ABSTRACT
The mystic-hero has crossed a threshold to Ruusbroec’s ‘inner life’ and now rests in God in a liminal borderland of divine darkness, having overcome a reliance on reason in exchange for the leading of divine love. This setting begins the next stage of the hero’s journey, characterised by magical highs and wounding lows. This chapter sees Ruusbroec develop the character of the mystic-hero by way of his groundbreaking theological anthropology, which recalls the divine origin of many archetypal heroes. Ruusbroec then describes the mystic-hero’s long journey through the second stage of his formational path, the ‘inner life’, which parallels the archetypal hero’s journey to the object of search on the road of trials. Part of the struggle of inner transformation is the archetypal hero’s experience of atoning wounds, which Ruusbroec calls ‘lacerations of love’. The wounds will have their atoning fulfilment in the conclusion of the inner journey and Ruusbroec’s ‘contemplative life’.
