SYMEON THE NEW THEOLOGIAN (949–1022) was a Christian mystic. Symeon is called "the New Theologian," first because, like John the Evangelist, he speaks of mystical union with the Trinity, and, second, because Gregory of Nazianzus, known as "the Theologian," had also written passionately on the Trinity. Symeon's personal life and his writings reflect a good deal of the polemical, because he considered himself a zealot battling the fossilized segments of the institutional church for a return to radical gospel Christianity. That he, as all mystics who articulated their experiences in writings, would be branded as a dangerous reformer walking the slender line between orthodoxy and heresy is not surprising. His ardent, passionate nature, plus the genuinely rare mystical graces that he had experienced, compounded to "force" him, as he confessed, to share his mystical experiences freely with others.

Symeon was born at Galatia...