A discussion of David Albertson's new book, The Geometry of Christian Contemplation: Measure without Measure (Oxford University Press, 2025). The author will be joined in conversation by Amy Hollywood (Harvard University) and Alexis Torrance (University of Notre Dame), moderated by Arjun Nair (USC). Organized in partnership with the School of Religion and the School of Philosophy. Registration is required. REGISTER HERE

About the Book: Many ancient and medieval Christian mystics were rediscovered in the twentieth century. But have modern assumptions about religious experience influenced how we hear those premodern voices? The Geometry of Christian Contemplation suggests a fresh approach to the history of mystical theology oriented toward exteriority more than interiority and toward the measurable world outside more than the invisible world within. The ancient Greek philosopher Plotinus taught contemplatives to close their eyes and withdraw into the soul. Most Christians followed his directions, but others dissented. In three critical episodes, an alternative model of Christian contemplation began to emerge: from Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite to the Byzantine monks who defended the icon to eccentric humanists in medieval Paris. Together, these episodes add up to a different theological aesthetics that can help us correct some imbalances in the modern study of mysticism. In the centuries before the scientific revolution and the secularization of nature, Christians still saw God in the exterior world, not only in the interior soul. God was not an ineffable and formless Absolute, immeasurable like the soul, but an infinite Measure who leaves behind geometrical traces in the figures of the world. The God who became a human body in the Incarnation not only entered time and matter but also spatial extension, and with it, the conditions of measure. Today, the wisdom of this countertradition can strengthen the study of mysticism and supplement contemporary fascination with negative theology by redefining what it means to name God positively.

About the Author: David Albertson is Associate Professor of Religion and Philosophy at USC. He is the author of Cusanus Today: Thinking with Nicholas of Cusa Between Philosophy and Theology (The Catholic University of America Press, 2024), Mathematical Theologies: Nicholas of Cusa and the Legacy of Thierry of Chartres (Oxford University Press, 2014) and, with Cabell King, eds., Without Nature: A New Condition for Theology (Fordham University Press, 2009).

Open to attendants outside of USC. An excerpt of the book will be made available to registered attendants. Registration before the event is required. 

This event is part of the Levan Institute for the Humanities' “Book Chats” series, conversations about new books published by USC scholars in the humanities and humanistic social sciences. To see more events in this series, including recordings of past events, visit https://dornsife.usc.edu/levan-institute/book-chats/.