William James Views On Mysticism

From the beginning of his book James has written that any experience the individual has needs to be processed, labeled and categorized by the individual. Even though the individual gets their labels and categories from society and their background, the experiences they have shape and possibly change those labels. James writes that if an individual has a mystical experience only that individual understands it: “The simplest rudiment of mystical experience would seem to be that deepened sense of the significance of a maxim or formula occasionally sweeps over one” (p 382). However, for the mystical experience to be understood by society it has to have labels that can be understood and judged based on how they fit and contribute to the social
context . If an individual has an experience like the drunken man did when he saw Jesus and became a priest that changed his life and brought him fruit. A specific mystical experience cannot be translated to others because the meaning behind the story will not be the same for society as it was for individual. The mystical experience applies directly to the individual. However, the drunken man retold the story to James who understood it and put it in his writing because he had the labels and categories to do so.
There are steps of what James calls "mystical consciousness" (p 384). For these, the writer just quotes from people who have experienced them. The meaning of the mystical experience is lost in social context but the experience itself is still communicable. Even though mystical experiences seem as though they are only feelings to the individual they are states of knowledge. They are conditions of insight into depths of truth unexplored by conversational understanding. They are lights, revelations, full of meaning and significance, they may seem incoherent to some; and as a rule they carry with them a meaning. James considers everything from déjà vu, “that sudden feeling, which sometimes sweeps over us, of having ‘been here before,’" to drug-induced states to be mystical experiences (p 383). This might seem like it is too broad or includes experiences that should not be labeled mystical but James states that if the experience has meaning to the individual and it provides fruit the experience will always be mystical.
William James concludes his lectures on mysticism by considering what truth it might hold for society and the individual.
He has three points to sort. Firstly, the individuals who have mystical experiences are themselves totally convinced by what they’ve experienced. But secondly, there is no reason why other people should share that belief; different individual’s experiences produce different fruits. James suggests that mystical experiences, viewed generally, are non-specific in content; the fact is that the mystical feeling of amplification, coming together, and freedom has no specific intellectual content of its own. It is capable of starting a bond with material equipped by the most varied philosophies and theologies, if only they can find a place in their context for its irregular expressive mood (pp 425-426). Yet thirdly, the presence of mystical experiences prevents the individual from rejecting out of hand the possibility of a world beyond their senses. The supernaturalism and optimism to which they persuade the individual may, interpreted in one way or another, be after all the truest of insights into the meaning of this life (p 428). We cannot reject James’ views on mysticism because any experience an individual has will always be judged based on society’s standards. However, society’s labels and categories are based on individual preferences. There is always a continuity between an individual’s mystical experience and society, there can however be a pause in the
meaning each gets from the experience.
There is no double standard in James’ philosophy or writing because what the individual experiences may only have meaning for the individual. However, the individual can still fully discuss that occurrence if the individual can find a way to express it in labels and categories that the rest of society understands. Society which is made up of many individuals will habitually judge an experience differently than the person who has the mystical experience because it is not the actual occurrence that matters to the individual it is the fruit, but society normally judges the experience and not the meaning.

Topic 2:
Even when James was working on the Principles of Psychology, he was starting to consider that many facets of human behavior, such as the creation and protection of instincts, could be clarified through a natural selection ideal: “I proceeded at that time to draw a tentative conclusion to the effect that the origin of most of our instincts must certainly be deemed fruits of the back door method of genesis, and not of ancestral experience in the proper meaning of the term.... The evidence for Mr. Darwin’s view is too complex to be given in this place. To my own mind it is quite convincing” (p 129-131). A little later in his writing James became much more exact saying evolution is not progressing in a certain way but the change it creates will only work if it is suitable for society.
In the very first line of the essay “The Will to Believe” James makes obvious just where this occasion for a similarity between the arrangement of natural selection and social behavior sits: “A remarkable parallel, which I think has never been noticed, obtains between the facts of social evolution on the one hand, and of zoological evolution as expounded by Mr. Darwin on the other” (p 4). For James, this extraordinary parallel has two parts. Initially, the huge bulk of all difference, of all change from generation to generation surfaces because of “internal molecular accidents, of which we know nothing” (p 623). The social equivalent to these molecular accidents for James are our continuously moving, often impulsive ideas, emotions. On the other side of the equation, the corresponding environment for the evolutionary difference is the social setting. The instincts, emotions, and twinges first appear as random distinctions. Only in their interaction with their environment or more specifically in their interaction with external conditions and other people do they start to gain their influential value.
As noted in the prompt evolution or change is value neutral and not necessarily progressing in a specific direction. Whether a change works within or fits a context is not and should not be the standard for judging change. This criterion is not suitable for judging the worth of change because fitting a context is not very important. In James’ own religion Swedenborgian, the new church was a branch of Christianity but because other sects of Christianity considered it a cult it evolved into something that does not fit in with culture today therefore it has mostly been forgotten. The change the Swedenborgians were trying to create did not fit within the cultural context and therefore was not considered worthy. At first change may seem as though it is unfruitful because it goes against what individuals and society thinks are right. However, the criterion for change should be whether the change experienced by society provides fruit overall. Hitler first went against the grain and preached Nazism, and moved people to prosecute and eventually kill millions of people. However, the horrid consequences ultimately moved the world to condemn him and the change he brought to Germany. On the other hand when Martin Luther King Jr. went against societal pressure and preached for equality he was murdered. However, the fruits he brought to a whole society has been immeasurable.
Topic 3: A religious experience as William James defines it is anything that brings fruits to an individual.
The mystical experience can be brought on by a drug induced state or déjà vu. The definition of religious experience that is written in his book is true and accurate if we take into consideration the circumstance of the experience. I define a religious experience as anything that brings your fruits and is wholly positive. Mystical experiences are only meaningful to the individual who has them and to be able to standardize criteria is impossible. The only way society knows of mystical experiences is if the individual shares them. Even if the individual shares them, their meaning is diminished because of the different labels and categories we each assign to our experiences. If we take for example the drunken man who saw Jesus his fruit was becoming a priest and changing his life. The benchmark of his experience is his own personal evolution and growth. If we take another written account James wrote about in his book of déjà vu, the evaluative criteria for that was the individual’s feeling of being in the same place as before. To say that religious experience can only be evaluated on a criteria that I create lessens the significance of that experience. I can tell you how to evaluate a religious experience based on any criteria that I choose for example fruits for all. However, your biases and experiences might state that fruit for you is different than to me. How
can I then say I’ve created a globally accepted criterion? Everything is subjective to everyone. Therefore all criterions are individually created. You can only evaluate a subjective experience based on whether you understand the experience not whether you agree with it.
Context is the framework to which we can standardize our experience. Mystical experiences are so individual that the meaning they produce can only be evaluated and counted by us. However, in order to explain to other people the value your experience had for you background, perspective and settings need to be given.