Religious Experience

Question 1

Genuine

Answer 1

By using this term we are not implying that the experience has definitely come from God. We are suggesting that there is nothing to imply that it has been contrived by an individual or individuals.

Question 2

Numinous

Answer 2

The feeling of the ‘holy’ and includes awe, fascination, religious awareness and the smallness of self.

Question 3

Intellectual conversions

Answer 3

A change in the way of thinking about something.

Question 4

Moral conversions

Answer 4

A change in behaviour so that the individual does what is thought to be right.

Question 5

Social conversions

Answer 5

Acceptance of a different way of life or worship.

Question 6

Mystical experience

Answer 6

A direct and intimate experience of God.

Question 7

Divine

Answer 7

Used here to mean a perfect being that is all-powerful and is not comparable to anything human. Such a being is usually referred to as ‘God’.

Question 8

Ineffability

Answer 8

The experience cannot be communicated in normal speech.

Question 9

Noetic

Answer 9

The mind gaining knowledge and understanding.

Question 10

Transciency

Answer 10

Refers to the fact that religious experiences only last for a limited time.

Question 11

Empiricism

Answer 11

The philosophical theory that all knowledge is derived from experience. Experience always means sensory, i.e. The Five Senses

Question 12

Passivity

Answer 12

Refers to the fact that the religious experience occurs without any action on the part of the recipient.

Question 13

Transcendent

Answer 13

God is separate and superior to the physical material world. God is outside space and time.

Question 14

Immanence

Answer 14

God is active in the world.

Question 15

Nature-mysticism

Answer 15

Observing the beauty or vastness of Nature triggers a mystical experience.

Question 16

God-mysticism

Answer 16

Meditating on the attributes of God and the desire to be one with God triggers a mystical experience.

Question 17

Existential judgement

Answer 17

A ‘primary’ question, and is concerned with the nature of something - how it came into existence, what it does and of what it is made.

Question 18

Value judgement

Answer 18

A ‘secondary’ question, and is concerned with the meaning, importance and significance of something.

Question 19

Medical materialism

Answer 19

To try to explain mystical experiences through a medical cause such as epilepsy.

Question 20

Stigmata

Answer 20

Unexplained markings on a person’s body that correspond to the wounds of Christ.

Question 21

Cognitive neuroscience

Answer 21

Neuroscience studies the nervous system, and cognitive neuroscience is the branch of neuroscience that studies the biological foundations of mental phenomena such as religious experiences.

Question 22

Correspondence theory

Answer 22

Tries to verify the statement (theory) by seeing if it matches (corresponds) to the known facts.

Question 23

Coherence theory

Answer 23

Tries to verify the statement (theory) by seeing if it agrees with other truths that have been proved already.

Question 24

Pragmatic theory

Answer 24

Tries to verify the statement (theory) in practical terms through any benefits gained from the experience.

Question 25

Principle of credulity

Answer 25

If a person sees something/someone then it is usually the case that they have seen something/someone.

Question 26

Principle of testimony

Answer 26

Unless you have reliable reasons to doubt what a person says they have experienced then what is said should be accepted as true.

Question 27

Phenomenal world

Answer 27

Is what is known through the appearance of something.

Question 28

Noumenal world

Answer 28

Is what is known by the mind rather than the senses.