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Religious experience - Coggle Diagram
Religious experience
Mystical experiences
- William James believed religion is a personal experience and that religious experience is primarily mystical in nature
- For James, primary experience of the divine was at the heart of religion and came before 'second hand religious life' eg rituals or theology
- A mystical experience is described as a direct experience of God or ultimate reality, a sense of oneness of all things
- St Teresa of Avila (who famously experienced a vision of a spear piercing her side) argued that experiences should be subject to tests to determine whether they are genuine - these tests include whether there is a positive change in the person, whether the experience left the person at peace rather than disturbed, and whether the experience fits with the teachings of the church
- Rudolf Otto described what he called a numinous experience - an experience of awe and wonder in the presence of an almighty God, he argued here we are not so much united with God but aware of our own insignificance in his presence
- However it is a matter of debate whether numinous experiences are a different type of experience or just a type of mystical experience
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James' overview of religious experiences led him to suggest four features common to all religious experiences, particularly mystical experiences:
- Passive - people feeling they were not in control of the experience, and as if another power was acting on them
- Ineffable - the experience is difficult to put into words and is beyond description
- Noetic - the experience provided insight or knowledge of God grasped through intuition - this can be called 'revelation'
- Transient - the experience lasted a short time, often under thirty minutes but the effects of the experience may be long lasting
James' key principles on religious experience
- Pragmatism - James is a pragmatist and believes truth is not something fixed, but rather 'true' is whatever has value for us and works in real life
- Empiricism - Although we cannot empirically verify the experience, the result of the experience is empirical data
- Pluralism - James believed there were similarities between different faiths - these experiences may be interpreted differently based on our own views and belief systems, but if they produce positive effects they are in some sense true
Conversion experiences
William James on conversion
- James argues that conversions are perhaps the strongest evidence for the divine because of their observable effects as they are often life-changing
- Centre of energy - a conversion involves someone altering their beliefs and way of life. It is similar to what may happen gradually over time in what James refers to as the shifting of energies. James uses the example of the President, who while fishing on a day off, gives little thought to political matters - in a religious conversion, religious beliefs and identity come to be at the centre of a person's consciousness
Psychology - there is undoubtedly a psychological explanation of conversion: James suggests that the subconscious may be active in a similar way to when someone is in a hypnotic state, but this psychological explanation doesn't need to be the whole explanation
- James argues the inner self is aware of being divided and unhappy but during conversion to religion becomes unified and happy
James described several 'fruits' of a conversion experience that showed its impact and longevity including:
- A conviction of something beyond the material world
- An immense feeling of elation and freedom
- A feeling of having met a friendly power and responding by self-surrender
- A change in the emphasis of life - more spiritual, charitable, morally aware and with a sense of awe and wonder at the universe
Edwin Starbuck on conversion
- A parallel with adolescence - Starbuck drew parallels between the normal process of development and finding our identity in adolescence
- He found that most conversions occurred between the ages of 14 and 17 years
- All adolescents go through similar stages of a sense of incompetence and anxiety before finding a sense of identity
- Starbuck argues that religious conversion is in fact a 'normal' process of growing up and finding one's identity
- Starbuck identifies two types of conversion: these are volitional conversions - gradual change and slow development of new moral ad spiritual habits, and self-surrender - a sudden, pivotal or crisis experience, followed by a change where religious ideas dramatically replace other dominant ideas
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