Religious Experience – The Key features for Mysticism and Near

Death Experiences

By the end of this lesson you will:

• Have been introduced to some of the key features of Religious Experience based

on Wendy Dossett’sReligious Experience

• Have started to think of ideas for your own essay

• Have seen where your reading material can guide

you= would be very good to talk about this in your essay

Experience

• Definition:

• 1. practical contact with and observation of facts or events.

• Question: How might we determine a religious experience as being specifically religious?

Religious Experiences

• Make a list of experiences which can be seen as religious, but others will see as normal on your post it notes

• What do you think an experience has to have to make it specifically religious?

Summary: Key features of a religious experience

• 1. A religious experience is when a person has an experience of God or another religious figure.

• 2. Religious experiences can happen anywhere.• 3. There is usually an overwhelming sense of

God's presence (numinous).• 4. The experience may lead to someone believing

in God (conversion).• 5. God may do something unusual (miracle)• 6. A person might experience God in a direct and

unique way (mystical experience).

Ninian Smart

• Claims that all religions have 6 dimensions, one of which is experience:

• ‘The experiential and emotional dimension’

• This is the personal and the collective experience of ‘the absolute’

• It is ‘the food’ on which the other dimensions feed

• He goes on to link the experiential with the emotional

• He points to feelings of love, awe, peace, gratitude and hope which give an experiential basis to their engagement with religion

Near death experiences

• You might want to focus on the features of near death experiences and state how people experience similar things when they nearly die. You can find people discussing their experiences on YouTube/TV programmes for this.

Raymond Moody – Life after Life

• His famous study into the features of religious experience used near death experience in 1975

• He used a large number of case studies to find common features:• Joyful• Ineffability• Feelings of peace and quiet or a really dramatic noise• They had out of body experiences• They encountered deceased relatives• Relatives would often tell them to ‘go back’• There is a ‘being of light’• A life review• A profound impact is placed on the person after the event

Marete Jacobsen – Negative Religious Experiences

• Controversially said that a feature of religious experience, particularly through near death experience, are defined as having features of:

• Fear

• Hell

• Spirits

• Horrific visions

Mysticism

• You might want to focus on the features of mysticism and state how the following mystics experienced these features:

• Julian of Norwich

• St Teresa of Avila

• John of the cross

So what are the general features of ‘religious’ experience…

• Mystical (Schleiermacher / William James)• In his book On Religion: speeches to its cultured despisers (1799),

Schleiermacher described religious experience in this way:

• ‘The contemplation of the pious is the immediate consciousness of universal existence of all finite things, in and through the Infinite, and of all temporal things in and through the Eternal.’

• A mystical experience is one in which a person may sense the underlying unity of everything, going beyond all conventional barriers between the individual self and the external world. It can produce a very deep sense of joy, of 'being at home', of being at one with nature and of seeing a truth that cannot be put into words.

William James [Features - PINT]

• Passitivity; A strong sense of being taken over.• Ineffibility; a state of experience unlike nothing

else and the experience is too difficult to describe. [Christians believe that God is incomprehensible].

• Noetic quality; Experiences reveal insights that are beyond human reason and understanding. [Eg. Isaiah's experience in the temple in Jerusalem]

• Transiency; Experiences don’t last long and are imperfectly remembered

William James - PINT

• ‘I find it difficult to describe my experience, only to say that it seems outside of me and enormous and yet at the same time I am part of it, everything is. It is purely personal and helps me to live and love others. It is difficult to describe, but in some way because of this feeling I feel united to all people, to all living things. Of recent years the feeling has become so strong that I am now training to become a social worker because I find that I must help people: in some way I feel their unhappiness as my own’

• Jim Carey’s experience

William James

• How useful are these elements in understanding religious experience in Christianity or another religion?

• What is the importance of personal ‘experience’ as opposed to received tradition?

Caroline Frank-Davies

• Interpretive:• An experience which is interpreted in a religious

way• Quasi-sensory:• It comes to the recipient through a sense• Revelatory:• It reveals something to the recipient – extra

knowledge• Numinous:• A sacred or holy feeling is gained by the recipient

St Teresa of Avila

• 1. It should be within the realms of the Catholic Church

• 2. It must be discussed with a spiritual advisor

• 3. It must change you forever

W. T Stace

• Introvertive – looking inwards at ones own experience

• Objective – Outward circumstances: “lovely the woods, waters, meadows” – GERARD HOPKINS. Its all down to God.

Paul Tillich

• Describes a mystical experience in 2 stages:

• 1. An objective event / encounter followed by a special understanding of that event, revealing its religious significance

• 2. A divine union with God

• Loss of self, feel in Gods ecstasy

Task

• Go through your orange booklets and get pages which would be useful to reference/read in your exam. Not all of the text will be useful for this question

• Make a note of the relevant pages

• Look out for phrases such as ‘features/characteristics/elements’

Book pages – AO1

• Brian Davies: 7-12• Jordan, Locke & Taylor: 1-8• Palmer et al: 4-11• Patrick Clarke: 4-8• Richard Swinburne: 0-5• Robert Kirkwood: 0-1• Webber: 1• Mel Thompson: 2-4, 10-13, 18-25• Matthew Taylor: 8-11• Peter Cole: 1-2