RUDOLPH OTTO WORKSHEET

numinous: an indescribable experience which invokes feelings of awe, worship and fascination; there is a spiritual quality which suggests the presence of divinity

What did Otto try to identify and what did he want to demonstrate?

• he sought to identify what it was about a religious experience that made it religious and not just an experience

• he wanted to demonstrate that it was fundamentally marked by a person having some form of personal encounter which he described as: ‘mysterium tremendum et fascinans’ » an awe-inspiring fascinating mystery

What three qualities did he say the divine would be recognised as possessing?

• “mysterium”: wholly other, different from anything we experience in ordinary life, produces reaction of silence

• “mysterium tremendum”: provokes terror as it’s overwhelming

• “fascinans”: glorious, compelling

​What were his views about the use of language in describing the divine?

• he believed that the use of numinous describes the quality of theistic religious experiences well

• less useful for exploring other traditions of religious xp

• eg Buddha’s religious XP characterised by calm n detachment over fear n fascination

​Any similarities with Schleiermacher and James?

• Schleiermacher also believe that religious experiences were personal

• the reactive terror that Otto talks of is similar to James’ ineffability