The Call of the Hidden
Philosophia Reformata July 16, 2026 DOI: 10.1163/23528230-bja10137 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Review Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Key findings | Argues that Smith's linkage of contemporary arts and mystical texts as sharing a contemplative wonder is legitimate, though the author questions whether Smith's proposed itinerary should be adapted to philosophers' life circumstances. |
Abstract
In this review essay, I survey James K. A. Smith’s use of contemporary arts and mystical texts to spur philosophers to reimagine their discipline as a practice of thinking that might be called a contemplative phenomenology of wonder sensitive to the mystery of existence. In the process, I identify the isomorphism Smith sees between contemporary arts and the disciplines described in mystical texts as sharing in an intuition that recalls the Romantic artist’s expansion of the artistic attention to embrace the sublime and the noumenal, whereby Kant’s distinctive treatment of art and religion in the Kritik der Urteilskraft is very nearly conflated. I defend the legitimacy of such a move, as well as the constructive philosophers’ reading of mystical texts for shared landmarks on a mystical itinerary, though I wonder whether Smith is or should be promoting a modified itinerary adapted to the life circumstances of philosophers and their readers.