Religious Experience

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Chapter 11

• Religious Experience

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The Messenger of God said, While I was sleeping
in the Hijr, Gabriel the angel came and stirred
me with his foot . . . He brought me out to the
door of the shrine and there was a white animal,
half mule half donkey, with wings on its side.
The messenger and Gabriel went their way until
they arrived at the shrine at Jerusalem. There
he found Abraham, Moses, and Jesus among a
company of the prophets. --Islam Muhammads
Night Journey
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Beyond the sense, beyond the understanding,
beyond all expression, is the Fourth aspect of
Self. It is pure unitary consciousness, wherein
awareness of the world and of multiplicity is
completely obliterate. It is ineffable
peace. Hinduism Mandukya Upanishad.
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Zen monk Koshu went without food or sleep,
giving himself up to constant zazen, often crying
out in his torment . . . At last Koshu admitted
his failure and, determined to make an end of it,
advanced to the railing and slowly lifted a leg
over it. At that very instant he had an
awakening. Zen Buddhism An enlightenment account.
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I was all by myself, left on the hilltop for four
days and nights without food or water . . . Of
course, when it was all over, I would no longer
be a boy, but a man. I would have had my
vision. --Lakota Sioux Religion Vision Quest
account of John Fire Lame Deer.
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About a quarter before nine, while the
preacher was describing the change which God
works in the heart through faith in Christ, I
felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did
trust in Christ, Christ alone, for my salvation
and an assurance was given me that He had taken
my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of
sin and death. --Christianity John Wesleys
conversion account
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My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
When can I go and meet with God? My tears have
been my food day and night, while men say to me
all day long, Where is your God? --Judaism
Psalm 42
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You may be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of
mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an
underdone potato. Theres more of gravy than of
grave about you, whatever you are. --Ebenezer
Scrooge to the ghost of Jacob Marley in Charles
Dickens A Christmas Carol.
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John Wesley seems to be describing a religious
experience of regeneration, or being born
again. could you describe this kind of
experience in your own words? Have you had
similar experiences, maybe not even religious
ones? Do you know many people who have had
religious experiences, or are they pretty rare?
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Tradition says that Muhammad was taken away on a
strange beast like a flying horse to Jerusalem,
as related in the first quote. Look also at the
picture of St. Frances receiving the stigmata
(??). Could such stories be real? Could we
verify them? Do we need to?
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Note that the psalmist in the sixth quote talks
of his thirst and unhappiness. Look also at the
picture of the prophet Jeremiah, famous for his
lamentations. Are some religious experiences
not very pleasant? Are they still religious
experiences?
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In the second quote, the Hindu doctrine describes
an awakening of deeper consciousness within
oneself, completely apart form sensory, worldly,
external experience. But St. Paul in the
painting was knocked to the ground by a vision of
Christ, thus dramatically changed, he would say,
by something outside himself, namely Jesus. Is
religious experience inside or outside? Is
it something we do to ourselves or something done
to us by an outside power? Is it both?
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The Buddha in the picture sat in perfect peace
and tranquility while around him danced the
flames of Mara, the tempter. Similarly,
Gomatesvara, the saint of Jainism, stood in
perfect quiet for so long that vines grew up
around him. Would you expect such peace and
quite to be a standard kind of religious
experience? Or should religious experience be
more exciting, more dramatic, and more
passionate? Compare again to Jeremiahs sorrow
or Muhammads vision.
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Koshu, the Zen Buddhist, achieved his
enlightenment experience finally after days of
hunger and struggle. the Vision Quest tradition
of the Sioux Indians, too, includes fasting and
isolation. Consider how much struggle and effort
and self-deprivation goes into such experiences.
Does this show how powerful our visions can be,
or does it make them seem like matters of
self-hypnosis?
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In the famous line from Dickens A Christmas
Carol, Scrooge sees the ghost of Jacob Marley but
attributes it to bad digestion. Might all
religious experience similarly just be matters of
physical changes in the body such as changes in
brain chemistry? How could we tell? Is
Scrooge reasonable, or is he too skeptical?
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Religious experience is . . . the noncognitive,
emotional, and impassioned parts of religious
life, not just what we think or do in religion
but how we feel our religion. (Richter, p. 283)
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As weve seen, religious experience is often
central to the founding of a religion or
religious movement Buddha Saul of
Tarsus/Paul Muhammad Joseph Smith ???? Scholars
define a commissioning experience as an
encounter with the Holly that leaves the believer
with a sense that he must carry out a special
mission.? To what extent are these experiences
transferable?
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Experiencing Ottos mysterium tremendum

• Sometimes the experience of the holy includes
  feelings of fear, terror, wonder, awe, delight,
  awesome presence, worship of grandeur
  confrontation, the Sacred as a raging storm.
• Other times it includes peacefulness, quiet,
  restfulness, oneness, loss of identity, loss of
  language, the Sacred as a quiet ocean.

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Two Poles of Religious Experience
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Religious Systems Associated withTwo Poles of
Religious Experience
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Two-types of Experience
Combinations e.g., some forms of Mahayana
Buddhism, Medieval Christianity, Taoism, etc.
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Similarities
Do these differing experiences apply to the same
entity? Are nirvana and the Divine one?
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Numinous/Contemplative and Other Human Experience

• Numinous describes the apprehension of an
  external powerinterplay between individual and
  environment (e.g., in early polytheism)
• Contemplative state lies within the
  individualevolution, pure consciousness,
  self-awareness of the universe

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Experience and Context
Is there a kind of perennial mystical experience,
or . . . Does every tradition have particular
diversities?
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Religious experience . . . Projection? Oceanic
feeling?
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Experiencing as . . . (John Hick)
Numinous Experience-gt Vision of the Divine
(e.g. as Creator)-gt Continuing Disposition
(God in nature)
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Experiencing as . . . (John Hick)
Numinous Experience-gt (High) experience of
nirvana-gt Vision of the Divine (e.g., as
Creator)-gt coming-to-see (e.g., truth of
Buddhas analysis)-gt Continuing Disposition
(God in nature) disposition to see the world in
that way
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Some Ramifications

• In both pre-Protestant Christianity and Buddhism,
  contemplation has generated monasticism
• While Protestantism could have generated more
  contemplation, until recently it has emphasized
  bhakti.
• In general, highly ritual systems generate
  hierarchies and elites, but almost everywhere
  movements try to break through the ritual mould
  to some kind of immediate experience/encounter
• The contemplative impulse towards asceticism and
  celibacy will create tensions in traditions that
  emphasize family life (e.g., Judaism, Islam,
  Hinduism, and some Protestantisms)
• Both poles can emphasize a sense of love the
  numinous Holy One dispenses love and grace and
  receives the same via bhakti seems to come from
  a sense of the divine and of union
• The numinous can attach to non-Divine figures
  (e.g., the Virgin of Guadalupe)
• Dreams can be interpreted as religious experience
  (vision)
• Healing can be interpreted as a religious
  experience

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Summary

• We can plot religious experience on two poles
  the numinous and the contemplative
• We can delineate three forms for each of those
  two poles numinous experience, divine
  conversion, divine disposition contemplative
  experience, luminous conversion, luminous
  disposition
• Panenhenic experience seems to be another
  possibility
• When considering religious experience, it may be
  helpful to analyze the kinds of experiences that
  gave rise to, spawned from, or coincided with
  particular rituals, doctrines, and practices
• It may be helpful to treat religious experience
  phenomenologically rather than either accepting
  or dismissing it in an a priori way.

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William James could speak of the sick and the
healthy soul. This was not how James evaluated
those persons, but rather how they self-evaluate
in the presence of the Holy. The sick soul feels
inadequate, divided, burdened. The healthy soul
feels more a sense of incompleteness than a
since of sinfulness.
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Three Experiences of the Holy

• God distinct from the world. (Judaism,
  Christianity, Islam)
• All nature participates harmoniously in the
  wholeness of the Tao, then life, death, joy, and
  suffering are all just part of the system.
  (Taoism)
• The one reality is Brahman (the Ultimate) and the
  world is a trap, seduction, or illusion.
  (Hinduism, Buddhism?)

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Evaluating Religious Experience

• My friend was raised Christian but found it
  boring. Finally, he discovered Buddhism and
  found peace of mind. Are Buddhist teachings
  therefore true?
• My friend had a powerful conversion experience
  that had him weeping and shaking. He felt
  terrible burdens of sin until that day, and then
  he felt born again. Does this indeed show, as
  he claims, that Jesus is alive and loves him?
• My friend was a jerk many people thought so.
  Then, upon being converted to a hare Krishna
  group, we all agreed that he had become a
  remarkably nice guy. Does that make his
  religious claims about the divinity of Krishna
  more believable?
• My friend was an alcoholic and then, upon going
  to a Pentecostal Christian meeting, was
  miraculously healed. She has not drunk since.
  Is her faith in the power of the Holy Spirit
  therefore justified? Is her belief true?
• I saw Jesus in a vision, walking down the road.
  Should anyone believe me? Does it make a
  difference that I am usually a very calm and
  reasonable person?

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Evaluating Religious Experience (cont.)

• I and several other people saw this vision. What
  if there were three of us? What if there were
  500? Does that make the claims about the vision,
  or about Jesus, more believable?
• My friend had a cancerous liver. The priest went
  in and anointed her with oil, laid hands on her,
  and the next day the cancer was gone. Doctors
  were amazed. Is her religious belief therefore
  justified? True?
• We have a video of the parting of the Red Sea.
  Does this prove that the Red Sea parted or, even
  if it did part, does the video prove God parted
  it?

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Factors in Evaluating

• Subjective vs. Objective Experiences
• Self-induced Experiences
• Neuroscience and Religious Experience
• Religious Traditions and Experience

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Globalization and Experience

• Does religious experience contribute to our view
  of the world and thus to our impact on the
  eco-system?
• Christianity emphasizes domination.
• The First Axial period emphasized the split
  between heaven and earth.
• New responses Miller, Teilhard de Chardin,???.

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Spirituality in America