Essential terminology
Authority
Direct religious experiences
Indirect religious experiences
Ineffable
Mystical experiences
Noetic
Passive
Transience
Vision
Key scholars
Karl Marx (1818–1883)
William James (1842–1910)
Alister Hardy (1896–1985)
Bernard Lonergan (1904–1984)
J.L. Mackie (1917–1981)
William Alston (1921–2009)
John Hick (1922–2012)
Richard Swinburne (1934–)
The nature and influence of religious experience, including:
Learners should have the opportunity to discuss issues related to arguments for the existence of God based on reason, including:
Read this account of a person’s religious experience and then discuss the questions which follow:
One day, when I was at prayer, the Lord was pleased to reveal to me nothing but His hands, the beauty of which was so great as to be indescribable. This made me very fearful, as does every new experience that I have when the Lord is beginning to grant me some supernatural favour. A few days later I also saw the divine face, which seemed to leave me completely absorbed. I could not understand why the Lord revealed Himself gradually like this since He was later to grant me the favour of seeing him wholly, until at length I realised that His Majesty was leading me according to my natural weakness.
(St Teresa of Ávila)
Personal experiences of God for many people show that God does exist. This is shown in the lives of both St Paul in Christianity and Mohammad 
in Islam. Many people see evidence of God in their everyday lives and in ordinary events or many interpret some event as having religious significance. Often these experiences have lasting effects on how people lead their lives. However, in order to argue that these experiences can be used to argue that God exists and acts in people’s lives it is necessary to explain what exactly is meant by a religious experience and what exactly caused that experience.
The Oxford Religious Experience Research Unit found that between about 30% and 45% of the population of Britain, irrespective of age, geographical position or even of belief, say that they have been aware of a presence or power beyond themselves. David Hay’s book Inner Space records that many of the people interviewed had never previously spoken about their experiences because they thought that others would make fun of them or would not understand. So what exactly are they experiencing?
A religious experience is when a person has, or believes that he has had, an encounter with God. Religious experiences are divided into two groups: direct and indirect experiences.
Direct experiences mean that someone experiences God directly and seems to observe God in some way. This may take different forms – for example Rudolph Otto (Otto, The Idea of the Holy) said that what was experienced was beyond human understanding and beyond the physical world in which we live. Otto called this the ‘numinous’ and said that experiencing God was experiencing the ‘wholly other’. God was something that was outside our own experiences and used the Latin words ‘mysterium tremendum et fascinans’ to try to explain an experience that was so completely outside our ordinary lives. This is experienced on the emotional level and leaves the person aware of his or her own smallness in the face of an all-powerful God. Albert Einstein also said that the most beautiful thing that we can experience is the mysterious and that this knowledge and feeling are the centre of true religiousness. Kant, however, rejected the possibility of such experiences as he argued that we do not have the senses to experience God as God belongs to the noumenal realm and is not an object in space and time.
Alternatively, Martin Buber (1878–1965) explained religious experiences as intimate and intensely personal – he called them I-thou relationships. This does not involve a sense of awe or wonder as Otto thought, but rather a personal relationship that the individual has with God.
These writers and others, when commenting on direct religious experiences of God, do separate them from ordinary everyday experiences and say that they are in some sense ineffable –they are too great to be described in words.
Indirect experiences are when something leads the person to think about God. For example a beautiful sunset might lead a person to think of God as the creator of such beauty. God does not directly reveal himself to someone, but the person gives a religious meaning to the experience and so learns something about God from the experience.
Direct religious experiences
Refer to events where God reveals her-/himself directly to the person having the experience. The religious experience is not chosen or willed by the person; the person experiences or observes God in some way.
Ineffable
Used to refer to experiences which it is beyond human powers and abilities to fully describe and communicate.
Indirect religious experiences
Experiences, thoughts or feelings about God that are prompted by events in daily life – for example observing the stars in the sky and having thoughts about the greatness of God the Creator.
Think of an event that was very important to you. Try to describe and explain the feelings created by this event. Was this experience religious? If so, what made it religious?
Can you think of events or incidents in everyday life, or in your life, which are ineffable?
According to Richard Swinburne (The Existence of God) religious experiences are varied and wide-ranging, and he considers that there are five types of religious experiences. He divides these into two groups: public experiences and private experiences.
In which of Swinburne’s categories would you put the following?
Vision
An event in which God, or something about God, is seen or observed. Visions are usually divided into three types: corporeal, intellectual and imaginative.
Look up the different accounts of Paul’s conversion (Acts 9: 4–8, 22: 6–10, 26) and try to explain what happened to him. In particular, think about how the event is described.
The religious experience of visions and voices is often described in terms of ordinary perceptions, using the phrases ‘I saw’ or ‘I heard’. However, usually the sights and sounds are not public or shared by others.
There are three types of visions:
There are a number of good examples of visions in the Bible. What characteristics can be found in the visions of these verses?
One dramatic type of religious experience is the hearing of voices. These experiences carry authority, but it is worth noting that the voice may not be an audible voice but usually communicates knowledge of some sort. The conversion of Augustine is an unusual example of voices.
I was asking myself these questions, weeping all the while with the most bitter sorrow in my heart, when all at once I heard the sing-song voice of a child in a nearby house … it repeated the refrain ‘Take it and read, take it and read.’ At this I looked up, thinking hard whether there was any kind of game in which children used to chant words like these. I stemmed my flood of tears and stood up telling myself that this could only be a divine command to open my book of scripture.
The voice may have been the natural voice of a child playing (even Augustine is uncertain); however, Augustine interprets this to be a means of God communicating with him. This shows that religious experiences may not always be supernatural, but are interpreted as such.
Mystical experiences
Used in many ways by writers on religious experience. In general, it is used to refer to religious experiences where God is revealed directly and the person having the experience is passive. William James identified four characteristics that are typical of mystical and other religious experiences: noetic, passive, transient and ineffable.
Noetic
Refers to something which gives knowledge, such as a revelation from God in which God reveals something.
Read the accounts of Jesus’ baptism (Mark 1: 1–9), Paul’s conversion (Acts 9: 4–8, 22: 6–10, 26) and the calling of the prophet Samuel (Samuel 1).
Some thinkers have observed that experiences such as visions and voices are often linked to physical factors, such as fasting. Could putting the body into a weakened state lead a person to have an authority or visual experience they believe to be a genuine religious experience?
Voices have three aspects:
How might one prove that an experience is from God? Some schizophrenics might even believe they have a message from God to kill people.
St Teresa of Ávila offered two tests to determine whether the experience was genuine.
Obviously, if an individual claimed to have experienced God it is possible to doubt that what he or she claims to have experienced is true. However, if several people claim to have had the same experience, or many people witness the experience, it becomes more difficult to doubt it. There are two examples of group or corporate experiences which could strengthen the argument from religious experience.
In 1916, in the small village of Fatima in Portugal, a group of three children aged 10, 8 and 7 started seeing visions of a being that claimed to be an angel of God. Then, on 13 May 1917, the children saw a vision of who they believed to be the Virgin Mary. She told them to return on the same day each month. The children told other people and on the 13th of each month, large crowds started to gather at the spot where Mary had first appeared to the children.
On 13 October 1917, about 70,000 people gathered to see the vision of the Virgin Mary. Mary appeared only to the children, but a miracle is reported to have happened on the same day, which was apparently witnessed by many:
One could see the immense multitude turn towards the sun, which appeared free from clouds and at its zenith. It looked like a plaque of dull silver and it was possible to look at it without the least discomfort. It might have been an eclipse which was taking place. But at that moment a great shout went up and one could hear the spectators nearest at hand shouting: ‘A miracle! A miracle!’ Before the astonished eyes of the crowd, whose aspect was Biblical as they stood bareheaded, eagerly searching the sky, the sun trembled, made sudden incredible movements outside all cosmic laws – the sun ‘danced’ according to the typical expression of the people …
People then began to ask each other what they had seen. The great majority admitted to having seen the trembling and dancing of the sun; others affirmed that they saw the face of the Blessed Virgin; others, again, swore that the sun whirled on itself like a giant Catherine wheel and that it lowered itself to the earth as if to burn it with its rays. Some said they saw it change colours successively.
This was likely to have been an eclipse, but the crowds reported it as a miracle.
Another form of corporate religious experience happens every Sunday in churches across the world. Charismatic worship is a form of Christian worship that takes its name from the word ‘charismat’ or gift of the spirit. This is inspired by the events of Pentecost, where the Holy Spirit visited the 11 remaining disciples and gave them the ‘gift of tongues’ – they could speak any language in order to spread the message of the life of Jesus to the world.
Charismatic worship, also known as Pentecostalism, really became famous in 1994, when Pastor Randy Clark preached at Toronto Airport Vineyard Church on 20 January 1994. Following the sermon people began to laugh hysterically, cry, leap, dance and even roar. Some saw this as the result of the Holy Spirit and numerous people went to Toronto to participate. The ‘Toronto Blessing’ has spread to evangelical congregations around the world.
As far as charismatic worship goes, it is clear that the people present at those services do experience profound emotional and spiritual moments. However, many of the congregations where these events take place see these experiences almost as necessary to be a member of the group. It is possible that many people feel pressured into having these kinds of experiences, simply to fit in. Also, many of the pastors who lead these services are extremely charismatic and use powerful readings from the Bible promising hellfire for sinners and rapture for the righteous. When in a group, people often get carried away by the emotions of the people around them, such as at football matches or protest marches that turn into riots. If the pastor is whipping people up into a frenzy, it is not surprising that there are extreme and hysterical reactions.
However, the supporters of the ‘Blessing’ point to the changes that people have experienced. Healings, both physical and spiritual, are claimed. Communities have been rejuvenated by the ‘Blessing’, families reconciled, relationships improved and non-believers converted. These claims are not unique to the Toronto Blessing – other charismatic communities have experienced similar benefits from far less spectacular (and controversial) experiences. Its supporters believe that the ‘Blessing’ is a sign from God that some new manifestation of God’s power is about to be released on the world. People’s lives are being transformed by this power. The barking, laughing and other strange manifestations are simply a sign of the sheer power of the experience.
To the outsider, the whole thing may seem bizarre. People behaving in a completely undignified way is alien to the traditional view of worship, even allowing for contemporary developments. More disturbing is the answer given to the cautious who suggest care and biblical study before accepting the experience. Such people are told that they should ‘stop thinking about it and simply allow the experience to happen’. Such non-analytical approaches seem to be similar to those employed by cults.
So, even the charismatic Christian community is divided. However, applying the various tests to the experience might help the observer to make some judgement about the validity of the claims. How suggestible are the people who demonstrate these manifestations? How far do the preachers engineer the situation so that people are coerced into the experience? Do people who feel spiritually starved in a bewilderingly materialist world make easy targets for induced ‘religious’ experiences? One could, therefore, ask whether the people who demonstrate these manifestations are simply suggestible. Equally, it has to be asked: how far are these genuine religious experiences?
Finally, it is worth asking whether the experiences match the various arguments, such as the test offered by Teresa of Ávila.
It is also worth noting that the experiences of charismatic Christians have not all been as controversial.
Pentecostal Christians emphasise the importance of ‘Pentecost’, the fiftieth day after Passover, when the Disciples experienced the events recorded in Acts 1:1–11. The story states that the Disciples were given the gifts of the Holy Spirit.
Evangelical – taken from the Greek euangelion, meaning ‘good news’. An evangelical seeks to share the ‘good news’ with others.
Charismatic worship tends to be contemporary in style. There is no set liturgy, and no prayer books. Modern multimedia technology is used to maximise the experience for the worshippers, who are encouraged to clap, sing and dance, and to become involved in worship.
Conversion experiences traditionally lead a person to change to a religious way of life as a result of some experience of divine truth (whether directly or indirectly). This can be sudden and dramatic, such as the conversion of St Paul, which completely changed his life, from being a persecutor of Christians to spreading the Christian message. This experience was transformative and all his previously held priorities and beliefs were changed. This type of conversion can be considered to be an involuntary and unconscious experience.
St Paul
Niday Picture Library/Alamy
However, conversion experiences are not always so sudden and may simply be gradual realisation, a conscious and voluntary experience. This volitional type features a gradual change and consists of the slow development of new moral and spiritual habits. It may be that the person suddenly ‘becomes aware’ of the change one day.
While a majority of conversions are clearly gradual, the sudden experience would appear to be the most significant and profound. It often affects people who have no religious faith whatsoever before the experience. Religious conversion is likely to include a change in belief on religious topics, which in turn leads to changes in the motivation for people’s behaviour so that they act in a way they believe to be right.
Bernard Lonergan distinguished three types of conversions: intellectual, moral and spiritual or religious. He explained that this is a process which takes place in incremental steps throughout a person’s life.
How permanent is conversion? In some instances, people experiencing sudden conversion may know very little about what they have come to believe in. Their knowledge may amount to little more than what they have read in a series of leaflets, or what they have heard from a local preacher, and as Lonergan points out, if this knowledge is not developed the individual may decide at some future point that there are inherent problems in what the preacher has told them, or that there are flaws in the literature they have based their new beliefs and outlook upon. Gradual conversion always seems more likely to be permanent than sudden conversion, probably because a slower procedure is more likely to be more thorough. For example a well-planned essay will always be more thorough than a quickly scribbled effort.
Thus, although conversion experiences do lead the individuals to change their beliefs and the way they lead their lives and have a great effect on the person concerned, this would not necessarily convince others. However, evangelical Christians do believe in the importance of conversion and the idea of being a ‘born-again Christian’.
William James argued that there are two basic types of conversions: the volitional type and the type by self-surrender. The volitional type is where people decide that they wish to make spiritual changes in their life and they go about doing the things necessary to bring this about. James argued that in the second case, there are two things in the mind of the candidate for conversion: first, the wrongness or sinfulness of their life and secondly the ideal form of life which they long to achieve (i.e. living life as a religious person). James argues that conversion is not something that we can strive after; it is something that just happens, almost as if it is given to us as a gift. James likens this situation to those moments when you are trying desperately to remember the name of someone, perhaps an actor in a film, and you know it is going to keep you awake. The mind seems ‘jammed’ in these situations and it is not until later on, when we have forgotten our search for the name, that it seems to miraculously pop into our head. James argues that there are two ways of understanding this process: either as the work of God or as the work of the subconscious mind.
James argues that there are several features of a conversion experience:
The question that remains is whether these feelings are caused by God or by psychological processes that take place in the brain. James comes up with no clear answer on this, as neuroscience (the study of the workings of the brain) was very much in its infancy at the time. However, experiments conducted since James wrote his book (see ahead) have suggested possible ‘naturalistic’ explanations for conversion (and other) religious experiences.
One of the key features of conversion that points to the reality of these experiences is saintliness: when a person’s life is completely changed by the experience that he or she has had. This is also often referred to as the ‘fruits’ of the experience. It is common for people who have had conversion experiences, either sudden like Saul or more gradually, to bring about serious changes to their life: they devote themselves more fully to religious practice and live more moral lives. This is very strong evidence that the people who have conversion experiences see what they have experienced as real: if they were in any doubt, they might not have made the significant changes to their lives that for most people require real efforts of the will. This idea is similar to dedicated smokers who say that they will never give up, or indeed, smokers who try over and over again to give up, but cannot and keep relapsing: when they develop cancer or heart disease, very often they stop smoking and never smoke again; it is a form of conversion experience.
In his book, The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature, William James investigated many accounts of religious experiences. He wanted to explore the nature of the wide variety of religious experiences people have. James thought that religious experience was how religious institutions, such as churches, came into being. Churches, for James, were secondary to each individual person’s religious experiences. James did not consider church communities as all that important and thought that religious experiences were ‘solitary’ events in which individuals experienced the divine or God.
He saw that religious experiences have great importance for the person who has them and often affect and change a person’s life, with religious beliefs assuming a great importance. It was this great change in people’s behaviour as a result of religious experiences that led James to think that they were the inspiration and source of religious institutions.
James saw that there were a great variety of religious experiences and examined what they had in common. William James argued that there are four ‘marks’ of mystical religious experience:
William James
Mary Evans Picture Library/Alamy
William James was a philosopher and psychologist. He was a pragmatist. He studied medicine at Harvard University and was initially a lecturer in anatomy. Later he became a professor of philosophy and then professor of psychology. He wrote a large number of books on both psychology and philosophy.
Pragmatism originated in the late nineteenth century. However, today it has a number of meanings.
The most common use of pragmatism is to describe an approach to political decision making which focuses on getting results – that is using the method and approach to get the job done in the most efficient manner. Political pragmatists reject ideological approaches to decision making.
In philosophy, pragmatism suggests that the meaning of a concept or idea is derived from looking at the consequences that come from the original idea or concept.
In order to ascertain the meaning of an intellectual conception one should consider what practical consequences might conceivably result by necessity from the truth of that conception; and the sum of these consequences will constitute the entire meaning of the conception.
(Peirce, CP 5.9, 1905)
Pragmatism was put forward by Charles Peirce and later developed by philosophers, such as William James and John Dewey.
Authority
When applied to religious experience the word ‘authority’ indicates that the person who has the religious experience has some new insight or knowledge about the world and God’s relationship with the world. This gives the person authority. Many authors argue that the authority is limited to the individual who has the experience; it is not about authority and power over other people.
William James did a lot of work in exploring how our psychology affects our understanding of religious experiences. One of his key arguments is the difference between what he called the ‘healthy minded’ and the ‘sick soul.’ People who are healthy minded are basically optimistic: if something goes wrong for them they take active steps to improve the situation. The person with the sick soul is basically pessimistic, seeing life as a constant struggle. This person may feel as if he has a ‘divided self’: the person may not feel worthy of being loved or of achieving success because he or she feels like a sinner who is constantly fighting to keep on top of sinful urges. James gives the example of St Augustine to illustrate the sick soul:
The new will which I have begun to have was not yet strong enough to overcome that other will strengthened by long indulgence. So these two wills, one old, one new, one carnal, the other spiritual, contended with each other and disturbed my soul.
(St Augustine, Confessions; quoted in James, p. 172)
Transience
Refers to the fact that religious experiences are experiences which are temporary. The experiences do not last forever.
Passive
Describes the common state of a person who has a religious experience. Often people do not seek out or will religious experiences; instead the experience happens to them – they are passive.
James argued that mystical experiences mostly happen to sick souls who need to be ‘twice-born’ in order to achieve happiness and unite the divided self. By this he meant that many people are happy and content for most of the time and their religious beliefs simply enhance this happiness. Others, however, are generally unhappy and some sort of radical change must take place in their life in order for them to be happy. For a number of religious people, this has been a mystical experience: the mystical experience is their ‘second birth’ into a new life of happiness.
James did make it clear, however, that conversion or mystical experiences are just examples of the many ways that unity can be reached. However, he thought that the only sign that a religious experience could be from God was that it resulted in a ‘good disposition’, but this would have value and meaning only for the person concerned. James said that religious experiences were real for those who experienced them, but he also looked at how they were similar to other experiences, such as dreams and hallucinations.
In the concluding chapter of The Varieties of Religious Experience he suggests that the cause of religious experiences lies in a deep and as yet not understood part of the subconscious mind:
It is one of the peculiarities of invasions from the subconscious region to take on objective appearances and to suggest to the Subject an external control … it is primarily the higher faculties of our own hidden mind which are controlling, the sense of union with the power beyond us is a sense of something, not merely apparently, but literally true.
(James, Varieties of Religious Experience)
James concluded that religious experiences on their own do not prove God’s existence, although they can suggest the existence of ‘something larger’:
I feel bound to say that religious experience, as we have studied it, cannot be cited as unequivocally supporting the infinitist belief. The only thing that it unequivocally testifies to is that we can experience union with something larger than ourselves and in that union find our greatest peace.
(James, Varieties of Religious Experience)
Thus, although James thought that religious experiences were ‘psychological phenomena’, he did not consider that this was an argument against the existence of God – this possibility he leaves open. He does, however, conclude that religious experiences lead to a new enthusiasm for life and often lead to profound and significant changes, such as a sense of peace and security, and of great love for others.
In action and discourse patterned by the frame of reference provided by the creed, we learn to find God in all life, all freedom, all creativity and vitality, and in each particular beauty, each unexpected attainment of relationship and community … To speak of ‘spirit’ as ‘God’ is to ascribe all creativity and conversion, all fresh life and freedom, to divinity.
(Lash, Easter in Ordinary, p. 267)
This view could support an understanding of religious experience whereby one learns to see the world in a religious way as a result of schooling and ‘formation’ into a religious tradition.
It would appear that religious experience is far more widespread than either James or his critics would allow.
In 1969 Alister Hardy founded the Religious Experience Research Centre, which now has an archive at Lampeter University, holding 6,000 accounts of religious experiences. Hardy collected people’s spiritual or religious experiences, asking what is known as ‘the Hardy question’: ‘Have you ever been aware of or influenced by a presence or power, whether you call it God or not, which is different from your everyday self?’
Since Hardy’s time there has been a growing amount of research. Surveys indicate that between a third and a half of British people claim to have had direct personal awareness of ‘a power or presence different from everyday life’. Much depends on exactly what question is asked, but the figure seems to be going up: a study by David Hay in 2001 found 76% of the British population claimed awareness of a transcendent reality. Some believe the rise may reflect a change in culture: perhaps more people feel able to admit that they had spiritual experiences without thereby identifying themselves with belief systems they do not hold.
Also in 2001 Olga Pupynin and Simon Brodbeck in London asked passers-by in Trafalgar Square, ‘Have you ever had an experience that you would describe as sacred, religious, spiritual, ecstatic, paranormal or mystical?’ Sixty-five per cent not only answered ‘yes’ but also were also willing to answer further questions. The following discussion showed that these had been important events in their lives, often life-changing events, and they were grateful for the opportunity to talk about them. The top three categories were ‘spiritual, religious and mystical’.
However, the question remains as to whether these are actually experiences of God, or simply the results of the human mind or even drugs. Can we simply accept it when someone says that he or she has had a religious experience? If religious experiences are ‘all in the mind’ they are still real experiences, just as someone feels pain, the pain is real, but those experiences might not necessarily point to anything: just as there is not always a physical cause of pain. In other words, someone might feel as if he or she has had an experience of God, but God might not exist and the experience might be all in the mind.
There are several main ways of trying to check that the experience is real:
Richard Swinburne has in The Existence of God suggested the principles of credulity and testimony to add support to believing in other people’s stories of religious experience.
The principle of credulity states,
if (in the absence of special considerations) it seems to a subject that x is present, then probably x is present. And similarly I suggest that … if it seems to a subject that in the past he perceived something or did something then (in the absence of special considerations) probably he did.
In other words, if it seems to people that they have experienced something (including God) then they probably did. Swinburne argued that, in general, we have good reason to believe what a person tells us is correct. So if someone tells us that he or she can see a robin in the garden, we believe them, even if we have not seen the robin.
We do, however, need to consider what Swinburne means by ‘special considerations’. He suggests five reasons why we might not believe someone:
It could be argued that Swinburne’s principle of credulity does not overcome the problem that even though we might think that we are experiencing God, we are in fact having another type of experience and claiming that it is God: the arguments from psychology you will look at later can be used here. Also, Swinburne uses our experience of everyday objects, such as tables and chairs, and people to argue that if something seems to be there, it probably is. That said, it is one thing to move from testimonies about things that we have regular interaction with in the physical world to testimonies about beings possibly beyond it. If someone claimed that there was a robin in the garden and that the person making the claim is quite sane and is basing the testimony on regular experiences of robins, but if that same person claimed to have experienced God, I would wonder how someone could do that, given that he may have had little or no direct experience of God at all in his life and, even so, would have precious little to verify his experience against, apart from the teachings of religion.
To strengthen his case, Swinburne has also developed the principle of testimony. This is the principle that ‘(in the absence of special considerations) the experiences of others are (probably) as they report them.’ In other words, when people tell us that something happened, it probably did. In other words, it is reasonable to believe people unless they are known liars. With the principles of credulity and testimony, Swinburne is arguing that the two variables within a report without an event: the person telling us the story and the events that make up that story are both, probably, reliable.
Swinburne suggests that a good way of making sure of the truthfulness of someone’s claim to have had a religious experience is to look at whether there are changes in that person’s life. If someone claims to have witnessed or experienced God, you would think that this would change his or her life, such as St Paul’s encounter with Jesus on the road to Damascus, which led to him becoming a follower of Jesus.
Swinburne does account for the fact that not everyone has religious experiences and those who do are likely to be religious as they are capable of using their religious beliefs to recognise the experience. According to Swinburne, if other evidence for God’s existence is taken into account, then religious experience makes it likely that God exists. Swinburne concludes, ‘On our total evidence, theism is more probable than not.’
Swinburne makes a cumulative argument and says that, taken with other evidence of God’s existence, religious experience makes it likely that God exists. Flew rejects the accumulation of arguments by his ‘ten leaky buckets’ analogy. He claimed (30 years before Swinburne) that ten deeply flawed arguments do not make one good one. However, Caroline Franks Davies suggested that the buckets could be stacked in such a way that the holes were covered! The issue is whether the various arguments are deeply flawed or whether, taken together, they do serve to make what Basil Mitchell called a ‘cumulative case’. It is important to recognise that the religious experience argument does not stand on its own – it depends on the prior probability of God’s existence being established.
The fruits of the experience are one way of verifying that it is genuine. Another way that philosophers argue that the experience has genuinely taken place is that as William Alston stated, ‘beliefs formed on the basis of experience possess an initial credibility by virtue of their origin.’ In other words, when we believe we have experienced something, we are usually right about that belief.
Alston argues, similarly to James, that unless we can prove otherwise, experiences are generally accurate. ‘Unless we accord a prima facie credibility to experiential reports, we can have no sufficient reason to trust any experiential source of beliefs’ (Alston, ‘Why Should There Not Be Experience of God?’). Alston concentrates on direct experiences of God which exclude, for instance, being aware of God ‘through the beauties of nature, the words of the Bible or a sermon’. These experiences are most likely to be plausibly regarded as presentations of God to the individual (St Teresa says that God ‘presents Himself to the soul by a knowledge brighter than the sun’). Alston also considers non-sensory experiences as, since God is held to be purely spiritual, a non-sensory experience has a greater chance of presenting God as God is than a sensory experience.
Alston rejects the limitation of the five senses suggested by Kant: ‘Why should we suppose that the possibilities of experiential givenness, for human beings or otherwise, are exhausted by the powers of our five senses?’ Animals, he claims, have senses wider than ours so ‘why can’t we envisage presentations that do not stem from the activity of any physical sense organs, as is apparently the case with mystical perception?’ Alston (‘Perceiving God’) also discussed whether it made sense to talk about a person experiencing God and gaining knowledge from the experience. Alston argued that in normal life knowledge is gained from experience. For example if you say, ‘There’s a robin in the garden’, then you are referring to things you have observed using your sense of sight. You are not doubted as others have had a similar experience using their sense of sight. Alston therefore asked that if many people have had a religious experience using their minds, is it right to immediately doubt what they claimed to have experienced? He claimed that if our sense perceptions are generally reliable, why should we not believe our senses if we have a religious experience? He said that just because an experience is unusual there is no reason to reject it as we would not reject other sense perceptions.
Alston rejected the argument that religious experiences cannot be verified, and suggested that we check things are true by making other sense observations. He suggested that other people’s religious experiences are also sense observations. Alston advocates a ‘perceptual model’ of mystical experience – something presents itself to us. We may ‘see’ it differently depending on our perceptual schemes and prior assumptions, but he claims there is something that presents itself to us. Alston accepts that believers make use of their prior frameworks but claims we do this with normal experience. If he sees his house from 50,000 feet, he sees his house and he may learn something new but it would basically be as he expected his house to look. Similarly, God is experienced as believers expect God to be experienced – there is no difference between ordinary experiences and religious ones.
These arguments do not show that religious experiences are experiences of God, but they do show that religious experiences cannot be rejected out of hand as illogical and irrational. Alston’s argument does not seek to prove God exists, but rather to show that if one believes in God, then it is reasonable to accept that religious experiences are from God.
However, the key problem is the word ‘if’ – in other words, the conclusion that God is experienced depends on one’s prior beliefs. Antony Flew took up this point and proposed the vicious circle argument in opposition to the argument from religious experience. He argued that everything which we are is based on something else; x leads to y, which in itself enforces x. A religious belief, Flew said, enforces a religious experience, and vice versa.
However, this does not account for either people of one religion having religious experiences relating to different religions or people converting to a religion without having a religious experience
John Hick also supported religious experiences, claiming that they are a different way of experiencing the world from non-religious experiences. He distinguishes between the transcendent as it is in itself and the way we think of it and experience it. In itself the transcendent is outside our concepts. Whatever concept we have of God is inadequate. There is an inbuilt human capacity to be aware that the transcendent is there, but we experience it in ways which are conditioned by our culture. It all depends on the interpretation, as events which one person considers to be ordinary or natural another person may experience as showing the presence and activity of God. The religious person simply interprets things differently and so experiencing God in the world is not irrational.
Look up 1 Samuel 3 in the Bible. What can be learned from this story about possible difficulties in recognising a religious experience?
Another philosophical problem with religious experiences is the lack of evidence that they have happened, beyond what a person says. Religious experiences may lead to noticeable changes in a person’s lifestyle (think of Paul) but this shows only that the person has changed; it does not give any insight into the nature and origins of religious experience.
Religious experiences may be challenged on philosophical grounds, by simply arguing that God is not the sort of being that may be experienced. If I have an experience of something like the wind, a table or a robin, unless my senses have been impaired I know that I have experienced it. Many philosophers, such as Kant, Aquinas and Maimonides, have argued that God is simply beyond our experience, so much so that for Aquinas and Maimonides our ability just to speak of God is strictly limited. However, this did not lead them to claim that God does not exist: all three believed in God, even though Aquinas argued that in this life, it is not possible to have direct acquaintance with God, because God is ultimately beyond the world in which we live – God is transcendent. Aquinas argued that we could become acquainted only with the products of God’s existence -– that is the universe and its contents. This is known as general revelation.
However, if we admit that the existence of God is possible, we should also admit that it could be possible to have some experience of God. If we argue, as Brian Davies has done in the introduction to Philosophy of Religion, that it is reasonable to believe that God exists, then we must logically accept that it is reasonable to believe that God may be experienced, or that some of his nature or attributes may be experienced, such as goodness or power, either directly (e.g. witnessing God’s power in a miracle) or indirectly (e.g. witnessing God’s goodness through the work of someone inspired by God to help the homeless).
An argument against religious experiences says that they have a physiological cause and are the result of physical changes in the body. It is possible that St Paul had epilepsy, which could possibly explain his experience of bright light, or that experiences claimed by teenage girls are caused by the hormonal changes at puberty.
However, much work in the last 20 years has focused on the function of various areas of the brain. Some scientists suggest that there are neuropsychological mechanisms which underlie religious experiences. They refer to the ‘causal operator’ and the ‘holistic operator’ within the brain. These seem to show up on brain scans done on meditating Buddhist monks. Just because there is a physical dimension to religious experience need not lead us to reject the experience completely. All experiences can be reduced to a series of neurological blips that show on brain scans, yet we do not doubt the reality of objects we see. Some thinkers have suggested our brains are constructed in such a way that we are almost wired up to experience God.
Richard Dawkins rejects this approach, and in his book The God Delusion, he tells a story from his student days. He recalls that a fellow undergraduate was camping in Scotland and claimed to have heard ‘the voice of the devil – Satan himself’. In fact, it was just the call of the Manx Shearwater (or ‘Devil Bird’), which has an evil-sounding voice.
For Dawkins, this highlights the key problem with personal experiences. They are often used in an appeal to God because people are ignorant of more straightforward physical or psychological explanations for what they perceive. According to Dawkins it is an argument based on ignorance.
However, it is one thing to say, ‘Some religious experiences can be explained physiologically’ and another to say that all religious experiences can be explained like this. There is no evidence that every person who has had a religious experience had an illness that can cause side effects, such as hallucinations, visions and delusions, in those who suffer.
Additionally, all experience has a biological basis. So just the fact that vision has a basis in the brain does not mean that it should be disbelieved. If religious experience has neural correlates, it could still be accurate.
Also, a religious believer can claim that if there is a God, God could work through one’s physiology.
William James did believe that religious experiences could in some way come from the human subconscious; he did not believe this was an argument against God’s existence.
Additionally, the work of Sigmund Freud has led some to suggest that religious experiences are a result of human psychology. This could explain why religious experiences occur in different cultures and throughout history.
Freud considered religion to be a neurosis as he observed that mentally ill patients displayed obsessive behaviour. These he thought were similar to religious practices and worship.
For Freud religion was an illusion – it simply expressed what people wanted to believe and met their psychological needs. Religion, he thought, came from a childlike desire for a God who resembles a father figure. This would suggest that religious experiences are a product of desire for a father figure. Religious experiences are hallucinations. Just as dreams are caused by deep desires we are unaware of, religious experiences are caused by the desire for security.
Some sociologists claimed that the origins of religion and religious experience are to be found in society. A religious experience thus reflects the society and religious tradition in which someone lives.
Karl Marx challenged religious claims and considered that religion was a form of ‘alienation’ from one’s true self. Religion simply took people away from the reality of their own lives – he called religion ‘the opiate of the people’ – it was like a drug that stopped people facing the reality of their lives and was a form of oppression and control.
For Marx the institution of the Church controlled people’s behaviour and was part of the class-divided society that kept working people oppressed and exploited. He considered the teaching of reward in heaven and punishment in hell gave people comfort of a better life and punishment for those who oppressed them.
Marx’s views were obviously shaped by the realities of life in the nineteenth century, arguing that the poverty of so many people was exacerbated by the Church as it encouraged people to keep to the status quo of society.
According to Marx, religious experience is simply the result of the society in which a person lived and his or her religious beliefs – it was not something that came from God but from the beliefs and teachings of the Church.
David Hume’s argument that the conflicting claims of miracles in different religious traditions cancel each other out can be used to oppose religious experience as well. He simply argued that two opposing religious experiences cancel one another out and discredit them. He called this ‘A triumph for the sceptic’.
Believers from many different religions claim to have experienced God, and while there are some similarities between these experiences, there are also differences – for example a Christian may claim to see Mary and a Hindu to see Lakshmi.
These differences can be explained by the prior beliefs of the person, and in any attempt to describe an ineffable experience the individual will naturally use his or her own culture and belief system. It could be argued that all religious experiences come from the same God but are simply interpreted differently.
Also, two conflicting religious experiences still leave the possibility of one being correct.
Many people have religious experiences, which are similar despite occurring to very different people in very different circumstances. The best explanation of these experiences, and their common nature, is that they are genuine experiences of something divine. Therefore, God exists.
Many philosophers have argued that, taken with other arguments for God’s existence, religious experience suggests that it is likely that God exists. It is true that the argument for the existence of God based on religious experience works better as a probability rather than a proof (which Swinburne would have agreed with). The existence of the world, and the way in which it is fine-tuned and ordered, as well as the existence of human consciousness and the apparent experience by so many of the presence of God, all make it more probable than not that there is a God (Swinburne, Is There a God?).
Religious experiences are a clear proof of God’s existence for those who have direct experience. However, as James said, this does not extend to other people and so a philosophical proof of God’s existence based on religious experience is not possible.
Religious experiences seem to depend so much on a person’s prior beliefs. As Alston pointed out, if someone believes in God then it is rational to believe that people have religious experiences of God. Additionally, Swinburne argued that an account of a direct religious experience of God should be accepted for what it is, unless there is a good reason to not believe what the person is saying.
In the light of all this, it is very difficult to argue conclusively that the object of a religious experience is an objectively existing supernatural power that many people call God. However, we must take James’ point seriously that religious experiences are absolutely authoritative for the subject. For people who claim to have had religious, spiritual or mystical experiences, whether the result of prayer, discipline or psychoactive drugs, these people very often believe the experiences to be life-changing, and for many, their lives do permanently change for the better. As St Francis of Assisi said, ‘for every tree is known by its fruits’.
It would seem that religious experience as an ‘argument for the existence of God’ is applicable only for the individual concerned. As with all philosophical arguments that attempt to prove the existence of God, this argument may well do much to strengthen the existing faith of the believer.
1 Types of religious experience
2 Corporate religious experiences
3 Conversion
Karl Marx
Everett Historical/ Shutterstock
4 Challenges to religious experience arguments
Try to explain the following ideas without looking at your books and notes:
|
Examination questions practice |
AO1 (15 marks)
You would need to explain the types of religious experiences using the work of Swinburne and William James. You might consider conversion, mystical experiences and/or corporate religious experiences.
AO2 (15 marks)
Alston, W.P. 1999. ‘Perceiving God’, in Philosophy of Religion: The Big Questions, Stump, E., et al. (eds). Oxford: Blackwell.
Alston, W.P. 2000. ‘Why Should There Not Be Experience of God?’ in Philosophy of Religion, a Guide and Anthology, Davies, B. (ed.). Oxford: OUP.
Davies, B. 1997. God, Reason and Theism. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Hay, D. 1990. Religious Experience Today. Mowbray: Continuum International.
Hick, J. 1964. The Existence of God. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
James, W. The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature. London: Penguin Classics.
Mackie, J. 1982. The Miracle of Theism. Oxford: OUP.
Palmer, M. 2001. The Question of God. London: Routledge.
Swinburne, R. 1991. The Existence of God. Oxford: OUP.
Vardy, P. 1990. The Puzzle of God. London: Fount Paperbacks.
