Accommodating Inspiration: Discernment and Imitation within the Ignatian Pedagogical Tradition

ABSTRACT

This article investigates the nuanced way that the Jesuits connect imitation with inspiration in the rhetorical arts. Highlighting the Ignatian pedagogical tradition of individual discernment, eloquentia perfecta, and “contemplatives in action,” this article shows how Ignatian imitation patiently permits time and space for rhetors to be actively inspired by their models. As such, Ignatian imitation practices may offer a more effective imitation approach than those offered by ancient rhetoricians that preceded (and influenced) the Jesuits. Informed by a humanistic understanding of tradition, this article celebrates how the Jesuit approach to imitation can accommodate both religious and secular thinking and inclusively empower individual rhetors still to this day.

Notes

1. Scholars have been skeptical about imitation as well, including Frank M. Farmer, Phillip K. Arrington, and Edward Erdmann.

2. Specifically, two official documents: The Characteristics of Jesuit Education (1986) and Ignatian Pedagogy: A Practical Approach (1993).

3. For example, the innovative/controversial work of Pope Francis, James Martin S.J., Teilhard De Chardin, S.J., and others.

4. This English translation is found on McKeon 1936, 28.

5. Nevertheless, instruction of the trivium in the Middle Ages ensured the importance of rhetoric. See John of Salibury’s Metalogicon, Hugh of St. Victor’s Didascalicon, and others.

6. Soarez presumably borrows this point from Aristotle’s Poetics.

7. Here, Ignatius was primarily inspired to rhetorically imitate through two books: The Life of Christ (Vita Jesu Christi) written by Ludolph of Saxony and The Golden Legend (Legenda aurea) (Genss 1991a, 15-19).