Phenomenology of Religion

Inter-Integralism ~~~ Critical Perspectives on Advanced and Adequate Phenomenology and “Pheno-Practice” for Integral Research

by Wendelin Kuepers

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This contribution investigates the status of phenomenology in integral theory. In particular it will problematise the... more This contribution investigates the status of phenomenology in integral theory. In particular it will problematise the classification of life-worldly phenomenology as a discipline located only in the interior upper-left quadrant or as a Zone 1 perspective in Wilber’s integral model and methodology.
Based on main ideas of classical (Husserlian) phenomenology and its various critiques and further developments, the treatment in integral (AQAL) theory is discussed critically. Especially the ordering of phenomenology into a separate field or zone, the status of consciousness, including the debate related to its structure and states, and inter-subjective dimensions as well as the relation to contemplation and meditation are examined systematically.
Furthermore, then with regard to the more advanced form of phenomenology as developed by Merleau-Ponty its proto-integral potential will be outlined. It will be argued that activating this potential may contributes to correct some of the weaknesses and limitations of conventional integral theory. 
Moreover, it will be proposed that advanced phenomenology provides the foundations for an “adequate phenomenology” in integral research. As part of this more adequate phenomenology and its ontological, epistemological, and methodological dimension some perspectives on what is called integral “pheno-practice” will be offered.
All in all, it is hoped that the critical exploration of phenomenology in its more proto-integral, adequate and pheno-practical forms might enrich integral research, improve its theory building and empirical testing by offering a more inclusive, coherent approach as part of an overarching holarchical ecology of integrative knowledge and practice

Perception, The Buddha-Nature, and the Brain: A Challenge to Neurotheology on the Dynamics of Spiritual Meaning.

by Jonathan Weidenbaum

This is my talk for the conference: Towards A Science of Consciousness 2012; Tucson, Arizona.

It incorporates insights from my earlier publications and conference talks (including "Between Mysticism and Medical Materialism"), but it is expanded, more general, more up to date, and offers different conclusions.

Neurotheology, the discipline which explores correlations between religious experience and the nervous system, comes... more Neurotheology, the discipline which explores correlations between religious experience and the nervous system, comes in more than one form. While some neurotheologians aim to isolate a specific part of the brain as the foundation for spirituality (i.e. the temporal lobe), others argue for the importance of recognizing myriad components of the nervous system as working in tandem. While a few are anti-religion, others seek, on the contrary, to vouch for both the validity of mystical experience and the value of religious commitment. However, what many neurotheologians seem to have in common is a general interpretation of the nature of experience: namely one in which the brain, as the primary seat of significance, fashions sensory data into structures of meaning. According to many neurotheologians, mystics can therefore alter their reality by provoking the right transformations within the nervous system. The purpose of this essay is to argue that this interpretation of our perceptual and intuitive life fails to account for the felt-character of some of the most venerable types of experience labeled as religious. I do not deny that the nervous system is a necessary condition for all experience, religious or otherwise. I maintain that it is not a sufficient condition, and that the ecstatic feel of religious experiences involves configurations of meaning that are not reducible to a model in which the brain receives and shapes value-neutral bits of stimulation. I argue that this model can also be self-refuting. For instance, in describing how the brain creates reality, the authors of Why God Won't Go Away state that even science is a kind of mythology, a useful fiction (leaving us to wonder why we should accept their conclusions). Drawing upon key American and European thinkers, I suggest that the rich qualities of religious experience are better accounted for through a more nuanced understanding of the relationship between the nervous system, an active and mobile body, and the environment--and not through a concentration upon a priori mechanisms or "God-parts" of the brain. I conclude with a discussion of the implications of my position for the veridicality of different kinds of religious and mystical experience. I hope only to advance the conversation over neurotheology, and not to dismiss it.

Roundtable: What is the Future of Religious Studies

by Jonathan Tuckett

Co-authored with David Robertson, Chris Cotter, Ethan Quillen, Kevin Whitesides and Liam Sutherland.

Not exactly a paper but a recorded roundtable session done for the Religious Studies Project. It concerns the future... more Not exactly a paper but a recorded roundtable session done for the Religious Studies Project. It concerns the future of Religious Studies in the current economic/social climiate.

TRUE STORIES ABOUT ANCIENT PEOPLES

by Peeter Espak

Folklore 38 (2008), pp. 170-174.

Tarmo Kulmar. Tõsilood muinasrahvastest. (‘True
Stories about Ancient Peoples’) Eesti Mõttelugu 76, more Tarmo Kulmar. Tõsilood muinasrahvastest. (‘True
Stories about Ancient Peoples’) Eesti Mõttelugu 76,
Ilmamaa, Tartu, 2007, 348 pp. (Editors Simo Runnel
and Urmas Tõnisson; foreword Märt Läänemets).

Reduction or Revelation? Fichte and the Question of Phenomenology.

by f. scott scribner

Published in : Fichte and the Phenomenological Tradition, Eds., Violetta L. Waibel, Daniel Breazeale, Tom Rockmore. Berlin/New York: Walter de Gruyter, Gmbh & Co., 2010, 41-56.

This paper argues that Fichte's own transformation of transcendental philosophy by means of an experimental... more This paper argues that Fichte's own transformation of transcendental philosophy by means of an experimental phenomenological approach can be
understood as one that anticipates the central impasse between phenomenology's aspirations for objectivity and its more relevatory accounts.

Bridging the Gap Between Social and Existential-Mystical Interpretations of Schleiermacher's ‘Feeling’

by Gorazd Andrejc

Appeared in 'Religious Studies', 2012 (Published & Copyrighted by Cambridge University Press).

The article engages with two contemporary understandings of Schleiermacher’s notion of feeling which are in important... more The article engages with two contemporary understandings of Schleiermacher’s notion of feeling which are in important aspects in conflict: a social understanding (Kevin W. Hector and Christine Helmer) and an existentialmystical understanding (Thandeka). Using the phenomenological category of ‘existential feelings’ drawn from the work of Matthew Ratcliffe, I argue that they can be brought into a coherent overall account that recognizes different aspects of feeling in Schleiermacher’s work. I also suggest that such an interpretation of Schleiermacher’s concept of religious feeling offers a different and better understanding of the role of feelings in religious experience and belief than the contemporary ‘perception-model’ of religious experience.

What is Phenomenology?

by Jonathan Tuckett

Published as a response article to a podcast on the Religious Studies Project.

A brief introduction into the phenomenology of religion highlighting certain key figures and the emergence of... more A brief introduction into the phenomenology of religion highlighting certain key figures and the emergence of phenomenology in religious studies. In defining the phenomenology of religion I demarcate the field into the three subdivisions: Methodological, Typological, and Speculative.

Passing to the Underworld in Sumerian Texts

by Peeter Espak

Forschungen zur Anthropologie und Religionsgeschichte (FARG) 42 (2008) pp. 67-71.

Human Beings as a Part of the 'Flesh of the World': Phenomenological Foundations for the Dialogue between Liberal Protestantism and Animism

by Gorazd Andrejc

This paper is in Slovenian. It was published in an edited volume: Harmony Among Cultures - Ways to Intercultural Dialogue (Sozitje med kulturami - Poti do medkulturnega dialoga, edited by Maja Lamberger-Khatib, Maribor: Pivec, 2011. (http://www.zalozba-pivec.com/katalog/knjiga/sozitje-med-kulturami/)

The present essay is a reflection on philosophical and theological foundations for a neglected intercultural dialogue:... more The present essay is a reflection on philosophical and theological foundations for a neglected intercultural dialogue: that between liberal protestantism and animism/shamanism. David Abram in his book The Spell of the Sensous (1997) builds his ecologically-minded defense of animism on Heidegger's and Merleau-Ponty's phenomenology. He offers an ecologically relevant critique of Christianity: In his view, Christianity has robbed nature of her sacredness and spiritual relevancy and confined spirituality inside the social space of the Church and narrowly defined orthodox doctrine. Such spirituality entails a flight from our mortal, bodily nature which is intextricable from the rest of nature, claims Abram. He agrues that the Western destructivity is a consequence of the Christian fixation on the written word of its founding text, anthropocentric view of spirituality, and Platonistic 'reification' of ideas which are set in a vertical opposition to less valued material, sensual world. I argue that contemporary Christianity can't avoid acknowedging validity of the central points of this ecophenomenological critique. Yet, there are resources in Christian tradition which can accomodate this critique: one such is Friedrich Schleiermacher's theology of feeling, interpreted phenomenologically – in conversation with exactly Merleau-Ponty and Heidegger. Schleiermacher claims that the common feature of 'religious feelings' is a fact that through them, human beings experience a communion with the universe – either social or natural environment. Healthy faith in God is related to such, albeit non-intentional states. Despite the great differences between them, this liberal-protestant understanding of Christianity shares a basic phenomenological wisdom with animism: ultimately, the relation of humans to the environment has to be based on the depths of experiential religiosity.

Doubt as Methodology and Object in the Phenomenology of Religion

by Malcolm Brown

The Holy Grail in the phenomenology of religion (and, to a lesser extent, the sociology of religion) is a definition... more The Holy Grail in the phenomenology of religion (and, to a lesser extent, the sociology of religion) is a definition of religion that actually works, but, so far, this seems to have been elusive. Classical definitions of religion—substantive (e.g. Tylor) and functionalist (e.g. Durkheim)—fail, in part because they attempt to be in three places at once, as it were: they attempt to distinguish religion from non-religion; they attempt to capture what religions have in common; and they attempt to grasp the “heart”, or “core”, of religion. Consequently, family resemblance definitions of religion replace certainty and precision for its own sake with a more pragmatic and heuristic approach, embracing doubt and putting forward definitions that give us a better understanding (Verstehen) of religion. In this paper, I summarise some “new” definitions of religion that take this approach, before proposing and defending another one, defining religion as non-propositional and “apophatic”, thus accepting that doubt is central to religion itself, as well as to the analysis of religion.

Rethinking Divine Perception in Merleau-Ponty

by Kenneth D. Koffer

Presented at Graduate Conference: The Emergence of the Idea of God in the History of Phenomenology. Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, May 2010.

The unsurpassed phenomenological account of depth given by Merleau-Ponty in his 1945 Phenomenology of Perception... more The unsurpassed phenomenological account of depth given by Merleau-Ponty in his 1945 Phenomenology of Perception contains a fundamental contrast for understanding those phenomenological descriptions. Merleau-Ponty contrasts human depth perception to divine perception, the latter of which perceives depth as breadth in a foreshortened form. This paper examines the consequences of this contrast for theology and philosophical anthropology, since humans access a dimension of space that God cannot. After demonstrating the dual nature of this contrast, both as a heuristic device and as a criticism of Cartesian metaphysics, I argue for a different understanding of divinity that escapes the theological problems posed by these phenomenological descriptions and positions humans once again in relation to the absolute [13 Pages].

Heidegger's Early Appropriation of Christian Eschatology

by Judith Wolfe

From: Phenomenology and Eschatology: Not Yet in the Now, edited J.P. Manoussakis and Neal DeRoo

Discontinuous Meditations on the Phenomenology of Religion

by Carole Cusack

Mentalites/ Mentalities, Vol. 25, Nos 1-2, 2011, pp. 1-7.

This paper argues the phenomenology of religion, which has come under attack from theorists of various persuasions... more This paper argues the phenomenology of religion, which has come under attack from theorists of various persuasions within Religious Studies, remains a useful tool in the methodological repertoire of scholars researching religion. Particularly damning criticisms will be addressed with a view to demonstrating that phenomenology is a fluid, and far from simple theory, which has frequently been misrepresented by its critics, who themselves may have questionable motives for impugning or dismissing it. Specific criticisms addressed include: that phenomenology of religion privileges individual consciousness and denies intersubjectivity and language; that phenomenology of religion presumes that ‘religion’ has an essentialist, a-historical core, ignoring historical and social contextualization; and that the phenomenologyical approach results in a disguised ‘theologizing’ of Studies in Religion through its ‘sympathy’ with the believer’s perspective

Da Totalidade ao Infinito - Quanto às possibilidades de superação das limitações éticas da Cultura Ocidental Contemporânea: um estudo à luz do pensamento de Emmanuel Lévinas

by Herlon Bezerra

BEZERRA, Herlon A. Da Totalidade ao Infinito - Quanto às possibilidades de superação das limitações éticas da Cultura Ocidental Contemporânea: um estudo à luz do pensamento de Emmanuel Lévinas. Universidade Federal do Ceará. Programa de Pós-graduação em Filosofia. Fortaleza: 2006.(Dissertação)

Este trabalho apresenta dois contextos significadores últimos: (1) por um lado, deve o mesmo ser entendido como... more Este trabalho apresenta dois contextos significadores últimos: (1) por um lado, deve o mesmo ser entendido como participante dos jogos argumentativos praticados na tradição hermenêutica do pensamento filosófico, particularmente naquele espaço teorético que reúne Fenomenologia, Pensamento Existencial e as Filosofias da Vida; (2) por outro lado, este exercício compartilha das preocupações morais que marcam a humanidade nos últimos séculos, em especial àquelas que dizem respeito à possibilidade e necessidade de significação ético-filosófica do multiculturalismo, tenso e caótico, que marca as urbanizadas sociedades contemporâneas, visando produzir condições culturais globais capazes de possibilitar a convivência pacífica entre as inúmeras diferenças em choque cotidiano. Nesse sentido, o mesmo encontra suas direções investigativas nas seguintes pressuposições: embora seja a Ética uma particularidade cultural grega, foi mesma “imposta” às mais diversas culturas “incorporadas” pelo violento processo
global de expansão e domínio em que se possibilitou, estabeleceu e desenvolveu a Civilização Ocidental. Os efeitos das evidentes contradições morais de tal processo
impõem severas limitações éticas à Cultura Ocidental Contemporânea, uma vez que, em resposta a tais contradições, dissemina-se o relativismo como único critério universal de julgamento ético das condutas, quer de indivíduos quer de
coletividades humanas. À luz do pensamento ético de Emmanuel Lévinas, propõe-se neste trabalho que a possibilidade de superação ética de tal condição cultural reside numa difícil escolha a ser hoje realizada pela consciência filosófica: de um
lado, a reposição do universalismo, fictício e violento, possibilitado na tendência intelectualista do logos grego e as abstrações de suas Luzes; de outro, a assunção das exigências advindas da imediaticidade concreta da Sensibilidade e da Proximidade, única fonte para uma universalidade humanamente significativa, já que pré-originária do próprio humano e, assim, anterior a toda possível cultura.

The Uses and Abuses of Husserl’s Doctrine of Immanence: The Specter of Spinozism in Phenomenology's Theological Turn

by Michael Kelly

Forthcoming essay 2012, please cite as fully as possible.

Hypersymmetrisk asymmetri: Distance og engagement som kritiske begreber 2009, e-publikation

by Jesper Aagaard Petersen

The Bedazzling God: An Argument Against and a Possible Solution to Jean-Luc Marion’s Insertion of Theology and Saturated Phenomena into Phenomenology

by Brendan Dean

An old paper I wrote in my undergrad that I still enjoy. Figured I would throw something on here at least.

Receptions of Phenomenology in French Philosophy and Religious Thought, 1889-1939

by Christian Dupont

PhD Dissertation, University of Notre Dame, 1997. Thomas F. O'Meara, O.P., advisor

This dissertation presents an historical investigation of the reception of phenomenology in France from 1889-1939. It... more This dissertation presents an historical investigation of the reception of phenomenology in France from 1889-1939. It examines anticipation of phenomenology in French thought as well as early encounters of French academic philosophers and religious thinkers with the phenomenological philosophies of Edmund Husserl, Max Scheler and Martin Heidegger.