William James Views On Mysticism

From the beginning of his book James has written that any experience the individual has needs to be processed, labeled and categorized by the individual. Even though the individual gets their labels and categories from society and their background, the experiences they have shape and possibly change those labels. James writes that if an individual has a mystical experience only that individual understands it: “The simplest rudiment of mystical experience would seem to be that deepened sense of the significance of a maxim or formula occasionally sweeps over one” (p 382). However, for the mystical experience to be understood by society it has to have labels that can be understood and judged based on how they fit and contribute to the social …show more content…
He has three points to sort. Firstly, the individuals who have mystical experiences are themselves totally convinced by what they’ve experienced. But secondly, there is no reason why other people should share that belief; different individual’s experiences produce different fruits. James suggests that mystical experiences, viewed generally, are non-specific in content; the fact is that the mystical feeling of amplification, coming together, and freedom has no specific intellectual content of its own. It is capable of starting a bond with material equipped by the most varied philosophies and theologies, if only they can find a place in their context for its irregular expressive mood (pp 425-426). Yet thirdly, the presence of mystical experiences prevents the individual from rejecting out of hand the possibility of a world beyond their senses. The supernaturalism and optimism to which they persuade the individual may, interpreted in one way or another, be after all the truest of insights into the meaning of this life (p 428). We cannot reject James’ views on mysticism because any experience an individual has will always be judged based on society’s standards. However, society’s labels and categories are based on individual preferences. There is always a continuity between an individual’s mystical experience and society, there can however be a pause in the …show more content…
The mystical experience can be brought on by a drug induced state or déjà vu. The definition of religious experience that is written in his book is true and accurate if we take into consideration the circumstance of the experience. I define a religious experience as anything that brings your fruits and is wholly positive. Mystical experiences are only meaningful to the individual who has them and to be able to standardize criteria is impossible. The only way society knows of mystical experiences is if the individual shares them. Even if the individual shares them, their meaning is diminished because of the different labels and categories we each assign to our experiences. If we take for example the drunken man who saw Jesus his fruit was becoming a priest and changing his life. The benchmark of his experience is his own personal evolution and growth. If we take another written account James wrote about in his book of déjà vu, the evaluative criteria for that was the individual’s feeling of being in the same place as before. To say that religious experience can only be evaluated on a criteria that I create lessens the significance of that experience. I can tell you how to evaluate a religious experience based on any criteria that I choose for example fruits for all. However, your biases and experiences might state that fruit for you is different than to me. How