religious experience

Question 1

What are the 3 types of religious experiences?

Answer 1

Corporeal, Imaginative + Intellectual

Question 2

What is a corporeal vision?

Answer 2

Empirical; supernatural experiences mediated through physical senses
Visionary sees the figure in the same way someone would see a chair

Question 3

What’s an example of a corporeal vision?

Answer 3

18 visions of Mary that Bernadette of Lourdes saw
Mary identified herself as the ‘Immaculate Conception’

Question 4

What’s an imaginative vision?

Answer 4

Visions mediated through the ‘minds eye’ not physical sight
Often dreams

Question 5

What’s an example of an imaginative vision?

Answer 5

Josephs dream where he was told Mary was preg. through power of Holy Spirit

Question 6

What’s an intellectual vision?

Answer 6

No image, but the subject claims to ‘see’ things as they rlly are
Mystical visions; hard to understand but they enlighten the soul

Question 7

What’s an example of an intellectual vision?

Answer 7

Teresa of Avila - a mystic who saw “nothing with the eyes of the body, nothing with the eyes of the soul” but saw Jesus as he rlly was

Question 8

What’s a numinous experience?

Answer 8

Exp. thats the basis of all gen. religion
Non rational + unique
Sense of the wholly other

Question 9

What is meant by the term ‘holy’?

Answer 9

‘Other than’ ‘Separate from’
Attempt to describe the sense some ppl have of a reality totally beyond their exp. of themselves

Question 10

What is meant by mysterium?

Answer 10

Far removed from humanity

Question 11

What is meant by tremendum?

Answer 11

Fearsome experience of God’s overwhelming energy

Question 12

What is meant by fascinans?

Answer 12

Nature of the experience creates a desire for a relationship w the Being

Question 13

What does Mysterium tremendum et fascinans mean?

Answer 13

Fearful + attractive mystery

Question 14

What did William James believe about religion?

Answer 14

He was sympathetic to it but wasn’t a part of an organised religion

Question 15

What did William James believe organised religion grew from?

Answer 15

People comparing their religious experiences

Question 16

What did William James believe the true purpose of humanist is?

Answer 16

Union w the higher universe that gives this world its significance

Question 17

What is William James’ 4 criteria for assessing the genuine nature of a mystical experience?

Answer 17

Ineffability, Noetic quality, Transiency, Passivity

Question 18

What is meant by ineffability?

Answer 18

Private experience that makes sense only to other mystics

Question 19

What is noetic quality?

Answer 19

The encounter gives a genuine insight into truth

Question 20

What is transiency?

Answer 20

The experience is usually short + it becomes difficult to reproduce the mem. after time

Question 21

What is passivity?

Answer 21

The experience controls the mystic

Question 22

What does William James say about the wide range of mystical experience?

Answer 22

Moving power of music
Deja vu
Drug-induced states where ‘depth beyond depth of truth’ is revealed

Question 23

What did Walter Stace think about Gods existence?

Answer 23

There’s little point in attempting to prove God’s existence
He’s either a mystery or nothing

Question 24

What 2 types of mystical experiences did Walter Stace identify?

Answer 24

Introvertive + extrovertive

Question 25

What is an introvertive experience?

Answer 25

Sense experience = suppressed No awareness of world No intellectual function

Question 26

What is an extrovertive experience?

Answer 26

Normal objects are seen w the physical senses but they're transfigured so the non-sensuous unity shines through

Question 27

What did Sigmund Freud say about religion?

Answer 27

It's 'wish fulfilment' God helps control fear of the unknown Religious experiences are hallucinations caused by out need to have control

Question 28

What is hinted at in the New Testament?

Answer 28

St Paul hints at being affected by a condition called a 'thorn in the flesh' but it sounds like temporal lobe epilepsy

Question 29

What are symptoms of TLE?

Answer 29

Temporary blindness, seeing light, having visions, hearing voices

Question 30

What does science of neurotheology show?

Answer 30

Religious experiences are produced by electrical stimulation of temporal lobes in the brain

Question 31

What is said about the God Helmet?

Answer 31

Magnetic coils stimulate temporal lobes Results include experience of mystical states, visions of God etc

Question 32

What is said about drugs + religious experience?

Answer 32

R.E. can be caused by drugs 'Entheogens' - generating the divine within (LSD, mescaline etc)

Question 33

What can a religious believer respond w about TLE?

Answer 33

If God wants ppl to have religious experiences, they have to be processed by the brain An area in the brain needs to be resp.

Question 34

What does Swinburne's principle of credulity (POC) say?

Answer 34

How things seem to be, is the way things really are Believability of a persons experience

Question 35

What does Swinburne's principle of testimony (POT) say?

Answer 35

Where there's no spec. consideration, we should believe what ppl tell Reliability of what ppl claim

Question 36

What are the 4 special considerations of the principle of credulity?

Answer 36

Reliability of the claim, truth of the claim, difficulty showing God was present + what is claimed can be accounted for in other ways

Question 37

What is the meaning of the special consideration: reliability of the claim? What principle does this apply to?

Answer 37

If someone describes a religious experience but has been known to lie in the past then you have good reason to doubt it (POC)

Question 38

What is the meaning of the special consideration: truth of the claim? Which principle does this apply?

Answer 38

Reasonability of the claim (POC)

Question 39

What is meant by the special consideration: difficulty showing God was present? Which principle does this apply to?

Answer 39

Proof of God is difficult (POC)

Question 40

What is meant by the special consideration: what is claimed can be accounted for in other ways? Which principle does this apply to?

Answer 40

Accounted for w medical explanations such as TLE (POC)

Question 41

What is Swinburne's rejection of the 1st special consideration in POC?

Answer 41

It can't be shown that all claims are unreliable just bc someone's lied in the past

Question 42

What is Swinburne's rejection of the 2nd special consideration in POC?

Answer 42

It can't be shown that all claims are untrue just bc its unlikely/unreasonable

Question 43

What is Swinburne's rejection of the 3rd special consideration in POC?

Answer 43

God is supposedly everywhere; so why would we need to prove he was there

Question 44

What is Swinburne's rejection of the 4th special consideration in POC?

Answer 44

God arguably may cause medical conditions that can be used as explanations

Question 45

What is Swinburne's 1st conclusion in POT?

Answer 45

Someone who's had a religious experience of what seems to be God has by POC good reason for believing

Question 46

What is Swinburne's 2nd conclusion in POT?

Answer 46

The testimony of others who report similar experiences supports claims

Question 47

What is Swinburne's 3rd conclusion in POT?

Answer 47

W/o R.E. the prob. of the existence of God would be 50/50; adding testimony of R.E. makes it greater than 50/50