Critically Asses, with Reference to William James, the Arguments from Religious Experience.

Although not the first scholar to examine the idea of religion, Jones utilizes the concept from the study of Self Psychology in order to determine if “transformative religious experience is mature or unhealthy” (Jones 2002). In chapter 5 of his text, Jones

Given that our will plays a role in determining our belief, James argues if we should embrace this as a fact of psychological life, or struggle against it.

Christianity treads a delicate delineation between faith and reason. At times, the two seem mutually exclusive. During the early stages of Christianity, church fathers argued about the roles of Athens and Jerusalem in Christianity. Some, like Tertullian, insisted Christianity consisted solely of Jerusalem, or faith alone. Others, like St. Augustine and Clement of Alexandria, argued that all truth stems from the character of God, and is thus viable to the Christian. They united Athens and Jerusalem, reason and faith. The interplay of faith and reason shines brightest through the work of Thomas Aquinas, who, like Augustine, believed faith and reason play an intertwined role in revealing truth.

For William James, his perspective on religious experience was skeptical. He divided religion between institutional religion and personal religion. For institutional religion he made reference to the religious group or organization that plays a critical part in the culture of a society. Personal religion he defined as when an individual has a mystical experience which can occur regardless of the culture. James was more focused on the personal religious experience, “the feelings, acts, and experiences of individual men in their solitude, so far as they apprehend themselves to stand in

In William James’ 1902 book “The Varieties of Religious Experience” he opens with depicting the approach of his review. He clarifies that it would be of little advantage to construct the examination with respect to regular people who have bound religious encounters and emulate customs which have been passed on to them. Rather, he centers the review around 'religious virtuosos '. In addition, as he clarifies in his second address, the attention must be on individual religious experience instead of corporate, in light of the fact that it is more central. Actually, it is out of the extreme encounters of a little few that most religious developments (or "factions" as he terms them) have created. Part 3 builds up that individuals appear to have the ability to encounter the concealed furthermore an inclination to see it as being more genuine than things seen, listened, touched or tasted.

Reading The Crucible of Life has provided me with an epistemological system to begin my journey into serious theological contemplation. I have thoroughly enjoyed thinking about the interrelationship of reason, experience, and scripture. Foremost, the relationship of reason and experience has proved highly. Understanding the ways in which reason and experience relate to each other is a tricky concept indeed and it is one that I look to in order to discern the process of learning in general. It is this process that allows learning to occur.

This semester in Philosophy of Religion has continued my journey to learn hard truths through class discussions but particularly through the required texts. All of our diverse texts have forced me to calm down my J of the Myers Briggs and helped me to understand the beauty and importance of openness toward God. Mircea Eliade 's The Sacred and The Profane, Martin Buber 's I and Thou, and Søren Kierkegaard 's Practice in Christianity have all forced an encounter with the myriad of ways in which humans experience God. Through this encounter, each author has provided ideas about a new outlet to experience God: Eliade taught us how to experience God in all parts of nature; Buber gave

Prior to understanding and describing religious experiences, it’s important to define the terms and typology of religious experiences. A point of contention for theologians is whether or not mystical or out-of-body experiences are religious in nature. To understand what the role religion plays in these experiences, for this context, you must define and understand what religion is and the major components that make it up. James states that religion “cannot stand for any single principle or essence, but is rather a collective name” (35). If you were to ask someone about the essence of an object or a concept, different people would provide various components or parts of it. You would end up of with a list ranging from objective and subjective responses, but it would provide a better understanding of it because, like religion, no one thing or person can be summed up in a sentence or a word.

This is why he decided to publish this novel, hoping to re-spark the peoples soul and remind them of all these genuine life experiences that can be achieved, in which is explained and stated through the insights (manuscript). So, by bringing people to a realization of these insights and events that happen to humans all at one time or another leads people to begin to consider spirituality at the level of personal experience rather than as religious doctrine because this world is designed to tune into a more personal journey that feels destined. This is the human potential. James wanted everyone to become more than they think they are by downloading a greater God intelligence into their conscious. This was a personal experience for James, but it feels the same to everyone. When humans seek for a non material and spiritual source, the mind expands and he wanted everyone that has the chance to sense that reality to act on

William Kingdon Clifford’s argument in “The Ethics of Belief” that it is morally wrong to form beliefs upon insufficient evidence has been widely debated. One such objection to Clifford is William James’s “The Will to Believe,” which argues, under certain circumstances, it can be morally justified to form beliefs without adequate evidence. In this paper, I shall argue that James’s position on belief is stronger than Clifford’s on the basis of being able to reveal more truths while not violating morality.

James taught at several universities including both Brown and Yale where he often had arguments and lengthy discussions with his students about religion. In his introductory comments, he clearly states that a lot of his freethinking students did not believe one should believe in religion if it cannot be rationally proven. This was contradictory to his thoughts and consequently wrote the paper in order to try sway his students view.

Joseph, I like your conclusion statement and to talk a little bit more about beliefs, James retains that pure reason is certainly not the ultimate root of what people believe. The non-intelligent elements of people mind like desires partly decide what beliefs people have. People can via will evoke belief in any live hypothesis which are dead for all of us since human beings have formerly used their will in a particular manner. To me, William James does embrace, and develops a very influential argument to support his thesis, that people do not have the mental influence to will a belief to be dead/ alive. That is to say, in the conclusion, people cannot actually "choose" their beliefs just as people desire. Due to the fact that that majority

Henry James’ father was devoted to studying theology, philosophy and mysticism (religion) as he was keen on studying and wanted his

For example, William James studied religious experience and suggested that the spiritual process works to curtail people's negative behaviors (James, 1936). For James, spirituality helps individuals recognize their own earthly suffering as either a consequence of individual pathology or addictive behavior, or both. When people begin to criticize or consciously reject problematic individual behaviors as a permanent way of being, then they become open to the possibility of rising to a higher awareness. This higher awareness of his or her own behavior is then integrated as a part of the person's psychology. James was already considering the role religion plays in a person's consciousness early in the twentieth century.

psychology of religious experience, and mysticism. He was the brother of novelist Henry James and of