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Appendix (13)

Middeleeuwen: Bonaventura en Thomas van Aquino

We now approach the Golden Age of Mysticism: and at the opening of that epoch, dominating it by their peculiar combination of intellectual and spiritual power stand the figures of the "Seraphic and Angelic Doctors," St. Bonaventura, the Franciscan (1221-1274), and St. Thomas Aquinas, the Dominican (1226-1274). As with St. Augustine, the intellectual greatness of St. Thomas has obscured his mystical side; whilst St. Bonaventura, the apostle of a wise moderation, may easily appear to the hurried reader the least mystical of the Franciscan mystics. Yet both were contemplatives, and because of this were able to interpret to the medieaval world the great spiritual tradition of the past. Hence their immense influence on the mystical schools of the fourteenth century. It is sometimes stated that these schools derive mainly from St. Bonaventura, and represent an opposition to scholastic theology; but as a matter of fact their greatest personalities - in particular Dante and the German Dominicans - are soaked in the spirit of Aquinas, and quote his authority at every turn.