quality:correction
Overview

The first four grades of Teresa's classifications of prayer belong to the ascetical stage of spiritual life. These are vocal prayer, meditational or mental prayer, affective prayer, and acquired or natural recollection.

According to Augustin Poulain and Robert Thouless, Teresa described four degrees or stages of mystical union, namely the prayer of quiet, full or semi-ecstatic union, ecstatic union or ecstasy, and transforming or deifying union, or spiritual marriage (properly) of the soul with God. While Augustin Poulain and Robert Thouless do not mention the Prayer of Supernatural (or passive) Recollection as a separate stage, Aumann discerns infused contemplation as a separate stage in the fourth mansion of the Interior Castle. Together, these "five grades are infused prayer and belong to the mystical phase of spiritual life".

Thomas Merton disagrees on a fine-cut distinction between acquired contemplation and the prayer of quiet, noticing the Carmelite tendency of systematization, whereas Teresa herself was just describing her personal experiences. Commenting on Teresa's writings and the scholarly discussions on the precise stages, Thomas Merton comments: "with all these divisions and distinctions, comings and goings and varieties of terms, one tends to become impatient with the saint".

Aumann synthesizes Teresa's writings into nine grades of prayer: