THE MYSTICAL ELEMENT OF RELIGION

The mystical body of society: religion and association in nineteenth-century French political thought.

‘‘It is not the case,’’ Alasdair MacIntyre once wrote, ‘‘that men first stopped believing in God and in the authority of the Church, and then subsequently started behaving differently. It seems clear that men first of all lost any overall social agreement as to the right ways to live together, and so ceased to be able to make sense of any claims to moral authority.’’1 Religious faith and moral ...

Psychology of Religion and Spirituality The Language of Ineffability: Linguistic Analysis of Mystical Experiences

Mystical Experience

Mystical experiences represent a fundamental dimension of human existence. These experiences are commonly reported across all cultures. A mystical experience subjectively is characterized by encountering the divine in a way that disrupts the normal sense of self . The definitions of mystical experience used in research and clinical publications vary considerably, ranging from "upheaval of the t...

Mystical experience as evidence

Thus the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend... 'But', He said, 'you cannot see my face; for man shall not see me and live'. Ex. 33:11 & 20 Religious apologetics is perennially attracted to the idea that religious beliefs are arrived at in ways that are fundamentally on all fours with the procedures by means of which more mundane beliefs are generated and jus...

Mystical Experience and Metaphysics

In Chapter 2 of Beyond Physicalism, I suggest that mystical experience, if a source of genuine metaphysical insight, can shed light on a variety of extraordinary phenomena, including psi and near-death experience, as well as the mystery that is ordinary consciousness. It is striking that mystics are often left with the conviction that they came into contact with deeper realities during their ex...