Religious Experience and Interpretation: Memory as the Path to the Knowledge of God in Julian of Norwich’s Showings

Religious Experience and Interpretation uses Augustine’s theory of memory to illuminate the differences between the two versions of Julian of Norwich’s Showings and to demonstrate that Julian’s experience of the sixteen showings and their theological understanding are the result of her active memory. This comparative study of the two texts shows how the triune mind - memory, understanding and will - works interactively in the process of recollection so as to actualize the memory-images of the visions as the knowledge of God. Based on Julian’s work, this book shows how human memory unites religious experience and interpretation and reveals the redeemability of time in religious experience.