Religious Experience: A Reader

224 Pages·2014·1.431 MB·English

by  Craig Martin (editor), Russell T. McCutcheon (editor)

RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE
CRITICAL CATEGORIES IN THE STUDY OF RELIGION
Series Editor: Russell T. McCutcheon, Department of
Religious Studies, University of Alabama
Critical Categories in the Study of Religion aims to present the pivotal articles that best
represent the most important trends in how scholars have gone about the task of describ-
ing, interpreting, and explaining the place of religion in human life. The series focuses
on the development of categories and the terminology of scholarship that make possible
knowledge about human beliefs, behaviours, and institutions. Each volume in the series
is intended as both an introductory survey of the issues that surround the use of various
key terms as well as an opportunity for a thorough retooling of the concept under study,
making clear to readers that the cognitive categories of scholarship are themselves histori-
cal artefacts that change over time.
Published
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Defining Hinduism: A Reader
Edited by J.E. Llewellyn
Religion and Cognition: A Reader
Edited by D. Jason Slone
Mircea Eliade: A Critical Reader
Edited by Bryan Rennie
Defining Buddhism(s): A Reader
Edited by Karen Derris and Natalie Gummer
Defining Islam: A Reader
Edited by Andrew Rippin
Myths and Mythologies: A Reader
Edited by Jeppe Sinding Jensen
Defining Judaism: A Reader
Edited by Aaron W. Hughes
Readings in the Theory of Religion: Map, Text, Body
Edited by Scott S. Elliott and Matthew Waggoner
RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE
A READER
Edited by
Craig Martin and Russell T. McCutcheon
with Leslie Dorrough Smith
First Published 2012 by Equinox Publishing Ltd, an imprint of Acumen

Published 2014 by Routledge
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Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor and Francis Group, an informa business
Editorial selection and matter © Craig Martin, Russell T. McCutcheon, and Leslie Dorrough Smith 2012
Essays © individual authors and publisher
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any
form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented,
including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publishers.

Notices
Practitioners and researchers must always rely on their own experience and knowledge in
evaluating and using any information, methods, compounds, or experiments described
herein. In using such information or methods they should be mindful of their own safety
and the safety of others, including parties for whom they have a professional
responsibility.

To the fullest extent of the law, neither the Publisher nor the authors, contributors, or
editors, assume any liability for any injury and/or damage to persons or property as a
matter of products liability, negligence or otherwise, or from any use or operation of any
methods, products, instructions, or ideas contained in the material herein.
ISBN: 978-1-84553-097-6 (hardback)
ISBN: 978-1-84553-098-3 (paperback)
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Religious experience : a reader / edited by Craig Martin and Russell T. McCutcheon with Leslie Dorrough
Smith.
p. cm. — (Critical categories in the study of religion)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-84553-097-6 (hardback) — ISBN 978-1-84553-098-3 (pbk.)
1. Experience (Religion) I. Martin, Craig, 1976- II. McCutcheon, Russell T., 1961- III. Smith, Leslie
Dorrough, 1975-
BL53.R443 2012
204’.2—dc23
2012002500
Typeset by JS Typesetting Ltd, Porthcawl, Mid Glamorgan
CONTENTS
Preface vii
Sources ix
1. Introduction 1
Russell T. McCutcheon
Part I: The Background of Experience
2. Raymond Williams 19
“Experience,” from Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society
3. Robert Desjarlais 24
“Rethinking Experience,” from Shelter Blues: Sanity and Selfhood
among the Homeless
Part II: The Autonomy of Experience
4. William James 37
“Lecture 2: Circumscription of the Topic,” from The Varieties of
Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature
5. Charles Taylor 55
“James: Varieties,” from Varieties of Religion Today:
William James Revisited
Part III: The Universality of Experience
6. Joachim Wach 71
“Universals in Religion,” from Types of Religious Experience:
Christian and Non-Christian
v
CONTENTS
7. Diana Eck 88
“Bozeman to Banaras: Questions from the Passage to India,” from
Encountering God: A Spiritual Journey from Bozeman to Banaras
Part IV: The Explanation of Experience
8. Wayne Proudfoot 109
“A Classic Conversion Experience” and “Explaining Religious
Experience,” from Religious Experience
9. Ann Taves 122
Excerpt from “Conclusion,” from Fits, Trances, and Visions:
Experiencing Religion and Explaining Experience from Wesley to James
Part V: The Unraveling of Experience
10. Robert H. Sharf 131
“Experience,” from Critical Terms for Religious Studies
11. Joan Wallach Scott 151
“The Evidence of Experience,” from Critical Inquiry
Conclusion: The Capital of “Experience”
12. William James in Late Capitalism: Our Religion of the Status Quo 177
Craig Martin
Some Afterwords …
13. I Have a Hunch 199
Russell T. McCutcheon
Bibliography 203
Index 211
vi
PREFACE
Talk of “religious experience” has been a part of religious studies for some time. German
theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768–1834) argued as far back as 1799 that the
core of religion is an awe-inspiring experience of God. His work was influential on a wide
variety of key figures in the history of religious studies, notably including William James
(1842–1910), Rudolph Otto (1869–1937), Joachim Wach (1898–1955), and Mircea Eliade
(1907–86). This vein of scholarship teaches us that religious experience is the essence
of religion, and that the “outward” things—like creeds, texts, rituals, and so forth—are
always secondary manifestations of religious experience. A person might tell a narrative
about a religious experience, she might invent a ritual to memorialize it, but these things
are always and necessarily secondary (temporally and in importance) to the original
experience itself.
Why would religion scholars argue that experience is at the core of religion, espe-
cially when we lack empirical evidence both of gods and of the universal experiences
they are supposed to have evoked? In part Schleiermacher’s theory was motivated by his
need to defend Christianity against materialist philosophers who had virtually done away
with supernatural claims. Then-popular philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) drew
a picture of the nature of the universe that left little if any room for divine beings; Kant
believed in a god of sorts, but argued that there is nothing we could know about him. Kant’s
religion was therefore stripped of many of the things important to Schleiermacher and
other Christians of his day. As far as they were concerned, Kant had taken the heart out of
Christianity. In response, Schleiermacher argued that the core of religion is an experience
of God that is completely independent of philosophy or philosophical knowledge. He would
allow Kant to paint the Christian god out of the philosophical picture, but Schleiermacher
would bring his god back in by saying that we have direct experiences of this god—on
Schleiermacher’s account, the fact that we can’t philosophically know something about
God is irrelevant. For Schleiermacher, we can intuitively know such a god exists, through
experience, in a way that bypasses philosophy and Kant’s critique. In sum, Schleiermacher’s
assertion of the centrality of religious experience was a defensive gesture designed to win
back for Christian theology some of the ground lost to modern philosophy.
vii
PREFACE
Despite the fact that we have many good reasons to reject Schleiermacher’s claims
about religious experience—as several of the essays in this book attest—the idea that reli-
gious experience is at the core of religion persists to this day. Few today use the term, as
Schleiermacher did, to defend Christian doctrine, but we—the editors—would argue that
the rhetoric of “religious experience” continues to be used to advance other social agendas,
some of which are discussed in the following pages. This volume is therefore designed to
introduce readers to the problem of “religious experience”—we have included essays that
argue for or assume the existence of universal religious experience, as well as essays that
call into question the idea.
The critics we have included hail from a wide range of disciplines: Wayne Proudfoot
is an analytic philosopher of religion, Raymond Williams was a literary critic, Robert
Desjarlais is an anthropologist and ethnographer, and Joan W. Scott is a feminist historian.
The concept of experience, it is worth noting, has come under fire not only from within
religious studies but across the humanities and social sciences in general.
Part I includes two essays we have chosen because they raise critical questions we
hope will frame the volume. Parts II and III contain essays written by scholars who take
for granted the existence and possible universality of religious experience. Parts IV and
V include essays by scholars who have begun to call into question the rhetoric of “experi-
ence.” Readers will notice that for Parts II through IV, the essays chosen include a “classic”
essay as well as a more contemporary contribution that falls within the same tradition.
Charles Taylor, for instance, assumes the sort of centrality of experience as did William
James before him, Diana Eck assumes the universality of experience as did Joachim Wach,
and Ann Taves remains as committed as Wayne Proudfoot was to explaining (and perhaps
explaining away) experience.
We are skeptical of talk about religious experience, and we believe that questions such
as “why would people talk about religious experience” are more interesting than ques-
tions about the nature of “religious experience.” Hence the concluding chapter ignores
the question of the existence of “religious experience” altogether, and instead considers
what people might gain or lose by rhetorically opposing “religious experience” to so-called
“organized religion.” The short afterword, “I Have a Hunch,” closes the volume by satirizing
scholarship gone awry.
The citation styles for the following essays have been converted to a uniform style,
and editors’ notes have been added to help readers unfamiliar with some of the historical
figures and technical terms that appear below.
The editors would like to acknowledge Leslie Dorrough Smith for writing the introduc-
tions to each chapter, introductions that nicely focus the reader’s attention on some of the
key issues in each essay. We would also like to thank Kim Davis and Melanie Williams
(then undergraduate students in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of
Alabama) for assisting with scanning and formatting many of the essays at a very early
stage of producing this volume. We would also like to thank Janet Joyce, Tristan Palmer,
and Val Hall at Equinox Publishing for their support and patience in seeing this volume
through to completion. Thanks also go to the presses that have allowed us to reprint copy-
righted essays, as well as the authors who gave us permission to do so.
viii
SOURCES
Raymond Williams. 1983. “Experience.” In Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society (rev. ed.), 126–9.
New York: Oxford University Press. Copyright © Raymond Williams 1976, 1983. Reprinted with permis-
sion of Oxford University Press.
Robert Desjarlais. 1997. “Rethinking Experience.” In Shelter Blues: Sanity and Selfhood Among the Homeless,
10–17. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Copyright © The University of Pennsylvania Press
1997. Reprinted with permission of the University of Pennsylvania Press.
William James. 1911. “Circumscription of the Topic.” In The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human
Nature, 26–52. New York: Longmans, Green, and Co.
Charles Taylor. 2002. “James: Varieties.” In Varieties of Religion Today: William James Revisited, 3–29. Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press. Copyright © The President and Fellows of Harvard College 2002. Reprinted
with permission of Harvard University Press.
Joachim Wach. 1951. “Universals in Religion.” In Types of Religious Experience: Christian and Non-Christian,
30–47. Chicago IL: University of Chicago Press. Copyright © The University of Chicago 1951. Reprinted
with permission of the University of Chicago Press.
Diana Eck. 2003. “Bozeman to Banaras: Questions from the Passage to India.” In Encountering God: A Spiritual
Journey from Bozeman to Banaras, 1–21. Boston, MA: Beacon Press. Copyright © Diana L. Eck 1993, 2003.
Reprinted with permission of Beacon Press.
Wayne Proudfoot. 1985. Selections from Religious Experience, 102–7 and 216–27. Berkeley, CA: University of
California Press. Copyright © The Regents of the University of California 1985. Reprinted with permission
of the University of California Press.
Ann Taves. 1999. “Conclusion.” In Fits, Trances, & Visions: Experiencing Religion and Explaining Experience
from Wesley to James, 348–61. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Copyright © Princeton University
Press 1999. Reprinted by permission of Princeton University Press.
Robert Sharf. 1998. “Experience.” In Critical Terms for Religious Studies, Mark C. Taylor (ed.), 94–116. Chicago,
IL: University of Chicago Press. Copyright © The University of Chicago 1998. Reprinted with permission
of the University of Chicago Press.
Joan Wallach Scott. 1991. “The Evidence of Experience,” In Critical Inquiry 17(4), 773–97. Copyright © The
University of Chicago 1991. Reprinted with permission of the University of Chicago Press.
ix