Abstract
The subject of this chapter is epiphanic visual apprehensions in the modern period with sensory or pictorial content, as opposed to what St. Teresa and others called intellectual visions. These sensory visions are what Teresa termed imaginary visions. They have strong visual content, although it may not be visible to others. Here, we consider three visions or apparitions of Mary, which occurred at Tepayac in Mexico, and at Lourdes and Fátima in Europe, in the sixteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth centuries respectively, each of which gained wide popular acceptance. We also present imaginary visions that Teresa experienced and as well visions of this type experienced by St. Catherine of Genoa, Teresa’s near contemporary. Turning to the Native American tradition, we consider visions attained by Black Elk, an Oglala Sioux medicine man and holy man, and others in that tradition, commenting on the great difference between the phenomenal content of visions occurring in this tradition and in the Christian tradition.
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Notes
- 1.
The Battle of Kosovo, trans. John Matthias and Vladeta Vučković (Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 1999), pp. 30 and 31.
- 2.
Stafford Poole, C.M., Our Lady of Guadalupe: The Origins and Sources of a Mexican National Symbol, 1531–1797 (Tucson, AZ: The University of Arizona Press, 1995), pp. 2–3 and 26–28. Poole’s account is mostly drawn from that of Father Luis Lazo de la Vega, the vicar of Guadalupe, published in 1649 and thought to be the most authoritative account. The origin of “Guadalupe” in the apparition’s title is unclear (Poole, pp. 31–32).
- 3.
Ruth Harris, Lourdes: Body and Spirit in the Secular Age (New York: Penguin Compass, 2000), pp. 3–9. Harris has drawn upon several sources for her account.
- 4.
Jeffrey S. Bennett, When the Sun Danced: Myth, Miracles, and Modernity in Early Twentieth-Century Portugal (Charlottesville, VA: University of Virginia Press, 2012), pp. 88–98 and 111–115 [electronic resource]. Among Bennett’s sources are the several memoirs of Lucia Santos.
- 5.
St. Teresa, Life, Chap. 28, in The Complete Works of St. Teresa of Jesus, trans. and ed. E. Allison Peers (London: Sheed and Ward, 1972), vol. 1, p. 178.
- 6.
Ibid., pp. 155 and 170.
- 7.
Ibid., p. 273.
- 8.
Ibid., pp. 273–274.
- 9.
Ibid., p. 271.
- 10.
Ibid., p. 215.
- 11.
Ibid., pp. 216–217.
- 12.
Ibid., pp. 187–188.
- 13.
St. John of the Cross, The Ascent of Mount Carmel, bk. 2, Chap. 23, in John of the Cross: Selected Writings, ed. Kieran Kavanaugh, O.C.D. (New York and Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1987), pp. 136–137 1987.
- 14.
Foreword to Catherine of Genoa: Purgation and Purgatory, The Spiritual Dialogue, trans. Serge Hughes (New York, Ramsey, and Toronto: Paulist Press, 1979), p. xv, and Benedict J. Groeschel, O.F.M. CAP., Introduction to Catherine of Genoa, pp. 3–5 and 14.
- 15.
Foreword to Catherine of Genoa, p. xv.
- 16.
St. Catherine of Genoa, The Spiritual Dialogue, in Catherine of Genoa, p. 118.
- 17.
Ibid., pp. 141–145.
- 18.
Native North American Spirituality of the Eastern Woodlands: Sacred Myths, Dreams, Visions, Speeches, Healing Formulas, Rituals and Ceremonials, ed. Elisabeth Tooker (New York, Ramsey, and Toronto: Paulist Press 1979), pp. 84–85, and Sam D. Gill, Native American Religions: An Introduction (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 1982), pp. 97–98. This practice in the Menominee tribe is described in Native North American Spirituality of the Eastern Woodlands. Gill observes that in the Ojibwe tribe both boys and girls fast at puberty in a vision quest.
- 19.
Gill, Native American Religions, pp. 98–100.
- 20.
Native North American Spirituality of the Eastern Woodlands, pp. 110, 112, and 113, and pp. 107, n. 8; 109, n. 11; 110, nn. 12 and 14; and 121, n. 36.
- 21.
Black Elk Speaks, Being the Life Story of a Holy Man of the Oglala Sioux, as told through John G. Neihart (Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 1961), pp. 22–34. Black Elk Speaks was originally published in 1932.
- 22.
Black Elk Speaks, p. 35.
- 23.
Black Elk Speaks, p. 40.
- 24.
Black Elk Speaks, p. 42. Despite differences between the Native American traditions and the Jewish and Christian traditions, this part of Black Elk’s vision has a parallel in the Psalms (Ps. 96. 11–12).
- 25.
Black Elk Speaks, p. 43.
- 26.
Black Elk Speaks, p. 49.
- 27.
Gill, Native American Religions, p. 167.
- 28.
Gill, Native American Religions, pp. 170–171.
- 29.
J.S. Slotkin, The Peyote Religion (New York: Farrer, Straus and Giroux, 1975), p. 75.
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Kellenberger, J. (2017). Visions and Apparitions in the Modern Period. In: Religious Epiphanies Across Traditions and Cultures. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-53264-6_14
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