The secret to inner harmony can be uncovered in Quietism, Dynamic Passivity, and the Void, yet what is the essential difference between these three concepts' Within a highly original and wide-ranging discussion of the concept of Quietism and its divergents, Trevor Boiling investigates a profoundly metaphysical concept, whose precise definition has eluded many scholars. Implied in any study of Quietism are the problematic notions of spiritual peace, power and passivity, which are subsumed by the author under his own concept of 'dynamic passivity', the central concern of the study. Boiling does...

First written in 1675 by Miguel de Molinos, The Spiritual Guide still carries advice and information relevant to the art of interior prayer today. In the seventeenth century it provoked sensational reactions, both of approval and controversy. This is the present-day reader's chance to discover a text, whose promotion of an 'interior way to contemplation and the rich treasure of inner peace', induced the praise of notable clerics within Europe, and simultaneously the Inquisition's condemnation. What makes Molinos's teaching so unusual is his appeal to the ordinary layperson and not simply to...