Religous Experience Flashcards
3 types of religious experience
Visions
Numinous experiences - R. Otto
Mystical experiences - W. James & W. Stace
3 types of visions
- Corporeal visions
- Imaginative visions
- Intellectual visions
How is each type of vision seen?
Corporeal - sensory, sensed through senses, through the eye of the body.
Imaginative - seen in the mind, the eye of the mind.
Intellectual - seen with the ‘eye of reason’.
What is an example of a corporeal vision?
St Bernadette
Visions of a small young lady claiming to be the virgin Mary, led to the discovery of a spring of water (became the site of miracles - Lourdes)
What is an example of an imaginative vision?
Joseph’s dream.
An angel appeared in a dream, warning him of King Herod’s attempt to kill Jesus & told him to run away with Jesus & Mary to Egypt.
What is an example of an intellectual vision?
St Theresa of Avila
Had a vision of Christ, though didn’t see him, she says she ‘felt’ Jesus at her right hand - claiming that such an experience ‘illuminates the understanding’, and in her case, Jesus made himself ‘present to the soul’.
What did Otto define mystical religious experiences as?
‘Numinous’ - derived from the latin word ‘numen’ meaning divine power.
What are numinous experience an experience of?
Something ‘wholly other’ - unlike anything else.
What did Otto believe too much focus had been put on?
That God could be known through logical argument, rather numinous experiences are non-rational (not irrational, but a way of knowing that doesn’t involve reasoning).
What are the latin/greek words Otto uses to describe numinous experiences that are different to anything else?
Mysterium - the utter indescribable mystery of the experience.
Tremendum - the awe & fear of being in the presence of an overwhelmingly superior being.
Fascinans- despite that fear, being strangely drawn to the experience.
Otto claims numinous experiences are what of any religion ‘worthy of name’?
Numinous experiences are the core of any religion ‘worthy of name’.
For Otto, what is fundamental to true religion?
A sense of a personal encounter with the divine.
What did James mean by ‘mystical’?
Intense & totally immersive.
What do mystical experiences often involve?
A sense of unity with some kind of higher power or even with the universe itself.
What are James’ four criteria which characterises all mystical religious experiences?
Ineffable
- beyond language, cant be put into words.
Noetic
- some sort of knowledge or insight gained.
Transient
- temporary.
Passive
- happens to the person, the person doesn’t make the experience happen.
What does James say that the most useful descriptor of a mystical experience is?
That it ‘defies expression, that no adequate report of its content can be given in words’.
It is ineffable, had to be directly experienced to be appreciated (like music or love).
What is James’ pluralist argument for religious experience?
His four criteria are found in religious experiences globally.
He concludes that mystical are the core of religion, and teachings & practices were ‘second hand’ religion (not what religion is really about).
This makes James a pluralist, the view that all religions are true.
What argument of James’ W. Stace develop? What did he say?
James’ pluralist argument - that all RE are coming from a higher spiritual reality.
Stace claims that this universality of certain features of RE is good evidence that they’re real.
What is James’ pragmatism argument?
It argues against the attempt to dismiss RE as mere hallucinations.
He argued that the validity of RE depended upon the effect it had on people’s lives.
What two types of mystical experience does Walter Stace differentiate?
Extrovertive mystical experiences
Introvertive mystical experiences
What is a extrovertive mystical experience?
It is non sensuous.
The material word is still seen, but with a non sensuous unity.
Everything appears to be unified, division of separate objects is dissolved.
What is an introvertive mystical experience?
It involves the transcendence of all sensory experience.
Our sense of self is replaced by mystical consciousness - we lose the sense that we are a self separate from the world.
The normal intellect is not functioning - it is a non-intellectual experience.
In regard to verifying RE, if RE are private (they occur in our minds) what does this mean?
That we can’t test if they are true, there is no way to verify a RE.
What argument can be used to respond to the claim that we cannot access the validity of RE because they are private to a persons’ mind?
James’ pragmatism argument
- The validity of RE depended upon the effects they had on peoples lives.
What is the challenge of naturalistic explaination?
That we can explain RE through psychological or physiological explanations.
This may be meditation, mental illness, mass hysteria, prayer, drugs, alcohol, fasting, hallucinations etc.
What did Persinger create that can be used as a challenge to RE?
The ‘God helmet’.
It physiologically manipulated people’s brain waves, sometimes causing them to have a ‘RE’ where they felt the presence of unseen beings.
- Showes RE originates from the brain, not something supernatural.
How could someone argue Persinger’s experiment doesn’t disprove a supernatural cause of RE?
Maybe that brain manipulation is the way by which God creates RE.
God can connect with us when our brain is in a certain state - this manipulation may bring about this state.
Who created the principles of credulity & testimony?
Swineburne
What is the principle of credulity & testimony?
Principle of Credulity (yourself)
- Argued that you should believe what you experience unless you have a reason not to.
Principle of Testimony (others)
- Argued that you should believe what others tell you they have experienced unless you have reason not to.
What is experiencing God, for Swineburne?
Experiencing God is evidence for God, unless we have some other evidence to justify dismissing it.
How do RE influence people?
