English eccentricity and utterly unique individuality mark all four mystics so much that the spiritual writers of the century never formed a national school. Nevertheless, they shared common values, approaches and the typical late medieval desire to express traditional Latin spirituality in the vernacular. Until today they are the greatest English prose writers of their age and their works remain unsurpassed masterpieces among all spiritual treatises written in the English language.