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Mysticism, Science and Revelation

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Mysticism, Science and Revelation MYSTICISM, SCIENCE AND REVELATION by GLENN A. SHOOK Ph.D., F.R.S.A. BAHÁT PUBLISHING TRUST WILMETTE, ILLINOIS ALL RIGHTS RESERVED GEORGE RONALD LONDON, ENGLAND First published in England 1953 Revised edition 1964 First American Edition 1967 This impression 1970 Printed in Great Britain To my daughter Betty Titles referred to in footnotes, as published by Baháh Publishing Committee, New York, are now published by Bahá 1' Publishing Trust, Wilmette, Illinois. CONTENTS Chapter Page INTRODUCTION ix. I GOD AND HIS CREATION 1 Different kinds of knowledge. Concepts of God. Man's relation to God. II GOD AND HIS CREATION {continued) The three worlds of being. The world of the Divine Essence. The world of the Prophets. The world of creation. Divine life process. III THE MYSTICAL EXPERIENCE 19 Soul and mind. The knowledge of God through the heart. Knowledge of God through vision. Epistemological approach. Science and spiritual experience. IV THE NATURE OF MYSTICISM 33 Mysticism defined. Contributions of mystics. Philosophical background of mysticism. The pre-suppositions of mysticism. Mysticism and the Primi­ tive Church. V TYPES OF MYSTICISM 46 Radical, absolute or extreme mysticism. Personal mysticism. Greek mysticism and the Church. The non-réligious type. Aesthetic mysticism. Contemporary religious mysticism. VI PROPHETIC RELIGION AND MYSTICISM; A CONTRAST 60 Prophetic religion. Mysticism. The two paths. The Seven Valleys of Baha'u'llah. Mysticism and fundamental concepts. VII SCIENCE, REVELATION AND MYSTICISM 73 Science and revelation. Revelation and experience. Science and mysticism. VIII THE CREATIVE WORD 82 The style of the creative word. Prayer as an expression of the creative word. Origin of common prayer. The idea of common prayer. Common prayer and the reform movements. The ideal of common prayer. IX MEDITATION 94 Supplication, prayer and meditation. Theories of meditation. The Baha'i viewpoint. X OCCULTISM 108 Mysticism and occultism. Science and occultism. Our philosophical back­ ground. Our scientific background. XI REVEALED PRAYERS 120 Man's offering of prayer and the revealed word. An appeal to God's mercy. An appeal to other attributes. God cannot forsake us. XII PRAYERS FOR SPIRITUAL DEVELOPMENT 131 Turning toward God. Divine Bounty. God's protection. The living waters. EPILOGUE 142 INTRODUCTION This book has a number of objectives. First of all I wish to make it clear that the essential element of true religion is that mystical feeling which, in some inexplicable manner, unites man with God. Speaking rather broadly, anyone who experiences this feeling is a mystic; but we shall be primarily concerned with the type of mystic who believes that finite man may attain the presence of the Absolute and become one with the Absolute, and it will be necessary to show that his claims are not valid. Some scientific inquiry must, therefore, be made into the nature of mystical experience; for without this experience the mystic would have insufficient ground for his claims. It will also be necessary to investigate the difference between mysticism and prophetic religion. Finally I desire to make it clear that revealed truth is not foreign to experience, if we evaluate it in terms of " total experience " and not merely experience in the world of science. The reader who has an analytical mind will probably be interested in what the physicist has to say about mysticism, and for this reason I have indicated, in a rather general way, the viewpoint of the physicist. Personally, I believe it is important to remember that religion belongs to the world of value and that science cannot make value judgments. The reader must also bear in mind that the modern physicist is no longer completely dominated by the mechanistic concept. As a scientist I naturally have great sympathy for the "scientifically-minded" man who is struggling with fundamental issues like mystical experience and divine revelation. In discussions concerning prophetic revelation I assume that all the great historic religions, like Christianity and Islám, are divine in origin. I have drawn freely on the Baha'i Faith for, as a serious student of religion, I realize that it is the consummation of all the prophetic religions of the past. Moreover, as we might expect, it is decidedly more explicit on the subject of mysticism than any of the revelations which preceded it. For those who are not familiar with the Baha'i Faith, a few remarks about its origin and its aims have been included in the Epilogue. Of all the books that I have consulted, Das Gebet, by Friedrich Heiler, is the most stimulating and the most instruc­ tive. I have consequently used it freely. I am very happy to express here my appreciation of the work of the translator, Karl Schiick. Not only has he taken great care in the translation which, as one may imagine, was no simple matter, but he has also made valuable suggestions. I also wish to express my gratitude to Jane Lovely for typing the manuscript. G. A. SHOOK. ELIOT, MAINE. CHAPTER I GOD AND HIS CREATION The mystic, as we shall see, maintains that he can enter the presence of the infinite God, or that he can experience God immediately. Now the mystical philosopher, on the other hand, is caught between two incompatible tendencies. He would like to be scientific, and to treat mystical experiences as he would treat the data of sense perception. He says, in substance, that the mystic has had an extraordinary experience. The mystic maintains that he has been in the presence of the Infinite; and, while this does not sound plausible to us, he is absolutely certain that he has been in the Divine Presence, and we cannot doubt his sincerity nor his intellectual integrity. Surely then, we can consider what he reports with an un­ biassed mind. On the other hand, the mystical philosopher knows that the mystic can only report on a psychic experience, nothing more. Any metaphysical doctrine the mystic may associate with this experience is quite another matter. But again (the mystical philosopher may argue), if the mystic says he has been in the presence of God—and very many do make this claim with good faith—can we completely ignore his report? The mystical philosopher may continue: Is not the world of value, the world of art, music and poetry, just as much a part of our consciousness as the world of sense impression? Is not the spiritual world more real than the symbolic world of science? May we not assume that the heart functions in the world of spirit as the mind functions 2 MYSTICISM, SCIENCE AND REVELATION in the world of matter? May we not assume, moreover, that God reveals himself to man through the ecstatic experience? Every mystic who claims that he can enter the presence of God also maintains that this ineffable experience transcends every other experience in the religious life. Therefore he might claim, and most of the mystics probably do claim, that for him this ecstatic experience must be identified with the Infinite. He may also add, and with some justification, that he is really not concerned about the opinion of those who have never had such an experience. To be sure, we may define God as that which we experience immediately, in contemplation. This would certainly simplify the issue; but this kind of simplification is far from satis­ factory. Take, for example, the pantheistic concept. If we define God as "the whole'' and consider the world as a part of "the whole," then we do not have to explain the difference between God and nature. While such a concept might appeal to a few poets and a few scientists, it really, as we well know, raises more questions than it answers. Perhaps we can learn a lesson from the history of classical physics. It introduced a simplification into our scientific thinking that had never existed before. It began by making man a potential God, capable of explaining almost anything, natural or supernatural; but it ended by making him a mere aggregation of particles devoid of free will. Now the mystic realizes that this immediate knowledge of the presence of God cannot rest upon experience alone; nevertheless without this supernormal psychic experience he would probably never claim that he could enter the presence of, or become one with, the Infinite. If, therefore, we are striving for a critical knowledge of mysticism our first concern must be with epistemology. Let us then review briefly the various kinds of knowledge with which we are more or less familiar. GOD AND HIS CREATION 3 Different Kinds of Knowledge We do not have to prove that we are happy. Our own unsupported testimony is quite sufficient. The cause of our happiness is, however, quite another matter, a matter of inference; and our inferential knowledge is not infallible. We are never absolutely sure about the origin of our inner experiences; but the experiences themselves are known to us by direct cognition, that is, they are immediately apprehended. If a man has an aversion to religion no argument will con­ vince him that the feeling of aversion is not real. It is real and we can do nothing about it. But we might convince him that the reason for this feeling is false. The fueling of beauty, compassion, or love is just as real to us as are external objects. In fact it is decidedly more real, for the external world is known to us only by inference. We see an object before us and we call it a stone merely because it looks like other objects which are known to us as stones. As a matter of fact this object may be a piece of wood or plastic and not a stone.
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