Exploring the first-person narratives of three figures from theChristian, Jewish, and Islamic mystical traditions -- St. Teresa of Avila, Rabbi DovBaer, and R zbih n Baql -- Anthony J. Steinbock provides a completephenomenology of mysticism based in the Abrahamic religious traditions. He relates abroad range of religious experiences, or verticality, to philosophical problems ofevidence, selfhood, and otherness. From this philosophical description of verticalexperience, Steinbock develops a social and cultural critique in terms of idolatry-- as pride, secularism, and fundamentalism -- and suggests that contemporaryunderstandings of human experience must come from a fuller, more open view ofreligious experience.
