The Journey of the Mind to God

by Bonaventure, Stephen F. Brown (Editor), Philotheus Boehner (Translator)

The Hackett edition of this classic of medieval philosophy and mysticism--a plan of pilgrimage for the learned Franciscan wishing to reach the apex of the mystical experience--combines the highly regarded Boehner translation with a new introduction by Stephen Brown focusing on St. Francis as a model of the contemplative life, the meaning of the Itinerarium, its place in Bonaventure’s mystical theology, and the plan of the work. Boehner’s Latin Notes, as well as Latin texts from other works of Bonaventure included in the Franciscan Institute Edition, are rendered here in English, making this the edition of choice for the beginning student.

Genres: Philosophy, Theology, Religion, Christianity, Nonfiction, Spirituality, Medieval

104 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1259

About the author

Bonaventure (b. 1221 as John of Fidanza) was an Italian medieval scholastic theologian and philosopher, the eighth Minister General of the Order of Friars Minor. He was a Cardinal Bishop of Albano. He was canonized on 14 April 1482 by Pope Sixtus IV and declared a Doctor of the Church in the year 1588 by Pope Sixtus V. He is known as the "Seraphic Doctor" (Latin: "Doctor Seraphicus"). Many writings believed in the Middle Ages to be his are now collected under the name Pseudo-Bonaventura.

Reviews

[Ellen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a short but dense work, full of mysticism and wonder and some philosophy that I found tough going. But the moments of beauty were intense, particularly in the last two chapters. This is a book to meditate upon, to read slowly, in small chunks and sit with. St. Bonaventure carried St. Francis' message to the world, that God can be found all around us, in nature, in ourselves and that having experienced God in these places a person can transcend it all in pure contemplation.

Definitely a work I'll be rereading and "working" with.

[Sengeset · Rating 2 out of 5]

This small "guidebook" was written in 1259 by St Bonaventure, the then-minister of the Fransiscan order. It describes how the human soul in the christian worldview must ascend through 7 steps to finally come to rest in God.

The spirit of the book lets itself summarize in the closing paragraphs:
(on how one should conduct life in order to reach God)
"If you wish to know how these things may come about, ask grace, not learning; desire, not understanding; the groaning of prayer, not diligence in reading; the Bridegroom [Jesus], not the teacher; God, not man; darkness, not clarity; not light but the fire that wholly inflames and carries one into God through transporting unctions and consuming affections" (Chapter 7, 6)

In short, truth or enlightenment is not to be found in human knowledge or exploration, but only through subjection to Gods will. All truth is to be found in spiritual exhaltation and in devotion to climbing out of the body and into the higher realms of the soul. The rest is just phantasmal images distracting from the one true path.

The book is an interesting read in so far as one tries to understand the medieval mentality, but the long-winded heavily religious arguments are tedious and confusing, rendering the book difficult to read with little intellectual gain. As an atheist the view that mankind should subject itself to some kind of non-empirical deity that created a sort of "game" for us that we all should play for his delight is abhorrent. It is a tragedy for me that humans for so long avoided intellectual pursuits in favour of religious ecstasy.

[Samuel G. Parkison · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful.

[Eric · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a slim, 99-page book that is so packed with dense writing that it takes three readings just to barely grasp some of the concepts. Saint Bonaventure's (1217-1274) text only takes up a little more than a third of the book, the remainder being introductory information and footnotes. It is those two extra elements that really make this book a worthwhile read, as they allow a modern reader to more deeply comprehend the concepts Bonaventure lays out.

This 1993 version of Bonaventure's work is a translation from Latin by Philotheus Boehner that has been edited, as well as given an introduction and explanatory notes, by Stephen F. Brown. Mr. Brown says he chose the Boehner translation because it "stays very close to the Latin and is generally quite readable." I would have to agree with that statement, as some of the other versions of The Journey of the Mind to God (also known as The Itinerarium) available online were not nearly as easy to comprehend.

The material Brown provides that truly helps to make Bonaventure's work accessible to a modern audience. Brown tells us from the very beginning that this work will be very different from other texts because 1) Bonaventure uses ample symbolism to represent complex concepts and 2) this is more of a technical university sermon. Brown's text is clear and well-written, and it often uses a simple metaphor or description to illuminate a point, such as these sentences to explain Bonaventure's worldview:

[He] never viewed the world in a hard-nosed, factual way. A rose, for him, was always more than a rose. Or, perhaps, we might better say that for Saint Bonaventure a rose, while remaining a rose, tells an attentive viewer a richer story of its reality.

Or this text to explain the "illumination theory of knowledge" developed by Augustine and embraced by Bonaventure:

[According to the theory], the first thing we know is God, even though we are not aware of this at first. Just as we would not see the colors and shapes of a stained-glass window unless the invisible sun was illuminating them, so we would not see visible things if the invisible God was not illuminating them from within. God, then, is present in things, and if we analyze our sense knowledge, our enjoyment of sense objects, and the judgments we make concerning them, we would come to realize God's invisible presence in them.

Bonaventure himself relies on these common images or experiences to elucidate a point as well. The majority of his text, however, is very dense. I mean "dense" in the sense that there is a layering effect to how he has written the work, where concepts are built up over the chapters as Bonaventure rigorously argues out his philosophy. There is also a purposeful use of repetition and contrast, so that one concept might be described six different ways, along with six opposite descriptions, to fully flesh out the complexity of what he is describing.

Bonaventure uses a term I had never heard before, but t seems to be popular is religious and philosophical texts: synderesis. Brown's note on the concept states that Bonaventure uses synderesis ".... as the highest power of reason and describes it as the natural gravity of the soul toward the good" Bonaventure also calls it "the unitive" or "loving power." I wasn't too satisfied with that definition, so I took a look at how Philosophy Pages defines it:

Immediate, intuitive apprehension of the fundamental principles of morality. For such medieval ethicists as Peter Lombard and Aquinas, synderesis, unlike mere conscience, is both infallible and general.

Perhaps not much clearer, but a bit helpful.

Overall, it is an excellent book to learn more about Saint Bonaventure and Franciscan religious philosophy. It is also an interesting insight into a deeply religious mind, that allows you to experience some of what made Bonaventure such an ardent believer in God.

[Gnome Books · Rating 5 out of 5]

perfect

[Gastjäle · Rating 3 out of 5]

At first I read a Finnish translation from the 80s and thought it awfully unwieldy and unidiomatic. Well, then I read an English translation (from goodness knows what time period) and I'm willing to cut the Finnedition some slack: it seems that translators of this work weren't really professionals in terms of readability, but were rather interested in translating the original pretty much word for word. This caused some confusion in certain cases, even to the extent that I had to look up the original to see what was the point being made - which kind of made me want to read the original instead. While I could somewhat understand the points being made or at least the points that were supposed to be made, the more important aspects of this work, to wit, a sense of piety, devotion, reverence and awe, were completely lost in translation. After all:

Therefore to the groan of praying through Christ crucified, through whose Blood we are purged from the filth of vice, I indeed first invite the reader, lest perhaps he believes that reading without unction, speculation without devotion, investigation without admiration, circumspection without exultation, industry without piety, knowledge without charity, understanding without humility, study apart from divine grace, gaze apart from divinely inspired wisdom is sufficient for him.

About the work itself. The first thing that strikes the reader of Bonaventure is his adamant adherence to the symbolism of numbers: this work is teeming with sets of 3, 6, 7 and 9! This makes following his train of thought rather tricky because of the superabundance of the sets, but I'll just jot down some of the core ones. First of all, we have the "threefold existence of things, that is in matter, in understanding and in the Eternal Art". Developing this line of thinking further, Bonaventure distinguished between three principle powers of the mind's aspectus: the sensory, the spirit and the mind. The first one pertains to actual seeing, the second one to self-discovery and the third one to beholding divine things. (An interesting point one should make here is that for Bonaventure, things going on in the mind were extra-temporal and extra-spatial: our humans' way of gaining a piece of eternity.) Then, further extrapolating from these, we have the six steps of mind's journey towards God: through something and in that something (so for instance, in "actual seeing", we behold God through vestiges of him and in those vestiges). Furthermore, we have the six powers of the soul: "the sense, the imagination, the reason, the intellect, the intelligence, and the apex of the mind or the spark of synderisis".

(This last bit forms by far the most complicated part in Bonaventure's philosophy: what is the difference between mind, soul and spirit? What's the difference between imagination, reason, intellect and intelligence? What the devil's "the apex of the mind"? What role does "understanding" play, since it is namedropped later on in the text? Well, the bad news is that Bonaventure does not define any of these; he merely drops hints of what he might mean by these throughout the text. And here's what I've figured out: Imagination could be the same as it is for Aquinas, that is, the one that forms our concepts but which are still not verified as the real thing. Reason is probably what allows us to use our intellect and intelligence. Intellect is the understanding of definitions and concepts. Intelligence is the verbalisation of the understanding. Apex of the mind is a complete mystery, but I suppose it's the ability which allows us to think of the mystical? And... frankly, I think "understanding" is just a bad translation making things needlessly complicated. The original uses "intelligentia", for one.)

There are plenty of more of those included in the text, and there's no point for me to reel them all off. But the main idea behind the numerical symbolism is both theological, ideological and aesthetical. Obviously, the aforementioned numbers are important for Christianity, so there's no need to explain that aspect. But ideologically speaking, such convenient figures enable Bonaventure to parse reality better and to come up with justifications for his faith. Lastly, the aesthetical element comes from the fact that "all things are beautiful and in a certain manner delectable; and beauty and delectation are not apart from proportion; and proportion is first in numbers". Since God is, among other things, perfect proportion, it makes sense for Bonaventure to see triads, troikas and triumvirates all over the place.

If one were to sum up the message of this book in a somewhat less frustrating and long-winded fashion, I would say it's about... let's say three things. First and foremost: for Bonaventure, nothing is done by us without the aiding grace of Christ. With his help, we are able to commence our journey towards the great Trinity, and we are able to keep our sins at bay. Without him, we would not have our knowledge or our senses intact (this one makes Bonaventure an advocate of illuminationism). Secondly: the task of the believer is to try to approach the mystery of God by first beginning from small things (that there are lots of things in the world, of varying shapes, colour, height...), then seeing and understanding the concepts behind those things (such as magnitude, multitude, beauty, fullness, order). (Note that the presupposition of God is kept the whole time, and the admiration towards him is increasing as the "pilgrim" moves on.) After that, one seizes the concepts themselves, and deduces from there that God has to be the top dog of every single one of these things (like the first being, most perfect, most actual...). And eventually, one should reach the goal of transferring and transforming the whole "apex of affection" into God... whatever that means.

While these things may seem either obvious or at the very least unimaginative, coming from a medieval Christian, the fascinating thing about this is the sheer scope of admiration Bonaventure had for God and how he wanted to share it with others. If a believer were to follow these steps and accept their (at times rather flimsy) arguments, I have no doubt that they would feel a sense of overwhelming awe towards their Creator. And that's what I love about the Middle Ages: awe and devotion. Desperation wasn't still part of the game, since the Christian truths were pretty much uncontested for a long while. The foundations of faith were unassailable: it was merely the works and mysteries of the Creation that sparked wonder. And at times one can catch a glimpse of these qualities when reading the works of the scholastics and other philosophers/theologians.

But the most important rule while doing so is: don't read them too critically. For their arguments are a cakewalk to demolish. Accept or pretend that you accept their reasoning, and see where that takes you.

[Richard Wu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Were I to speak of a treatise on communicability by which practitioners of a school of thought are led through a scattershot series of propositions so that they may grasp the long-promised treasure of their tradition, your first guess, I think, would not be Bonaventure's Itinerarium, it would be Wittgenstein's Tractatus, but the former bears so much family resemblance to the ladder that I cannot help but notice their likenesses. What interests me in the comparison, however, is not the texts' metaphorical similarity (which any reader, especially now primed for cross-reference, may discuss) but the psychology of their authors and whether we, regardless of our capacity to climb, can find something of their motives in ourselves.

A superficial but immediate predicate here of composition bears mentioning, namely a shared belief in originality, at the very least, of expression; if either had encountered a document which contained more-or-less the same ideas, they would not have written. I have nothing to back this up aside from my own faith that each maintained a certain epistemic integrity and would never, for instance, have intentionally paraphrased or plagiarized some earlier author for personal social gain. And though Wittgenstein famously cited no sources, a good case may be made that syntax supersedes substance where public activation is the goal, and so a new clarity in delivery more than justifies a (potential) rehashing of the extant but previously obscure. Thus we may concede to Qohelet that "there is nothing new under the sun" while retaining, in full conscience, a revelatory and/or evangelical ethos.

Having had an experience of enlightenment (loosely defined) is of course a more crucial necessity; one cannot presume to lecture honestly without first having flown, so to speak, out of the fly bottle, or one's mind into God, and here too a certain benefit of the doubt must be given or grain of salt taken with regard to such claims. Bonaventure, to his credit, cites in chapter 4.8 that old acorn on the fundamental idiosyncrasy of subjectivity otherwise known as 1 Corinthians 2:11. For purpose of immersion (or, if you like, of maximizing your chances of reforming your soul—same difference really), I can only recommend entertaining the claims with a spirit of general charity.

Tertiarily, belief in the transmissibility of the methods of achieving said enlightenment, and quaternarily, a desire to communicate them. Basically, they want to help us out! It's the same impulse behind the making of DIY tutorials on YouTube, except instead of saving money on replacing the bob in your toilet tank, you could save years by not pursuing the ridiculously shortsighted symbol manipulation commonly called philosophy any further—years you could spend in the army or in Austria beating little schoolchildren with a measuring stick or something. Essentially, what I'm saying is that Bonaventure and Wittgenstein were both good people who wished humanity well, since they could have kept their insights to themselves, without sharing. But they didn't.

So here we are, four paragraphs later, and I've said nothing about the actual text. Well, I stand by the four stars I gave it because it got me thinking about this and that in a pleasant way. For example, we tend to consider quantity and quality separately, but it can be usefully said that quality, or at least some qualities, are but a balance of quantities—bittersweet, sugary, saccharine, etc.—and from this the Aristotelian remark "beauty is a ratio" becomes readily digestible. For another example, chapter 2.7 is a wonderful piece of theology in its analogizing, from the scale of Man onto the scale of God, the relation of perceptual artifacts to objective facticity. For yet a third, we may credit Bonaventure for being the first to abstract "being," in itself, as a concept worth examination, which for context was as revolutionary a maneuver in the history of philosophy as was discovering how landing lag could be effectively nullified by pressing the Z-trigger within eleven frames of hitting the ground with an aerial attack in the history of Super Smash Bros. for the Nintendo 64. Needless to say, HE WHO HIDETH EGGS oweth a big much part of his intellectual career to our boy. Lastly I beseech you to appreciate the miraculous act of ideation that posited a register of apprehension neither cognitive nor sensorial but nevertheless experiential as the proper location of phenomenological divinity.

Onto the negatives. On the prose level, there is no magic whatever, but this is forgivable because the act of philosophy (as it was conceived by Bonaventure's milieu) entailed the reduction of sense to the singular, the precise, the specific. This, in turn, is less forgivable because semantic erosion over the years, much less the centuries, crumbled his whole Babel of metaphysics where a single misplaced brick would have precluded sufficient grasp. The autistic diligence of his terminological delineation is thus wasted on such nonscholastic moderns as you and me. But one wonders whether even armed with the prerequisite hermeneutic acumen, even assuming correct mentation executed nigh-mechanically, would one attain to death in providential darkness as advertised. By virtue of self-evidence, I am inclined to dissent.

Fear not, for better methods—methods more amenable to contemporary access—exist. If you wish to lean into the faith, you could always try this; and if you wish to journey your mind into God, into the mind of God, or hell even God into your mind, you could just pop a tab or two.

[Edvard Gaukstad · Rating 5 out of 5]

Title should be «journey of the SOUL to god.» !!

[lucia · Rating 3 out of 5]

philosophical mysticism acid trip except he’s kinda right

(bonaventure LOOOOOOVES numbers so much. SO much. hard to overstate how much. notable numbers: 3, 6, 7, sometimes 5)

[Kirk Metzger · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great, quick read. Part of the Center for Baptist Renewal reading challenge.

[Joseph R. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Saint Bonaventure was a medieval Franciscan theologian. He wrote this brief but dense work inspired by Francis of Assisi, who often focused on seeking peace as a way to God. Bonaventure meditated on this peace and found a way to the mystical contemplation of God. He describes six steps that lead to God.

The first step considers the very faint image of God in the "vestiges of the universe." By our human sense powers, we come to a knowledge of the world and perceive the orderliness and abundance in the universe. Bonaventure's idea here isn't how we can see an intelligent design to the universe, but how the rationality and immensity of it is reflective of higher and more perfect things, leading to the highest and most perfect God.

The second step looks to that faint image of God in the visible world. How is this different from the first step? Bonaventure explains--in this step we see the universe not as a product of God but as God is present in the universe. After some scientific explanations (which, quite frankly, are no longer valid), he cites Augustine's argument that numbers can be found in all things, and these numbers reflect an order and harmony that leads to God.

The third step sees God's image in our natural powers--memory, knowledge, and desire. Memories are made in the present and include the past; memories also give a hint to the future. So memory gives a shadowy reflection of the eternity in which God lives. Knowledge seeks the truth of things, understanding what they are and how they are related to one another. Truth relies on knowing the being of things (which ultimately relies on the Supreme Being) and the relationship they have to each other (which is a shadowy reflection of the Trinitarian community of the Godhead). Desire is always for the good and must focus on the highest good for man, happiness. That happiness can achieve fulfillment if it has the greatest good as its object, the unchanging and infinite good found in the Supreme Being. Our natural intellectual powers are an image of God.

While the third step is attained through philosophical reflection, the fourth step sees God's image in the human soul perfected by grace,. This step is attained through the gift of grace. A deeper understanding of our relationship to others and to God comes with the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity. These virtues cannot be acquired through human effort but are a gift from God that we accept. Contemplation of Sacred Scripture reinforces and deepens the impact of grace on the soul.

The fifth step looks at God Himself in His essential attributes. Like the third step, this contemplation looks with a more philosophical eye at the primary name of God given to Moses at the burning bush: I am who am. God is Being, pure and simple. Pure being has no potency or division; it cannot be improved or added to. As such, it must be eternal and unchanging. God is one.

The sixth step looks at God as the Good, that is, the highest and most perfect good. Such a good must exist (Bonaventure cites Anselm's famous argument) and also be self-diffusive. This supreme self-diffusion is the starting point from which Bonaventure explains the Three Persons of the Trinity and shows how They can be co-equal and distinct. This is the highest level of contemplation, where the mind is illumined most perfectly.

Of course, a person's ascent to a mystical understanding of God requires not only the intellectual insights described. Bonaventure says in his prologue that only a prayerful and purified spirit can make this ascent. A life of holiness both in prayer and in act is prerequisite for the journey of the mind to God. He reiterates this dependence on divine power in the final chapter. By contemplating Jesus Christ and relying on the grace He provides us, we are able to come close in this life to the vision that we will have in Heaven.

The text, like many medieval writings, is very terse and has some technical language common in medieval philosophy and theology. So reading it isn't the easiest thing but it is very rewarding.

[E. · Rating 2 out of 5]

I started on this short book some months ago as part of my on-going effort (begun a few years back) of reading through (at least some of) the philosophical canon (including some books I've read before and some which I have not). But I didn't get this book finished, because I was reading other philosophical works for my class and was otherwise distracted with other goings on in life.

This short volume is a good introduction to key ideas in medieval Christian thinking. Bonaventure holds that nature is a mirror reflecting God and that the path to truth is the path of contemplation of the divine. Because the human mind was created by God, it has access to the truth, described as "infallibly, indestructibly, indubitably, irrefragibly, unquestionably, unchangeably, boundlessly, endlessly, indivisibly, and intellectually"--a list of adverbs that makes it clear that there are no skeptical worries for Bonaventure.

His language is beautiful, as is his image of reality and human access to it. For example, this description of the attributes of God: "the divine Being is at once primary and last Being, eternal and most present, most simple and greatest or unlimited, all everywhere and yet never bounded, most actual and never moved, most perfect and having nothing superfluous or lacking, and yet immense and infinite without bounds, one to the highest degree and yet all-inclusive as having all things in itself, as total power, total truth, total goodness."

Yet, none of this beautiful vision could withstand the modern skeptical questions of Descartes, et al.

[Mark Adderley · Rating 4 out of 5]

As the other reviews have noted, this is not an easy book to read. The style is extremely dense. However, a little patience really pays off. And the editors of this translation have done all they can to assist: there's a helpful summary of the book in the introduction, as well as copious notes at the end. Between the two of them, they make the book accessible.

St. Bonaventure's idea is that the soul progresses towards God in three steps, each of which can be subdivided, producing six altogether:

1. The Created World. In the first step, we recognize God through the created world. In the second step, we realize that God is present in the created world.

2. The Mind (i.e., the mind/soul/will). In the third step, we see that the soul is a reflection of God, i.e., it resembles God. In the fourth step, we recognize God's presence in the soul, as we had in the created world in the second step.

3. Contemplation of God. In the fifth step, we realize that God is Being itself. In the sixth step, we realize that God is good.

The last chapter is a description of the mystical union with God.

It's a great book--you can get a lot out of it if you put a lot into it. But there's no hidden meaning. What you see is what you get. It works on a very literal level. There's nothing tricky about it. The ideas are just dense.

[May Fly]

Was following this translated text in dual-language along with the audio exegesis by Brother William Short (part of a Now You Know lecture series). Alas I failed to read the fine print on my Hoopla library loan; turns out the thing expired after two days (way shorter than the normal lending period). So then I had to read the rest solo, and that sixth chapter was quite a doozy. But overall this was an interesting philosophical/theological exploration from a major (albeit lesser known) contemporary of Aquinas.

Mainly got my attention because of the centrality of St. Francis as a focal point and exemplary figure, as he's always been a historical personage of considerable interest to me. Bonaventure was clearly well-schooled in the university curriculum of his day (i.e. the Trivium and Quadrivium) and his knowledge of science and mathematics is the cornerstone of this exploration, which breaks outside the hackneyed arguments familiar today in favor of an approach that blends the natural sciences, philosophy, and mysticism: an alchemical brew I found most fascinating.

It's a relatively short work compared to some of the more famous philosophical treatises of the European medieval tradition. Even with all the Latin bits it was under 60 pages. If you're wanting to dig deeper into the scholastic tradition of the Middle Ages, this is a good place to start.

[J. · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a short but profound book, it is one that should not be underestimated by its size either. One will need to most likely re-read this book over a couple more times after the initial reading just to make sure they get all the concepts, reading this with a group may even be better. I also highly recommend reading the footnotes for each chapter, either while reading each chapter or after reading said chapter, because they are vital for understanding in a fuller appreciation what this book is trying to convey. I give this book 5-Stars for its Profoundity and yet also its compactness.

[Brent · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fairly straightforward. Franciscan theologian offers his "steps" to total tranquility and peace, starting from the basic sense perception of the visible world to the last step of transcending being itself, "God beyond God," etc. Pretty much cut out of Pseudo-Dionysius, although he quotes Augustine a few times and St. John of Damascus once. His steps on contemplating the properties of God, namely the Trinity, is straight from Augustine's "De Trinitate."

[Katie · Rating 1 out of 5]

Bonaventure: Neither engaging nor original.

[Marcos Augusto · Rating 4 out of 5]

Founded by St. Francis according to strict views about poverty, the Franciscan order was at that time undergoing internal discord. One group, the Spirituals, disrupted the order by a rigorous view of poverty; another, the Relaxati, disturbed it by a laxity of life. Bonaventure used his authority so prudently that, placating the first group and reproving the second, he preserved the unity of the order and reformed it in the spirit of St. Francis. The work of restoration and reconciliation owed its success to Bonaventure’s tireless visits, despite delicate health, to each province of the order and to his own personal realization of the Franciscan ideal. In his travels, he preached the Gospel constantly and so elegantly that he was recognized everywhere as a most eloquent preacher. As a theologian, he based the revival of the order on his conception of the spiritual life, which he expounded in mystical treatises manifesting his Franciscan experience of contemplation as a perfection of the Christian life. His Journey of the Mind to God (1259) was a masterpiece showing the way by which man as a creature ought to love and contemplate God through Christ after the example of St. Francis.

[David Haines · Rating 4 out of 5]

A whirlwind of Philosophy and theology as Bonaventure presents 6 steps by which we come to knowledge of God. The first three steps can be climbed by all men, regenerate or unregenerate, but no one can move past the fourth step unless they believe in the Crucified Christ. The first three steps are filled with succinct, but dense, philosophical claims concerning everything from philosophy of human nature to the division of the sciences and the question of Being. The last three steps are as succinct and dense, but look at the theological virtues, the importance of the Scriptures, the Divine attributes, and the doctrine of the Trinity. The key to beginning the ascent is prayer, and the ascent ends in prayer. The ascent begins with the recognition that the pilgrim is a sinner, the ascent involves confession, belief in Christ, and purification, ending in worship.

[Scott Meadows · Rating 4 out of 5]

Simply beautiful. Boersma’s “Pierced by Love” helped prepare me for Bonaventure’s understanding of contemplation. Compared to the modern meditations of those like Merton, I find great value in following Bonaventure’s contemplative ladder.

[Sam Peterson]

Well I certainly looked at all these words...

[Moss Bertin]

Beautiful language of light, still a horrific metaphysics. Intellectual anti-intellectualism proves itsellf quite incoherent.

[soulAdmitted · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Ti solleverai alla luce sovraessenziale delle tenebre divine".

[Joshua Biggs · Rating 4 out of 5]

Honestly, most of this book went over my head. Giving it 4 stars because I think if I could have grasped everything in the book it would have been an enriching experience, but I don’t have quite the philosophical chops to track with Bonaventure all the way through.
Glad I read it though! I might come back to it one day and try again.

[Alex Kartelias · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the greatest Christian philosophers during the middle-ages. The influence on Dante is evident and the way he transitions from the traces of God in The Book of creation, to the First Principle and it's Trinitarian emanations Within, shows his superiority over most philosophers by making a marriage with Plato and Aristotle. One should definitely study both these philosophers to understand this work.

It's a shame nobody ever talks about this philosopher, because he contains so many teachings which other philosophers merely discuss one aspect of. From the world and soul as being a ladder or mirror, God's signs/traces in creation, the many Aristotelian categories he makes concerning the modes of theology, the 7 fold condition of creatures, the innate nature of Wisdom, how the trinity dwells in the soul and the cosmos, the 3 categories of philosophy- with each of its own 3 branches-, Jesus as The Tree of Life and the Celestial Jerusalem with the 9 realms of angels/intelligences in The Heart, St. Bonaventure's text is something a soul hungry for God could use exclusively.

[Haley · Rating 5 out of 5]

He wrote this on the same mountain upon which St. Francis received his stigmata: I guess all of us trying for sainthood should literally take a hike.
This is a short, dense book, and one that cannot be read casually. While he is a contemporary of Aquinas, they are writing from two very different traditions, and thus must be handled very differently. This book is a thumotic and erotic venture, not one built upon categorical logic; it is something that must be entered into, not simply read. This is a telling of an experience that we are invited to participate in, not casual bedside reading.
It is both a philosophical and theological work, and so if you have to be superficial about it, read it as both a book on the esse of man as well as his telos.
All in all, good move, Bonaventure. Writing this was a better decision than trying to monopolize the market of St. Francis biographies.

[Andrew Price · Rating 5 out of 5]

Published in Latin as Itinerarium Mentis ad Deum, and considered to be one of the masterpieces of medieval philosophy. The work is based on the Tree of Porphyry; logical classification that become more encompassing as they ascend. This work is well-written and translated, and I highly recommend it to anyone interested in wither theology or medieval philosophy.

[Tom Marsan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed returning to this book. With the help of the Living School's videos and forums, I was able to appreciate the path that could have been, and still can be, had we not focused most of Western Christianity on the works of Aquinas, than the Franciscans. The language and style can be a bit dense, and obscure, but with the right discussion it reveals a nice primer to contemplation.

[Alison · Rating 4 out of 5]

So very smart. The language is pretty complex so you really need a mild prior understanding to grasp alot of the ideas. It would have probably been more informative if I had read the new/or old testament but oh well. Amazing ideas about God and the truth of existence and love and all that jazz.

[dameolga · Rating 2 out of 5]

To be fair, I don't think my mind was ready to read something like this. Even Bonaventure stated that a certain amount of study or self discipline was necessary to comprehend the steps leading to God.