With a particular emphasis on the soul, this book explores Edith Stein's holistic conception of the human being's body-soul-spirit unity, which forms the foundation of her Christian anthropology and her view of human formation. Characterized by an unremitting attention to interconnections, Stein emerges as a forerunner of contemporary holistic approaches. Edith Stein and the Body-Soul-Spirit at the Center of Holistic Formation demonstrates the breadth and relevance of Stein's work by engaging her thought with the anthropological views of fellow phenomenologist John Paul II, Wilkie Au's perspectives on holistic spirituality and formation, and several nonreductionist, neuroscientific viewpoints of the human being. This book also makes available to the English reader a significant amount of material from Stein's untranslated works. Anyone interested in theological anthropology, holistic spirituality, human formation, the body-mind question, or Edith Stein studies will benefit from the wealth of material presented in this single book.
«Marian Maskulak's exposition of Stein's thought is extremely subtle, attentive to the many distinctions Stein makes, and clearly presented. She uses a wide range of Stein's writings, including works that have not been translated and are relatively rarely discussed in the literature on Stein. Overall, her discussion of Stein on the soul is one of the clearest and most thorough discussions I have seen.» (Sarah R. Borden, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Wheaton College)