Religious Experience Flashcards
Essay Structure:
“Do religious experiences support the existence of God”
YES:
- Swinburne
- Freud and Marx
- William James
Definition for general Religious Experience:
Spiritual or mystical experience that can be interpreted in a religious framework.
William James’ definition of religious experience:
Feelings and experiences of individual men in their solitude…
As far as they apprehend themselves to stand in relation to whatever they may consider the divine.
Numinous Experience…
Indescribable and feeling of awe
Types of Experience:
Numinous Conversion Corporate Visions/Voices Miracles
Swinburne’s argument…
Reason and type
It’s impossible to refute a religious claim as the experience is private to the person and if that’s what they claim to be God then no further proof is needed.
Cumulative argument
Swinburne’s 5 categories…
- Exp through public object
- Exp through unusual public object
- Exp through private and describable
- Exp through private and indescribable
- Exp not through sensory object
Swinburne’s two ideas reasons to support religious experience…
CREDULITY:
- Believe what people say if no reasonable doubt
- What one perceives is probably so
TESTIMONY:
- Believe people
Evaluation of credulity and testimony:
YES: Believe people in everyday life unless reason to doubt?
NO: Everyday life is different to supernatural events
YES: Brian Davies- if we don’t accept and only criticise we would never have any answers
Swinburne evaluations…
YES: Supported by Toronto blessing as not all could have been on drugs?
NO: People act weird to not feel left out?
YES: There is no evidence so we should accept that the experience is true for that person
YES: Jungle- similar to religion as some believers find God where as others have not yet found God
YES: Millions of people have similar religious experiences
NO: People could be interpreting experiences wrong
YES: Or the people who haven’t had experiences could have but not interpreted them correctly?
Freud’s 5 points…
- Wishful thinking derived from the unconscious which contains repressed memories.
- RE is linked with neurosis and religious practise is similar to neurosis
- Religion is used as a measure of security so people can believe what they wan’t to believe.
- Created God as a father figure
Evaluation of Freud…
NO: There is a psych explanation but that doesn’t discount the experience as mental state is caused by physical things
YES: It does question if experience is from something rather than God
NO: If God created our minds then does that not still make the experience from God
Marx’s 2 points…
Religion is a method used to control people in a conditioned system. The experience is positive as that’s what they want you to think.
Blurred vision of reality like a drug induced state
Evaluation of Marx…
NO: Plurality of experience supports experience. Many intelligent people have experiences.
YES: It does provide another explanation without the use of God
NO: The explanation is no more valid than to say they are from God. No evidence of being socially conditioned.
William James intro:
3
- Series of lectures “Varieties of religious exp”
- Takes an unbias/objective view and doesn’t try to prove God instead tries to prove the experience itself and the effect on people’s lives
- The effect on people’s lives makes an experience valid
