Experiencing God

[soma]

We can experience God on different levels and in different ways, each being a personal experience. The difficulty with classification of a 'real' or 'artificial' experience is, to me, one of setting. We do not need music, books, speaking of prayers, or any other external vehicle to bring us to such a state. God cannot be 'induced'. We do need to quiet ourselves. to calm our minds, our hearts, close our eyes, and listen with nothing more than our breathing and being as an activity. This 'waiting on the arrival of God' is something Quakers of the silent worship tradition have been doing for 350 years

 

Russ very profound. It made me think that all experiences are legitimate because they are real for the person in the experience. I managed a half way house for the mentally disturbed. Some would hear voices in their head and they thought they were real even when they told them to commit suicide. We never said they were crazy, but we did try to help them understand what they were going through. It was real for them even if we thought they were imaginary.

 

Sbnr1 you had some good points. I didn't see your post until I posted. I got called away in the middle of my reply so I edited to let you know.

[GeorgeW]

And that's what I'm saying also. Experiencing Reality (or God) subjectively, we may not ever know for sure if our experiences are authentic, based on the experience alone. If God is the Source and Author of ALL that is, including emotion and even imagination, then it may not be necessary to draw hard lines between objectivity and subjectivity. All that may be necessary is to look at the fruit. Is it benign or beneficial, not only to one's self, but to others, to the world? sbnr

 

Yes, I think that is a good standard to apply to any practice, belief or experience.

 

George

[Brian Holley]

abnr1 said

 

And that's what I'm saying also. Experiencing Reality (or God) subjectively, we may not ever know for sure if our experiences are authentic, based on the experience alone. If God is the Source and Author of ALL that is, including emotion and even imagination, then it may not be necessary to draw hard lines between objectivity and subjectivity. All that may be necessary is to look at the fruit. Is it benign or beneficial, not only to one's self, but to others, to the world? sbnr

 

Thanks for that. It sums the situation up nicely. "By their fruits you shall know them."

[Brian Holley]

I came across this entry in my journal and hope it may be relevant:

 

"When you have an encounter with God you discover that God doesn't use words. Language is what the little self uses to try to express its experience of the Self. When consciously in the presence of the Self the little self is a child gamboling and playing with thoughts and ideas; delighting in this and that, while the Self looks on like a good mother."

 

More recently I read a Rumi poem in which this line appeared: "Don't talk about the orchard, eat the grapes."

 

Hope this is more help than hindrance.

[BillM]

"Don't talk about the orchard, eat the grapes."

 

That's good advice, Brian. As you know, I came out of traditional Christianity. Much of my time spent there concerned talking about the orchard, which trees were the right trees, which trees needed pruning, which trees needed to be cut down before they could infect other trees, etc. There is nothing, I suppose, inherently wrong with such an approach. But it became, for me, less and less fruit-full.

 

This was especially true in my own life. I had been walking the traditional path for 40 years and although there were some victories, I still felt a lot of pain in my heart, bitterness, envy, unforgiveness, lust, superiority - things not really "the fruit of the Spirit." And I wasn't satisfied with the typical Christian answer that we have two natures - one sinful and one good - especially given how good "Christ in us" is supposed to be. The fruit just wasn't there, even after 40 years.

 

Now, I'm certainly not going to claim that since I've left traditional Christianity that everything is coming up roses. My wife can testify that such a claim would be a lie. But my focus is slowly shifting (sometimes very slowly) from analyzing all the trees in the orchard to just letting my own roots grow deep in my experiences of the Spirit. In biblical terms, this might be "taste and see that the Lord is good." And I'm finding that though the growth is slow, the deeper my roots go, the more my branches want to reach out. I also find it helpful to know that we don't have to produce the fruit. That is the Spirit's job. We just bear the fruit. Trees don't struggle to produce their fruit, it just comes about through the deep roots of maturity. I am, of course, not claiming any spiritual maturity. And I'm certainly not claiming to bear all good fruit. I still have what you might call a lot of ego in the way. But I am on a different path now and that is a start.

 

I was listening to a podcast this week and the speaker said something like this: "The goal of most religions is the same - to experience oneness, both with what Is and with others. But how we describe those experiences, the words we use, will be as different as the people and the cultures in which those experiences happen."

 

If this is true, then experiencing this oneness, this unity, will result in good fruit. Bad fruit only drives us away from each other.

[Nick the Nevermet]

That's a great Rumi quote. It would be a bad thing if someone confused experience (eating grapes) with interpreting and understanding an experience (talking about the orchard). That's the mistake of confusing theology for faith, and nothing good comes from that. And it's at least as bad if one's interpretations / theology / "orchard talk" hardens so much that it closes itself off from everything that doesn't perfectly fit The Rulebook's List of Approved Stuff . While I didn't grow up in a traditionalist Christian family, it sounds like sbnr1's experiences might fall into that category.

 

It seems to me one should try and develop as healthy a relationship between interpretation and experience as possible. Or, if I can mix some Ecclesiastes into the Rumi, there is a time to eat the grapes and there is a time to talk about the orchard. Even if an experience is beyond words, humanity is going to need a conceptual vocabulary to reflect upon what an experience was or meant. The question then becomes what does that vocabulary look like. What it means to experience God and what can one do to help bring that about will be quite different for a Orthodox Hesychast, a Quaker, a Christian Neoplatonist, or William James.

 

I'm not advocating a One True Way type of situation, but rather your beliefs exist in a dialectical relationship (for lack of a better quick term) with your religious experiences.

[GeorgeW]

That's a great Rumi quote. It would be a bad thing if someone confused experience (eating grapes) with interpreting and understanding an experience (talking about the orchard).

 

I would hope that appreciating a spiritual experience would not preclude attempting to understand it. However, there is the risk that an objective analysis might lead to a conclusion that would impair future experience.

 

In an earlier comment in this thread, I used an unfortunate word 'ignorance' when I said, "It is my belief that knowledge is generally preferable to ignorance." The word 'ignorance' may carry some negative connotations that I did not intend. Maybe, 'not knowing' or 'not understanding' would have been better.

 

George

[JosephM]

I would hope that appreciating a spiritual experience would not preclude attempting to understand it. However, there is the risk that an objective analysis might lead to a conclusion that would impair future experience.

 

In an earlier comment in this thread, I used an unfortunate word 'ignorance' when I said, "It is my belief that knowledge is generally preferable to ignorance." The word 'ignorance' may carry some negative connotations that I did not intend. Maybe, 'not knowing' or 'not understanding' would have been better.

 

George

 

 

Thanks George for the clarification on your words.

 

In my experience, it seems to me that the experience carries with it it's own knowledge and understanding rather than requiring a lot of explanation that our mind attempts to give it. I think Sbnr1 and others have spoken well in their examples and posts (my opinion) . Perhaps there is really not much to explain and the understanding is more in the tasting than the minds sometimes incessant grasp for words. In my experience, we don't really make experiences happen. They happen of themselves when the conditions are ripe.

 

These words by Sbnr1, speak well to me..... Thanks Sbnr1

But my focus is slowly shifting (sometimes very slowly) from analyzing all the trees in the orchard to just letting my own roots grow deep in my experiences of the Spirit. In biblical terms, this might be "taste and see that the Lord is good." And I'm finding that though the growth is slow, the deeper my roots go, the more my branches want to reach out. I also find it helpful to know that we don't have to produce the fruit. That is the Spirit's job. We just bear the fruit. Trees don't struggle to produce their fruit, it just comes about through the deep roots of maturity.

 

Joseph

[Brian Holley]

Nick said:

". . . humanity is going to need a conceptual vocabulary to reflect upon what an experience was or meant."

 

I like the idea of a 'conceptual vocabulary'. Thank you for that. I'm trying to connect words and experience, so can I try this out on you:

 

I guess when words are not connected with experience, it's difficult for them to provoke meaning in others. I'd better try to explain that. I understand meaning to be in the individual, not in the words. When I hear someone's words they may evoke whatever meaning can be found in me - bringing understanding into experiential consciousness, as it were. Perhaps that's why words are such difficult things to use in conveying meaning. Another person may have quite a different meaning provoked by my words, than was my intention. That certainly happened sometimes with my children! Maybe we're getting more from the words of someone who fully embodies the experience of them than from someone who's got the 'conceptual vocabulary', but not the experience.

 

How does this fit?

 

P.S. Bill's Sbnr1) quote in Joseph's post, summed it up beautifully. Thank you Bill.

[BillM]

In my experience, it seems to me that the experience carries with it it's own knowledge and understanding rather than requiring a lot of explanation that our mind attempts to give it...In my experience, we don't really make experiences happen. They happen of themselves when the conditions are ripe.

 

This rings true with me as well, Joseph.

 

IMO, traditional Christianity often focuses on certain words or a certain message in order to try to cause a certain desired (and usually common) experience. This is sort of a cause/effect style of evangelism and I suspect it is less fruitful than it used to be.

 

To illustrate: I recently received an email and a website link from a man and his wife that I attended a very conservative Bible School with. After 20 years of working for and with the school, they finally realized their dream of going to the Philippines as missionaries (I think this is where the apostle Paul wrote his letter to -- they should have all been converted by now, ha ha!). My friend was thankful to finally be on the mission field and relayed to me how glad they were to be able to go through some of the hospitals there and pass out tracts. Knowing this particular Bible school, these are probably Chick tracts with the Four Spiritual Laws or the Romans Road or some other word-based "formula" designed to created in the others the experience of being born-again or saved or converted. I don't want to be too critical of this method because I have no doubt that God works in mysterious ways and sometimes uses this particular type of evangelism. But there was a slight pang in my heart as I saw the pictures on their website of them handing out "words" to try to illicit a certain response from physically hurting people when, perhaps, actually experiences (sitting, listening, hugs) could have been created.

 

Again, I'm not saying that God can't or doesn't work through tracts. But I think progressives and liberals have known for some time that "religious experiences" or spirituality is more caught than taught. God catches us when we least expect it and, somehow, things are never quite the same again.

 

Two (hopefully short) concluding thoughts:

 

1. In an information age, we are, as this board demonstrates, forced to use words to describe our experiences. But as you have often said, our experiences cannot be captured by or accurately conveyed by our words. Our words are signs pointing to the experiences, not the experiences themselves. So it is often helpful, IMO, to try to "see" behind the words to the experiences.

 

2. Where experiences are concerned, this may well be a new/old style of evangelism appropriate for progressives. As humans, and especially as humans who seek unity, we need to establish relationships with each other. But these relationships need to be based upon more than agreed upon words (doctrines, creeds, dogmas, etc.) to actual compassion for one another. When this happens, evangelism (sharing good news) is much more about what we do than about what we say. It is more incarnational; it is about, not just our "hard-to-define" experiences of/with God, but about our "hard-to-define" experiences with one another. It is much more holistic and "human" than the old monologue way of passing out tracts. And it gets damned messy. But, to me, that's the way that real life and real spirituality is.

 

So I'm excited that "progressive evangelism" tends to be more experienced-based than word-based. The point is not to share certain words in order to obtain certain experiences, but to share our lives with one another and trust that meaningful relationships based in compassion will be the result.

[Nick the Nevermet]

I guess when words are not connected with experience, it's difficult for them to provoke meaning in others. I'd better try to explain that. I understand meaning to be in the individual, not in the words. When I hear someone's words they may evoke whatever meaning can be found in me - bringing understanding into experiential consciousness, as it were. Perhaps that's why words are such difficult things to use in conveying meaning. Another person may have quite a different meaning provoked by my words, than was my intention. That certainly happened sometimes with my children! Maybe we're getting more from the words of someone who fully embodies the experience of them than from someone who's got the 'conceptual vocabulary', but not the experience.

 

How does this fit?

 

It fits fine, IMHO

 

But really, you state the point I was trying to make. One of the reasons why I self-identify as a Christian is the simple fact that I have at least some understanding of its 'feel', especially when compared to other faith and wisdom traditions I know comparatively little about. If one accepts Anselm's maxim of I believe to understand, then religious belief is less something you prove and more a lens that allows you to see the world. The rub is that, IMHO, you cannot help but have some sort of a lens, so one might as well choose the best lens for oneself and polish it as one sees fit.

 

A conceptual vocabulary is necessary to make sense of things, even if the thing in question is an ineffable experience of the Divine. What happened, what happens next, how does one try and fold that experience into one's life, how can one explain an experience to another, etc.... All those questions require reflection, and reflection requires terminology. At the same time, you're absolutely right that there is a danger organized religion can become so fixed it becomes anchored to a "dead" theology. Cold legalism offers little religious experience.

 

...I'm repeating myself without saying anything new, aren't I? Sorry.

[JosephM]

(snip)

A conceptual vocabulary is necessary to make sense of things, even if the thing in question is an ineffable experience of the Divine. What happened, what happens next, how does one try and fold that experience into one's life, how can one explain an experience to another, etc.... All those questions require reflection, and reflection requires terminology. At the same time, you're absolutely right that there is a danger organized religion can become so fixed it becomes anchored to a "dead" theology. Cold legalism offers little religious experience.

(snip)

 

 

Nick,

 

When we have an 'ineffable experience' which as the word is defined, it makes it incapable of being expressed conceptually. Perhaps pointed to but not described with an understanding unless experienced also by the hearer. Why would we find it necessary to express conceptually that which can only be experienced for oneself? It seems to me we might only confuse the issue. Perhaps Kind of like describing a sunset to a person who was born without eyes and has never seen. In my experience, there is usually no need during that experience to put it in words nor a concern for what happens next or how to fold it into ones life. Life comes from that experience and bears its own fruit if we allow it. In my past experience, trying to produce something from it detracts from a natural change that takes place by virtue of the experience itself. Perhaps we can allow it to happen without a lot of what next?, how do i explain it?, etc. etc. which of course seems a natural response with the mind.

 

Sbnr1 had said.. "The goal of most religions is the same - to experience oneness, both with what Is and with others. But how we describe those experiences, the words we use, will be as different as the people and the cultures in which those experiences happen."

 

I think that statement has much truth in it to me. That experience brings forth change or transformation naturally. Whether you can describe it in words or not is in my view of lesser important because there seems to me to be a natural tendency of the human natural thinking mind to not receive that oneness as real because the mind works on the concept of separateness from the 'other' which is continually being reinforced by the five senses. As it is reported that Jesus said, "that which is flesh is flesh and that which is spirit is spirit." Oneness in my view is a spiritual experience, not necessarily a fleshly one though it inevitably seems to manifests itself in the flesh as fruits of that experience.

 

Anyway, just my 2 cents to consider or trash...

 

Joseph

[Nick the Nevermet]

When we have an 'ineffable experience' which as the word is defined, it makes it incapable of being expressed conceptually. Perhaps pointed to but not described with an understanding unless experienced also by the hearer. Why would we find it necessary to express conceptually that which can only be experienced for oneself? It seems to me we might only confuse the issue. Perhaps Kind of like describing a sunset to a person who was born without eyes and has never seen. In my experience, there is usually no need during that experience to put it in words nor a concern for what happens next or how to fold it into ones life. Life comes from that experience and bears its own fruit if we allow it. In my past experience, trying to produce something from it detracts from a natural change that takes place by virtue of the experience itself. Perhaps we can allow it to happen without a lot of what next?, how do i explain it?, etc. etc. which of course seems a natural response with the mind.

 

Sbnr1 had said.. "The goal of most religions is the same - to experience oneness, both with what Is and with others. But how we describe those experiences, the words we use, will be as different as the people and the cultures in which those experiences happen."

 

I think that statement has much truth in it to me. That experience brings forth change or transformation naturally. Whether you can describe it in words or not is in my view of lesser important because there seems to me to be a natural tendency of the human natural thinking mind to not receive that oneness as real because the mind works on the concept of separateness from the 'other' which is continually being reinforced by the five senses. As it is reported that Jesus said, "that which is flesh is flesh and that which is spirit is spirit." Oneness in my view is a spiritual experience, not necessarily a fleshly one though it inevitably seems to manifests itself in the flesh as fruits of that experience.

 

Anyway, just my 2 cents to consider or trash...

 

Joseph

 

Definitely not trash, Joseph.

 

I'm sure it's obvious that I'm still trying to figure out how to discuss matters of faith, and unfortunately this means I am sometimes not clear or make an argument that goes a bit too far. My use of the term ineffable seems to fall in the latter category as it's too extreme of a term. You rightly point out I painted myself into a corner, wanting to talk about something I just defined as impossible to talk about.

 

Beyond that, I'm unsure how to explain myself (likely because I don't have a fully formed idea). I'm glad the oneness comment was brought up, but while the sentiment contains a remarkable truth, I'm not comfortable leaving it there. I'd love to explain myself or give examples, but this is when I running head-first into an inarticulate wall. I have no interest, however, in telling anyone that their personal experience of God doesn't qualify or some other silliness. Beyond that, I need to get back to you.

[glintofpewter]

 

Much of what I think has been said earlier in the thread. I have a need to be more more basic and less elegant and subtle.

 

Nick

A conceptual vocabulary is necessary to make sense of things, even if the thing in question is an ineffable experience of the Divine.

If we looking for words to to give a sense of the experience we must, I think, remember that we are making meaning and not describing the experience. Other wise I am not sure this is possible. I think there may be three events and sometimes we push two of them together. 1) What happens to set up the experience. Sometimes this seems unknowable; 2) The experience itself; and, 3) What it means.

 

The experience:

this can be described only with direct feeling words. When talking about the experience, the only question that can be asked is, "How did it feel?"

 

What it means:

Our understanding is usually not naive. It seems to me that all abstract terms like "Religious" are not descriptions of the experience; they give meaning to the experience. I think meaning making is always in context; I don't see how it cannot be in context. The first step towards action or abstraction moves the description to meaning. "I felt the hand of God ..." or "God told me to kill my children." are meaning making sentences. They are not the experience; they are categorically different than the experience.

 

The action or meaning or vocabulary one uses to say what the experience means is available for discussion. Whether it is in anthropology or in theology or in a jail cell, or with another to whom you have given permission to make meaning of the experience; one creates, or rather, finds words and concepts in the existing set of words, to make meaning. (There are a few people, like mystics and theologians, for example, who create new language or metaphors to understand or make meaning of experiences)

 

What led to the experience:

The people who say, "The devil made me do it," most often are not able to to describe their feelings and/or actions that led to experiences, I suppose. One of the goals in therapy is to describe what preceded the experience and to examine the meaning ascribed, perhaps to re-frame and change the meaning. With mystics what preceded the experience are usually practices or disciplines that are known to bring about the ineffable experience of oneness, of transcendence, of the divine, or of God. Fasting, particular mental exercises, or attending exercises such as meditation are such practices. Some are quite complex as described by Armstrong in History of God. Also, I believe there are sudden and unexpected moments with which there seems to be no prelude.

 

Again, I think that the experience itself is only accessible with language about our feelings, not thinking; the action that follows is available for evaluation and the meaning we make afterwords is available for discussion, re-framing, re-languaging.

 

 

That maybe how it is.

 

Take Care

 

Dutch

[GeorgeW]

Dutch,

 

Good analysis.

 

George

[BillM]

Being a fan of arranger keyboards (electronic pianos where you can put all kinds of different sounds and rhythms together to make “band-in-the-box”-style music), I was listening to a Yamaha keyboard podcast earlier today that really reminded me of this topic. The featured performer was describing the realistic sounds of a new Yammie keyboard and he was quickly running out of words and superlatives to describe what the keyboard sounded like. He was blown away by the quality of the sounds of the strings and the organ and the choir section. And he reached the point where he simply said, “Let me play this for you.”

 

No more words. Only music. He was playing Canon in D and his playing, coupled with the instrument’s sounds, made the hair on the back of my neck stand up. I can’t find the right words to describe to all you good folks how awesome this song sounded on this new keyboard. And it certainly wouldn’t do just to the keyboard, the performer, or the song for me to name off the notes he played (G-C-D-E-G-F-etc.) For me to truly communicate my experience of it, I would have to have the instrument (which I don’t) and his playing ability (which I don’t). Even then, each of you would hear it a bit differently.

 

But my point is that, as we have been discussing, words, as wonderful as there are, cannot create or replicate experiences. “You had to be there.” I don’t classify myself as a mystic. I have had…experiences…of what I believe to be God, but they certainly weren’t the equivalent of knocking me off my horse, rendering me blind, and hearing audible voices. Mine are quiet and subdued and much more “earthly” – looking into the faces of children, hearing a wonderful song, helping someone who needs a hand, crying during a chick-flick (sometimes, not all the time), talking with a cherished friend, holding hands with my wife. These, to me, are sacred moments, experiences of and with God. Scoffers will laugh these off as common, everyday experiences. Maybe they are. But maybe it is how I perceive or feel these experiences that make a difference. My words to describe these things make them sound trite, inconsequential. But I’ve found that it is often the “little things” that make life worth living and I want to be grateful for them all.

 

My words can never convey my experiences, only point to them. So the truth of the matter is that my words don’t really count for much, just like naming the notes of a song is not the same thing as the experience of listening to it.

 

BTW, if you want to have the experience, here is the song embedded in podcast 3:

 

http://www.yamahapkowner.com/?p=28

[soma]

I feel the spiritual experience in the abstract can be explained in the concrete experiences of the mind so consciousness can be experienced. The realization of God’s pure consciousness is beyond the mind’s personality so it is referred to as mystical, but there is no mystery when it can be seen moving the force fields of this planet. I also feel it can be seen in service and a child's face. The power in my mind can be seen built up from layers of energy to an awareness built from within where the subtlest knowledge rises to be expressed externally. My current understanding has evolved by the exploring of my physical existence bringing my understanding to a spiritual evolution beyond the mean, selfish, physical mentality of survival to a high-minded, altruistic spiritual consciousness. To go beyond the limits of gross creation, the limits to which our eyes and senses can receive, I feel our attention needs to see through the sub strata of the physical realm to the subtle spiritual consciousness permeating all things. With spiritual perception and a new respect for creation, the world comes alive with meaning and purpose, which is better than the alternative of physical survival of the fittest where cruelty, violence and loneliness prevail, in contrast to the bliss of spiritual realization.

 

I like to speak and write in abstract images to describe the ultimate goal, but in no way interfere with the chosen path of the person with whom I am speaking. If I am speaking with a Muslim, I want to make him a better Muslim, Jew, Hindu or Christian. I feel teachers in these disciplines with patience helped me to become a better Christian. Visiting many churches I noticed not many young people attending. I can see a strong spirit in the youth of today, but they seem not to find much guidance in the Church. The spiritual experience at church does not seem to be important because the words seem more important, and they do not describe the spiritual experience or a way to experience it. Internally, I felt a need to pass on what was so graciously given to me. I feel the best way is in retreat so the mind is more fertile from such an experience. Knowing my own children and the youth I come in contact with are not interested in retreats, I then started to write what I deemed to be a logical explanation of the experience. I first had to decide the audience, which I chose Christian. When I started to write I also noticed that Christian terminology was not enough for a rational explanation. I had to bring in another vocabulary along side the Christian terminology. The people who post here, I also hope the youth of today have the fortunate experience to be with you. I don't think words are necessary because the experience is transferred by awareness. I enjoy the words people use here because so many different aspects of the Experience is expressed and explored. The Christian organizations do not spread Christian thought because they seem to lack interior force and vitality. The force of their words is not felt with the spirit, but has been found to be difficult and left untried. I think that is because the institutions are trying to expand the field of activity and are not that interested in deepening the interior life. The people here seem to be of a spiritual era and open to all the influences of our time. I need to thank you for aligning yourselves with the energies of your soul, which is inspiration for me to do the same.

[tariki]

I think soma has given a good insight into the words of St Paul, where he spoke of being all things to all men (and, hopefully, women.... ) For me that is the key for going beyond words (the letter written on stone) to the law that is finally found on/as the human heart. I was heartened by the post of sbnr1, who spoke of the commonplace (as sometimes thought) as being a true experience of God. For me, the true experience of "God" is to experience the true depth of our own humanity, and has not much - if anything - to do with "visions", or in fact anything that would suggest we are "above" any other.

 

The present has no extension but intensity.......which for me needs the counterpoint of a few words I once read concerning the spirituality of the Cistercians....Here is a life which is not a succession of alternating superior and inferior activities, but rather a continuous rhythm of equally valid ones So for me the "intensity" is not felt at any separate moment, but just speaks of the true unfolding and continuous humilty of the divine (as us) that seeks only to serve, not to be served - in empathy towards others, and in communion with others.

[BillM]

Small update: For those interested, I've pulled the Canon in D out of the podcast and placed in on my website here: http://www.evergreentunes.net/misc.htm

 

This way, you don't have to listen to the whole hour-long podcast in order to hear the song.

[GeorgeW]

Subsequent to starting this thread, I read something interesting (at least to me) and relevant to the topic in "In Gods We Trust: The Evolutionary Landscape of Religion" (an anthropological examination of religion, Scott Atran):

 

"A key feature of the creativity of human worship is that all religions use music in social ritual . . . In a survey of person who reported a religious experience, music emerges a the single most important elicitor of the experience (49% of cases), followed by prayer (48%), and attending group services (41%), reading the Bible (31%) and being alone in church (30%)."

 

I assume that when Atran says "all religions" he means on a religion-wide level, not every single individual or every single group within a religion.

 

George

[BillM]

I find that to be the case also, George. Religion also employs art, either in structure, schulpture, or painting in which to capture something of the spiritual or the transcendant.

 

In my own journey, while I definately lean more towards the rational and reasonable in my theology, I also recognize my spiritual side which seems to need, as Atran says, the creative component. I enjoy good music, art, and even some ritual that calls me to both feel connected to the More and to experience that sense of awe in that More.

 

To me, this is what "experiencing God" does. It makes us feel connected to/with God while, at the same time, realizing that God is so much more than we are.

 

In my life, I'm trying to find the "middle ground." The religion of my youth always reminded me how disconnected I was from God, usually because I couldn't stop sinning. And some forms of modern spirituality seem to say that I am God which doesn't leave me much in awe of me. So I'm seeking a healthy balance where though I know I am connected and part of God (panentheism), I am still very much in awe of God and the universe that he has created. Good music and good art play a 'sacred' role in that for me.

 

Have a great day!

[GeorgeW]

And some forms of modern spirituality seem to say that I am God which doesn't leave me much in awe of me.

 

If you are God, I have a couple of requests I would like to make. If I am God, hmmm, God help us. :-)

 

On a more serious note, Atran also writes about how music facilitates social cooperation. This is true in both religious and non-religious activities. When I read this I thought about soldiers chanting ditties when they march, women in agricultural societies working together in processing foods, people singing nationalistic songs, etc.

 

George

[NORM]

I hope this will be received as an invitation to dialog and understanding as opposed to debate. It is not intended negatively or as a challenge to any one's faith.

 

I have been reading a lot here about 'experiencing' God vs. 'reasoning' to God. My question is, how do we determine if an experience is authentic (meaning a real experience of the divine).

 

Some instances could be imagined under conditions of emotion or contagion. As an example, people who speak in tongues, I think, typically do so during a religious service, not when they are eating a burger at MacDonald's or watching a football game. The format of some religious services are, I suspect, designed to induce emotion and, perhaps, contagion. Native Americans would have spiritual experiences after a period in a sweat lodge. Sufis have spiritual experiences following (induced by?) periods of chanting. In fact, it has been self described as 'intoxicated.'

 

I don't think anyone would claim that all experiences of God are authentic as there are people who perceive that god is telling them to commit heinous acts like the mentally disturbed lady in Texas a few years ago who killed several of her young children under a perceived instruction from God.

 

Having said this, I certainly have no objection to spiritual experiences as long as they are benign or beneficial. But, how do we determine if it is authentic, emotion or imagination? Does it matter?

 

George

 

George, I experimented with hallucinogens quite a bit in my younger days and was quite surprised at the potential of the brain to produce very realistic "visions."

 

My most memorable experiences were under the tutelage of my cousin who lived with Hopi Indians in the Sonoran Desert. We drank a tea made from peyote and tripped for a period of about 30 hours. I saw things that I can barely describe to you in words. I watched cars melt into puddles in the sun, a hamburger jump up and dance with the french fries on my plate, and the most beautiful visions of what I can only describe as a world constructed from random thoughts within my head. I watched as musical notes took on shapes and colors right before my eyes!

 

Sometimes when I read accounts of people who had near-death experiences, they sound surprisingly like some of my LSD trips. I even think that perhaps the author of Revelation was inspired by hallucinogens.

 

There was a time when I attributed the visions to supernatural occurrence as my cousin and the Hopi Indians would claim. Now I am not so sure. I've seen documentaries on the experimentation done by people like Timothy Leary in the 60s, and am of the opinion that the visions I saw were purely creations created within the synapses of my brain. According to the documentary, the hallucinogens stimulated action in the part of the brain associated with dreams. This sounds plausible to me.

 

On very rare occasions, I will meditate and induce some of those past visions at will without the aid of hallucinogens (I have no desire to take them now). It is at once exhilarating and terrifying.

 

NORM

[minsocal]

 

Fear of the Inexplicable

 

But fear of the inexplicable has not alone impoverished the existence of the individual; the relationship between one human being and another has also been cramped by it, as though it had been lifted out of the riverbed of endless possibilities and set down in a fallow spot on the bank, to which nothing happens. For it is not inertia alone that is responsible for human relationships repeating themselves from case to case, indescribably monotonous andunrenewed: it is shyness before any sort of new, unforeseeable experience with which one does not think oneself able to cope.

 

But only someone who is ready for everything, who excludes nothing, not even the most enigmatical, will live the relation to another as something alive and will himself draw exhaustively from his own existence. For if we think of this existence of the individual as a larger or smaller room, it appears evident that most people learn to know only a corner of their room, a place by the window, a strip of floor on which they walk up and down. Thus they have a certain security. And yet that dangerous insecurity is so much more human which drives the prisoners in Poe's stories to feel out the shapes of their horrible dungeons and not be strangers to the unspeakable terror of their abode.

 

We, however, are not prisoners. No traps or snares are set about us, and there is nothing which should intimidate or worry us. We are set down in life as in the element to which we best correspond, and over and above this we have through thousands of years of accommodation become so like this life, that when we hold still we are, through a happy mimicry, scarcely to be distinguished from all that surrounds us. We have no reason to mistrust our world, for it is not against us. Has it terrors, they are our terrors; has it abysses, those abysses belong to us; are dangers at hand, we must try to love them. And if only we arrange our life according to that principle which counsels us that we must always hold to the difficult, then that which now still seems to us the most alien will become what we most trust and find most faithful. How should we be able to forget those ancient myths about dragons that at the last moment turn into princesses; perhaps all the dragons of our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us once beautiful and brave. Perhaps everything terrible is in its deepest being something helpless that wants help from us.

 

Rilke

[BillM]

George, I experimented with hallucinogens quite a bit in my younger days and was quite surprised at the potential of the brain to produce very realistic "visions."

 

I've never done drugs, Norm, (can you imagine *me* on drugs? ha ha!) but I do have epilepsy. Scientific research has demonstrated that when certain parts of the brain are stimulated, either through drugs, electrical impulses, or damage, people are prone to have "visions" or experiences of God.

 

I've had a couple of "experiences of God" that fall within the "mystical" category. They seemed real...but I don't know for sure. They could have been mild epileptic seizures. Who's to say? Knowing this, it makes me very reticent to say that my experiences were 100% legitimate and even more reticent to insist that others believe or have my experiences.

 

The Bible, IMO, is prone to the same thing. I have little doubt that Abraham experienced God. I have little doubt that Paul experienced what he called Christ on the road to Damascus. I do, however, think John the Revelator got ahold of a bad batch of 'shrooms on Patmos. I recognize these experiences as legitimate for these people. But I don't accept them as necessarily legitimate for me. In other words, neither Abraham nor Paul nor John are authorities for me. And I even go so far as to say that some of Jesus' experiences are authoritative for me. There is much in his teachings and lifestyle that rings true for me but I certainly don't experience God in the same way that he did.

 

So I get somewhat squeamish when religion tells me that I have to experience God or the More in exactly the same way as someone else has. To me, that is religion based on hearsay. I trust my own experiences more. But, then again, I don't insist that anyone trust my experiences either.