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John of the Cross · 1578 · Poem
"Del Verbo divino" is the shortest surviving poem of John of the Cross: four lines of Spanish ballad verse, a single copla, small enough to be copied on a scrap and carried…
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John of the Cross · 1578 · Poem
Eight stanzas in Spanish liras, composed by a Carmelite friar in his mid-thirties who had recently been imprisoned in a Toledo monastery cell by members of his own order opposed to the…
FreeOriginal languageModerate
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John of the Cross · 1578–1579 · Poem
A short Spanish ballad paraphrasing Psalm 137 (Vulgate 136), the psalm of the exiles weeping by the rivers of Babylon. It belongs to the body of verse that emerged from the crisis…
FreeOriginal languageModerate
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John of the Cross · 1578–1579 · Poem
A sequence of nine ballads in the plain octosyllabic assonant meter of Spanish popular song, composed by John of the Cross during or immediately after his nine months of confinement in the…
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John of the Cross · 1578–1579 · Other
The "Mount of Perfection" is a small drawing with handwritten captions that John of the Cross made for the Discalced Carmelite nuns he directed in Andalusia after his escape from the Toledo…
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John of the Cross · 1578–1584 · Poem
The Spiritual Canticle is a lyric poem of some forty stanzas in liras, spoken mostly by a bride who has lost her Beloved and goes out to find him. Its beginnings are…
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John of the Cross · 1578 · Poem
A short lyric poem in Spanish by John of the Cross (1542–1591), the Carmelite friar who worked with Teresa of Ávila on the reform of the order, was imprisoned by his own…
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John of the Cross · 1579–1585 · Treatise
The Ascent of Mount Carmel emerged from John of the Cross's profound spiritual experience and his pastoral responsibility as spiritual director to the reformed Carmelite communities in sixteenth-century Spain. Written during his…
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Luis de León · 1580–1591 · Commentary
Luis de León's commentary on the Book of Job emerged from his profound engagement with biblical wisdom literature during his years as a professor of theology at the University of Salamanca. Writing…
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Luis de León · 1580 · Commentary
Luis de León's Latin commentary on the Song of Solomon emerged from his scholarly work as an Augustinian friar and professor of theology at the University of Salamanca during the Spanish Golden…
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John of the Cross · 1581–1591 · Letter
Thirty-three letters survive from John of the Cross, written between 1581 and 1591, the decade in which he governed houses of the Discalced Carmelite reform in Andalusia and Castile — the college…
FreeOriginal languageModerate
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John of the Cross · 1582 · Poem
"Un pastorcico solo está penado" is a five-stanza poem by John of the Cross, the Spanish Carmelite friar and reformer (1542–1591) whose verse and prose commentaries became the foundational texts of the…
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English College scholars; NT chiefly Gregory Martin, revised by William Allen and others · 1582 · Scripture
The Douay-Rheims Bible was the first complete English Catholic Bible and served as the principal Catholic counterpart to the Protestant English versions circulating in the same period. Produced by English Catholic exiles…
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John of the Cross · 1582–1585 · Treatise
The Living Flame of Love represents John of the Cross's final and most mature exploration of mystical union with God, written between 1582 and 1585 as a commentary on his own four-stanza…
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Luis de León · 1583–1585 · Treatise
Luis de León's The Names of Christ emerged from the theological ferment of sixteenth-century Spain, written during and after the author's imprisonment by the Spanish Inquisition from 1572 to 1576. De León,…
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Luis de León · 1583–1585 · Treatise
Written during Luis de León's imprisonment by the Spanish Inquisition from 1572 to 1576, this treatise emerged from the Augustinian friar's profound meditation on the person and nature of Christ while confined…
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Luis de León · 1583 · Treatise
La perfecta casada is a moral treatise on Christian marriage written by the Spanish Augustinian friar Luis de León in 1583. Composed during the height of the Counter-Reformation, the work emerged from…
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John of the Cross · 1584–1591 · Other
Grados de perfección — "Degrees of Perfection" — is a very short piece of practical direction by John of the Cross, belonging to the cluster of brief counsels he wrote for individual…
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John of the Cross · 1584–1591 · Other
The Dichos de luz y amor — the Sayings of Light and Love — is a collection of brief spiritual maxims by John of the Cross, the Spanish Carmelite friar who, with…
FreeOriginal languageEasy or light
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John of the Cross · 1585 · Poem
Four stanzas of six lines, alternating seven- and eleven-syllable measures, addressed directly to the Holy Spirit as a living flame: this is the shortest of John of the Cross's major poems and…
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Robert Bellarmine · 1586–1593 · Treatise
The Disputations on the Controversies of the Christian Faith represents the most comprehensive Catholic response to Protestant theology produced in the sixteenth century. Written by the Jesuit cardinal Robert Bellarmine between 1586…
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Francisco Suárez · 1590–1603 · Commentary
Francisco Suárez's Commentary and Disputations on the Third Part of Saint Thomas emerged from his teaching responsibilities at the universities of Alcalá and Coimbra during the late sixteenth century. Published across multiple…
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Francisco Suárez · 1590 · Treatise
Francisco Suárez's De Incarnatione stands as one of the most systematic and comprehensive treatments of the doctrine of the Incarnation produced during the Catholic Counter-Reformation. Written in 1590 as part of his…
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Luis de León · 1590 · Treatise
This Latin treatise by the Spanish Augustinian friar and scholar Fray Luis de León examines the theological relationship between the Passover lamb of the Old Testament and Christ's sacrificial death. Written during…
