Exploring the Cosmos: Unraveling Cusanus’ Metaphors
Synopsis
The works of Nicholas of Cusa (1401–1464) distinguish themselves by an extensive range of metaphors spanning from things and circumstances of everyday life and aspects of the natural world to cosmological phenomena and more abstract geometrical and mathematical images. Many of these metaphors challenge the reader due to their often unusual and daring combination of elements, which appear to be semantically incongruous or remote from each other. In this special issue, we want to take up this challenge and further explore both the scope and the particularities of Cusanus’ figurative language.
The articles of this special issue were firstly presented at the workshop “Exploring the Cosmos: Unraveling Cusanus’ Metaphors” that took place on 15th and 16th June 2023, at Ruhr University Bochum, Center for Religious Studies and was organized by the Subproject C03 “Metaphors of Every-day Life (Cusanus and Melanchthon)” of the Collaborative Research Center 1475 “Metaphors of Religion.” The presenters approached the complexity and intricacy of Cusanus’ metaphors by investigating a range of test cases, mainly texts or passages whose imagery is borrowed from the domains of the arts and sciences and of everyday practices.
Chapters
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Exploring the Cosmos: Unraveling Cusanus’ MetaphorsIntroduction
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Exploding MetaphorsReflections on the Methodology of Cusanus’ Divine Metaphorics
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Per beryllum intueamur.The Metaphor of ‘Beryl’ in Nicholas of Cusa and the Cologne School in the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries
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Mill, Miller, and Grinding as Theological Comparisons and Metaphors in Cusanus' Sermones
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‘Metabolism’ as Metaphor of Appropriation in Nicholas of Cusa’s Sermones
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Light, Brooms, and Drops of Oil on Thick PaperCusanus' Everyday Metaphors: A Suggestion for their Typology
Published
April 9, 2025
Copyright (c) 2025 Linda Simonis, Knut Martin Stünkel; Elizabeth Brient, Andrea Fiamma, Viki Ranff, Phoenix Savapkarn
