Mixing up heaven and Earth

The turn of the seventeenth century was marked by a sense of cosmic disorientation. Transformations in religious belief brought about by the Protestant Reformation and transformations in modes of conceptualizing space brought about by the popularization of geometry profoundly affected understandings of the relationship between chthonic and supernatural geographies. As a centuries-old structure of cosmic and divine order pressed up against new cartographies and new theologies, the realities of earth, heaven, and hell warped. The confluence of multiple, often contradictory, spatial and theological epistemologies resulted in unsteady beliefs about the universe. This book sets out to explore some of the expressions of this destabilization. Specifically, it examines how the coexistence of often incompatible spatial understandings affected beliefs about, and the experience of, the supernatural.