Religious experience Flashcards
what is a religious experience?
A subjective experience which is interpreted within a religious framework.
Types of visions
Corporeal
Imaginative
Intellectual
What are corporeal visions?
-empirical
-involving sense experience, particularly vision and hearing
-the eyes sees a supernatural vision that is really present and the experiencer can interact with what is seen and heard
Examples of corporeal visions
-Bernadette Subirious at Lourdes. 2 weeks of visions claimed to see Mary, most focused on the need for prayer and penance.
-Visions told her to “drink of the water of the spring”, as an act of penance. The water was no longer muddy but clear the next day.
-“I am the immaculate conception”.
What are imaginative visions?
-seen by the eye of the kind rather than by direct sight
-usually in dreams
-beyond the control of the experiencer
Examples of imaginative visions
Pharaoh’s dream in Genesis 41 - Phaoraoh had dreams symbolising what God was about to do (e.g 7 years of good harvest followed by 7 years of famine - gave Pharaoh time to store grain for the famine.)
What are intellectual visions?
-have no image
-what is experienced is ‘seen as it really is’
-the light of an intellectual vision is through illumination of the soul
Example of intellectual vision
Teresa of Auila - claimed to see Jesus as he really was, not as an image but as a presence.
“I saw nothing with the eyes of the body, nothinf with the eyes of the soul”.
What is Otto’s idea of numinous experience?
-Experiences of awe and wonder in the prescence of an almighty and transcendent God
-Our feelings about the numinous are ‘sui generis’ (of their own kind).
-Numinous feelings are unique feelings that recognise the holy and respond to it. They are non-rational as we cannot reason our way to understanding them.
-“Mysterium Tremendum et Fascinans”
What is Mysterium Tremendum et Fascinans?
Give an example of a numinous experience.
-Fearful and fascinating mystery.
-Focuses on God as transcendent; God is so far removed from humanity that we must approach him with numinous awe and fascination.
The Call of Moses - Exodus. It was Moses’ experience with the Holy through a burning bush.
Rudolf Otto’s ‘Idea of the Holy’
2 quotes
-God’s essence is holy
-God is numinous and transcendent
-It shows it is fundamental to religion that individuals should have a sense of a personal encounter with nature.
“There is no religion in which it does not live as the innermost core and without it no religion would be worthy of the name” - Otto
“An experience of the wholly other” - Otto
3 main qualities of the Divine according to Otto
-Mysterious (God is incomprehensible, can never be fully captured).
-God is of ultimate importance
-God has a quality that is both attractive and dangerous; God can’t be controlled.
The individual feels a certain sense of privelages during a religious experience
What does Otto mean by the ‘Wholly Other’?
God is not among beings but rather a completely different order from anything in ordinary experience.
Who’s ideas was Otto developing
-Schleiermacher
-The essence of religion is in personal experience.
-Religious experience is ‘self-authenticating’, it requires no other testing to see. if it’s genuine.
-Believed feeling and experience were all-important and “the feeling of absolute dependence”.
How does Otoo define a numinous experience (quote)?
“Non-rational, non-sensory experience or feeling whose primary and immediate object is outside the self”.
What were Walter Stace’s ideas
-Genuine mystical experience is a non-sensuous and non-intellectual union with the divine.
-Visions + voices are not mystical experiences.
-2 types of mystical experience: introvertive + extrovertive
What are Stace’s 2 types of mystical experience?
Extrovertive = objects in the world are transfigured so that the non-sensuous unity shines through them.
Introvertive = achieves the total suppression of sense-experience in which awareness of the world is completely obliterated. Ordinary consciousness is replaced by mystical consciousness.
Stace key quote
‘Either God is a mystery or He is nothing at all. To ask for proof of the existence of God is on par with asking for a proof of the existence of beauty’
What are William James’ 7 parts of mystical experience?
1-Religious experience came from a factually existing God.
2-God is not the being described by Christian-Judeao teaching.
3-Religious life involves 3 beliefs: there is a higher/spiritual universe, the end of humanity is union with it, and prayer is purposeful because it makes people feel better.
4-Religious experience has psychological benefits as it gives life meaning.
5-Mystical experiences must be ineffable, noetic, passive and transcient.
6-Some religious experiences are more significant than others.
7-The purpose of religious experience is so God meets the individual on the basis of their personal concerns.
Define James’ ideas: ineffable, noetic, passive and transcient.
Passive= can’t control what happens
Ineffable= can’t be described in words
Noetic= experiences are states of spiritual and non-transferable knowledge, as well as feelings.
Transcient= actual experience is short but effects are long lasting.
Criticisms of James
-Some normal experiences can be passive e.g childbirth
-He doesn’t try to capture anything specific about NML
What is the difference between numinous and mystical experiences?
Numinous experience is the feeling/awareness of being in the presence of soemthing greater.
-Mystical experiences are where the recipient feels a sense of union and oneness with the divine, or in James’ case IS united with the divine.
How does Freud challenge religious experience?
-Argued religion is wish-fulfilment by the unconscious mind.
-Idea of God helps us control fear of the unknown and death.
-Religious experiences are simply hallucinations.
What are challenges of RE from science?
-Temporal Lobe Epilepsy (suggested for Paul’a vision on the road to Damascus).
-God Helmet (neuroscience shows REs can be stimulated through devices).
-Psychological/medical explanations.
-Freud claimed visions were just illusions created by subconscious fears and desires.
How does Walter Pahnke support the idea that experiences can occur due to drugs?
-1962
-Conducted a scientific study of 20 theology students at Harvard Divinity School, known as the ‘Good Friday Experiment’.
-Ten were given the drug psilocybin while the others were given a placebo. -Those who took the drug experienced feelings very similar to those induced by the ‘God Helmet, which provides further evidence that religious experience is produced by a particular state of the brain.
What scientific diagnosis is assumed for St Paul?
If you read the accounts of his conversion from Judaism to being a follower of Christ you will see that his conversion was accompanied by seeing light, having visions, hearing voices, suddenly falling to the floor and temporary blindness - all of which can be associated with TLE.
Philosophical challenges of RE
-Only have word that the experience took place.
-REs are subjective and person, not objectively real (Wittgenstein/Hick)
-Inability to describe them implied they aren’t real.
-James said there was a fine line between mysticism and insanity.
-Elitist, only some have that intimate connection with God.
Religious responses to criticism
-Group experience = wider evidence
-Difficult to explain doesn’t mean not real.
-Many people in all walks of life have claimed to have them.
-Vatican II claims mysticism is open to all.
-God communicates through the brain so neuroscience doesn’t prove anything as it is God’s doing.
-God may work through peoples conditions such as TLE.
What is the Principle of Credulity?
-Swinburne
-“What one seems to perceive is probably so” (Swinburne)
-If it seems to someone that X is present, then X is probably present.
-We must accept what appears to be the case unless we have clear evidence to the contrary.
What is the Principle of Testimony?
-Swinburne
-Counterpart to Principle of Credulity
-“The experiences of others are probably as they report them” (Swinburne)
-We should believe what people tell us, provided there are no particular reasons not to.
What percentage of people claim to have had a mystical, spiritual or religious experience?
30-40%
