1.5 Religious Experiences Flashcards
What is a religious experience?
a non-empirical direct or personal experience with God
What are the 3 different types of religious experiences?
- visions
- numinous
- mystical
What are the impacts about religious experiences?
they draw people closer to god
Define visions
an image or event where there is a message or revelation
What are corporeal visions?
where a figure is externally present
What are imaginative visions?
a vision seen in the minds eye
What are intellectual visions?
visions which bring new knowledge or understanding and no figure is seen/heard
Example of corporeal vision
St Bernadette/St Paul
Example of imaginative vision
Pharoah/Joseph’s ladder
Example of intellectual vision
St Teresa of Avila
Who proposed numinous visions?
Rudolf Otto
What is Otto’s main work?
‘The idea of the Holy’
Define numinous experiences
Experiences of the ‘wholly other’
Where does numinous derive from?
‘numen’ meaning power or deity
Define non-rational
Cannot make sense of it using own senses/intellect
Define ‘sui generis’
unique/of its own kind/ in a class of its own
What quality does Otto emphasise?
Transcendence
How did C S Lewis define numinous experiences?
‘uncanny’ with feelings of dread
Biblical example of numinous experience?
- Moses and the burning bush
- Peter and the fish
Define ‘mysterium tremendum et fascinans’
a tremendus and fascinating mystery
What is a mystical experience?
an extraordinary union with the divine characterised by feelings of bliss and ecstacy
Main work of William James
Varieties of religious experiences
How does James describe mystical experiences?
“an ability to see the truth in a special way”
Define passivity
the mystic is passive and is taken over by the experience
