Religious Experience

Question 1

What’s a religious experience?

Answer 1

Any experience of the sacred in a religious context, including visions, mystical and conversion experiences.

Question 2

What are 3 things which religious experiences usually have in common?

Answer 2

They are universal, important and diverse.

Question 3

What was Schleiermacher’s background?

Answer 3

He was brought up in a Moravian community, a protestant group that stressed the importance of faith and an individual relationship with God. Religious faith was not about setting up strict doctrines of worship, this lead him to conclude that humans are intrinsically religious beings, so every experience they have is a religious experience.

Question 4

What did Schleiermacher believe the role of religion was?

Answer 4

To foster awareness and develop a consciousness of the divine.

Question 5

How did Schleiermacher believe religious experiences should be tested?

Answer 5

They shouldn’t be, in the part of his book called the Defense he said that religious experiences are self authentising. Here he is critsising the Roman Catholic approach of its reliance on reason.

Question 6

What did Schleiermacher believe about the importance of religious experiences?

Answer 6

They are more important than doctrine as religion is the process of being totally reliant on Gods will. This feeling supersedes any statement made by the Church.

Question 7

How is subjectivism a critism of Schleiermacher?

Answer 7

As he removes the need for reason and empiricism he puts too much emphasis on subjectivism which may effect dialogue between his argument and the “outside world.” It would also be dangerous to the possibility of allowing any alleged religious experience as valid even one that had been caused by drugs or hallucinations.

Question 8

What does numinous mean?

Answer 8

Otto’s term for an individuals encounter with the holy or God.

Question 9

What does mysterium tremedum et fascinas mean?

Answer 9

For Otto, this was the effect that a religeous experience had on an individual.

Question 10

What was the purpose of Otto’s book, the idea of the holy?

Answer 10

To analyse the difference between a religious experience and a experience.

Question 11

What does irreducible mean?

Answer 11

Something that cannot be reduced or simplified.

Question 12

What type of theory was Otto’s?

Answer 12

A priori

Question 13

How did Otto define a religious experience?

Answer 13

There was an irreducible experience of religion which he called the numinous. This he described as mysterium tremedum et fascinas and is non rational. The experience of the mysterium is what he the complete dependence on what calls the wholly other, God. It is entirely over powering, unapproachable and awe inspiring. It is also attracts the person like a magnet, its shown in concepts like love, mercy and goodness.

Question 14

What does Otto say is the best way to understand the numinous?

Answer 14

While the foundation of religion is the numinous, it also needs a logical framework for people to understand the experience. He studied several religions and concluded that Christianity provided the best way for understanding the numinous.

Question 15

What does mysticism mean?

Answer 15

Where a person feels that he/she is gaining spiritual truth beyond normal understanding as he /she is growing ever closer to God.

Question 16

What are the two types of religious experiences?

Answer 16

Mystical and conversion

Question 17

How does mysticism differ from Otto?

Answer 17

Otto’s notion revolves around an awareness of an absolute power which is wholly other. Mysticism instead doesn’t describe the power they experience as wholly other, many mystics believe to be united with this power. Other mystics still agree that this power feels close and intimate. It also differs as mystics describe the power having numerous other characteristics which Otto’s does not.

Question 18

What book did William James write?

Answer 18

The varieties of religious experience.

Question 19

What does William James call the doctrines and teachings of the Church?

Answer 19

The second religion, he holds it in lesser importance than religious experiences.

Question 20

What four characteristics did William James say a religious experience had to have to make it genuine?

Answer 20

1. Ineffability. 2. Noetic Quality. 3. Transiency. 4. Passivity. These can only be experienced by the person and still need to be verified by others.

Question 21

What did William James mean by ineffability?

Answer 21

They are usually intensely private events that cannot be accurately described to anyone else. St Teresa of Avila stated as such.

Question 22

What did William James mean by noetic quality?

Answer 22

They provide incites into unknowable truths, they are not recognised by the intellect. It gives direct knowledge of God.

Question 23

What did William James mean by transiency?

Answer 23

There is a discrepancy from the amount of time taken in real life then by the mystics experience.

Question 24

What did William James mean by passivity?

Answer 24

They are often characterized by the loss of control from the subject and the feeling of being overwhelmed by another greater power. The mystics did not start the experience but was taken over by a power.

Question 25

What is the difference between dualist and monists views of religeous experiences?

Answer 25

Dualists view the experiences as maintaining a distinction between themselves and God. Monism believes that the distinction between themselves and God is an illusion and mystical experiences allow the subject to appreciate oneness with the divine.

Question 26

What is the story of Dame Julian of Norwich?

Answer 26

She experienced both visions and shewings, mainly of the death of Jesus. Her most famous shewing was when God showed her a round ball the size of a hazlenut in her hand, this ball represented all things that were made, which lead her to believe that we must see all earthly things as meaningless if people wish to know and love God truly. She saw that God made, loved and kept it.

Question 27

What does the story of Dame Julian of Norwich show?

Answer 27

Despite being formally uneducated, she was led to consider other important doctrines through her mystical experiences and also wrote things about the soul. This supports the argument that mystical experiences usually happen to the formally uneducated. This shows supporters of Gods involvement and his love of people of all classes and genders.

Question 28

What are the specific shrewings examples of?

Answer 28

Special revelation as its a type of divine speech.

Question 29

What does Timothy state about scripture?

Answer 29

“All scripture is God breathed.” This is because it is the result of divine speech to the prophets and later His son Jesus.

Question 30

What’s a volitional conversion?

Answer 30

Where the subject gradually develops new religious beliefs aswell as moral and spiritual practices by exposing him/herself to the teaching of a particular religion. This a rational and reflective form of conversion.

Question 31

What is a self surrender conversion?

Answer 31

Where the subject very suddenly and sometimes involuntarily is convinced of the truth of the divine. or the particular religious system to which they convert. This often happens before someone has the sufficient knowledge of a religion to make it a informed and rational choice. These are called born again by some branches of the Christian church. There is often a common process of four stages.

Question 32

What are the common five stages of a self surrender conversion?

Answer 32

1. Before the conversion, the persons lifestyle often contradicts or opposes the ones that are about to come after the conversion. 2 Crisis when the person becomes overwhelmed by a sense of guilt and sin in the presence of God. 3. Repentance. 4. Catharsis where the subject is overwhelmed by a sense of forgiveness and love. 6 After the conversion the person changes their lifestyle and beliefs and this has a positive impact on others.

Question 33

Who was Nicky Cruz?

Answer 33

This is an example of a conversion experience from thiest to religious. He was born in Puerto Rico, his parents were violent and his parents could not control him. When he was 15, his parents sent him to visit an older brother in New York and by aged 16 he became members of a gang named the Mau Maus, where he became their leader after only 6 months. He one day encountered a preacher who told him God loved him and shocked Cruz slapped him. When Cruz heard that the preacher was going to have a evangelistic meeting in the area Cruz decided to go teach him a lesson. However, his message effected Cruz and 25 of his gang all prayed and the preacher asked God to forgive him. After then, Cruz travelled the world talking of his experience and he created the Nicky Cruz outreach foundation.

Question 34

What is the story of Saul of Tarsus?

Answer 34

This is an example of a conversion experience from one religion to another. After the crucifixion of Jesus, Saul had sworn to wipe out Christianity. He travelled to Damascus with a warrant to arrest Jesus followers, when he heard a voice saying, “Saul, Saul why do you persecute me?” Saul was blinded by the light which had appeared at the time for three days, the men with him had heard the voice but not seen the light. For the three days he did not eat or drink anything. At the same time a disciple named Ananias had a vision of Jesus which commanded him to go to Saul. Despite being afraid of Saul he went anyway and he layed his lands on Saul where through him the holy spirit laid his hands on Saul and something like scales fell from his eyes and he was able to see again. Saul converted to and was baptised in Christianity and changed his name to Paul.

Question 35

What is the story of Malcom Muggeridge?

Answer 35

This an example of a gradual conversion. He was a famous journalist, author and producer of well known TV shows at the time. He was born into a agnostic family and had come across a Bible as a boy. He’d studied the gospels intensity and prayed for a sign during his university years to no avail. After university, he gave it up and moved to India discovering in detail other religion but he still upheld the importance of Christianity. He still struggled with faith but put his attentions into socialism. When he married his wife, they viewed their marriage outside of religious expectations so they were both unfaithful to each other but Muggeridge felt guilt ridden every time. He met Mother Teresa which effected him, 13 years after this he accepted himself as a Christian and even later after this both him and his wife were accepted into the Catholic Church.

Question 36

What three distinctive ideas did Swinburne say about religious experience?

Answer 36

1. If God exists, then his nature would make sense that he would want to interact with his creation. 2. The Principle of Credulity- If someone perceives something then what they perceive is probably correct. 3. Principle of testimony- In absence of special considerations, the experiences of others are probably as they report them.

Question 37

What are Swinburne’s 5 special considerations?

Answer 37

1. We know the object was not there. 2. We know the person was a known liar. 3. The person reporting was under psychological stress. 4. The person had consumed alcohol or drugs. 5. The person is prone to hallucination and mistaken perception.

Question 38

What is Swiburnes burden of truth?

Answer 38

He places it on those who doubt religeous experiences as he blieves that unless we have proof that it os not true then we have to accept them as truth. This is because he believes that it is phillisophical prejudice to judge religeious experiences by a different standard from non religious experineces. All beliefs of perception are prima facie justified.

Question 39

What is Swiburnes cumalitive argument?

Answer 39

Many people have claimed to have a religious experience, many in great detail, so the sheer weight of testimonial counts as strong evidence for the existence of God. For example, St Paul’s religious experience effected so many people and he did not benefit from making it up so it had to be real.

Question 40

How can AJ Ayer disprove Swinburnes argument?

Answer 40

His verification principle says that all true things are either analytical (true by meaning) or empirically verifiable (can be observed.) Therefore if you can’t define a religious experience there is no point trying to understand it.

Question 41

What is the neuro physical explanation for religious experiences?

Answer 41

It could be a result of a temporal lobe seizure. There are entire categories of seizures that can cause a number of different symptoms. These experiences are entirely subjective and could be interpreted by a religious believer as a religious experience.

Question 42

What is Feuerbachs explanation for religious experiences?

Question 43

What is Frueds explanation for religious experiences?

Answer 43

Religeon is a form of neutric illness. Religeon is therefore a form of wish fulfillment and religious experiences are hallucinations and illusions