Editing Teresa of Ávila (section)

====''Transverberation''====
Around 1556, friends suggested that her newfound knowledge could be of diabolical rather than divine origin. She had begun to inflict [[mortification of the flesh|mortifications of the flesh]] upon herself. But her [[confession (sacrament)|confessor]], the [[Jesuit]] [[Francis Borgia]], reassured her of the divine inspiration of her thoughts. On [[St. Peter's Day]] in 1559, Teresa became firmly convinced that Jesus Christ had presented himself to her in bodily form, though invisible. These visions lasted almost uninterruptedly for more than two years. In another vision, the famous ''transverberation'', a [[seraph]] drove the fiery point of a golden lance repeatedly through her heart, causing her an ineffable spiritual and bodily pain:
{{blockquote|I saw in his hand a long spear of gold, and at the point there seemed to be a little fire. He appeared to me to be thrusting it at times into my heart, and to pierce my very entrails; when he drew it out, he seemed to draw them out also, and to leave me all on fire with a great love of God. The pain was so great, that it made me moan; and yet so surpassing was the sweetness of this excessive pain, that I could not wish to be rid of it&nbsp;...{{efn|name=cherub}}}}

The account of this vision was the inspiration for one of [[Bernini]]'s most famous works, the ''[[Ecstasy of Saint Teresa]]'' at [[Santa Maria della Vittoria, Rome|Santa Maria della Vittoria]] in Rome. Although based in part on Teresa's description of her mystical [[Transverberation of Saint Teresa|transverberation]] in her autobiography, Bernini's depiction of the event is considered by some to be highly eroticized, especially when compared to the entire preceding artistic Teresian tradition.{{efn|For the creation of the work and an analysis of its transgression of religious decorum, see Franco Mormando's article, "Did Bernini's 'Ecstasy of St. Teresa' Cross a 17th-century Line of Decorum?," ''Word and Image,'' 39:4, 2023: 351–83 {{doi|10.1080/02666286.2023.2180931}}.}}

The memory of this episode served as an inspiration throughout the rest of her life, and motivated her lifelong imitation of the life and suffering of Jesus, epitomized in the adage often associated with her: "Lord, either let me suffer or let me die."<ref name=":0">The Interior Castle, St. Teresa of Avila.</ref>{{page needed|date=October 2023}}

Teresa, who became a celebrity in her town dispensing wisdom from behind the convent grille, was known for her raptures, which sometimes involved [[Levitation (physics)|levitation]]. It was a source of embarrassment to her and she bade her sisters hold her down when this occurred. Subsequently, historians, neurologists and psychiatrists like [[Peter Fenwick (neuropsychologist)|Peter Fenwick]] and Javier Álvarez-Rodríguez, among others, have taken an interest in her symptomatology. The fact that she wrote down virtually everything that happened to her during her religious life means that an invaluable and exceedingly rare medical record from the 16th century has been preserved. Examination of this record has led to the speculative conclusion that she may have suffered from [[temporal lobe epilepsy]].{{sfn|Barton|1982|pp=}}{{sfn|Rodriguez|2007|p=}}