n.
Spiritual quest for union with the divine.
Forms of mysticism are found in all major religions. Hinduism , with its goal of absorption of the soul in the All, is inherently predisposed to mystical experience. Buddhism emphasizes meditation as a means of moving toward nirvana . In Islam , Sufism employs metaphors of intoxication and of the love between bride and bridegroom to express the desire for union with the divine. In Judaism , the foundations of mysticism were laid in the visions of the biblical prophets and were later developed in the Kabbala and in Hasidism . Mysticism has appeared intermittently in Christianity , notably in the writings of St. Augustine and St. Teresa of Àvila , and in the works of Meister Eckhart and his 14th-century successors.