Read the Bible like a Mystic: Contemplative Wisdom and the Word

By Carl McColman. Broadleaf Books, 2025. 202 pages. $25.99/hardcover; $16.99/eBook.

One might be tempted to see the title of Carl McColman’s Read the Bible like a Mystic as an invitation with an implicit “How to” at the beginning. But it’s really more of an imperative: McColman believes people should approach Scripture “like someone whose life has been illuminated and transformed by immersion in the very heart of divine love,” and he has a lot to say about why they would benefit from doing so, but he doesn’t spend much time explaining how to go about it.

(A brief appendix does outline two traditional practices: lectio divina, or “divine reading”; and Ignatian prayer. For spiritual novices, however, the quick guidelines may feel like being thrown in the deep end of the pool at the end of the first lesson.)

McColman has a reasonable argument for being stingy with specific instructions. Words might be able to inform us of the possibility of being transformed by God’s love “to the point of being made one with it.” It is such an intensely personal experience, however, that if it happened to me, for example, I could only explain to other people what it felt like for me, with no guarantee that describing my path to that experience would lead anyone else to the same outcome.

McColman does provide some insights from mystics throughout Christian history, like the late civil rights activist and Episcopal priest Pauli Murray, whose approach to Scripture is quoted approvingly: “Our concern is not with the historical accuracy of the details, but with the religious truth these stories represent.” This is a major theme for McColman, as he repeatedly cautions against reading the Bible as a fundamentalist, using the “inerrant word of God” as a cudgel to wield spiritual authority over others, or as an atheist, looking for evidence of the foolishness and naivety of religious faithful. “[T]hink of the miracles and supernatural stories as masterpieces of the spiritual imagination,” he advises. “If you want to imagine that they are also historically factual, that is your prerogative.” It’s an ambivalent approach to Christian faith that left me desiring a more decisive hand.

McColman acknowledges the Bible’s status as “a basically wise and beautiful book that nevertheless has some real problems.” He freely invites us, as we dive into Scripture, to “celebrate the wisdom and calmly set aside the rest.” The “rest,” in this case, is anything “contrary to the compassion and mercy of God,” which we will recognize through “the guidance of the Spirit in our own hearts.”

Along those lines, one of the book’s few explicit instructions is actually couched as a polite suggestion: “The next time you pick up your Bible,” McColman writes, “as you read it, mentally substitute the word Love for God. It’s a great way to remind us that the only god worth worshipping is the God who is the source of all true love, compassion, mercy, and justice.” This strikes me as dangerously close to picking out the parts that resonate with modern liberal society’s own ideas about what the best possible form of God’s nature would be. It’s not that I’m knocking those ideas, or even disagreeing with them—just wondering if there might be more to Scripture than this.

The earliest Quakers were fervent Christians. They recognized that people from other spiritual traditions could experience mystic union with God’s love, but it was their understanding that Christ could be found at the core of such experiences. In the centuries since the founding of the Religious Society of Friends, the belief that Christ is not the very heart of divine love, but rather one facet of a more universal diamond, has gained greater and greater currency.

Perhaps this is true, perhaps not. If so, though, why turn to the Bible in particular for mystic insight? If “the Bible is not a how-to manual on becoming more creative or compassionate,” as McColman concedes—describing such transformations as “a direct gift from the Spirit in our hearts”—why not open any text and let “the Spirit who resides within” work upon us? But if we recognize that Scripture delivers one masterpiece of the spiritual imagination after another, then we might ask ourselves: why does this collection of histories, poems, aphorisms, and inspirational letters (among other literary forms) manage to get things so right so often?

That’s not a question Read the Bible like a Mystic sets out to answer in much detail. Instead, we’re broadly encouraged to trust that there is great wisdom to be found within Scripture—wisdom we each must dig out for ourselves. McColman brings readers to a profound threshold, and I understand the desire to hold our hands loosely: the easier to set us free on our own journey. If you do find yourself wanting closer companionship afterward, he at least offers some good candidates for further reading.

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Ron Hogan is the audience development specialist for Friends Publishing Corporation. He shares weekly Scripture-centered messages on Quaker.org and through our email newsletter. He is also the author of Our Endless and Proper Work.