The Demise of Mysticism Today
The positions defended here are these:
•There appear to be genuine mystical experiences, i.e., experiences associated with neurological events that are distinct from those associated with other experiences.
•There appear to be mystical experiences that are empty of all differentiated content.
•If there are transcendent realities and introvertive mystics experience them, the postexperience understanding of the nature of such realities depends in large part on the doctrines of a mystic’s tradition, with input from the experiences themselves; thus, all mystical knowledge-claims involve more than what is experienced.
•We are not in a position to determine if mystical experiences are cognitive or, if they are, to determine which extrovertive and introvertive mystical doctrines are best.
•Mystics can rationally treat their experiences as evidence of some transcendent realities, but they cannot transfer any experienced sense of certainty to their tradition’s doctrines on the nature of such realities, since equally qualified mystics produce genuinely conflicting doctrines, and thus the degree of rationality is lower for holding any tradition’s doctrines.
•Mystical experiences, like all experiences, are grounded in the brain, but this alone is not reason to discredit mystics’ cognitive claims, and so the science of the brain events is not grounds by itself for a natural reduction of these experiences.
•Mystics do not produce one generic “mystical metaphysics,” and mystics are not in a unique position to determine which metaphysical doctrines, if any, are correct.
•Mystical discourse can be coherent, and nonmystics can understand it to a degree.
•Mystics can be rational in their arguments.
•Mysticism and science are different endeavors approaching different aspects of reality, and scientific methods cannot test or support mystical claims or vice versa.
•Mystics’ values and ethics come from outside mystical experiences, but mystical experiences can affect how beliefs and values are seen and applied.
With this lack of certainty on any mystical matter, it may seem that mysticism has little to offer our understanding of the world or our values today. However, the possibility that mystics experience aspects of reality that nonmystics do not cannot be ignored. In addition, depth-mystical experiences may be a pure consciousness—i.e., in that state, the light of consciousness is on but not illuminating anything. If so, this will affect our view of the nature of consciousness even if no transcendent reality is involved, and that could affect the study of the mind. If the mystics’ claim that there is no phenomenal ego is correct, this too would have important implications for what we take to be real. The possibility of an experiential grounding of the religious notions of transcendent realities similarly is important for philosophers and theologians alike to consider, even if we cannot determine the nature of such purported realities. The extreme of mystical selflessness and its implementation in different mystical traditions can expose our underlying values and beliefs. Thus, the study of the mystical beliefs and values of different cultures can expose hidden assumptions of our own beliefs and widen our perspective on possible options. All of this makes studying mysticism interesting and important to understanding our situation in the world today.
But today there are factors in our culture working against taking mysticism seriously. Within academia, those who bother to take a metaphysical position very often adopt naturalism—i.e., the view that all that exists is only what is open in principle to scientific examination. Naturalists can readily accept that genuine mystical experiences occur and can also accept any verified physiological or psychological benefits of meditative practices.1 Indeed, naturalists themselves may have mystical experiences, which they would give a natural explanation.
But naturalists deny classical mysticism’s cognitive claims. They reject all transcendent realities or explanations, since by definition these would be untestable by scientists in any fashion, and hence go beyond science. Thus, they keep introvertive mystical experiences, along with extrovertive experiences, within the phenomenal universe. They may deny that depth-mystical experiences occur that involve truly emptying the mind of all sensory and conceptual content, arguing that all experiences are intentional. And if they do accept such an experience, they would insist that it is either the result of the brain malfunctioning, or at most an awareness of a purely natural self or only a monitoring activity of the mind that continues even in the absence of any processing. That is, consciousness has arisen through the natural forces of evolution, but a depth-mystical experience may be the experience of it in a bare state. Such an event may be of interest to neuroscientists studying how the brain works, but there is no transcendent consciousness or self separate from the body that survives death. Moreover, the experienced sense of joy proves to naturalists that the experience is not cognitive of a transcendent source, since the appalling natural suffering of eons of evolution of animal life proves that this universe is not the creation of a loving being—the bliss results from the purposeless spinning of mental gears when there is no mental content to work on—and that mystics take the bliss as indicating an experience of something transcendent only shows that the experience is misleading them. Naturalists can accept extrovertive mystical experiences as experiences that focus on the sheer beingness of the natural realm, although they may contend that nothing of value is revealed by such experiences since it is not scientifically relevant. All that happens is that the area of the brain responsible for a sense of a boundary between the self and the rest of the universe receives less input and the area attaching importance to events is more active, and so mystics naturally feel more connected to the universe, which in naturalistic metaphysics we in fact are. Nothing about the unreality of the self is exposed, but the self-transcendence valued in spirituality can thereby be achieved, even though this transcendence does not exceed the natural realm. And there are “religious naturalists” today who find aspects of nature as satisfying their religious needs.
The academic study of mysticism would not even go that far toward accepting mystical experiences today. Many postmodernists in academia deny that there are any genuine mystical experiences and ignore neuroscientific studies suggesting that unique mystical experiences do occur. In philosophy, the topic of mysticism has generally faded into the background. The dominance of constructivism and attribution theory in religious studies also plays down the significance of mystical experiences. Under the latter, “mystical experiences” become nothing but a mystical overlay given to mundane experiences and emotional states. Under the former, mystical experiences are accepted as possibly genuine, but they have no independent cognitive content and play no role in the development of any tradition’s doctrines. There is nothing to study of mysticism outside of a tradition’s texts. Any mention today of mysticism in the study of, for example, Buddhism is rare. Indeed, in the humanities, mysticism has become “unfashionable” and a “bad name” (Cupitt 1998: 56, 45). Even scholars who accept that there are depth-mystical experiences dismiss out of hand any claim that they are cognitive (Bharati 1976: 48; Forman 2010). In sum, mystical experiences, if they are accepted at all, have been pushed aside as at most a curiosity for neuroscience.
Within Christian theology, the situation is similar. A generation ago, the Jesuit William Johnston lamented that “from the time of Thomas à Kempis better men than I have been attempting to convert the theologians [to the need for theologians who are also mystics]—and they have been conspicuously unsuccessful. The theologians remain unregenerate” (1978: 58). Today the situation is no different. To postmodern theologians, the experience of God is impossible on logical grounds (since God is by definition transcendent), and to view God through the lens of “experience” is hopelessly naive (see Hart & Wall 2005). The past focus on interiority in any spirituality is now seen as having been a mistake (Thomas 2000). The questions that Christian mystics raise for theology visibly embarrass many academic theologians (McIntosh 1998: 14). Indeed, in theology today any “experientialist” approach to mysticism that would affirm any genuine mystical experiences is “thoroughly dated” (Nicholson 2011: 194).
Outside of academia, serious mysticism is in a general decline in the West. In mainline Christian churches, the split between spirituality and theology since at least the early modern period has led to a decrease in interest in anything mystical. According to Michael Buckley, the divorce of spirituality from fundamental theology in Catholicism has led to bracketing the actual witness of spiritual experiences as having no cogency (quoted in McIntosh 1998: 14). Hans Blumenberg puts the very definition of modernity in terms of “self-assertion” (1982: 138). He is not contrasting it with mystical selflessness, but nevertheless classical mystics would readily agree. Under the modern view, the mystical denial of self-assertion certainly makes mystics appear irrational and their passivity immoral. More generally, our era can be defined by “a loss of faith in transcendence, in a reality that encompasses but surpasses our quotidian affairs” (quoted in Smith 2000: 655).2 Unlike premodern people, we no longer live in a “sacred universe” in which all aspects of life are permeated with transcendent significance. Even if transcendent realities are intellectually accepted, they are cut off from this world and everything in life and thus do not affect our living. Many who are scientifically minded have lost any comprehensive myth that makes this world understandable and the travails of life bearable. Any sort of focus on an inner spiritual development of any mystical experiences or the radical self-transcendence and transformation of character of an enlightened mystical way of life has been discouraged by liberal churches as unnecessary, if possible at all. Liberal theists may be happy with the theistic mystics’ message that the universe is animated by love, but the claim that someone had actually experienced God would probably only make them uncomfortable, since God is seen as having withdrawn from his creation. In conservative churches, other types of experiences related to personal salvation have become emphasized, and the idea of any mystical awareness of God is seen as blasphemous. Fears of antinomianism have limited mystical influences in most traditions of Judaism today. So too, Islam today has seen a steep decline in Sufism. In monasteries Eastern and Western there is little emphasis on serious meditation. For example, Thomas Merton complained that there were few or no real contemplatives even in many Catholic contemplative monasteries, because rigid conformity to rules prevented it (2003: 78, 123–30). And if reports are correct, in most Buddhist monasteries today few monks under age fifty meditate at all; nirvana is seen as only a long-term goal.3 (But in the past more monastics may also have been like that than we might suppose.) The authoritarian nature of monastic training also runs counter to the spirit of our age.
Psychology today only strengthens the ego and self-esteem. Few people would want to give up the sense of individual existence when the assertion of self-will dominates our culture—purposefully inducing any type of selflessness is precisely what most people do not want to do today. Buddhist teachings on selflessness have become transformed in psychotherapy into a way to actually enhance the sense of self. (One Buddhist practitioner dismissed psychotherapists as “pimps for samsara [the cycle of rebirths].”) Ironically, serious mysticism is dying even as New Age spirituality is increasing; many young people describe themselves as “seekers”; people claiming to be mystics are flourishing on the Internet. And mystical experiences apparently remain common (Hardy 1983; Hood 2005). The superficial spirituality of the New Age is more about validating how one currently leads one’s life than about any serious change in a mystical direction—a watered-down spirituality of a “Buddhism Lite,” as it were. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s complaint seventy years ago that people flocked to his lectures but no one transformed their lives (Lutyens 1983: 171) is applicable more generally to mysticism today. Today there may be a spike in interest in mysticism as people search for a sense of certainty and reassurance of the rightness of things in a time of uncertainty and search for a way to feel experientially grounded in the world and connected to other people, but there is little commitment to any rigorous traditional spirituality with its developed depth. Most New Age theorizing is disconnected from cultivating any mystical experiences. Few people stick to meditation long-term. And more meditation is practiced for its purported psychological and physiological benefits than as part of a mystical way of life. It is a sign of our culture’s spiritual decline that this is considered an advance.
All of this leads to a trend today toward the secularization of mystical experiences. Cultivating mystical experiences—in particular, mindfulness meditation—has been absorbed into parts of modern culture while engaging in full mystical ways of life has atrophied. That is, even among those who endorse mystical experiences for our well-being (e.g., Kornfield 2001; Forman 2010, 2014; Harris 2014), mystical experiences are being separated from mystical ways of life with their religious goals, i.e., from mysticism. Traditional religious metaphysics and transcendent goals are ignored; traditional mystical ethical codes are at best watered down. For example, one can adopt aspects of a Buddhist way of life while being agnostic about its factual claims about rebirth and karma (Batchelor 1997). A total inner transformation is not always the goal. Teachers of complicated metaphysical doctrines are no longer needed, nor is adherence to difficult monastic ethical codes. Traditional meditative techniques may be adopted to calm the mind or to focus attention fully on the present, thereby increasing our happiness, but any claim that mystical experiences may provide cognitive insights into an aspect of the phenomenal world or into a transcendent reality is not so much denied as simply ignored as irrelevant—all that matters is the physiological or psychological well-being that mystical experiences or meditation may foster. The significance of the experiences is exhaustively studied by scientists, and so all mystical metaphysics is beside the point. For many today the only ontic claim that mystical experiences can support is that only the natural mind and body is involved, not a transcendent mind or other reality. Scientific studies are taken as reinforcing the view that the only value in mystical experiences is in their effect on the body; the issue of whether the brain states that scientists observe may permit insights into the nature of reality does not arise. Any understanding of the significance of mystical experiences that involves alleged transcendent realities can be set aside. Traditional mysticism is replaced by a naturalistic spirituality where self-transcendence involves no claim of cognition. Only the phenomenal world is deemed real, and so mystical experiences can still be seen as aligning experiencers with how things really are if they enable experiencers to have greater personal well-being and to function better in society. Thus, far from inspiring a hatred of the natural world, mystical experiences are taken as making us more at home here: with no transcendent realities to worry about, such experiences can make us feel more connected to reality as it truly is and thus help us overcome any emotional or cognitive alienation from the natural world that society has generated.
Overall, our culture has become too affluent and comfortable for people to want to escape it, and too materialistic to think that the vertical dimension of beingness is of any importance. From a mystical point of view, we have lost sight of the ontic source of this realm—we are not even aware of the possibility that we are in Plato’s cave. So too, our awareness of alternatives makes it harder for us to commit fully to anything and thus makes us more superficial. In addition, our technology has produced so many distractions that it is difficult to focus our attention fully on anything: it is hard to commit fully to the moment in the barrage of so many options confronting us and so much information at our fingertips—indeed, ours can be called the “Age of Distraction” (Loy 2008). It is not that science or philosophy has refuted mystical knowledge-claims, but rather that we have lost interest in mystical matters and we see mysticism as counterproductive.
Many have noted the lack of spirituality in mainstream religion in the West today, the erosion of liberal religiosity, and the spiritual malaise of many today. Without some injection of personal spiritual experience—for theists, some encounter with a living god—religion becomes no more than a social club with a bloodless metaphysics (and probably suffocatingly dogmatic, if doctrines are taken seriously). Can religion survive if it does not generate any spiritual experiences of alleged transcendent realities? Some argue that a reinvigorated mysticism may be the cure. Robert Ellwood suggests that it is hard to conceive of religion persisting without continual mystical experiences on the part of some, because mysticism is the only guarantor of any future for religion since it points to the one undeniable empirical fact in religion: that now as much as ever people report having experiences of ultimacy (1999: 190). The Catholic theologian Karl Rahner predicted that the “Christian of the future will be a mystic or he or she will not exist at all” (1981: 149–50).4 In Asia, many, including Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan in the middle of the twentieth century, have argued that the future of religion in general or even of civilization itself depends on a strong continuing presence of at least some mystics.
But can mysticism in fact help? The first point toward answering that question is that today the natural universe is too ingrained in the mind of anyone influenced by modern science to doubt seriously that it is fully and fundamentally real. Scientists have revealed a complex and intricate universe of extraordinary size, with billions of galaxies, billions of years old, and an earth with a fascinating history and diversity of life. The majesty and splendor of it all cannot be ignored. The fact that the universe existed for billions of years without any conscious life is enough to dispute any mystical claim that the universe is just a staging ground for human beings to return to our true state in another realm, unless one wants to accept a wasteful creator of truly cosmic proportions, or that the universe is the result of sentient beings’ mysterious “root-ignorance.” The phenomenal world is irreducibly real in the sense that it is now a fact that we cannot get around. In light of evolution, it is also hard to maintain that each of us is a special creation of God, or that human beings as a species are the goal of the universe. And the amount of natural suffering only becomes more mysterious in light of any mystical experiences of bliss associated with a theistic source. In sum, once we have passed through the education provided by science, it is very hard to treat the unfolding world of time as no more than the “dream” realm of some other reality. Indeed, many scholars argue that we are so secularized that we are no longer capable of experiencing the world in the way that premoderns did as the creation of another reality.
In addition, there is a metaphysical issue: if there is a transcendent source, we still have to explain why the natural world exists. The spectrum of colors is as real as its source of white light and must be accounted for. If introvertive mystical experiences give the sense that the transcendent realm is all that is important, why does the natural realm exist at all? Why is there now more than merely the transcendent state? Why did the source emanate out a diverse realm (or whatever is the relation of the source to this world) and not remain alone real? And why are we here and not there? We like to think that there must be some reason and that the world did not occur simply by dumb luck or without a purpose.5 It is hard to accept that this world is a meaningless “play” of a transcendent reality. Any system such as Advaita Vedanta that does not explain all the incredible variety of the diverse phenomena of our old and extensive universe but dismisses it all as a dream is thus difficult to accept today. It would dissolve all the phenomena that form the basis of any meaning or content to our lives as an illusion. Indeed, Advaita has trouble explaining how there could even be the illusion of a phenomenal realm. The unchanging luminous consciousness also somehow presents the discursive mind, and thus the discursive mind is part of what is real and not in any way an illusion. The waves on the ocean are as real as the still ocean depths. We may not be simply our changing thoughts and feelings, and thus it may be an error to identify ourselves with those or to reduce consciousness to those, but such mental content is also real, and thus it is just as much an error to claim that we are not our thoughts and feelings, but only an unchanging observing consciousness. It may be simpler, easier to bear suffering, and more freeing to identify only with the silent observer, but that does not reflect all that we are.
So too, if there is a reason for all this, it would have to be more than putting us through trials and eventually simply returning us to our prior “true state.” That is, something must be wrong with this picture if the only goal of this world is to get out of it and return to the same condition we were in before. Why create something if the end result is merely the same as the beginning? In light of science’s findings, we cannot accept that we are aliens in this world—“strangers and exiles on the earth” (Hebrews 11:13). There may be more that is real about us, but this universe must be taken to be our natural home, and thus we must take it seriously. Moreover, there is no reason to think that the objective of life here is to sit blissed out all the time, as the caricature of mystics goes, even if that were possible. It is difficult to see even having introvertive mystical experiences—i.e., glimpses of transcendent realities—in the world as the ultimate goal of life. Thus, if mysticism is to be taken seriously today, mystics must provide an interpretation that gives full significance to this realm and advances a meaningful way of life in accord with it. Any revamped mysticism must accept as a basic premise that this realm is profoundly significant, and it must proffer a reason for why it is here. To that extent, any mysticism must be “this-worldly” and not exclusively “other-worldly.”
All of this means that no matter how powerful introvertive mystical experiences are, they must be interpreted to give full reality to the world—this world is now irrevocably embedded in our view of what is fully real. Today our starting point for understanding what we are is that we are all the refuse of an ancient supernova—we may be more than that, but we cannot start by thinking we are really a disembodied mind or the special creation of a god.6 Mystics today must accept that we are a natural part of this world, and any mysticism must explain why this is so and also why we have an analytical mind that seems to alienate us from the rest of reality. Suffering cannot be dismissed as an illusion but must be accepted as fully real and in need of an explanation. And if they are to be anything like classical mystics, mystics today must also defend the existence of a transcendent ground to this real world. That is, the problem for anything resembling a classical mystical way of life today is how to reinject the world into a nonnaturalistic framework with transcendent realities without denying the world’s full reality—one that incorporates both an eternal ontic vertical dimension and a historical horizontal dimension as both real and important. But if successful, mysticism can replace the image of a totally transcendent deity with one that is also immanent in space and time, since the god of theistic mysticism is experienceable and the ground of the natural world.
However, living a life that incorporates awareness of the still ontic depth while functioning in the constantly changing surface-world is not simple (see Jones 2004: 379–405, 2010: 261–76): how can one rest inwardly in the source of being with a still mind and emotional calm while yet remaining outwardly active in the realm of diversity? How do we quiet the inner noise in our mind to let the ground shine through and still have a fully functioning, concept-guided mind? How can one integrate what Meister Eckhart calls the soul’s two eyes—the inward one that focuses on being and the outward one that focuses on creatures (2009: 570–71; also see Mundaka Up. 3.1.1)? That is, how can one integrate a background awareness of beingness into the foreground of active involvement with the world? How can we not end up with a divided consciousness—one that is either aware of the ontic depth or the diversified phenomenal surface, but not both at the same time? How do we overcome a dualism of one self who acts and another transcendental self who only witnesses events and does not participate? Even if a mystical liberation in this life (jivan-mukti) is possible despite our ties to the body and with a mind having multiple functions, disdain for the world would not reflect life in this world. An ascetic renunciation of the world is clearly misguided if we accept that this world as fully real. If we focus exclusively on the present moment without a thought to the future or on the depth of being without regard to the surface waves, we will not last long. Through meditation we may be able to eliminate many negative states of mind and replace them with states permitting calmness and compassion, leading to more focus and a more productive life. (Some initial studies of meditation programs for elementary school and high school students indicate that meditation helps with behavioral problems and even math scores.) We may also integrate more awareness of the vertical dimension into our lives and become less self-centered. We cannot, however, have a life of true selflessness, because one’s life in the world is still real and requires some self-assertiveness—the Daodejing emphasizes nonassertiveness, but assertive yang-actions must be part of the balance along with such yin-actions. So too, complete self-denying love for others does not reflect reality as it truly is, since we are also equally part of the world—we are as real and important as the other beings we want to help. Indeed, from a mystical point of view, the total renunciation or denial of oneself and the world involves making distinctions and is an attachment since we and the world are real. In addition, quashing all personal emotions such as hate and greed may help us see something of reality that we missed, but we can still ask if such even-mindedness reflects all that is real. Being emotionally detached from all people, including one’s family and friends, also may not reflect life as it has actually evolved.
Thus, even if the idea of a distinct, self-contained “ego” is a socially constructed fiction, we must have a place for our particular node among the different nodes in the web of phenomenal reality: a “person” may not be a permanent, separate entity, but the impermanent stream of conditions constructing a node is a real part of what in the final analysis is real. What happens to our body and mind in the world matters, even if our transcendent beingness remains unaffected by the vicissitudes of the world. Much of our suffering may arise from identifying with surface thoughts and emotions and forgetting our ontic depth, but those surface phenomena are still part of what we are. (Indeed, if the depth-experience is the experience of one’s true self and not merely of pure beingness, then an issue arises: what is experienced is changeless, and if one’s self is changeless, then it does not have any of the features that make a person a person—emotions, sense-experience, and indeed even consciousness change.) So too, the other conscious nodes that are worthy of moral concern cannot be dismissed as illusions in a dream. Thus, treating this world as an illusion or “play” of the gods not only gives us no reason to treat the world itself seriously, but removes other people as realities to treat morally.
And it is important to note again that mysticism is not necessarily in conflict with science. To classical mystics, the metaphysics of naturalism would have to be abandoned, and some transcendent dimension to both the natural world and a human being that is open to experience would have to be accepted. But science is not the philosophy of naturalism, and thus giving up naturalism is not giving up science (see Jones 2010: 191–202). As discussed in chapter 8, mystical experiences involve calming the mind of its normal differentiated jumble and discerning one dimension of reality—the beingness of the natural world or its source—while scientists discover the causal realities within the natural world and how they work. Thus, it is not a matter of mysticism replacing science, but supplementing it with a different type of knowledge. We can interpret mystical experiences as a cognitive insight into the depth beingness of reality and still affirm the full reality of the phenomena of the natural world and the value of instrumental states of consciousness. Thus, there would be a role for different states of consciousness enabling different ways of knowing. Mystical matters would be limited to the issue of beingness, and even depth-mystical experiences would not be taken as overwhelming all other types of cognitive experiences. If we accept this approach, we need not deny science as cognitive to accept mysticism as cognitive, or vice versa. So too, a scientific explanation of the biological bases of mystical experiences could still be affirmed. Mystical doctrines of transcendent realities would not need to be revised in light of any scientific findings or theories—again, consciousness may present a problem—but other doctrines of mystical ways of life may have to be revised to incorporate scientific insights.
Thus, it is possible to forge a conciliation of mysticism and science that accepts both endeavors as knowledge-giving (see also Jones 2010: 261–76). This means that it is not necessary to naturalize introvertive mystical experiences for a reconciliation: one can accept the classical mystical position that these experiences involve transcendent realities while still fully affirming science. However, this position does reflect a nonmystical point of view, since it gives equal weight to a nonmystical approach to the world, and it would lead to what from a classical mystical point of view is a truncated mysticism. But such a conciliation removes one objection to the cognitive validity of introvertive mystical experiences by showing that their claims to be an awareness of a transcendent reality are consistent with science’s cognitive claims. Thus, we are not forced to choose between “the path of spirituality” and “the path of reason,” as the biologist Edward O. Wilson and many other naturalists believe, at least when it comes to the core of mystical knowledge-claims. Whether theism can reconcile a transcendent god that is active in the phenomenal world with a “path of reason” is another question.
But whether any accommodation of science and mysticism is successful or not will ultimately depend on basic philosophical judgments that transcend both endeavors. One must also ask whether a mystically informed life must be bifurcated: we can focus on beingness or the differentiations of the phenomenal world but not both at the same time. We may be calmer and more focused with mystical training, but the conceptualizing analytical mind and concept-driven perceptions are needed to conduct science and to live in the world. We cannot live focused only on the present moment even if doing so lets us see the beingness of things.
If adopting a worldview shaped by science does not require denying that mystical experiences are cognitive of a transcendent dimension to reality, mysticism today may in principle make a contribution to the world’s current religious situation even for the scientifically minded. And there have been religious reawakenings in the past when civilizations were in crisis. However, factors militate against the widespread influence of mysticism on religion, at least in the near future. First, as noted above, the spirit of the age is antimystical, and the demands of mystical training may seem too strenuous for most people.
Second, if mystical and other spiritual experiences are in fact a normal product of a healthy brain and common among the population at large, as surveys suggest, then mystical experiences were probably also common in the past without producing any social revolutions. And there is little reason to suppose that mystical experiences today could have a wider cultural influence than they have had in the recent past. Many New Age advocates think that we are on the verge of a new stage in human evolution, but if mystical experiences have been common throughout history, why should we think that they would change society today, in our culture that values self-assertion, if they did not produce a mystical society in the past, especially when many experiencers today do not accept their experiences as cognitive?7 In addition, mysticism remains focused on the inner changes of individuals—changing society or advocating the social rights of individuals is a relatively recent development in mysticism (see Johnston 1995: 254–68, Jones 2004: 347–77). Throughout history, mystics also have tended to be socially conservative except when coupled with a radical movement arising for nonmystical reasons; thus, mysticism can easily become counterproductive to social change (Ellwood 1999: 190). So too, a great interest in mysticism in a society inevitably focuses energies on inward experience that otherwise might have been used to effect outward change (ibid.). In the 1960s, drug-induced experiences did not have a political effect—the hippies had no institutional support system, and the only lasting cultural effect was an increase in the general hedonism of the “Me Generation,” which was followed by decades of greed. There is no reason to think that the conditions are any different today. It may also be overly optimistic to believe that we are seeing not only the twilight of older religions but the birth of some new general spiritual revolution. The “New Age” may remain nothing more than a fringe movement among the affluent.
Third, it should not be forgotten that mysticism has a dark side. Mysticism is not all peace and love—mystics have also supported inquisitions, crusades, wars, and religious fanaticism, often in the name of love. Spiritual rogues with feet of clay have also been narcissistic monsters exploiting their followers. So too, drugs and meditation can aggravate negative psychological conditions. It must be remembered that the basic beliefs and values of a mystic come from outside mystical experiences. A supportive social context, socially positive doctrines, and ethical values must be integrated into a mystical way of life to give a positive meaning to the experiences.8 Otherwise, rootless mystical experiences may only open people to dangerous psychological events by releasing the subconscious into the conscious mind or reinforcing one’s current unenlightened beliefs and sense of self. A society dominated by such untutored mystics running amok may be very unpleasant and dangerous, if it is viable at all. Certainly looking on mysticism as a simple remedy for any of our social ills is a mistake.
Late in his life the theologian Paul Tillich said that the question for his time was this: “Is it possible to regain the lost dimension, the encounter with the Holy, the dimension that cuts through the world of subjectivity and objectivity and goes down to that which is not world but is the mystery of the Ground of Being?” (quoted in Smith 2000: 32.) From what was discussed above, the prospects look bleak for the near future of more fully incorporating parts of mystical traditions as one component of a reinvigorated general religious life.9 But perhaps our species is Homo religiosus, as many in religious studies and some in anthropology have asserted, and perhaps a thirst for transcending the natural realm is natural to us (although the rise of the number of the religiously unaffiliated in America—the “nones”—leads to doubt that human beings are inherently religious). Certainly, contact with more of reality (if that is what in fact occurs in mystical experiences) would lead to being more fully human and to a more meaningful life with potentially a more positive, optimistic outlook. Mystical selflessness would also widen the application of whatever values one adopts, including compassion and a moral concern for others. Even if mystical experiences are not cognitive, they may open us to the possibility that there is more to reality than the natural world. They may help us overcome a sense of alienation from the natural world and give us a sense of being connected to the world and to each other that will affect how we see ourselves and treat others and how we act in the world. And today we are in a situation where we all can see ourselves as the spiritual heirs of all the major religious traditions of the world, and individuals who believe that mystical experiences are cognitive of a generally hidden dimension of a reality or are otherwise important to attain for our knowledge of the world are in a position to utilize those contemplative traditions to that end and to develop new mystical systems in association with science and modern cultural interests.
The role of philosophy in such a quest will be to help clarify issues related to beliefs and values for anyone adopting mysticism into his or her life. Philosophy may expose that we know less than we like to think we know about mystical matters. Nevertheless, it is best that we know our true situation: if mystical experiences are genuine, mystics are aware of aspects of reality that nonmystics miss, but the experiences still give less knowledge and fewer values than mystics typically believe. Mysticism gives an experiential sense that there is more to reality than we previously supposed, but philosophy reveals that we know less than we supposed. However, a sense of mystery at the heart of both reality and our knowledge may not greatly offend those who have allegedly experienced realities they deem ineffable.