Notes

  1. . NinianSmart, “Interpretation and Mystical Experience,” Religzous Studies  1 (1965):75.
  2. . Terminology from Claudio Naranjo and Robert E. Ornstein, On the Psychology of Meditation (New York: Viking Press, 1971.
  3. . See Smart, pp. 75–87; Walter T. Stace, Mysticism und Phzlosophy (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, 1960), chap. 2; R. C. Zaehner, Mysticism Sacred und Profane (New York: Oxford University Press, 1961); and William J. Wainwright, Mysticism (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1981), chap. 1.
  4. . See, e.g., Carl R. Kordig, “The Theory‐Ladenness of Observation,” Review of Metaphysics 24 (1971): 448–84. For a discussion of some of the problems involved in comparing mystical and sense experiences, see Wainwright, chap. 3.
  5. . Bhagavad‐gt 3.27–28.
  6. . Enneads 3.8.9, 6.9.2
  7. . Ray C. Petry, ed., Late Medieval Mysticism (Philadelphia: Westminister, 1957), p. 210.
  8. . Charles T. Tart, States of Consciousness (New York: Dutton, 1975), pp. 84–85.
  9. . See, e.g., Norwood Russell Hanson, Observation and Explanation (New York: Harper & Row, 1971), pp. 1–8; Frederick Suppe, ed., The Structure of' Scientific Theories, 2nd ed. (Chicago: University of Illinois, 1977), pp. 192–99: and Thomas S. Kuhn, “Reflections on my Critics,” in Imre Lakatos and Alan Musgrave, eds., Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), pp. 276–77.
  10. . Steven T. Katz, ed., Mysticism and Philosophical Analysis (New York: Oxford University Press, 1978), p. 26.
  11. . See J. F. Staal's account of this process, Exploring Mysticism (Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1975), pp. 170–73. He does not distinguish types of mystical experiences and so does not deal with whether this is true of only one type.
  12. . Raymond B. Blakney, ed. and trans., Meister Eckhart (New York: Harper & Row, 1941), p. 97.
  13. . For more on the problems of' mystics' use of language, see Richard H. Jones, “A Philosophical Analysis of Mystical Utterances,” Philosophy East and West 29 (1979): 255–74.
  14. . Cited in Stace (n. 3 above), p. 112. Porphyry mentions that Plotinus was “oned” with the One four times (Life of Plotinus, chap. 23).
  15. . JanVanneste, “Is the Mysticism of Pseudo‐Dionysius GenuineInternational Philosophical Quarterly  3 (1963): 304.
  16. . For a depth‐mystical experience to occur, all knowledge must be eliminated from the mind. Also, new knowledge‐claims may not be revealed. See R. J. ZwiWerblowsky, “On the Mystical Rejection of Mystical Illuminations,” Religzous Studies  1 (1966): 177–84. But a new inward wisdom is usually felt to be obtained that is cognitive (an insight into the nature of reality).
  17. . Petry (n. 7 above), p. 47.
  18. . Cited in Mircea Eliade, Patanjali and Yoga (New York: Schocken, 1975), p. 171.
  19. . Cited in William James, The Varieties of Religious Experiences (New York: New American Library, 1958), pp. 313–14.
  20. . E. g., K. N. Jayatilleke, Early Buddhist Theory of Knowledge (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1963), with the qualification that the Theravadins accept paranormal experiences as veridical.
  21. . Ninian Smart, Doctrine and Argument in Indian Philosophy (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1964), p. 50.
  22. . Ibid., p. 78; cf. Stace (n. 3 above), p. 125.
  23. . J. F. Staal, Advaita and Neo‐Platonism: A Critical Study in Comparative Philosophy (Madras: University of Madras, 1961). pp. 88–89, 158–60.
  24. . Bruhma‐stra‐bhsya 1.1.1, 1.1.4.
  25. . Ibid., 1.1.1.
  26. . Ibid., 2.1.1.
  27. . Ibid., 2.1.17; e.g., 2.3.1–3.
  28. . Blakney (n. 12 above), p. 156; Mark 11: 15–17 and parallels.
  29. . John Hick, ed., Truth and Dialogue in World Religions: Conflicting Truth‐Claims (Philadelphia: Westminister, 1974), p. 149.
  30. . Matthew Fox, reakthrough: Meister Eckhart's Creation Spirituality in New Translation (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1980), p. 23. Ecclesiastical authorities were hostile to some Christian and Muslim mystics. Some mystical utterances seem intentionally provocative, although the mystics usually said that if properly understood the claims were orthodox.
  31. . E.g., Thomas S. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 2nd ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970), pp. 205–7.
  32. . John Blofield, The Tantric Mysticism of Tibet (New York: Dutton, 1970), pp. 45–46.
  33. . Staal (n. 11 above), p. 25.
  34. . Ibid., p. 147.
  35. . See Richard H.Jones, “Theravada Buddhism and Morality,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion  47 (1980): 371–87.
  36. . Even the idea that mystical teachings are rafts to be jettisoned once we become enlightened is misleading since enlightenment involves the internalization of a conceptual system: we come to see reality by means of the raft even if we are not consciously trying to employ it (which would involve a dualistic stance toward the concepts present).
  37. . Frithjof Schuon, The Transcendent Unity of Religions (New York: Harper & Row, 1975), p. xxviii. This position holds not only that all mysticism is ultimately one but also the questionable claim that mysticism is the essence of all religiosity and hence that all religions are one.
  38. . Gleaned from Aldous Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy (New York: Harper & Row, 1944).
  39. . Schuon, p. 82.
  40. . D. T. Suzuki, Mysticism, Christian and Buddhist (New York: Harper & Row, 1957), p. 44.
  41. . Ibid., p. 9.
  42. . Evelyn Underhill, Practical Mysticism (New York: Dutton,1915), p. 3.
  43. . Gilbert Ryle, Dilemmas (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,1954), p. 90. For a discussion in philosophy of science on this point, see Kordig (n. 3 above).
  44. . Agehananda Bharati, The Light at the Center (Santa Barbara, Calif.: Ross‐Erikson, 1976), pp. 69, 109.
  45. . Harold I. Brown, Perception, Theory and Commitment (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1979), p. 120.
  46. . Cited in C. F. Kelley, Meister Eckhart on Divine Knowledge (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1977), pp. 49, 143, and 143 respectively.
  47. . Cited in Frederick H. Holck, ed., Death and Eastern Thought (New York: Abing‐don, 1974), p. 111.
  48. . Cited in William A. Christian, Oppositions of Religious Doctrines (New York: Macmil‐Ian,1972), pp. 115–16.
  49. . Mystics are never critical realists since ultimate reality is directly experienceable. The mystical is not known by inference or speculation, but understanding and interpreting its status are required.
  50. . W. M. Watt, The Faith and Practice of al‐Ghazdi (London: Allen & Unwin, 1963), pp. 21, 19, 55–56.
  51. . Martin Buber, Between Man and Man (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1947), pp. 24–25.
  52. . E.g., can any post mortem experience—even those lasting a great length of time—decide between a cycle of rebirths and one eternal life? Would even impressions of past lives assure that these lives were ours? For a discussion of philosophical problems in this area, see John Hick, Death and Eternal Life (New York: Harper & Row, 1976).
  53. . Ernest Nagel, Logic Without Metaphysics (Glencoe, 111.: Free Press, 1956), p. 390.
  54. . See Paul Feyerabend, Against Method (London: NLB, 1975) and Imre Lakatos, “Falsification and the Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes,” in Lakatos and Musgrave (n. 9 above).
  55. . Joachim Wach, Understanding and Believing (New York: Harper & Row, 1968), a. 148.
  56. . Clifford Geertz, Islam Observed (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1968), pp. 17, 97.
  57. . Feyerabend, p. 44.
  58. . Smart (n. 1 above), p. 86.
  59. . Staal (n. 23 above), pp. 88–89, 158–60.
  60. . Paul W. Taylor, Normative Discourse (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice‐Hall, 1961), p. 132.
  61. . See Lakatos (n. 54 above), pp. 91–195.
  62. . According to Reinhold Niebuhr mysticism is at total variance with the Christian faith(The Nature and Destiny of Man [New York: Scribner, 1941], 1: 135–36). For certain Protestants (such as Karl Barth), mysticism is sinful because it is an attempt to become God.
  63. . Antimystical positions in this situation are just other positions of the same fundamental level of decision; they are no less metaphysical than the acceptance of a mystical alternative.