the mystical theology of valentin weigel - DataSpace at Princeton ...

the Book of Life, and conversely the Book of Life must be the Word and therefore
God. 117 Establishing God’s universal presence in all people (if God is everything, how
could he not be in all people?) is the final move in Weigel’s unusual theology, allowing
him to claim that each person carries his salvation within him—this “treasure” must be
dug up, to be sure, but in principle nobody is denied the possibility of salvation, whether
baptised or not. As we will see in Chapter 2, this treasure is unearthed when each person
prevents her own cognitive faculties from standing in the way of God’s own knowledge.
That is, every Christian should aspire to quiet his mind and senses completely, so that
God can contemplate God’s own self in man. 118 By suppressing the individual knower
entirely, Weigel can eliminate disagreement entirely because there is, on Weigel’s
account, effectively only one knower—God himself. 119 Far from the Book of Life being
the only criterion for true judgement, the Book rather does away with criteria altogether.
But having found this Book, what kind of instruction does it contain for Weigel?
Curiously, Weigel concludes that he need not change his behaviour at all: preaching is
useless, but that he should continue preaching all the same, reading (physical) books is
useless but he should continue reading, performing ceremonies is useless but he should
continue performing them. 120 True believers, that is, should not let themselves be
117 Weigel, Griff, 92. “Gottes gesetze, gottes wort, gottes wille gottes same gottes sinn bildnis Christus geist
finger, gottes reich etc. ein ding sey, und sey In allen Menschen.” This idea that God can be called by all
names is omnipresent in Weigel’s work and we will encounter it many times in this dissertation,
particularly in Chapters 2 and 4.
118 Ibid, 53.
119 Ibid, 49-50.
120 Weigel treats the topic of inaction in numerous places in his work, and this dissertation will deal with all
of these texts, particularly in Chapters 2 and 4. Briefly, to offer one such statement here, Weigel writes: “Es
seindt hin und her Lehrer heimblich, welche diesem Greuel der Verwustung ann der heiligen Stedte wol
erkennen. Doch sitzen sie Beucht, bleiben in ihrem Stande, lauffen nicht dauon, tragen das Creutz geduldig
nach dem eusern Menschen. Inwendig klagen sie es Gott und seindt nach dem inwendigen Menschen
weder Priester noch Beuchtvater.” (“Ein Gespreche, wie ein Leyhe seinen Beuchtvatter uberzeuget, das der
Priester an Gottes Stadt nicht Sunde vorgebe”, 90-91.) Weigel even seems to consider the Priest’s decision
to believe in secret and not voice his true beliefs as a kind of devotional suffering—it is a Cross he must
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