Religious Experience

Question 1

St Augustine classified visions into 3 categories, what were these 3 categories?

Answer 1

• Corporeal
• Imaginative
• Intellectual

Question 2

What is a corporeal vision?

Answer 2

Visions that come through the physical sense of sight making them empirical experiences and often supernatural experiences

Question 3

What is an example of a corporeal vision?

Answer 3

Bernadette of Lourdes’ 18 vision of the Immaculate Conception

Question 4

What is an imaginative vision?

Answer 4

Visions that are seen through the ‘minds eye’ often in the medium of a dream

Question 5

What is an example of an imaginative vision?

Answer 5

Joseph’s dream in which he was told that Mary was pregnant through the Holy Spirit and that he had to marry her

Question 6

What is an intellectual vision?

Answer 6

Visions that have no real imagery and rather illuminate/expand/enlighten the soul of the person who underwent the experience

Question 7

What is an example of an intellectual experience?

Answer 7

Teresa of Avila was a mystic and had many of these visions

Question 8

What is a quote from Teresa of Avila?

Answer 8

‘I saw Christ close by me…I saw nothing with the eyes of the body, nothing with the eyes of the soul’
(The Life of St Teresa of Jesus of the Jesus of The Order of Our Lady of Carmel)

Question 9

What are numinous experiences and it’s key thinker?

Answer 9

Numinous experiences are experiences of the ‘wholly other’ with the main thinker being Rudolf Otto

Question 10

What is a quote from Isaiah 6;3?

Answer 10

‘Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory’

Question 11

Why does Otto see Isaiah 6:3 as an example of a numinous experience?

Answer 11

• It is an experience that is the basis of genuine religion
• It is a non rational and unique form of experience outside of everyday experience
• It is a sense of the wholly other
• Emphasis is on God’s transcendence
• It refers to a presence and reality that cannot be understood with our current senses or intellect

Question 12

What is Otto’s book called?

Answer 12

The Idea of the Holy

Question 13

What does the word holy mean?

Answer 13

‘other than’/’separate from’; expressing the absolute distinctness of God from the universe

Question 14

What is Otto’s main idea is his book ‘The Idea of the Holy’?

Answer 14

Otto is attempting to describe the sense some people have of a reality totally outside and beyond their experience of themselves and the world

Question 15

What is the Latin term to describe the complex nature of Numinous Experiences?

Answer 15

Mysterium, Tremendum et Fascinans’

Question 16

What is mysterium?

Answer 16

• Refers to something far removed from humanity that can be experience but not understood
• It elicits the response of awe and wonder

Question 17

What is tremendum?

Answer 17

• Refers to the fearsome experience of God’s overwhelming majesty and energy
• Creates a sense of human nothingness and a reminder of our dependence on God

Question 18

What is fascinans?

Answer 18

• The compulsive and attractive nature of the experience evoking our want for a relationship with his being despite fear
• Creates the awareness for the need of salvation

Question 19

What is a mystical experience?

Answer 19

a subjective experience that is interpretated in a religious framework
(another way to say religious experience)

Question 20

What were some key beliefs of William James?

Answer 20

• Wasn’t a member of any religion but was sympathetic to religion
• Applied insights of science to his research (esp. psychology)
• Saw organised religion arising out of people comparing their religious experiences
• True purpose of humanity is a union with a higher significance

Question 21

What were William James’ 4 criteria for assessing the genuine nature of mystical experiences?

Answer 21

Passivity
Ineffability
Noetic Quality
Transiency

Question 22

What does James mean by the experience have an element of passivity?

Answer 22

The mystic who is experiencing the experience cannot have any will over what happens in the experience. This could lead to unusual activity such as Teresa of Avila levitating but the mystic must be completely passive and in submission to the higher power controlling the experience

Question 23

What does James mean by the experience have an element of ineffability?

Answer 23

The experience must be private and really only make sense to other mystics. The experience cannot truly be put into words or explained

Question 24

What does James mean by the experience have an element of noetic quality?

Answer 24

The experience must give a genuine insight into truths and consist of non ration and intuitive knowledge rather than intellectual knowledge

Question 25

What does James mean by the experience have an element of transiency?

Answer 25

The experience must be short and hard to reproduce in memory but must hold high value to the individual such as potentially changing their lives

Question 26

What were some of Walter Stace's key beliefs?

Answer 26

- Saw no real point in attempting rational proofs of God's existence as God is either a mystery or nothing at all - He saw the goal of all religious experiences as a union with God - Mysticism has nothing to do with occult, parapsychology, vision or auditory experiences

Question 27

What were the two mystical experiences that Stace identified?

Answer 27

- Introvertive Mystical Experiences - Extrovertive Mystical Experiences

Question 28

What are the common features of both of Stace's experiences?

Answer 28

- Sense of reality - Sense of absolute peave - Sense of the holy - Experience of paradox - An ineffable experience

Question 29

What are the two different features of an introvertive and extortive experience?

Answer 29

Introvertive: pure consciousness and non-spatial and non-temporal Extrovertive: all things are one and there is a sense of the one as inner subjectivity

Question 30

What are key characteristics of introvertive mystical experiences?

Answer 30

- Ultimate mystical experience - Sense experience is completely suppressed - No awareness of the world - No intellectual function - Ordinary human consciousness is replaced with mystical consciousness in which the 'I' is absent

Question 31

What are key characteristics of extrovertive mystical experiences?

Answer 31

- Stace saw the extrovertive experience as a halfway house to introvertive experiences - Normal objects are seen with the physical sense but they are transfigured so that the non-sensuous unity of all things shines through them

Question 32

What are some challenges from philosophy and theology about religious experience?

Answer 32

- We only have the word of the experient that the experience took place making them highly personal and subjective - Inability to describe experiences suggests they are not real - James said there was a fine line between mysticism and insanity - Religious experiences are so alien to the experiences of ordinary people it cannot be believed - Mystical experience appear to be elitist

Question 33

What are some responses to the challenges posed by philosophy and theology about religious experiences?

Answer 33

- William James pragmatic approach claimed that the transforming effect of such experiences on people's lives was a testimony to their genuineness - Group Experiences can provide wider and more potential evidence (Nebraska Church) (Miracle on the Hudson) - Ineffability is a key characteristic of mystical exp but it doesn't mean they are fake - All walks of life have experience some kind of 'religious' experience - According to Vatican II, mysticism is a gift open to all yet only a few are prepared to engage in the discipline and effort required

Question 34

What did Freud say about visions?

Answer 34

Freud claimed visions were just illusions created by subconscious fears and desire. They are at best signs of immaturity and at worst symptoms of mental illness/disorder

Question 35

How did Jung challenge Freud?

Answer 35

Jung argued that visions of sane people were not necessarily delusions as they often had beneficial results for the experient

Question 36

How does neuroscience propose a challenge to religious experience?

Answer 36

Neurotheology can show that religious experiences can be stimulated through devices such as the God Helmet - stimulating the temporal lobes leading to experiences akin to those of religious. -> Entheogens can also provide similar results to those induced by the God Helmet

Question 37

What is a response to challenge proposed by neuroscience?

Answer 37

- Just we can stimulate or explain experiences, does not mean they aren't real - Maybe God chose to communicate with someone during their states even they were forced to experience God as he is the ultimate giver of mercy - God's communication with humanity has to processed by the brain, neuroscience cannot ultimately prove that religious experience are just a faction of the brain - The mind can also generate such experiences and spiritual discipline may be what is needed to communicate with God linking back to Vatican II that mysticism is a gift open to all yet only a few are prepared to engage

Question 38

What is a challenge to Paul's vision on the road to Damascus?

Answer 38

Temporal Lobe epilepsy can explain Paul's conversion experience. The description given in Acts 9:3-9 fit with the features of the condition

Question 39

What is a response to the challenge made to Paul's vision?

Answer 39

Perhaps God works through people's conditions. The 'thorn in the flesh' that Paul said he suffered may also be explain in other ways showing there's no definitive cause or explanation for Act 9:3-9

Question 40

Who came up with the idea of credulity and testimony?

Answer 40

Richard Swinburne

Question 41

What does Swinburne mean by credulity?

Answer 41

In the absence of special considerations, how things seem to person is how they actually are. aka this is about the believability of the individual's own personal and private experience

Question 42

What does Swinburne mean by testimony?

Answer 42

In the absence of special considerations, we should believe what people tell us. aka this is about the reliability of what others claim about their personal experiences

Question 43

What was Swinburne's four special considerations?

Answer 43

1) If the person claiming the experience has been know to tell lies 2) If the claims seems beyond the realms of possibility 3) It is very difficult to show that God was present 4) Other explanations to the experience

Question 44

What are some rejections to the special considerations?

Answer 44

- Just because someone lied in the past, does not mean the person is lying now - Just because one claim is false does not mean all other claims are false - If God is everywhere and underpins all processes, how can we can say he wasn't there or say there are pther explanations?

Question 45

What are some criticism against Swinburne's approach?

Answer 45

- It is a huge leap to go from saying that normal observable sense experiences are reliable to claim the same for metaphysical experiences. - Others can confirm claim about ordinary sense experiences but religious experience are typically private and cannot be investigated in the same way - Even if every experient was convinced God was present, it doesn't mean God is actually the explanation

Question 46

What are some supporting points to Swinburne's approach?

Answer 46

- As William James argued, the transformation in lifestyle can prove the genuineness of religious experiences - People who undergo similar experience typically have similar transformations giving further support - The argument for the existence of God from religious experiences is a strong argument strengthened by inductive arguments

Question 47

How can Abraham's experience show the influence and value of religious experience for religious faith?

Answer 47

- lead to the foundation of faith/religious traditions in Judaism, Islam and Christianity - inspiration and lead others to faith as Abraham was the epitome of loyalty and submission showing the benefits of following God and convinced his wife to trust God - experience was life changing as he left Haran at God's command - places associated with his experience are pilgrimage sites

Question 48

What is a quote from Abraham's experience and it's impact?

Answer 48

Abraham 'believed the Lord, and he credited it to him as righteousness' becoming the perfect example of submission to God by Jews, Muslims and Christians - showing the consequences of being obedient to God

Question 49

Why do some only become certainty of God through a personal experience?

Answer 49

- William James claimed religious experiences come in a wealth of different forms - our consciousness may be multilayered and religious experience may be in one of those deeper layers - many people believe there is more to consciousness that what we experience in the everyday which science agrees with as modern science points to layers behind and beyond what we observe through our senses