However, at the very least, the phenomenon of a "crisis of meaning" seems to cause many people very real mental anguish...
— Count Timothy von Icarus

That, for example, is very true. There are threads on this site about this. It's something I have trouble understanding, something I'm curious about, but it's also something I'd be sort of afraid to ask about when it's acute… — Dawnstorm

It might interest you to know of a pubic figure who’s come to prominence in this regard in the last five years or so. That is John Vervaeke, who is professor of Psychology and Cognitive Science at University of Toronto. He has a YouTube lecture series comprising 52 units on the topic of ‘The Meaning Crisis’. Review here.

Congratulations. You are the first person to use "cromulent" on The Philosophy Forum. — BC

This is demonstrably false. (I suspect you were misled by the mobile version having search in two different menus.)

Either you had never run across the word here before or had forgotten that you had; then ― perhaps ― you checked your memory using a faulty procedure.

Either your experience of the forum was idiosyncratic, or you misunderstood and mischaracterized that experience yourself, and then ― whichever was the case ― you projected your understanding of your experience onto the forum as such, and everyone's experience of it.

But I'm sure that's completely irrelevant to the thread topic ...

My feeing is that deity is ‘personal’ only insofar as not being not an ‘it’ or an impersonal force or mere principle — Wayfarer

That's my view as well, but I still want to add "conscious" because this force has to have, at the very least, the same capacities I do. The Suzuki passage captures this very well: "a willing and knowing being, one that is will and intelligence, thought and action. . . . an inexhaustible fountainhead of love and compassion."

If more personalism is wanted, there are many spiritual paths that emphasize a relationship with an avatar or bodhisattva, Christianity being the most familiar example.

However, at the very least, the phenomenon of a "crisis of meaning" seems to cause many people very real mental anguish (and to motivate self-centered hedonism in at least some cases). I think Charles Taylor is correct in saying that this particular sort of crisis is distinctly modern; I have never seen it in older works of fiction, whereas it is almost the definitive issue in much literature from the 19th century onwards. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I don't think we know enough to come to definitive conclusions about an alleged "crisis of meaning." We also didn't really see working class literature emerge until the 19th century. The fact that old certainties had been crumbling in modernity - including things like slavery, rigid class structures, the roles of women—meant that people often felt unmoored. And technological change never stopped coming. So it's hardly surprising that people have often felt anxious about their purpose and future. Some of this may well have come from the decline of Christianity's hold on culture. But I’d say that a crisis of meaning comes less from the collapse of belief, and more from too many choices, too much change, and from having leisure time and disposable income to explore identity.

But no doubt some will argue that the word of disenchanted rationalism and modernity has allowed us to retreat into crude things like money in place of spiritual riches.

The two aren't unrelated though, right? — Count Timothy von Icarus

My take on this. Humans have always had a tendency to retreat into crass materialism - even in times when there was "certainty" about nation, religion, and social order. It's not something unique to modernity. The difference is that in earlier eras, access to material indulgence was largely confined to the aristocracy and the institutional church. The class system restricted who could participate in that kind of worldly excess. Now that those old structures have weakened, and consumerism has become democratised, it just appears more widespread. But the impulse itself isn’t new - it’s just more visible.

That's actually me, too; otherwise I wouldn't be in these sort of threads at all. But it's a second-hand interest: I'm interested in believers, not God. I guess there's a derived intellectual curiosity that does make me interested in God, too, but not in a practically relevant way.

I sort of have misgivings about this: as if I'm putting myself above others and play arm-chair psychiatrist. I don't think that's quite it, but I do worry from time to time. In any case, even if I do, it's a two-way road: I look back at myself, too. — Dawnstorm

I think we not only have every right but perhaps even a responsibility to try to understand where others are coming from. This isn't the same as psychiatry, which tends to focus on diagnosis, disorders and treatment. What we're talking about is different—it's about trying to understand other's perspective as charitably and clearly as possible. We can try to "steelman" people’s positions on issues like Trump, God, or race - to present their views in the strongest, most coherent form and genuinely try to grasp how they see the truth. Even if we ultimately disagree, that kind of effort is probably essential for serious conversation. And it's true that this is not an exact artform, one can get things wrong. That's life.

Yes. I was thinking of mechanization as an improper model for understanding how humans -- and other forms of life -- coexist with each other. Otherwise, it has its uses. Technology, as you say, is neither good nor bad. — J

I agree with the idea that organisms, at least complex organisms, such as us and the so-called "higher animals' cannot be understood comprehensively in reductive mechanistic terms. The reductive models have their uses in understanding animals, including humans, but they have their limitations.

Philosophical accounts of theism are not necessarily more sophisticated, so I'd start by pushing back at that built in bias. — Hanover

It's worth noting the relation between the terms 'sophisticated' and 'sophistry'; to sophisticate may be to make sophistical, if the elaboration does not reflect a well-founded and understood increase in complexity.

So the problems of modernity would stem from the collapse of older institutions a century ago and a surfeit of income and lesiure, not from any positive constructions within modernity itself?

I just have a hard time buying it. Not least because, for all prior epochs for which we have better hindsight, such "subtraction narratives" don't pass the smell test. It's not just that old structures pass away; positive constructions arise to take their place. I don't know why this should be any different for the 20th and 21st centuries.

However, IMHO the common tendency for apologists of "modern secular liberalism" to see it as "just what happens when superstition and calcified oppression are washed away and the progress of science and technology hum along," (e.g. Pinker or Harris are fine examples) is itself definitive of a certain sort of myopia affecting liberalism. It's an outlook that justifies itself with a certain sort of inevitably (e.g. Fukuyama's particular understanding of the "End of History"). Fukuyama is a good example because he presciently identified a major fault line that looks libel to tear liberalism apart in the US and Europe, the revolt of the "Last Men." Yet somehow he missed that this could possibly pose an existential threat, let alone countenancing that it is symptom of something seriously deficient in the underlying liberal ethos. Afterall, how could anything be systematically wrong with "life with oppressive structures removed and scientific progress set lose?" All efforts to diagnoses modern pathologies need to "come from outside" if that's the case.

Plus, "suicide rates are surging because oppression is being lifted and people have too much freedom and income," doesn't feel quite right. Even if I agree that they might be tied together in some compelling way, there is something definitely missing from that equation. The antecedent only implies the consequent given other, equally important qualifications, e.g. "too much choice," is only paralyzing when one is not equipped to deal with it. Ceteris paribus, an end to oppressive institutions should foster greater solidarity, as it certainly appears to have in past epochs. It certainly doesn't seem to have done so in later 20th century contexts however (e.g. the Korean 4B Movement is decidedly not what I think Hegelian feminists were thinking of in terms of mutual recognition).

So the problems of modernity would stem from the collapse of older institutions a century ago and a surfeit of income and lesiure, not from any positive constructions within modernity itself? — Count Timothy von Icarus

I'm not saying that, there's more to it and one might go on for many thousands of words, but I am not a theorist and my thoughts, like most of us, are not worth more than a few paragraphs. But I do beleive this is important. I think increasing freedom and choice have probably been catastrophic when combined with marketing and constant social change. Our ability for sense making is consistently thwarted. Stability isn't merely about god and transcendence, it is about employment, identity and the capacity to live in a predictable world.

Hardly surprising that people differ on what the problem is and what the solutions might be. I’d say Vervaeke’s “meaning crisis”, for instance, is a bit vague, and we could also attribute most of the symptoms he describes to capitalism and socio-political changes, like industrialization, secularization, and globalization—rather than cognitive evolution, which seems to be his go to to. But Vervaeke is just another guy on the speaker circuit, making a living by identifying a problem and offering solutions and I sometimes wonder about his affiliation with a certain Jordan B Peterson, who is also (when framed less kindly) in the business of identifying problems, capitalising on insecurity and selling "cures" to modernity.

is itself definitive of a certain sort of myopia affecting liberalism — Count Timothy von Icarus

Liberalism has always had the potential to become a victim of its own impulse to dismantle institutions and expand the definition of citizenship - especially in the context of capitalism. Conservatism, of course, has its own problems, which tend to run in the opposite direction. But this kind of discussion is inherently messy; it deals in values and inferences that are rooted in disagreement.

If more personalism is wanted, there are many spiritual paths that emphasize a relationship with an avatar or bodhisattva, Christianity being the most familiar example. — J

On a personal note - after many years studying Buddhism and attempting to practice meditation along Buddhist lines, I started attending Japanese Pure Land services in around 2019, as it was about the only Buddhist practice centre in my neighbourhood. It was part of Hongwanji, which is in the Jodo Shinsu lineage. The priest was a very gracious Japanese minister who would don his ceremonial attire to conduct the services which he conducted in both Japanese and English. I learned from this that Pure Land deprecates any effort at practicing meditation. It’s not, they say, that such practices are not efficacious, but that they’re difficult to master; they are part of ‘the way of sages’ which is recognised by Jodo Shinshu but regarded as the preserve of the elite. Only one in a million will be able to bring them to fruition (which certainly matched my experience). The ordinary foolish being is ‘bombu’ (and I myself far more bombu than bodhisattva.) The basis of Jodo Shinshu is recitation of the name of Amidha Buddha (albeit in the context of a considerable amount of liturgical Japanese chanting and a highly formalised iconography.) The principle is that Amida Buddha - ‘Amida’ being ‘the Buddha of limitless light’ - vows to save all beings who believe and recite His name. (‘a-mida’ means ‘not measurable’, where ‘a’ is the negative particle and ‘mida’ is ‘measure’, so literally ‘immeasurable’.)

The similarities with devotional Christianity have often been commented on, but the underlying doxology is of course completely different as Pure Land is a part of Mahāyāna Buddhism and is thoroughly Buddhist in orientation. But it introduced a dilemma for me, as I found the figure of Amida more remote than…well, the religious tradition I was brought up with. When we toured Europe in 2022 we saw a great deal of devotional and symbolic art and architecture, and I can’t help but feel an affinity with it; I have Christian Platonist archetypes, although I don’t know if I’m ready for a return to the Church. (I do try from time to time.)

From time to time a visiting Pure Land minister from Canberra would come and give a talk, and I found his persona and teaching highly congenial. But I don’t think I’m really at home in that school.

I’d say Vervaeke’s “meaning crisis”, for instance, is a bit vague — Tom Storm

His 52 one-hour lectures do, however, define it with a pretty high degree of depth and precision.

It might interest you to know of a pubic figure who’s come to prominence in this regard in the last five years or so. That is John Vervaeke, who is professor of Psychology and Cognitive Science at University of Toronto. He has a YouTube lecture series comprising 52 units on the topic of ‘The Meaning Crisis’. Review here. — Wayfarer

That's interesting, thanks. I read the article; most of it felt familiar (the worldview part, for example, sounds straight out of phenomenological sociology - and then the name drop: Peter L. Berger, yep). I'll need to get to the videos, but it's a tad daunting. We'll see when I get to it.

From the article alone it sounds like "society will find a way," coupled with an awareness that academics participate in society.

I think we not only have every right but perhaps even a responsibility to try to understand where others are coming from. — Tom Storm

Heh, I'm certainly not worried about trying to understand others. It's assymetry inherent in simply not having a concept that's fundamental to others that worries me: trying to understand can easily go astray in the sense of "they believe this because" theories I might hold unconsciously. Things that sound ridiculous to me aren't ridiculous to others; but it's hard to cut out the ridicule, if you know what I mean. If it were just clear-cut this-is-nuts moments of breakdown, it would be easier to deal with. But it's more insidious.

I remember someone online saying something like "atheists often don't have no strong father figures". This happens to be true for me. My inner response to that was something like "so you folks want the universe to take care of you?" There's a sense of sparring, here, that overlays the understanding. I'm well aware that I can't overgeneralise like that, but there's this sense of condescension here that I have to be very vigilant against. (Does this make any sense?)

Heh, I'm certainly not worried about trying to understand others. — Dawnstorm

Not trying to understand others. Trying to understand where they are coming from. It's less ambitious.

Things that sound ridiculous to me aren't ridiculous to others; but it's hard to cut out the ridicule, if you know what I mean. — Dawnstorm

We are all ridiculous to someone.

I remember someone online saying something like "atheists often don't have no strong father figures". This happens to be true for me. My inner response to that was something like "so you folks want the universe to take care of you?" — Dawnstorm

Yes, this kind of point-scoring is what happens when we bypass attempting to understand and simply project our values onto others.

On a personal note - — Wayfarer

Thank you for this. I believe many of us have had similar experiences and journeys. It points up something important -- the choice of a specific spiritual path may have less to do with an exclusive truth than with a constellation of images and associations that unlock the deepest parts of ourselves. And that will be different for everyone.

Just to be clear: I'm using "spiritual path" very broadly, but not so broadly as to include, say, ethnic cleansing. The word "spiritual" has to carry with it certain presumptions about values. But not necessarily about God or gods.

I’d say Vervaeke’s “meaning crisis”, for instance, is a bit vague
— Tom Storm

His 52 one-hour lectures do, however, define it with a pretty high degree of depth and precision. — Wayfarer

Is it not more like a one hour lecture repeated 52 times? I probably should have said nebulous. And perhaps I should have watched more than the 15 hours I've seen. It comes off as tendentious. But I'm sure that people who already share his values like it. I understand he is an atheist, is that right?

:up:

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I've watched about 30 of those lectures, but quite a while ago now, and I agree with you that they are kind of nebulous and they do become repetitive.

It seemed to me that he is saying we should trust our experiences of the numinous, not in that they give us any actual knowledge about anything, but in that they can be personally transformational, they can change the way we feel about life.

I quite liked his distinctions between kinds of knowledge, much along the lines of what I've been banging on about for years.

I've watched about 30 of those lectures, but quite a while ago now, and I agree with you that they are kind of nebulous and they do become repetitive. — Janus

:up:

It seemed to me that he is saying we should trust our experiences of the numinous, not in that they give us any actual knowledge about anything, but in that they can be personally transformational, they can change the way we feel about life. — Janus

I suspect that this would appeal to some people, but many would struggle to make this work. If the numinous is not tied to the transcendent, but is essentially an emotional reaction, then I suppose it's tantamount to enjoying music or a painting. But at least with art, there is a tangible artifact that serves as the source of the experience. Bathing in one's subjective sense of the numinous might also be somewhat indulgent and narcissistic. You may be more receptive to this, how do you see it working?

Bathing in one's subjective sense of the numinous might also be somewhat indulgent and narcissistic.

Perhaps, but you could consider Schiller's view where the moral and appetitive are aligned in the aesthetic and our actions are over-determined in desire and duty. On the view, the aesthetic and "spiritual" is precisely what helps us overcome egoism.

A lot of new "spiritual but not religious" stuff strikes me as somewhat akin to Romantic philosophy in a lot of ways, with the stress of the numinous, the deeper nature beyond mechanism and disenchantment, etc. But like any good modern ethos, it also has to sell itself in disenchanted terms, hence the peer reviewed studies on the benefits of mindfulness and meditation, the economic indicators referenced in appeals to "cultural Christianity," and of course sticking within the limits of bourgeoisie metaphysics such that "everyone can be right" about their own experience and synchretism.

I get the appeal. What I find bizarre is some of the Christian alignment with this sort of thing (or Muslim, or Buddhist, although the last is less surprising because Western Buddhism is itself often already stripped down for contemporary audiences). From the standpoint of Christian doctrine, a Jungian analysis in of the Pentateuch that does not invoke the name of Christ and the revelation of Christ in Scripture, is perhaps interesting, but hardly helpful for the "Lost." Nor is "cultural Christianity" much of a step in the right direction. Far from it, it's to lean on the clay leg of human pride; if anything it is better that people be brought low that they might rise higher.

Liberalism has always had the potential to become a victim of its own impulse to dismantle institutions and expand the definition of citizenship - especially in the context of capitalism.

I think this is actually the sort of critique liberalism is easily aware of. It moves "too fast," and "change needs to be managed." You know, "the people aren't ready," or "the system isn't ready for advances in technology." And so there is self-reflection in liberal terms about the threat of expanding wealth inequality under AI, or cultural tensions derailing the benefits of replacement migration, etc.

What I think it tends to have myopia about is the way it does positively indoctrinate, it does punish people for slipping outside its value norms, it does push ideologies that actually challenge it out of the public sphere by force, and it does manage to enforce many of the same systems of oppression it claims to have dismantled, and in some cases manages to make them worse (e.g. the "exporting of misery" referenced earlier).

I think this tends to get missed precisely because liberalism is seen as "the natural place where you end up if you dismantle what was bad in the old world." It's worth noting though that monarchy and noble privileged was also once seen as "natural." It was the natural place you ended up if you advanced beyond mere anarchy. If liberalism is "natural" in this way, then the problems of liberalism are "natural" and endemic, not attributable to liberalism itself.

So, for example, people focus on the option of "escape valves" and "exiting the system." But it's worth pointing out that the Russian Tsars tolerated anarchist communes and fringe religious communities. There mere existence of toleration of some low levels of dissent, pushed to the borders, isn't good counter evidence to the totalitarian tendencies in modernity anymore than it was in imperial Russia.

I think this is actually the sort of critique liberalism is easily aware of. It moves "too fast," and "change needs to be managed." You know, "the people aren't ready," or "the system isn't ready for advances in technology." And so there is self-reflection in liberal terms about the threat of expanding wealth inequality under AI, or cultural tensions derailing the benefits of replacement migration, etc. — Count Timothy von Icarus

That's not what I'm saying. My point is that liberalism is fundamentally driven by dissatisfaction, with an underlying tendency toward dismantling existing structures, seeking to overturn privilege. This forensic mode of deconstruction perhaps becomes so reflexive and self-perpetuating that it ultimately turns inward, subjecting liberalism itself to the same critical scrutiny it once directed outward, gradually hollowing out its own foundations in the process.

Perhaps, but you could consider Schiller's view where the moral and appetitive are aligned in the aesthetic and our actions are over-determined in desire and duty. On the view, the aesthetic and "spiritual" is precisely what helps us overcome egoism. — Count Timothy von Icarus

But is this correct? What is the contemporary evidence that the aesthetic and the spiritual overcome egoism?

From the standpoint of Christian doctrine, a Jungian analysis in of the Pentateuch that does not invoke the name of Christ and the revelation of Christ in Scripture, is perhaps interesting, but hardly helpful for the "Lost." Nor is "cultural Christianity" much of a step in the right direction. Far from it, it's to lean on the clay leg of human pride; if anything it is better that people be brought low that they might rise higher. — Count Timothy von Icarus

You're absolutely right from the standpoint of Christian doctrine. But what about outside of doctrine; could cultural Christianity (the default setting of the West, we might say) still be useful? And isn’t it also true that many people who think in terms of Christian doctrine and saving the “lost” can still be bigoted and even morally compromised? It seems like neither the secular nor the religious path is any guarantee of quality, right?

But what about outside of doctrine; could cultural Christianity (the default setting of the West, we might say) still be useful? — Tom Storm

Yes - I don't think proponents of cultural Christianity ("Christianists," on one rendering), claim to be expounding Christian doctrine per se. There has been a pretty interesting discussion of this topic since Paul Kingsnorth's lecture, "Against Christian Civilization" (paper version).

Thanks. I’m on First Things too.

I suspect that this would appeal to some people, but many would struggle to make this work. If the numinous is not tied to the transcendent, but is essentially an emotional reaction, then I suppose it's tantamount to enjoying music or a painting. But at least with art, there is a tangible artifact that serves as the source of the experience. Bathing in one's subjective sense of the numinous might also be somewhat indulgent and narcissistic. You may be more receptive to this, how do you see it working? — Tom Storm

I don't see the numinous as excluding the darkness and the suffering and the tragedy of living and dying. It doesn't overcome the mystery, and it has nothing to do with the transcendent. We are cast upon the shores of life like flotsam. The shores of life, the shores of death, they are the same shores. The ocean out of which we came is right there, but we don't know its depths. What is there, which we can only superficially understand, is irrelevant to the numinous dimension of living and to the mystery of dying.

How could the numinous be "tied to the transcendent' when the transcendent can be nothing to us? The meaning of our lives is found in feeling, not in thinking. How could anything be meaningful except insofar as it feels meaningful? We are washed up on the shores of life and death with nothing to lose. We learn to gain and then we find ourselves having something to lose. So we begin to dream of salvation, of liberation. We think they must be transcendent, but how can there be liberation of salvation in nothing?

Salvation, liberation, freedom are dreams of perfection. This world is not perfect, so they cannot be found here we think. So, in the face of the nothing which is the transcendental we look back to ancient wisdom, imagining that something has been lost—there was a Golden Age, an age of Perfect Intellect, of perfectible thought and understanding. This is pure fantasy. Even for the elites there was no such thing—they were condemned to live and die just like the masses.

We think that there is a darkness in modernity. Well, of course there is—there is a darkness in everything. Without the darkness there would be no light. The only salvation, liberation, freedom is to be found in acceptance of our condition. We cannot be free of suffering, but we can be free of the attachment to our suffering in acceptance of it.

This is a disposition, and dispositions are matters of feeling not of thinking. Or at least they are not matters of Pure Thought—we must think with our feelings and feel with our thoughts. It is that immanence, that acceptance of absolute mystery, and the embracing of limitation. Which is the numinous. There is a reason that the greatest beauty in literature and the other arts is to be found in tragedy.

It is not merely "bathing in one's sense of the numinous"—we are always already drowning in it. It is the vacuous distractions afforded by dreams of transcendence that leave us blind to the terrible. the beautiful, truth of our most intimate companion—the numinous.

I don't see the numinous as excluding the darkness and the suffering and the tragedy of living and dying. It doesn't overcome the mystery, and it has nothing to do with the transcendent. — Janus

Good to know. I don't think I have a sense of the numinous, so I can only go with what I hear from others. My experince of this word is mainly confined to New Age groups I was a member of decades ago and Christianity - which I grew up in. I also studied Jung at university in the 1980's and I have a range of vestigial traces of that frame in my head whenever I hear this word "numinous"

We think that there is a darkness in modernity. Well, of course there is—there is a darkness in everything. Without the darkness there would be no light. — Janus

I'm not particularly partial to the light-and-dark dichotomy. I tend to see everything as shades of grey. But, I understand the symbolism.
.

So, in the face of the nothing which is the transcendental we look back to ancient wisdom, imagining that something has been lost—there was a Golden Age, an age of Perfect Intellect, of perfectible thought and understanding. This is pure fantasy. — Janus

Yes, we seem particularly keen on golden era nostalgia, don't we?

As far as encounters with the numinous are concerned, many of these are described in William James' classic The Varieties of Religious Experience. Another source is R M Bucke's Cosmic Consciousness, published 1901, and an ur-text of New Age spirituality. I was particularly struck by some of the anecdotal cases gathered by Bucke of private individuals who had glimpsed or attained to this purported state of higher consciousness. One such case is presented of a woman named only as 'C.M.C', born 1844, who had provided a long letter, describing her spiritual background and her doubts about the Presbyterian faith she was brought up in. Obviously intelligent, she read widely and wrestled with religious questions all her life which she called a 'constant struggle'. This all comes to a kind of apotheosis, rather unexpectedly, in September 1893, in what she describes as 'the supreme event of my life':

I had come to see that my need was greater even than I had thought. The pain and tension deep in the core and centre of my being was so great that I felt as might some creature which had outgrown its shell, and yet could not escape. What it was I knew not, except that it was a great yearning—for freedom, for larger life—for deeper love. There seemed to be no response in nature to that infinite need. The great tide swept on uncaring, pitiless, and strength gone, every resource exhausted, nothing remained but submission. So I said: There must be a reason for it, a purpose in it, even if I cannot grasp it. The Power in whose hands I am may do with me as it will! It was several days after this resolve before the point of complete surrender was reached. Meantime, with every internal sense, I searched for that principle, whatever it was, which would hold me when I let go.

At last, subdued, with a curious, growing strength in my weakness, I let go of myself! In a short time, to my surprise, I began to feel a sense of physical comfort, of rest, as if some strain or tension was removed. Never before had I experienced such a feeling of perfect health. I wondered at it. And how bright and beautiful the day! I looked out at the sky, the hills and the river, amazed that I had never before realized how divinely beautiful the world was! The sense of lightness and expansion kept increasing, the wrinkles smoothed out of everything, there was nothing in all the world that seemed out of place. At dinner I remarked: "How strangely happy I am to-day!" If I had realized then, as I did afterwards, what a great thing was happening to me, I should doubtless have dropped my work and given myself up to the contemplation of it, but it seemed so simple and natural (with all the wonder of it) that I and my affairs went on as usual. The light and color glowed, the atmosphere seemed to quiver and vibrate around and within me. Perfect rest and peace and joy were everywhere, and, more strange than all, there came to me a sense as of some serene, magnetic presence grand and all pervading. The life and joy within me were becoming so intense that by evening I became restless and wandered about the rooms, scarcely knowing what to do with myself. Retiring early that I might be alone, soon all objective phenomena were shut out. I was seeing and comprehending the sublime meaning of things, the reasons for all that had before been hidden and dark. The great truth that life is a spiritual evolution, that this life is but a passing phase in the soul's progression, burst upon my astonished vision with overwhelming grandeur. Oh, I thought, if this is what it means, if this is the outcome, then pain is sublime! Welcome centuries, eons, of suffering if it brings us to this! And still the splendor increased. Presently what seemed to be a swift, oncoming tidal wave of splendor and glory ineffable came down upon me, and I felt myself being enveloped, swallowed up.

I felt myself going, losing myself. Then I was terrified, but with a sweet terror. I was losing my consciousness, my identity, but was powerless to hold myself. Now came a period of rapture, so intense that the universe stood still, as if amazed at the unutterable majesty of the spectacle! Only one in all the infinite universe! The All-loving, the Perfect One! The Perfect Wisdom, truth, love and purity! And with the rapture came the insight. In that same wonderful moment of what might be called supernal bliss, came illumination. I saw with intense inward vision the atoms or molecules, of which seemingly the universe is composed—I know not whether material or spiritual—rearranging themselves, as the cosmos (in its continuous, everlasting life) passes from order to order. What joy when I saw there was no break in the chain—not a link left out—everything in its place and time. Worlds, systems, all blended in one harmonious whole. Universal life, synonymous with universal love!

How long that period of intense rapture lasted I do not know—it seemed an eternity—it might have been but a few moments. Then came relaxation, the happy tears, the murmured, rapturous expression. I was safe; I was on the great highway, the upward road which humanity had trod with bleeding feet, but with deathless hope in the heart and songs of love and trust on the lips. I understood, now, the old eternal truths, yet fresh and new and sweet as the dawn. How long the vision lasted I cannot tell. In the morning I awoke with a slight headache, but with the spiritual sense so strong that what we call the actual, material things surrounding me seemed shadowy and unreal. My point of view was entirely changed. Old things had passed away and all had become new. The ideal had become real, the old real had lost its former reality and had become shadowy. This shadowy unreality of external things did not last many days. Every longing of the heart was satisfied, every question answered, the "pent-up, aching rivers" had reached the ocean—I loved infinitely and was infinitely loved! The universal tide flowed in upon me in waves of joy and gladness, pouring down over me as in torrents of fragrant balm.

This describes an actual sensation. The infinite love and tenderness seemed to really stream down over me like holy oil healing all my hurts and bruises. How foolish, how childish, now seemed petulance and discontent in presence of that serene majesty! I had learned the grand lesson, that suffering is the price which must be paid for all that is worth having; that in some mysterious way we are refined and sensitized, doubtless largely by it, so that we are made susceptible to nature's higher and finer influences—this, if true of one, is true of all.

Some points that struck me: the sense of 'loosing oneself' or loosing one's identity - self abnegation as the opposite of any kind of self-indulgence. Falling into a state of rapture and wonder at the order of the Cosmos'. The 'shutting out' of the 'objective'.

Bucke records that C.M.C's sister also wrote to him:

It was in December, three months after, that I saw my sister for the first time after the experience described, and her changed appearance made such a deep impression on me that I shall never forget it. Her looks and manner were so changed that she scarcely seemed the same person. There was a clear, bright, peaceful light in her eyes, lighting her whole face, and she was so happy and contented—so satisfied with things as they were. It seemed as though some heavy weight had been lifted and she was free. As she talked to me I felt that she was living in a new world of thought and feeling unknown to me. Sincerely, P. M.

Good to know. I don't think I have a sense of the numinous, so I can only go with what I hear from others. My experience of this word is mainly confined to New Age groups I was a member of decades ago and Christianity - which I grew up in. I also studied Jung at university in the 1980's and I have a range of vestigial traces of that frame in my head whenever I hear this word "numinous" — Tom Storm

This leaves me wondering what the numinous, which you apparently don't find yourself having a sense of. means to you. It must mean something, have some associations, or you would not be able to say that you don't think you have a sense of it. You would instead say that you don't even know what the word 'numinous' means. (Funnily when I thought I had written the word 'numinous' I had hit the 'h' at the beginning of the word instead of the 'n' and the spell prompt suggested 'humongous'). Do you have a sense of the humongous?

For years, also decades ago, I was a member of the Gurdjieff Foundation. Perhaps back then I associated the word numinous with the Mysteries, with the fantasy that we can come to know the Ultimate Truth, that anyone could come to know such a thing. that there could be, that there are those who Know.

Now I simply associate the word with the very real fact that, although we may know many facts about the world, the existence of the world and of ourselves is nonetheless absolutely mysterious. That the only absolute truth to be known is that there are questions that can never be answered. That the only possible liberation is to accept this fundamental ignorance down to the very depths of ourselves. I think this is a truth which is hard to deny.

I'm not particularly partial to the light-and-dark dichotomy. I tend to see everything as shades of grey. But, I understand the symbolism. — Tom Storm

You don't see the light and the dark sides of life? That leaves me wondering how you enjoy the arts and literature. What about nature? It is overwhelmingly beautiful, isn't it? But also overwhelmingly violent, and ultimately dangerous? For me to see only shades of grey would be to be distracted from these realities.

Yes, we seem particularly keen on golden era nostalgia, don't we? — Tom Storm

We do. And for me it is like the difference between reading escapist works of fantasy and works that reflect the realities of human life. (Of course, not all works of fantasy do not reflect the realities of human life—they might instead be allegorical, so I have in mind here the most puerile works).

I have the requisite emotional reactions to most things others have, but I don't recall experiencing the sublime, rapture, awe or wonder, which I think is what the word numinous is trying to get at.

'Rapture' is an emotionally charged word, a word that signifies intense emotion. Perhaps that is relatively rare. I think it's fair to say, though, that many people experience a sense of the sublime in the Kantian sense, a feeling of being part of something so much greater than the self. I think many people, if they stop to think about it, feel some wonder, even awe, at the mere fact of their existence. I find it hard to believe that you are a complete stranger to these kinds of feelings.

As with anything it a matter of degree—these kinds of experiences are on a spectrum of intensity, and of subtlety and nuance. The other point is that attachment to ego i also seems obviously to be on a spectrum within the human race—and I think it's fairly reasonable to think that the less attached to ego one is, the more relaxed, and the more relaxed the more open to just these kinds of feelings.

Peace, brother... :wink:

:pray: