Knowra The Varieties of Religious Experience The Varieties of Religious Experience A 1902 book by William James that analyzes personal religious experience through psychology, drawing on lectures he delivered at the University of Edinburgh.
William James : An American philosopher and psychologist whose work helped establish pragmatism and modern psychology. James’s psychological method and pragmatic philosophy shape the book’s treatment of religious life.
Healthy-mindedness : A religious temperament that emphasizes goodness, confidence, and the positive aspects of life. James contrasts this outlook with religious attention to suffering and evil.
Edinburgh : The capital of Scotland and the location of the University of Edinburgh. James delivered the lectures that became the book at the University of Edinburgh.
Institutional religion : Organized religious life expressed through churches, rituals, authorities, and shared doctrines. James distinguishes personal religious experience from religion organized around institutions.
Gifford Lectures : An annual lecture series established to promote the study of natural theology at Scottish universities. The book grew from James’s 1901–1902 Gifford Lectures in Edinburgh.
The sick soul : James’s term for a temperament acutely conscious of evil, suffering, and the instability of life. This type experiences religious need through distress that healthy-mindedness cannot readily dismiss.
University of Edinburgh : A public research university in Edinburgh, Scotland, founded in 1583. Its Gifford Lectures invited James to develop his inquiry into religious experience.
Medical materialism : The view that religious beliefs and experiences can be explained by their bodily or pathological causes. James rejects causal diagnosis as a substitute for assessing what religious experiences mean and produce.
Religious experience : An individual's perceived encounter with the divine, sacred, or transcendent. Personal experience, rather than religious institutions, supplies the book’s central subject.
The divided self : A condition in which conflicting impulses or ideals make a person feel inwardly fragmented. James treats inner division as a psychological condition that conversion can resolve.
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