Religious Experience

Mystical experience

An altered state of consciousness with a deep connection with the universe/divine

Who are the two scholars for mystical experiences

William James and Walter stace

William James

19th century philosopher

Father of American psychology

Religious experiences has to have 4 qualities to be mystical experiences:

• Passive (out of your control)

• Ineffable (can’t describe in human language)

• Noetic (new knowledge is gained)

• Transient (temporary)

Walter stace

Expanded William James’ work, came up with extrovertive and introvertive types of mystical experiences

• extrovertive- looks outward onto a physical world

• Introvertive- turns inward, shutting off external presence

Richard Swimburne

• thinks god cannot be proven by logic

• 2 principles (credulity: how things see to us is good grounds to believe it, Testimony: trusting what others say)

• Special considerations (when to reject accounts of religious experience): Unreliable person, unreliable circumstances, strong evidence God was not present, claims can be proven as false

3 types of visions

1. Intellectual - seen by the ‘eye’ of the mind, enables you to see things how they are

2. Imaginative - seen by the minds eye, internal, typically in dreams

3. Corporeal - empirical religious experience that affects the senses

Example of a corporeal vision?

Joan of arc, heard the voice of an angeln

Example of an intellectual vision

St Teresa, a piercing of her heart from an angel, image less spiritual awareness

example of an imaginative vision

Pharaohs dream, couldn’t control his dream containing healthy and unhealthy cowsm

5 main criticisms of religious experience

1. Freud- religion as a neurosis, wish fulfillment, it’s a security blanket

2. J.L Mackie- religious experiences are not valid as not everyone can verify it

3. Temporal lobe epilepsy- Saul → Paul “seeing God” can be described as an epileptic fit

4. Dr Persingers God Helmet- altered the electromagnetic field around the temporal lobes that made a women feel as if her body was being pulled apart

5. Good Friday experiment- double blind drug test, Psilocybin v Vitamin B, some reported experiencing something described as mystical experience

5 counter arguments to the criticisms of religious experience

1. It is not ethical to argue that all people believing in religion are experiencing a neurosis

2. Swimburnes principles of testimony

3. No scientific proof to prove that it was an epileptic fit

4. Brain simulation just shows that brain isn’t the source of religious experiences, a higher being is

5. Psilocybin rarely produces structured experiences as those described