William James Essay

'The feelings, acts, and experiences of individual men in their solitude, so far as they apprehend themselves to stand in relation to whatever they may consider the divine' (William James, -The Varieties of Religious Experience, p31) What would you commend or criticize in this approach to Christian Spirituality, and why?

William James 1842-1910 brought a scientific spirit of enquiry to the domain of religious experience when he delivered then published the Gifford lectures which would become 'The Varieties of Religious Experience', and in so doing broke controversial new ground in the study of religion. Advancements in natural sciences were demolishing dominant Christian world views when, having studied religious classics himself, James set out to examine a range of personal accounts of intense spiritual 'peak' experiences – in part driven by his own experiences of 'The Reality of the Unseen'1 - not from a traditionally religious context, but from the perspective of a psychologist and scientist seeking to understand the impact of such experiences on the human psyche.

In tune with his times, when scientists in many fields were seeking 'to shape visions of human existence and the universe…independent of religious definition'2 and scientific authority was replacing religious, specifically Christian, authority, James sought to give scientific gravitas to the phenomenon of transcendent and mystical states of consciousness experienced as objective phenomena worthy of scientific investigation.

James is at pains to define the parameters of his argument: '..my own narrow view of what religions shall consist'3 he explains will mean that he will 'ignore the institutional branch entirely, to say nothing of the ecclesiastical organization.'4 James introduces the concept of 'personal religion pure and simple'6 liberated from any doctrine, belief and practice in order to establish this type of consciousness as part of universal experience and seek commonalities. Thus James validated a neglected area of scientific study – transcendent consciousness - by extrapolating the pure experience from the religious context in which it may have arisen. In attempting to raise the status of religious experience, the price James pays is that the psychological types who experience 'personal religion'6 become heroes at the expense of other religious believers, and what is of value for Christians is studiously ignored. James is uninterested in communal acts of worship, or ceremony, or prayer '..where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them' Mt 18:20 focusing solely on 'experiences of individual men in their solitude'. The accounts describe self-absorbed experience with no relational content other than to 'whatever they may consider divine'. This presents two problems for Christians. Firstly religion and spirituality is part of a giving of self away as they try to emulate Christ in activating His sacrificial love in service to the world. Secondly, whilst the nature of a triune God may remain a mysterious and unfathomable concept, the theology of the nature of God underpins the Christian understanding of how God works in themselves, in their lives and in the world.

On the other hand, James's radical break with institutional religion could be said to be an overdue liberation from the stranglehold of organized religion, and a validation of the experiences of spiritual seekers of no particular creed who seek to believe in 'The Reality of the Unseen'7 and may have had experiences containing 'that element or quality in them which we can meet nowhere else.'8 Its strength lies in its refusal to be confined to any set of prerequisite beliefs and insistence on value in and for itself. Nicholas Lash in 'Easter in Ordinary: Reflections on Human Experience and the Knowledge of God' finds James' rejection of institutional religion problematic and his rhetoric misleading.

Lash acknowledges that the structures, hierarchy and authority of organized religions have caused of controversy before:
'the contrast between material and spiritual, or "external " and "internal" religion was persistently drawn in the dominant narrative of both Liberal Protestantism and its secularized successors…'9
So in some ways James appears to be saying nothing new as this in fact was the thrust of the Lutheran argument and the drive to reform. But Lash questions the premise of James' distinction, arguing that
'his rhetoric invites us to see "personal" and "institutional " religion not as two aspects of a single complex whole but rather as descriptions of two different kinds of religion'. 10
Lash questions James's distinction between 'personal acts' and 'ritual' acts and his labelling of religious ritual as 'manipulative':
'for why on earth should we suppose all such celebration to be
manipulative in intent?' 11
A catholic Christian today would likely take the same view. The ritualistic celebration of Eucharist can be experienced individually as a transformative and holy encounter; performed communally but nevertheless personal. For each recipient, receiving Eucharist is a deeply meaningful act and in no way manipulative but rather receptive.
'The Eucharist is not a thing. It is not a dead object. It is Christ, and He is fully alive. Receiving Him with this awareness, we become more fully alive…'12
For Catholic Christians who receive the Eucharist as part of their ongoing relationship with God in the person of Jesus Christ, James's disinterest in ceremony and ritual is incomprehensible. Worship not being an act in 'solitude' this ritual is unworthy of James' attention. Lash is right to point out that James is guilty of oversimplification which will not stand up to rigorous scrutiny.

James restricts his focus to 'the inner dispositions of man himself',13 in isolation from any organized religion, and restricts those experiences to be examined to the 'most exaggerated'14 but in so doing argues Lash, he makes a qualitative distinction between the
' "firsthand" experience of the solitary, if eccentric "genius" and the "secondhand" experience of the rest of us….who live by suggested feeling and imitated conduct.' 15
Here, then, are the two kinds of religion with one of more value than the other. For James the solitary geniuses are the initiators of institutional religion while their followers live from their words without the benefit of the feeling of their firsthand experience. The implication, argues Lash is that doctrine and theology which spring from the religious experiences of the few are corruptions as they contain none of the 'freshness of feeling or the force of divine command'16 originally experienced by 'the individual men in their solitude.' As mentioned previously, the intensity of encounters with 'whatever they may consider the divine' is not necessarily limited to the originators of what becomes a religious institution and secondly, some who have had extreme religious experiences – Martin Luther for example – have not been innovators but reformers, argues Lash, 'proclaiming the urgency of a return to lost standards'17. These reformers most certainly owe their zeal to having a discontent with an already established tradition and although bringing a fresh perspective, they are 'a product of the culture and traditions which he or she refashions.'18 Lash points out that Jesus was one such individual, and claims that 'James exaggerates the pattern setter's originality'.19 In other words, the 'experiences of individual men in their solitude' cannot just be validated from an account, no matter how articulate, as the feelings experienced and the comprehension of those feelings will be always filtered through the culture and tradition of the solitary individual. The societal world into which we are born is the primary force which shapes us and forms us and, argues Lash, 'not whatever "private" world we make or suffer to be …our own.' 20

Clearly for anyone approaching a study of Christian Spirituality it would be unhelpful to ignore the Jewish inheritance of Jesus Christ as without this, any comprehension of the Divinity of Christ and the redemption of mankind would be impossible. The narrowness of James's approach would serve to confuse and obscure.

The word 'solitude', in James's quotation above, presents more problems when juxtaposed with their 'stand(ing) in relation to whatever they may consider the divine'. As Lash rightly observes the journey into the desert or into the wilderness 'has been very differently construed in different circumstances and traditions' 21 therefore the phrase cannot substitute for all the differently understood purposes of the solitary experience. For some seekers of God, claims Lash, 'God is most truly and purely to be found only in the desert'22 and this type of quest is not for everyone. Lash goes on:
'for the second, he is sought in the desert because his presence has been obscured by the circumstances…in the city; for the third, he is to be sought in the desert in order that his presence may be better discerned, and his purposes more purely obeyed, on return…' 23
The reasons for these solitary journeys are subtly different but importantly different in intention and, points out Lash, none of them are
'triggered.. by.. dramatic irruption of raw emotion which James took to be paradigmatic of "religious experience" '. 24
The wilderness experience of Jesus is of the third variety as it marked the beginning of his three year ministry and would make absolutely no sense unless seen in that context. It is not the encounter with God – the divine - that is the focus of that dramatic solitary experience, but rather the encounter with evil. The power of 'The Temptation' experience is not in a sense of mystical happiness, but in the triumph of a choice made: a choice pivotal to the redemptive power of the Christian narrative.

For Christians and those who study Christian Spirituality it is not the 'experiences….in solitude' which carry most weight although Jesus sought solitude often. More important, as recorded in the Gospels, were how those solitary experiences impacted on Jesus' ability to teach, heal and preach to his followers. These solitary moments were undoubtedly encounters with God, sustaining in their intensity, but no approach to the study of Spirituality would be effective if the life of Jesus 'in community' was not taken into account.

James's approach may still speak to 21st century disillusioned spiritual seekers unfulfilled by established religions on offer, and 'may be more relevant than ever as we ponder questions of faith in a society of increasing spiritual variety and complexity'25 by encouraging respect for other traditions as we seek ecumenical dialogue. However it is woefully inadequate as an approach to Christian Spirituality per se.

Mark McIntosh, reframes the moments of transcendence which formed the focus of James's study. He argues that 'encounter with God' can be seen as 'the common ground of spirituality and theology'26 which justifies James's use of the term 'religious experiences',27 but McIntosh suggests that for Christians, this kind of encounter, whilst renewing, and transformative is the start of 'new life and understanding in the believer'28 and not an end in itself. For Christians, the 'new life' will then be played out in the form of service to others and in the context of community. For Christians, an encounter with the Divine is never enough as we are, like Christ, called to express love in the world: 'In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us…we also ought to love one another.' (1 John 4:10, 11) In order to understand the demands of the Christian life, and make sense of a study of Spirituality, it is impossible to ignore the Bible and theological discourse which has evolved over the centuries. Any study of Christian spirituality cannot only focus on James's 'personal religion pure and simple'.29

Another difficulty for Christians is James's refusal to work with any definition of the Divine, leaving it a matter for the individual. James appears to worship the god of sensation putting feeling at the centre of all human experience but as Lash points out as he does this he annihilates the value of the human critical faculty of reason. Lash explains that James justifies this by saying in ' "The only form of thing that we directly encounter……is our own personal life."' 30 Without applying our human faculty of reason to what is encountered it is difficult to imagine how learning of any sort would occur. For students of Christian Spirituality knowledge can best be gained when studying both experience ' pure and simple'31 – of themselves or others - in the context of the body of Christian theology and exploring the tension between these two. Knowledge of the Divinity will come about for Christians in personal experience, including when that experience is revelatory in nature; in growth and understanding of the Word of God in the Bible; in studying theology; in witnessing the nature of God as revealed in the world and through relationship with others. This is far more than James's narrow view.

In conclusion, as an approach to the study of Christian Spirituality, there are too many restrictions of meaning and scope. James's narrowness of focus on personal transcendent experience does not allow an examination of what is experienced in the more everyday lived experience of Christians, and leaves Christians who never have transcendent experiences feeling second class. Additionally James's refusal to engage with theological issues detracts from a full understanding of a 2000 year old religion. Finally, the focus on the purely personal experience for Christians is too limiting as the underpinning principal of the meaningful Christian experience, which is both relationship to the triune Divinity and relationship to the world, is excluded. Historically, James's approach had value as the reality of religious experience was redeemed and elevated to a subject which could be objectively studied. For students of Christian Spirituality today, an examination of an individual's feelings will not suffice.









Footnotes:
William James, 'The Varieties of Religious Experience' Abridged with an Introduction by Robert H Abzug (Boston: Bedford St Martins 2013) P 38
William James, The Varieties….' Abridged, P5
William James, The Varieties….' Abridged, P31
William James, The Varieties….' Abridged, P31
William James, The Varieties….' Abridged, P32
William James, The Varieties….' Abridged, P32
William James, The Varieties….' Abridged, P38
William James, The Varieties….' Abridged, P35
Nicholas Lash, Easter in Ordinary: Reflections on Human Experience and the Knowledge of God (London: SCM Press, 1988) P54
Lash, Easter in Ordinary, P54
Lash, Easter in Ordinary, P54
Vinny Flynn, 7 Secrets of the Eucharist (Massachusetts: MercySong Inc, 2006) P15
William James, The Varieties….' Abridged, P31
William James, The Varieties….' Abridged, P34
Lash, Easter in Ordinary, P55
Lash, Easter in Ordinary, P56
Lash, Easter in Ordinary, P56
Lash, Easter in Ordinary, P57
Lash, Easter in Ordinary, P56
Lash, Easter in Ordinary, P58
Lash, Easter in Ordinary, P59
Lash, Easter in Ordinary, P59
Lash, Easter in Ordinary, P59
Lash, Easter in Ordinary, P59
William James, The Varieties….' Abridged, P3
Mark A McIntosh, 'Mystical Theology: the integrity of spirituality and theology', (Oxford: Blackwell 1998) P6
William James, The Varieties….' Abridged, P32
McIntosh, Mystical Theology, P6
William James, The Varieties….' Abridged, P32
Quoted in Lash, Easter in Ordinary, P66
William James, The Varieties….' Abridged, P32


Bibliography:

Books & Chapters

Downey, Michael; Understanding Christian Spirituality'; (New Jersey: Paulist Press, 1997)

Flynn, Vinny: '7 Secrets of the Eucharist'; (Massachusetts: MercySong, Inc 2006)

James, Henry: 'The Varieties of Religious Experience'(London: Longmans, Green and Co, 1928) pp 26-52

James, Henry: 'The Varieties of Religious Experience' Abridged with an Introduction by Robert H Abzug; (Boston:Bedford/St Martin's, 2013)

Lash, Nicholas: 'Easter in Ordinary: Reflections on Human Experience and the Knowledge of God (London: SCM Press, 1988) pp 51-70

McIntosh, Mark: 'Mystical Theology: the integrity of spirituality and theology' (Oxford: Blackwell, 1998) pp 3-38

Morrison, John D, 'Review: Easter in Ordinary: Reflections on Human Experience and the Knowledge of God' Liberty University 1990

Electronic Resources
Abzug, Robert, 'On William James' "Varieties of Religious Experience" (Youtube: NEP 2013) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slqmmKQlDaw




10