Religious experience

Question 1

What are the forms of religious experiences?

Answer 1

Mystical experience
Conversion experience 
corporate religious experience 
numinous experience 
near- death experience

Question 2

Mystical experiences

Answer 2

• the term mystical refers to the sense of connection with God at a deep personal level, where God is beyond the boundaries of reason and knowledge.
• relatively modern term- used to convey the idea that all religious experiences share in common a sense of divine- expressed in different ways.

Question 3

what are the stages the soul goes through during a mystical experience?

Answer 3

1. devotion of heart- prayer& contemplation.
2. devotion of peace- surrender to God.
3. Devotion of union- Absorption in God.
   4- Devotion of ecstasy- consciousness of the body disappears.

Question 4

The 4 characteristics of a Mystical experience?

Answer 4

1. ineffable- beyond description
2. noetic- reveals something of Gods nature.
3. Transient- temporary with long term consequences
4. passive- recipient& in control.

Question 5

Mysticism conveys what idea?

Answer 5

the idea that the physical world is not all that there is, and that God is the foundation of everything.- God known not through reason but through intuition, through the soul rather than the mind.

Question 6

Mystical experiences can involve what?

Answer 6

seeing visions or hearing voices.

Question 7

well- known mystical experiences include what?

Answer 7

include visions of Julian of Worwich, Teresa of Avila, Francis of Assisi and Bernadette soubirous.

Question 8

what are conversion experiences?

Answer 8

-involve abandoning an old way of life and adopting a new one, based on inner experience.

Question 9

conversion experiences can sometimes be what?

Answer 9

They are dramatic and sometimes gradual.

Question 10

what book describes the pattern of conversion experiences?

Answer 10

HD lewis, book our experience of God.

Question 11

what is the pattern found in may conversion experiences?

first two steps

Answer 11

The individual is dissatisfied with their current ‘system of ideas’.
The person searches for answers e.g by reading scripture or trying out going to church.

Question 12

pattern found in many conversion experiences?

third and fourth steps

Answer 12

There is a point of crisis, which can be emotional, with a sense of the presence of God. The person might see a vision, hear a voice or have a strong sense of forgiveness.
There is a following sense of peace and joy, and keenness to tell others about the experience.

Question 13

pattern found in many conversion experience?

fifth step

Answer 13

In the long-term, there is a change of direction for the person.

Question 14

what does William james say about conversion experiences?

Answer 14

in conversion experiences, something which was once on the edge of a persons consciousness becomes at the centre, and religious aims become a habitual focus of energy.

Question 15

what is well known conversion experience?

Answer 15

include the conversion of St Paul on the road to Damascus.

Question 16

what is a corporate religious experience?

Answer 16

A corporate religious experience is when several different people all have the same religious experience at the same time.

Question 17

What do some people think about corporate religious experiences?

Answer 17

some people think these have more evidential force as there are more witnesses to the experience.

Question 18

what do other people think of corporate religious experiences?

Answer 18

others think that people could be carried along by others’ emotions and that they do not have more evidential force.

Question 19

examples of religious experience?

Answer 19

well- known corporate religious experiences include the story of Pentecost ( acts 2) and modern experiences of the Toronto blessing.

Question 20

What is near death experience?

Answer 20

Near- death experiences are sometimes reported by people whose hearts have stopped beating or who have been comatose.

Question 21

near- death experience?

Answer 21

Near- death experiences are sometimes reported by people whose hearts have stopped beating or who have been comatose.

Question 22

what are similarities in descriptions of a near- death experience?

Answer 22

include a sense of being ‘out of body’, feeling a loving presence or a sense of great peace, and feeling as if travelling through a tunnel towards a bright light.

Question 23

some people see near- death experience as what?

Answer 23

some people see these as evidence of life after death, whilst others are more sceptical and think they are more likely to have a natural, scientific explanation.

Question 24

William james wrote a book called what?

Answer 24

The varieties of Religious Experience (1902)

Question 25

William james aimed to do what?

Answer 25

He aimed to take an objective, scientific approach to religious experience and explore it through collecting peoples own accounts of their experiences.

Question 26

William james thought what?

Answer 26

he thought that religious experience could be tested for validity by its long- lasting effects, just as a medicine can be tested by seeing whether it makes the patient better.

Question 27

James’s approach to understanding truth is what?

Answer 27

pragmatist- he thought that the truth of something could be established by its practical results.

Question 28

William identified four main qualities of religious experience- what is first two?

Answer 28

1. ineffability- difficult to express in normal everyday words.
2. Noetic quality- recipients feel they have learned something they don’t know before.

Question 29

Williams third and forth main qualities of religious experience?

Answer 29

3. Transience- the experiences do not last long although the effects may last a life time.
4. Passivity- The person feels the experience is happening to them rather than that they are doing It.

Question 30

what did james notice?

Answer 30

He noticed that religious experiences feel very convincing to those who have them.

Question 31

what did james conclude?

Answer 31

He concluded that religious experience does not prove anything but that it should be taken seriously.

Question 32

Rudolf Otto wrote what book?

Answer 32

The idea of the Holy (1917)

Question 33

what did Rudolf Otto aimed to explore ?

Answer 33

the nature of the divine as encountered through religious experience.

Question 34

Rudolf Otto thought what was central to religion ?

Answer 34

That people should experience God or the divine.

Question 35

how could the divine be described?

Answer 35

as a ‘mysterium tremendum et fascinans’- an awe- inspiring, fascinating mystery.

Question 36

Otto thought divine has three characteristics in religious experiences, what were these?

Answer 36

1. A quality of mystery making the individual realise that God can never be fully understood.
2. A quality of ultimate importance
3. A quality that is both attractive an dangerous.

Question 37

What are Swinburne’s principles of credulity and testimony?

Answer 37

Swinburne Wrote a book called is there a God? 1979. He argued that people should take religious experience just as seriously as other kinds of experience.

Question 38

In Swinburne’s principle of credulity, he said what?

Answer 38

he said that we should be prepared to trust our own experiences unless we have good reason not to. If it seems to us that we are experiencing God, then we should be prepared to believe that we really are experiencing God

Question 39

In Swinburne’s principle of testimony, he said what?

Answer 39

he said that if people tell us they have had an experience we should be prepared to believe them unless we have good grounds not to.

Question 40

What are non- religious understandings or religious experiences?

Answer 40

psychological interpretations of religious experiences.

Question 41

psychological experiences- who was Ludwig Feuerbach?

Answer 41

he was a very influential in psychological interpretations or religious experience. He argued that God was an invention of the Human mind.

Question 42

Feuerbach took a psychological approach to religious experience, what did he think?

Answer 42

He thought that people transfer all their highest ideals and hopes on to this made-up God and imagine him to be all the things they wish they were themselves.

Question 43

how did Sigmud Freud take a psychological approach to religious experience?

Answer 43

he is a founder of modern psychology, used similar ideas in his interpretation of religion.- he thought the mind was made up of the ego, ID and the superego.

Question 44

Freud thought that the subconscious layers of the mind lead people to what?

Answer 44

the subconscious layers of the mind lead people to believing that there is a God, but this is an ‘infantile neurosis’. They cannot cope with being adults in the world so they make up an imaginary parent figure.

Question 45

Freud believes religious experiences happen when what?

Answer 45

Happen when the sub- conscious intervention takes over the imagination. For Freud, people who have had religious experiences, need psychological treatment.

Question 46

what are physiological interpretations of religious experience?

Answer 46

neurophysiology is the study of the brain and the nervous system.

Question 47

some neurophysiological studies of religious experiences think what?

Answer 47

They suggest that some experiences have a natural cause rather than a supernatural cause.

Question 48

the ‘persinger’s helmet’ is what?

physiological approach

Answer 48

device invented by Michael Persinger in the 1980s which induces feelings similar to those of a religious experience.- could suggest that religious experience is caused by magnetic fields rather than God.

Question 49

studies of near death experiences show what?

Physiological approach

Answer 49

They sometimes show that these sensations can be created artificially. The findings could suggest that near- death experiences are caused by endorphins or other emotion- altering hormones in the body rather than God.