Introduction to the two volumes

from phenomenological theory to the concretum of religious experiencing

Olga Louchakova-Schwartz

University of California Davis

pp. 1-22

in: Olga Louchakova-Schwartz (ed), The problem of religious experience, Berlin, Springer, 2019

Abstract

This is Introduction to The Problem of Religious Experience: Case Studies in Phenomenology, with Reflections and Commentaries. The book presents an updated overview of the problem of religious experience in phenomenology, from the time of Husserl to French phenomenology's theological turn, which was followed by important publications such as Steinbock (2007), Depraz (2008), Alvis (2016 and 2018) and others. Significantly advancing understanding of religious experience, these studies nevertheless left open a question of what exactly makes religious experience what it is: that is, gives it a specific quality distinguishing it, for its subject, from all other experiences. In contemporary phenomenology, Dahl's (2010) theory of interruptions and Barber's (2017) theory of the appresentative mindset and the finite province of religious meaning comprise two most probable and mutually complementary answers to this question. Further, Introduction covers the contents of the two volumes, entitled respectively The Primeval Showing of Religious Experience and Doxastic Perspectives in the Phenomenology of Religious Experience. The case studies in Volume I proceed from the descriptive phenomenology of religious experience as it relates to subjectivity research (Part 1) to the relationship between religious experience, intersubjectivity, and alterity (Part 2). Part 2 also serves as a bridge to metaphysical, theological, and theistic approaches in Part 3 and Part 4. Along with the overview of the contents of the book, this Introduction presents Olga Louchakova-Schwartz's (as editor of the book) synthetic meta-reflection on the findings, so that the findings in the book are coherently represented in light of contemporary debates in the philosophy of religion.

Cited authors

Husserl Edmund