Types of Religious Experience

Stephen Loxton

Introduction

Many explanations of religious experience deal with accounts and description of personal, individual and subjective experiences of

1. Conversion
2. Mystical communion or union with the ‘divine’, ‘holy’ or absolute’.
3. Revelation(s) of God’s will or purpose and/or of the divinity of reality as a whole.

These various accounts are always subject to the criticism that they are private, subjective and thus arguably, non-verifiable.

But some accounts deal with something much more social in character when a group of people appear to have had and then to claim a transformational experience as a collective, and we will begin with an account of one such phenomenon that has had wide publicity in recent times.

The Toronto Blessing

The Toronto Blessing is relevant here as a quite recent and widely reported event.

The basic facts:

Date: 10th January 1994.
Location: The Toronto Airport Vineyard Church. (Toronto in Canada – in case you aren’t sure!)

During a sermon given by the Pastor, R. Clark, eyewitnesses gave strikingly similar accounts of a ‘blessing’ that was given.

What was experienced was ‘like an explosion’ as people were ‘knocked off their feet by the Spirit of God’.

About 80% of the congregation were felled. Some lay still; some trembled or shook; some danced; others laughed; some shouted and others cried.

The event was viewed as an ‘outpouring of the Holy Spirit’.

The background to this event is in large part a very similar event connected to a sermon delivered by Rodney Howard-Browne (b.1961) in 1979. In the context of his sermon, he was praying for a more profound spiritual experience, and he challenged God:

“‘Either You come down here and touch me, or I will come up there and touch You,’ he prayed in desperation. Suddenly, his whole body felt like it was on fire. He began to laugh uncontrollably. Then he wept and began to speak in tongues. ‘I was plugged into heaven’s electrical supply,’ he later wrote in his book, The Touch of God. ‘And since then my desire has been to go and plug other people in'” (Julia Dulin, “Praise the Lord and Pass the New Wine,” 8/94, Charisma, p. 22).1

Howard-Browne worked as a minister in South Africa until the late 1980s when he moved to the United States of America. In April, 1989, while working in a church near Albany, New York, he gave a sermon during which that the so-called holy laughter broke out again.

Howard-Browne claimed that he felt a sensation like a heavy blanket coming over him. Then people began falling out of their seats. Some were laughing, some were crying. Howard-Browne then established the Rodney Howard-Browne Evangelistic Association in Louisville, Kentucky. In Howard-Browne preached at a Church in Florida and a one-week appearance was carried over for three more weeks.

The services were broadcast on radio, and people began to come along to the Church experience what they heard on the air. Then Howard-Browne was appearing on the Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN). Soon after his Howard-Browne’s influence reached the Toronto Airport Vineyard through the visit by R. Clark. From that point, it was spread from the Toronto Airport Vineyard to churches throughout the world, primarily through the Vineyard movement.

Effects:

1. As the above accounts demonstrate, one key feature claimed is that of being in the presence of the ‘Holy Spirit’. People fall as they cannot stand ‘in the presence of the Spirit’.
2. Another feature – the body shakes – this is thought to be due to being in the presence of God…
3. There is weeping – at the joy of repentance and cleansing from perceived sin.
4. There is so-called ‘Holy Laughter’, claimed to signify the coming of the Holy Spirit into the individual’s soul. The laughter is expressive of the joy experienced.

And the experiences set out here are experienced corporately but congregations – and there is clear consensual evidence from eyewitnesses as to the accuracy of what has been observed.

Visions & Conversion

We might consider these categories of religious experience together.

A classic case of vision and conversion is often said to be that of St Paul, as in the account in the Acts of the Apostles.

In Acts 7 and 8 we learn that Saul is an approving witness of the stoning of the disciple Stephen, and that Saul is then a severe persecutor of the followers of Jesus. In Acts 9 Saul is ‘still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord’ and he seeks leave to go to Damascus to root out those who follow ‘the Way.’

‘Now as he was going along and approaching Damascus, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, ‘Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?’ He asked, ‘Who are you, Lord?’ The reply came, ‘I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. But get up and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do.’ The men who were travelling with him stood speechless because they heard the voice but saw no one. Saul got up from the ground, and though his eyes were open, he could see nothing; so they led him by the hand and brought him into Damascus. For three days he was without sight, and neither ate nor drank. (Acts 9: 1-17)

We might add the following text:

In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.’ (Mk 1:9-11)

Jesus’ baptism portrayed in stained glass.

In both narratives individuals experience transformational callings to a new way of life. The calling comes against a backdrop – Paul’s is the classic case of conversion – from being an opponent of the Way of the Lord he becomes an Apostle. Jesus’ calling, which we find in all four Gospels, is variously shown to be a response consistent with a history of expectation of a Messiah – or in the case of John, the incarnation of the Word. However, in Mark’s account, it is much more akin to Jesus making a conversion response to the message of John the Baptist, and in so doing feeling a personal confirmation from God. We should note how the Markan account makes clear that the experience of calling of personal to Jesus.

In these as well as in less dramatic cases, conversion involves a changing perspective and a new commitment; it is seen as a qualitative change, a re-birth or regeneration.

The Psychology of Conversion

Conversion has been subjected to a lot of study by psychologists – William James’ influence is considerable here.

A common view that psychologists take is that as a rule individuals have a cluster of ideals, values and motivations that they live by. Sometimes a particular ideal or value is very much at the heart of a person’s concerns – and this is said to form the ‘habitual centre’ of the person’s concern. This ‘habitual centre’ could flow from a person’s upbringing or culture and be something that is acquired naturally through individual and social development. Now, if, via some event or through some process, the key ideals or values by which an individual lives changes, we have what is termed a conversion experience of transformation.

The key thing is that through the conversion experience a new and determinative value or ideal comes to prioritise the individual’s orientation and commitment.

In the process of change intellectual factors may be involved – people may have reasons for a change of view and focus, but emotional factors are often much more significant. What is at stake is commitment – that is to say the commitment is that of an individual’s heart and mind, we might say – and so it involves a real cost.

Obviously the conversion experience is not limited to the religious dimension of experience. You can have conversion over your relationships, study habits, eating regime, shopping priorities or over which Rugby team you support!

Edwin Starbuck (1866-1947) is credited with making one of the earliest detailed studies of conversion experiences – and his conclusions have been confirmed in ongoing research. Starbuck is credited with developing the idea of ‘psychology of religion’ and he studied with and worked with William James.

Starbuck (1) studied 14-17 year old subjects and looked at conversion experiences of those brought up in evangelical homes and at adolescent experiences of others who had had no emphatic religious background.

Common dispositions were identified in those who became converts:

• A growing sense of imperfection.
• A sense of being incomplete.
• Introspective reflection.
• Moodiness and anxiety.
• Depression.

But Starbuck found that the same characteristics were typically found in 14-17 year olds anyway! Thus his view was that the move through adolescence is one that naturally involves a form of conversion experience, as the individual negotiates a route from childhood through to the wider horizons and yet more specific targets of adulthood.

Starbuck’s research suggested that religious conversion tended to shorten the period of stress and anxiety.

The convert, once the religious commitment has been made or once the individual has made it though to an adult perspective, shows the following symptoms:

• Relief.
• Happiness.
• Objectivity (meaning an ability to stand back and analyse the experience).

Starbuck also thought that the key to conversion in the religious sense was that it was prompted by the desire to overcome a state of sin rather than through a desire to be ‘righteous.’

William James (in The Varieties of Religious Experience) argued that religious conversion was

• Something that was experienced as being very real by those who had them –with divine agency being the effective power that causes the conversion commitment
• A crisis of some kind was thought – by Methodists in particular – to be the necessary precondition for conversion.
• Sudden conversion was experienced a miracle rather than as a natural process.

James thought that whether a conversion was seen as a natural process or not, it was a consequence of divine agency.

However, James also thought that conversion was something that some people could experience but other could not. Some people rather obviously did not put religious ideas or commitment at the centre of their concerns.

• Some people were too cynical to be converted.
• Some were too pessimistic.
• Others had reasons based on their own experience that inhibited them from conversion.

Types of Conversion

James and Starbuck both reflected on the types of conversion experience that they found evidence of, and the general view was that there are two main forms of conversion activity:

Volitional Conversion: This is where conversion is a gradual process and where the individual at some point suddenly realises that her perspective and commitment has changed. This gradual process may well be one that takes a person from extreme doubt and scepticism about a religious perspective to a point of quire define religious commitment.

and

Self-Surrender Conversion: This is where in a more dramatic manner the individual is aware of some other force or power at work in relation to which they make, in a sacrificial manner, a commitment.

Either way, a faith commitment – and act of trust and surrender, is a feature of all conversion experiences, and converts appear to exhibit two consistent concerns:

• That there life at present is somehow wrong and unworthy and this they want to change.
• A sense of the positive changes that they want to make

Another feature of the two types of conversion is that the fall-out rate of self-surrender conversion is greater than that of the volitional conversion. Perhaps the more gradual approach engages a person holistically, and gives an intellectual as well as a moral and emotional aspect to the perspective. Self-surrender conversions can be transacted on high tides of emotion and out of traumatic levels of anxiety – and later on, but perhaps not much later on, holes may begin to appear in the perspective to which the convert has committed.

Miracles

With concept of miracle we come upon a most problematic term.

On the one hand, we have the everyday sense of using the term ‘miracle’ to describe something that was unexpected and surprising – and positive.

• Driving to work I might round a corner and find five deer in the middle of the road. Later I describe it as ‘a miracle’ that they all leapt out of the way and none were killed!
• I might come in in August to get the A level results and find that so-and-so has an A grade – ‘a miracle’, I say!

But we then have the ‘religious’ sense of miracle, particularly as some claim, in biblical literature where, on some understandings, divine power is directly perceived to have intervened to some good effect.

Let’s take some examples. Here are some things that happen as a matter of course, or occasionally:

• If I want to make wine I need a lot of water, the process involves a lot of work and several stages and time – it can’t be done in an instant!
• Someone is ill and they have tried several treatments and therapies for several years with no real improvement. Then they hear of a new doctor who people speak well of. They visit the doctor and at once they feel sure that things are going to improve – and they do.
• Someone might be very ill and be thought beyond recovery – but in fact they do pull through.
• Someone is certified dead but hours later in the morgue they recover consciousness and give the morgue attendant a severe shock.

In the New Testament writings we have numerous examples of events akin to the above –

John 2 1-11 Jesus changes water into wine at the Wedding in Cana-in-Galilee.

Mark 5 24/5 -34: The healing of the woman with haemorrhages.

Mark 5 21-24 & 35-43: The healing of Jairus’ daughter.

The Raising of Jairus´ daughter, from The Life of Jesus Christ by J.J.Tissot, 1899.

John 11:1-16 & 38-44 – The death and raising of Lazarus.




´The Raising of Lazarus´ by Rembrandt. Panel, ca. 1630.

All of these things are ‘signs’ (in John) or ‘miracles’ in Mark – and the view that we have been explaining says that the miraculous aspect here is not really what happens, but that it is said to have happened in a particular way and via the agency of an individual or by the power of some divine intervention.

On matter to raise here and to explore more later is that the philosophical discussion of miracles almost always works on the basis of assuming that the New Testament writings must be taken as factual and descriptive. Many religious people think this too! For many such stories are evidence of supernatural power breaking through into the natural or created order, and so evidence of God’s reality and God’s care. A feature of this view is that what has happened cannot be explained in naturalistic terms – it is a supernatural event.

Thus we have common-sensical and a religious view that is variously literalistic in its reading of the biblical material and orthodox if not fundamentalist in its theology.

There is at least one other way of looking at miracles that we will consider later, but for now we need to note that the main philosophical discussion of miracles given by David Hume is directed against the religious view as set out so far.

David Hume: Of Miracles

Hume’s view on miracles is easily summed up:

The Christian religion, he says, was at the first ‘attended with miracles’ and even today ‘cannot be believed by any reasonable person without one.’

Belief requires faith and this is in effect a ‘continued miracle’ in the person of the believer, ‘which subverts all the principles of his understanding, and gives him a determination to believe what is most contrary to custom and experience.’2

Hume’s modus operandi

It is well-known that Hume is an empiricist. All ‘objects of human reason or enquiry’ can be divided into one of two kinds:

1. Relations of ideas – by which Hume means logic, mathematics and the like – matters than can be known intuitively or through deduction. ‘That four times five is equally to half of forty’ is the sort of thing Hume means. A feature of a true proposition expressing a relation of ideas is that it will be certain. Thus we are certain that ‘3×3’ ‘= 9’ is right (or true)and as certain that ‘7+3 = 12’ is wrong!
2. Matters of fact – by which Hume means all matters that we infer through the senses about the world we take be outside ourselves. A feature of such knowledge is that is not certain. The contrary of every matter of fact is possible; for example, ‘the sun will rise tomorrow’ and ‘the sun will not rise tomorrow’ are both intelligible propositions; neither are contradictory.

Hume assumes we will see that the knowledge that we needs for most of our dealings with life is knowledge of matters of fact.

So far as we can tell, knowledge of matters of fact ‘seems to be founded on the relation of Cause and Effect.’ ‘Seems’ is a key term here – Hume does not think that we observe a phenomenon directly called ‘cause and effect’, ‘cause and effect’ is simply our habitual convention for what we do observe. Thus, if we ask of anyone why they believe any matter of fact, they will explain via a description of other facts that are seen as causes of the fact in questions which viewed as an effect.

Thus ‘A man finding a watch or any other machine in a desert island, would conclude that there had once been men on that island.’

Our thinking on matters of fact is via a principle of habit, which Hume calls constant conjunction. It is, Hume says:

‘A general maxim, that no objects have any discoverable connexion together, and that all the inferences which we can draw from one to another, are founded merely on our experience of their constant and regular conjunction.’ David Hume

To adapt Hume’s example, a child does not know a priori that water of a certain depth would drown her. Reason, ‘unassisted by experience’ cannot ‘draw inferences concerning real existence and matters of fact.’ It is only via a series of events where one things is observed regularly following another – so choking after going beneath the surface of the bath or a pond or a pool – gives rise to the view that drowning follows as an effect from immersion in water (the cause) – though not the only one, as many murder enquiry’s discover.

Hume thus feels that wisdom involves proportioning ‘belief to the evidence.’2 All knowledge of matters of fact is uncertain to some degree, so contrary views can be envisaged to some degree to every possible belief.

For any belief that we are considering we should consider opposite views and the weight of experimental evidence on each side of the case, so that we can judge the probability of a view being proportionally assured. If we have one hundred experimental confirmations of a view and no contrary cases we can have strong assurance. Exceptions, however, prove the rule – that is Hume’s view.

Hume thinks that the principle of understanding here should be applied equally to human testimonies and eyewitness accounts of personal experience. He is thinking of accounts of miracles or testimonies of having had a miraculous experience. All such accounts are ‘founded on past experience’ and so are ‘varied with the experience’ and should be examined either as proof or as probability relative to the conjunction or otherwise with other reports and evidence. Hume considers the case of an Indian Prince who refused to believe the accounts he heard of the effects frost, did so justly, since the accounts invited him to assent to a state of nature that he had not encountered such that he had no experience conformable with what was being described.

Here Hume is recommending scepticism as a reasonable outlook in the face of the unexpected – and by implication suggesting that the use of the term ‘miracle’ to explain the unexpected is unwarranted.

Hume’s definition of miracle: ‘a violation of the laws of nature.’

Hume and Regularity

By ‘laws of nature’ Hume means that regular experiences have given rise to firm beliefs about certain regularities we term ‘laws’: that all men die, that objects are subject to gravity, that fire burns wood and is extinguished by water. Nothing in conformity with the laws could count as a miracle – by default a miracle is something that appears to be an event that is a violation of the ‘common course of nature’.

Hume, mindful of the Christian belief in the miracle of resurrection, says that it is no kind of miracle that a man should die suddenly. This is of course unusual, but it has been observed to happen. But is would be a miracle if a dead man came to life. Hume then reasons1 that the conformity of observed experience gives direct and full proof , ‘from the nature of the fact, against the existence of any miracle’. Such a proof can only be overcome (and a claimed miracle made probable) by evidence that is superior to what is in fact regularly observed to be the case the case.

Whatever else Hume achieves, he manages, with this reasoning, to define miracles into the domain of irrational fantasy.

Hume has thus far shown that we would never have good reason to prefer a miracle as an explanation for an event to an explanation that conforms to regular experiences of natural events.

But Hume then produces a series of further arguments against miracles1:

Hume reasons that :

‘There is not to be found, in all history, any miracle attested by a sufficient number of men, of such unquestioned good sense , education and learning, as to secure us against all delusion in themselves; of such undoubted integrity, as to place them beyond any suspicion of any design to deceive others; of such credit and reputation in the eyes of mankind, as to have a good deal to lose in case of their being detected in any falsehood; and at the same time, attesting facts performed in such a public manner and in so celebrated a part of the world, as to render the detection avoidable’. (David Hume)

Hume next suggests that the passions of ‘surprise’ and ‘wonder’ arising from miracles, ‘being agreeable’ give ‘a sensible tendency towards the belief of those events, from which it is derived. And this goes so far, that even those who cannot enjoy this pleasure immediately cannot believe those miraculous events, of which they are informed, yet love to partake of the satisfaction at second-hand or by rebound, and place a pride and delight in exciting the imagination of others… A religionist may be an enthusiast, and imagine he sees what is has no reality; he may know his narrative to be false, and yet persevere with it, with the best intentions in the world, for the sake of promoting so holy a cause.’

Hume states that ‘strong presumption against’ the supernatural and miraculous being viable that they originate mostly amongst what he terms ‘ignorant and barbarous nations.’