Editor's Note
ADVENT 2016
Juliane Stokes' Master's thesis, entitled "Geborgenheit and the Tabor Vision: What Modern
Personalists Reveal About Women" is a remarkable and original intellectual exploration that
crosses the boundaries of philosophy and theology.
this project explores Christian and philosophical anthropology, specifically the understanding
of women, bringing into conversation two remarkable and important Catholic intellectuals of
the 20th century: Hans Urs von Balthasar (1905-1988) and Alice von Hildebrand (b. 1923).
Von Balthasar, a Swiss Jesuit, is by most accounts considered one of the most prominent
Catholic theologians of the 20th century; and Dr. Alice von Hildebrand is an accomplished
philosopher, scholar, and essayist.
While they have their affinities as intellectuals, von Balthasar and Alice von Hildebrand are
seldom considered in tandem. Herein lies the remarkable and original nature of Ms. Stokes'
insight in her thesis. In a comparative fashion, Ms. Stokes links together two important
concepts from these two prominent Catholic intellectuals. She explores the remarkable
concept of Geborgenheit, a German term often used by von Balthasar in his theology. This
term can be rendered in English as “safekeeping”. As Ms. Stokes observes, for von
Balthasar geborgenheit “refers to God's omniscient safekeeping of the truth about all things
as their Creator and as Love itself”. Ms. Stokes then considers a remarkably original insight
from Dr. Alice von Hildebrand into the nature of womanhood, what Alice von Hildebrand
refers to as the “Tabor Vision” unique to women. Dr. von Hildebrand explores the notion of
a transfigurative vision of the other, akin to the Apostles' vision of our Lord in the Gospel
accounts of the Transfiguration, as something that has a special resonance and reality for
women. Dr. von Hildebrand argues women, in their unique gendered reality as human
persons, have the special gift of “Tabor Vision” - a vision that sees and nurtures the
potential for goodness and beauty in those they love. This is a gift for all women, according
to Dr. von Hildebrand, as wives, mothers, siblings, and caregivers of all sorts, to see in
others something akin to the glory the Apostles saw in our Lord on Mt. Tabor.
In a stroke of intellectual originality and insight, Ms. Stokes brings together the rich notion of
geborgenheit, the experience of being held and sustained by God in comfort and in love,
with Alice von Hildebrand's powerful phenomenological insight into “Tabor Vision”. This
thesis convincingly argues that both of these concepts provide immense insight into the
nature and structure of feminine human personhood.
This thesis makes a very positive and important contribution to the Church's recent call for
exploring, emphasizing, and upholding the immense dignity and mystery of women as made
in the image of God.
Aaron Urbanczyk, Ph.D.
Catholic Distance University, November 2016