2014-02-19 introduction english -libre

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The Turn to Experience in Contemporary TheologyDavid S. Koonce, L.C., S.T.D.

Required course in dogmatic theology, Pontifical AthenaeumRegina Apostolorum

Academic Year 2013-2014, second semester

LECTURE 1. INTRODUCTION TO THETHEOLOGICAL PROBLEM OF EXPERIENCE

February 19, 2014

1. The question of experience.

What place does experience have in theology? What function or functions should it

exercise? These are questions that shaped a broad sector of theological inquiry in the 20th

century, though without reaching a clear consensus regarding their answers.

The questions, though, and the search for consensus, remain pertinent in the 21st

Century, as the question of experience remains at the forefront of much recent and ongoing

research into religious epistemology and its relation to theology (as theology is classically

understood). For instance, the 3rd

Annual Fordham Graduate Theology Conference, held on

February 8th

, 2014, was organized on the topic The Limits of the Thinkable: Religious

Experience and the Apophatic Impulse Between Antiquity and Modernity. Meanwhile, at

Oxford University in England, the Ertegun Graduate Scholarship Programme in the

Humanities has announced as the theme for its annual conference, to be held from April 3-6,

2014, Interpreting Experience - Experiencing Interpretation: Im/Possibilities of a

Hermeneutics of Religious Experience. On an even larger scale, Oxford University, with agrant from the John Templeton Foundation, is carrying out a four year research project

(2012-2015 entitled New Insights and Directions for Religious Epistemology.

2. The problem of experience.

The problem this study seeks to address concerns a relationship between two terms,

theology and experience. Both terms in themselves are problematic, though it is to be

hoped that within a theological faculty there is a common enough consensus about theology

that it requires no immediate special treatment. Regarding the second term, experience,

however, questions can and should arise about what experience is in itself before seeing

whether and in what ways theology should take experience into account. As John E. Smithstates, No appeal to experience is nave, for every such appeal carries with it a theory of

experience, some principle indicating what experience is and on how much it is supposed to

contain.1Consequently, any theological appeal to experience must also take into account the

many possible theories of experience that vie for acceptance.

1

J.E.SMITH,Experience and God, Fordham University Press, New York 1995, 21-22. Emphasisin the original. One may also observe that not only does every appealto experience imply a theory of

experience, but also every rejection of such an appeal.


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Lecture 1. Introduction to the

theological problem of experience

2

The concept of experience is not one that simply comes ready-made for theological use.

The question What is experience? is a philosophical question before it is a theological one,

and philosophy itself uses the term experience in many ways. In his article for Walter

Bruggers esteemed Philosophical Dictionary, Josef de Vries offers six senses in which

philosophy uses the term experience: (1) as a state of subjectivity or awareness, wherein the

spatio-temporal dimension is emphasized and the person receives an impression from the

things that happen to him or her. Such a state is distinguished from thinking, which is a

more active type of knowing going beyond sense impressions; (2) a knowledge derived from

direct contact with people or things, as opposed to knowledge acquired from books; (3) as

any simple perception that is produced by an impression from without; (4) as the

concentration of many perceptions and memories of the same kind, in which a common

element is grasped in a schematic image or as a pattern; this was the way Aristotle used the

term experience (empeira); (5) as any judgment based on perception; or (6) as only those

judgments that include an a prioriform of understanding, and consequently have universal

validity; this was the sense in which Kant used the term experience, and consequently, for

him, not every judgment based on perception qualifies as an experience.

2

Although the definitions of experience tend to focus on the perception of external sense

objects, nevertheless, a common distinction is made between external and internal

experience, in which external experience corresponds to the perception of corporeal objects

and agents by means of the external senses, while internal experience is identified with

consciousness, that is, the awareness of ones own internal mental states and activities.3

Although the content of experience is sometimes said to be purely sensible, a more careful

examination of experience discovers that insofar as experience includes internal experience,

we also grasp our spiritual acts, our own ego, and a limited essential knowledge of sensible

objects. Since this essential knowledge, present within experience, is knowable only by a

spiritual power, de Vries concludes that human experience is characterized by both sense andspirit.

4

A second distinction is between experience as a verb and as a noun.5As a verb, it refers

to a process or an activity in which I, as the subject, experience something; the question

that arises, though is how does one experience something? As a noun, experience refers either

to the thing experienced, or to the whole structure of subject, acts, and objects, wherein the

subject experiences something; in either case, the fundamental question here concerns the

what of experience: what is experienced? What constitutes an experience?

2 cf. J. DE VRIES, Experience, in W. BRUGGER - K. BAKER (eds.), Philosophical Dictionary,

Gonzaga University Press, Spokane, Washington 1972, 134-135.3cf. J.DE VRIES, Experience, 135. Karl Lehmann follows a similar outline when presenting the

notion of experience, distinguishing first between transcendental experience and particular

experience, dividing the latter into external experience, related to corporeal objects known through the

sense, and internal experience of ones own states of mind and soul. cf. K. LEHMANN, Experience,

in K.RAHNER(ed.), Sacramentum Mundi: An Encyclopedia of Theology, II, Herder and Herder, New

York 1968, 307.4

cf.Ibid., 135.5R.SHUSTERMAN, Aesthetic Experience: From Analysis to Eros, The Journal of Aesthetics and

Art Criticism64/2 (Spring, 2006), 217.


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A third distinction is made between ordinary, pre-scientific experience and scientific

experience, which consists either in a planned observation of natural occurrences, usually

with the help of special instruments, or in an experiment, in which certain conditions are

artificially produced and the results carefully recorded. In English, the difference between

experience and experiment is clear, but that is not always the case in Romance languages.6

German complicates matters further by distinguishing between experience as Erfahrung, a

term with a long philosophical pedigree tracing its conceptual origins to the Greek empeira,

and experience asErlebnis, a term of more recent coinage.7Erlebnis contains the rootLeben

(life), but while the verb erleben is transitive, implying the experience of something, the noun

Erlebnisoften connotes a primitive unity prior to any differentiation or objectification and

implies a more immediate, pre-reflective, and personal variant of experience thanErfahrung.

This latter term for experience contains the root Fahrt (journey) and is linked with the word

for danger (Gefahr); thus, whileErfahrungis sometime associated with sense impressions of

the external world, or with the judgments about such impressions, it can also refer to a notion

of experience that is temporally elongated, in which the memory of cumulative experiences

produces a kind of wisdom resulting from a learning process in which discrete moments areintegrated into a narrative whole, almost as a kind of adventure.8The distinction between the

Erfahrung and Erlebnis, therefore, cannot simply be reduced to the distinction between

experiment and experience.

A fourth distinction concerns the division of human experience into various subsets,

such as religious experience, aesthetic experience, political experience, historical experience,

etc. The fragmentation of experience into subsets is sometimes referred to as the

modalization of experience, where the subsets are viewed as specialized discursive modes.9

According to Martin Jay, this use of the term modes of experience derives from the British

neo-Idealist political philosopher Michael Oakeshott (1901-1990), and his most exhaustive

treatment of the theme, Experience and Its Modes, first published in 1933.10The notion ofmodes of experience is itself highly flexible and intuitive; other theorists, such as William

A.Van Roo (1915-2004), use the term modes of experience to refer to the human

6cf. J.DE VRIES, Experience, 135.

7An ample treatment of the philosophical use of the German term Erfahrungcan be found in F.

KAMBARTEL, Erfahrung, in J. RITTER (ed.), Historisches Wrterbuch der Philosophie, Scwabe,

Basel/Stuttgart, 609-617. In the same dictionary, see also H.HOLZHEY, Erfahrung, Analogien der,

in J.RITTER(ed.), Historisches Wrterbuch der Philosophie,II.D-F, Scwabe, Basel/Stuttgart , 617-

619; G.KNAUSS, Erfahrung, innere, in J.RITTER(ed.), Historisches Wrterbuch der Philosophie,

II., 619-620; K. CRAMER, Erleben, Erlebnis, in J. RITTER (ed.), Historisches Wrterbuch der

Philosophie, II., 702-711.8 M. JAY, Songs of Experience: Modern American and European Variations on a Universal

Theme, University of California Press, Berkeley 2005, 11.9cf.Ibid., 76.

10 cf. M. JAY, Songs of Experience, 183-190. Oakeshott resisted the tendency to analytically

distinguish between experiencing and what is experienced, which for him were meaningless

abstractions. Experience for him was a single whole, one and unified, yet which could be seen from

various vantage points or modes, which themselves were homogenous but abstract worlds of ideas.

Oakeshott distinguished between three principal modes of experience: historical (experience

understood sub specie praeteritorum), scientific (experience understood sub specie quantitatis), and

practical (experience understood sub specie voluntatis); other modes, such as the ethical, the aesthetic,or the religious were merely variants of the practical. cf. M. OAKESHOTT,Experience and Its Modes,

Cambridge 1978, 85.


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operations, such as sensation, intellection, emotion, volition, and motor action, which

predominate in any given human experience. In this study, the term mode of experience will

be employed in a way consonant with Van Roos usage, referring to the human operation that

predominate in any particular experience; what Oakeshott refers to as modes will be

designated as subsets of experience.

A fifth distinction regards the differentiation of functions within experience into

cognitive and non-cognitive ones. This differentiation of functions, however, can sometimes

even lead to their radical opposition, so that experience is either limited to a purely

cognitive, epistemological category, or it is invoked by religious, aesthetic, psychological,

and somatic theorists to argue for meanings and knowledge not captured by ordinary

scientific discourse or even by any conceptual language at all.11

Beyond the semantic difficulties, the notion of experience touches upon many aspects of

the human way of interacting with the world: external perception, consciousness of ones

own mental state, affectivity, memory, judgment, to name just a few of the elements thatemerge from an initial examination of the term. For this very reason, Karl Lehmann gives

voice to the opinion of many, saying, Experience is one of the most enigmatic concepts of

philosophy.12

Yet, precisely because the notion of experience touches upon so many aspects

of human reality, its use in theology is not only both legitimate and important, but also

demands to be radically explored.13

3. A method for exploring experience

Since experience is by no means an univocal term, even in philosophy, a proper

understanding of how it is used by theologians requires careful attention to differentmeanings and different functions in different theological contexts.14

If indeed every appeal to

experience carries with it a theory of experience, then the theologian must be attentive to

discern what theory of experience underlies different kinds of appeal. Hence, one of the first

11R.SHUSTERMAN, Aesthetic Experience..., 218.

12 K. LEHMANN, Experience, in K. Rahner (ed.), Sacramentum Mundi: An Encyclopedia of

Theology, II., Herder and Herder, New York 1968307. Compare, for instance, J. MOUROUX, The

Christian Experience: An Introduction to a Theology, Sheed and Ward, New York 1954, 3: Nothing

is more difficult to understand, more obscure, in spite of custom and appearances, than the idea of

experience. People talk about it as though it were a simple fact that could be defined without any

difficulty. But the truth is it raises a whole host of problems, and there has to be some sort of

metaphysical decision about it before it can be used legitimately.13

K. LEHMANN, Experience, 309. For similar assessments, see also: E. SCHILLEBEECKX - B.

VAN IERSEL(eds.),Revelation and Experience, Concilium 133, The Seabury Press, New York 1979,

ix: The problem of what experience really is and of its meaning for revelation, which was not solved

during the Enlightenment or the Modernist period and has not been solved since, calls for a systematic

analysis of the whole complex concept of experience; G. OCOLLINS, Experience, in R.

LATOURELLE - R. FISICHELLA (eds.), Dictionary of Fundamental Theology, Crossroad, New York

1994, 308: Fundamental theology needs to analyze carefully what human and religious experience

entails. Otherwise this complex notion and reality will not prove very productive in developing the

disciplineBesides clarifying the concept itself, fundamental theologians need also to establishcriteria for interpreting and evaluating religious experiences.14

E.SCHILLEBEECKX -B.VAN IERSEL(eds.),Revelation and Experience, vii.


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on single historical figures, very little diachronic research had been done, which alone could

trace developments across authors and provide a synthetic overview.19

The fruits of Geybels admirable research thus provide the backbone of the first part of

this study, though it has been complemented by other historians, and some omissions havebeen filled in.20

In terms of content, the first part of this study differs from Geybels work on

three points. First, the period of time under consideration has been extended temporally

farther back; whereas Geybels theological genealogy begins with Augustine and ends with

William James, the present inquiry begins earlier, considering the notions of experience in

Greek culture and in the Bible. Second, the present inquiry not only includes William James,

but also examines the notion of experience in Catholic Modernism, particularly within the

thought of George Tyrrell. Third, Geybels gives little attention to the development of the

notion of experience in scholasticism, and he offers two reasons for this omission. On the

one hand, he recognizes that there is already an extensive body of research on scholasticism

and on Thomas Aquinas in particular, and thus he saw no need to delve into the field himself.

One cannot help but sympathize with the difficulty! On the other hand, he considers thatscholastic theology leaves little room for religious experience, and therefore he prefers to turn

his attention to other movements that emerge during the same period.21

While it may be true

that scholasticism represents a departure from the experiential methodology of the monastic

theology that preceded it, it does not follow that scholasticism is irrelevant for the theological

genealogy of the notion of religious experience. It seems that it would be far more consistent

with Geybels endeavor to identify the paradigm of experience that is at work within

scholastic thought. If scholasticism did indeed move away from a consideration of the direct

and immediate experience of meditative theology, it did so for very specific and explicit

reasons. Although a researcher may not agree with those reasons, if he wishes to be fair and

unbiased, he must at least try to present those reasons as objectively as possible. While a full

treatment of the scholastic notion of experience would exceed the possibilities and limits ofthis current thesis, some brief comments are nevertheless in order.

In addition to Geybels, whose overall narrative structure is maintained, other specialized

works were consulted for each figure studied, as well as Martin Jays study Songs of

Experience: Modern European and American Variations on a Universal Theme, which does

for philosophy what Geybels attempts to do for theology.22

Although the two studies

produced by Geybels and Jay are independent, and cover different but overlapping fields,

their approach to studying the notion of experience is quite similar, while their differences

tend to be complementary rather than conflicting.23

With these methodological premises in

place, the first item of business is to trace the basic lines of the notion of experience intheological reflection.

19Ibid., 8. For an apology of the respective benefits and limitations of the synthetic approach, cf.

Ibid, 8-9.20

Geybels work examines some 98 primary sources, while his bibliography includes 33 pages of

modern studies on the authors he considers.21

cf.Ibid., 13.22M.JAY, Songs of Experience, 1.23

Ibid., 2-3.

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