Author: Matthew Sanderson
Category: Philosophy of Religion
Word Count: 998
Philosophers of religion sometimes distinguish two types of religious experience: mystical experience and numinous experience.[1]
Mystical experience is where someone feels like they become united or “one” with a spiritual being or reality (e.g., God, Nirvana, etc.).
Numinous experience, on the other hand, is where they also seem to encounter a spiritual being or reality, but as totally different and separate from themselves.[2]
German philosopher and theologian Rudolf Otto (1869-1937) coined the term “numinous” and described numinous religious experience in his influential 1917 book The Idea of the Holy.[3] This essay introduces Otto’s theory.
1. “Mysterium Tremendum”
For Otto, a numinous experience is a type of religious experience, i.e., what seems to be an encounter with what Otto calls “the holy” or “numen” (i.e., a spiritual being or reality).[4] Numinous experience consists of a single bittersweet “mixed emotion” (what Otto calls “numinous emotion”) made up of a combination of shock, fear, and joy.[5]
Otto believes that the mixed numinous emotion allows for what seems like an accurate perception of the holy, similar to how someone loving you might enable them to see “the real you.”[6] Otto thinks that numinous emotion reveals the holy to be what he calls the “mysterium tremendum et fascinans,” i.e., the tremendous and fascinating mystery. Otto provides a detailed analysis of each concept in this description.
1.1. “Mysterium”
Otto thinks the holy seems to be a “mysterium” or mystery when experienced through the lens of numinous emotion. Otto says this means the numen appears as “the wholly other,” i.e., as entirely different from or “other” than the experiencer and all of creation.[7] In other words, the holy seems to be a completely otherworldly, transcendent presence, totally separate from the ordinary, and thus a mystery beyond rational comprehension.This aspect causes us to feel the sense of shock or astonishment that is a major part of the numinous emotion.[8]
The appearance of the holy as “wholly other” or totally different from you is one aspect of numinous experience that contrasts it with mystical experiences of oneness in which the holy seems to be the same as you.
1.2. “Tremendum”
As an astonishing mystery, the holy also seems to be “tremendum” or tremendous. The tremendous nature of the holy causes us to feel the sense of fear that is central to numinous emotion. Otto says the holy’s tremendousness consists of “awefulness,” “overpoweringness,” and “energy.”
As tremendous, the holy seems to possess what Otto names “awefulness.”[9] This means it appears eerie, weird, and uncanny. Thus, this aspect of the numen causes us to feel a sense of fear like what we feel upon encountering what are believed to be ghosts and haunted places.[10]
Also due to its tremendous nature, the holy seems overpowering, referring to the might and majesty—the “bigness”—of the numen.[11] This element causes us to experience what Otto calls “creature-feeling.” This is the sense of your relative smallness—that as a creature you are but a tiny mortal—in contrast to what appears to be the overwhelming power of the holy.[12]
Creature-feeling adds a sense of fear to the numinous experience by making us intensely aware that we are finite in both space and time, and thus we can be crushed and die. Because it involves feeling that there is a profound difference between yourself and the holy, creature-feeling is another element of numinous experience that contrasts with mystical experiences where you feel one with the holy.
Lastly, as tremendous, the holy seems to possess the trait Otto calls “energy,” i.e., the numen’s purported vitality, activity, and passion.[13] Otto says a good example of seeming to perceive the energy of the holy is encountering what appears to some to be the wrath of God.[14] In this instance, the holy’s energy inspires fear in its perceived ability to express strong emotions and act upon us with great force.
1.3. “Fascinans”
Viewed as a tremendous mystery, the holy causes shock and fear, and thus mostly seems scary and repulsive. However, according to Otto, we are also profoundly attracted to the numen.[15] We desire and long to encounter the holy; we feel blissful rapture and ecstasy upon seeming to experience it.[16] Otto says this is because the holy appears in a numinous experience as supremely valuable and capable of providing humanity with ultimate salvation.[17]
This means that, in addition to appearing scary, the numen also seems to possess an alluring and intoxicating dimension, which Otto names its “fascinans” (i.e., fascinating) aspect.[18] This fascinating element of the holy is what causes us to feel the joy that is a defining part of the numinous mixed emotion.[19]
Thus, overall, the numen, as disclosed to numinous emotion, seems both repulsive and attractive, humbling and uplifting, terrifying and exalting, i.e., both a tremendous and fascinating mystery.[20] As a result, Otto claims we experience a combination of shock, fear and joy upon purportedly encountering it. Numinous experience is then a bittersweet religious experience.
2. Conclusion
Philosophers debate whether religious experiences justify religious beliefs. The question is whether you are rationally justified to believe in God, for instance, simply because you seemed to experience God.
Otto’s answer is that the existence of the holy is self-evident to anyone who has ever felt numinous emotion.[21] And he provides no further rational argumentation for the existence of the holy.[22] Instead, he directs readers to engage in introspection to discover their own inner numinous emotion.[23] Once people access that emotion, Otto believes they will immediately seem to perceive the holy, and thus need no further argument to convince them of its existence.
However, critics say that personal, subjective emotions are not good evidence for the existence of anything, much less an objective divine reality.[24] After all, feeling that a threat exists (e.g., experiencing fear and anxiety), for instance, doesn’t mean one really does.
Nonetheless, Otto’s theory is an important starting point for anyone who wishes to explore the emotional dimension of religious experience.
Notes
[1] For more about the philosophy of religious and mystical experience, see Philosophy of Mysticism: Do Mystical Experiences Justify Religious Beliefs?, William James on Mystical Experience, and Richard Swinburne on Religious Experience, all by Matthew Sanderson. Wainwright (1981), Davis (1989), Yandell (1994), and Netland (2022) are examples of philosophers who consider numinous experience to be a unique and major type of religious experience that is sharply different from mystical experience.
It should be noted that philosophical discussions about religious experiences concern how things seem to the person; they decidedly do not not assume or presume that what the person seems to experience actually exists or is real—indeed a core question in philosophy of religious experience is to what extent these experiences—how things seem to the person—are evidence of a reality that’s being experienced. For more on this concept of how things seem— called “seemings”—see Seemings: Justifying Beliefs Based on How Things Seem by Kaj André Zeller; for further discussion on how things seem can justify beliefs, see Epistemic Justification: What is Rational Belief? by Todd R. Long.
[2] This means that numinous experiences are often considered “dualistic” in the sense that the experiencer and God (for instance) seem to remain two distinct beings during the experience, whereas mystical experiences are considered “monistic” because they involve the experiencer feeling “one” with the spiritual being or reality. See e.g., Davis (1989) for a discussion of how numinous religious experiences are dualistic compared to monistic mystical experiences.
[3] Otto’s theory of the holy is arguably one of the most important theories of religious experience of the 20th century. Most theories of religious experience published after it reference and wrestle with it. For a helpful introduction to Otto’s philosophy of religious experience, see Almond (1984).
[4] Otto coins the term “numinous” from the Latin word for divinity or the holy, “numen.” See Otto (1958: pp. 5-7) for his discussion of the term. Otto often uses the term “the numinous” to seemingly refer to both the holy or “numen” and the experience of the numen (i.e., numinous experience). However, to maintain a clear distinction between the holy and one’s experience of the holy, this essay will treat “numinous” solely as qualifying a type of experience, i.e., a purported experience of the numen. Thus, the essay will speak either of “numinous experience” or “the numen,” but never use “the numinous” to refer to both, as Otto often seems to do.
[5] Otto (1958: p. 16) calls numinous experience “numinous emotion.” Otto (1958: pp. 12-13) writes that numinous emotion “may at times come sweeping like a gentle tide, pervading the mind with a tranquil mood of deepest worship. It may pass over into a more set and lasting attitude of the soul, continuing, at it were, thrillingly vibrant and resonant, until at last it dies away and the soul resumes its ‘profane,’ non-religious mood of everyday experience. It may burst in sudden eruption up from the depths of the soul with spasms and convulsions, or lead to the strangest excitements, to intoxicated frenzy, to transport, and to ecstasy.”
Otto (1958: p. 5) holds that numinous experience consists purely of non-rational (i.e., non-conceptual) emotion. It is non-rational in that he considers the experience to be entirely emotional – i.e., it is only felt and involves no conceptual (i.e., rational) thinking. Thus, the full title of Otto’s book is The Idea of the Holy: An Inquiry into the Non-rational Factor in the Idea of the Divine and its Relation to the Rational. Otto is often criticized for downplaying or overlooking the role of rational (or conceptual) elements – such as thinking, judging, interpreting, etc. – in religious experience. For examples of this criticism, see Proudfoot (1985), Wynn (2005), Roy (2001), and Almond (1982).
[6] Otto (1958: p. 12) writes that the nature of the holy “can only be suggested by means of the special way it is reflected in the mind in terms of feeling.” Otto (1958: p. 33) writes that the holy is something which we “may know only by a direct and living experience.” Otto (1958: p. 34) writes that the holy “can be firmly grasped, thoroughly understood, and profoundly appreciated, purely in, with, and from the [numinous emotion] itself.” Otto (1958: p. 143) writes, “It is one thing merely to believe in a reality beyond the senses and another to have experience of it also; it is one thing to have ideas of ‘the holy’ and another to become consciously aware of it as an operative reality, intervening actively in the phenomenal world.” Otto (1958: p. 143) writes that “by feeling” (i.e., numinous emotion) the holy is “directly encountered in particular occurrences and events.” Otto (1958: p. 11) writes that, from the perspective of numinous emotion, the holy is “experienced as present” and “felt as objective and outside the self.”
According to Otto, we have a “gut feeling,” so to speak, of the holy. Otto (1958: p. 2) writes that the holy “requires comprehension of a quite different kind [i.e., non-rational, emotional comprehension]. Yet, though it eludes the conceptual way of understanding, it must be in some way or other within our grasp, else absolutely nothing could be asserted of it.” Otto (1958: p. 33) writes that, regarding the real nature of the holy, “he can neither proclaim in speech nor conceive in thought, but may know only by a direct and living experience.” Otto (1958: p. 147) writes that numinous experiences (consisting of numinous emotion) “must certainly be termed cognitions, modes of knowing, though, of course, not the product of reflection, but the intuitive outcome of feeling.” Otto is saying that numinous emotion “knows” the holy, but intuitively rather than cognitively or intellectually. In other words, we “know” the holy through feeling it, so to speak.
[7] Otto (1958: pp. 25-30) analyzes the “mysterium” and “wholly other” aspects of the numen. Otto (1958: p. 26) writes, “Taken in the religious sense, that which is ‘mysterious’ is – to give it perhaps the most striking expression – the ‘wholly other,’ that which is quite beyond the sphere of the usual, the intelligible, and the familiar, which therefore falls quite outside the limits of the ‘canny,’ and is contrasted with it, filling the mind with blank wonder and astonishment.” Otto (1958: p. 28) writes, “The truly ‘mysterious’ object is beyond our apprehension and comprehension, not only because our knowledge has certain irremovable limits, but because in it we come upon something inherently ‘wholly other,’ whose kind and character are incommensurable with our own, and before which we therefore recoil in a wonder that strikes us chill and numb.”
[8] See Otto (1958: p. 26) for his analysis of the types of feelings evoked by the mysterium and the wholly other aspects of the numen. Otto most often calls the emotional response to the mysterium or ‘wholly other’ aspect of the numen “wonder” and “astonishment,” but it’s clear from his description (1958: p. 28)—“recoil in a wonder that strikes us chill and numb”—that “shock” is arguably the most common contemporary colloquial term used to express what he has in mind. “Amazement” would also work, though “shock” conveys more of the “negative” reaction suggested by Otto’s use of the word “recoil,” for instance.
[9] See Otto (1958: pp. 13-19) for his analysis of the awefulness dimension of the numen. Otto (1958: p. 19) describes awefulness as a sense of absolute unapproachability. “Spooky” is the modern colloquial term that perhaps comes closest to expressing what Otto calls “awefulness” here.
[10] Otto (1958: p. 13) writes that awefulness involves “a quite specific kind of emotional response, wholly distinct from that of being afraid, though it so far resembles it that the analogy of fear may be used to throw light upon its nature.” This is an example of Otto’s claim that numinous emotion is entirely unique and different in kind from ordinary emotions and yet the latter may be used as analogies to help us understand numinous emotion. Otto (1958: p. 14) says, in regards to the feeling of awefulness, “Here we have a terror fraught with an inward shuddering such as not even the most menacing and overpowering created thing can instill. It has something spectral in it.” Otto (1958: pp. 14, 16-17, 28-29) compares the fear of awefulness to the fear of ghosts and other phenomena which appear uncanny, eerie, and weird. Otto (1958: p. 16) says that numinous fear is the kind of fear that makes one’s blood run icy cold, flesh creep, and hair stand on end.
[11] Otto (1958: pp. 19-23) analyzes the overpoweringness aspect of the numen.
[12] Otto (1958: pp. 8-11) describes his notion of creature-feeling which he (1958: p. 10) defines as “the emotion of a creature, submerged and overwhelmed by its own nothingness in contrast to that which is supreme above all creatures”; (1958: p. 17) “the feeling of personal nothingness and submergence before the awe-inspiring object directly experienced”; (1958: p. 20) “in contrast to ‘the overpowering’ of which we are conscious as an object over against the self, there is the feeling of one’s own submergence, of being but ‘dust and ashes’ and nothingness”; (1958: p. 21) “impotence and general nothingness as against overpowering might, dust and ashes as against ‘majesty.’”
[13] See Otto (1958: pp. 23-24) for his discussion of the energy aspect of the numen. Otto (1958: p. 23) describes energy “in symbolical expressions” as “vitality, passion, emotional temper, will, force, movement, excitement, activity, impetus” and says it is particularly evident in the feeling of God’s wrath. Otto (1958: p. 24) defines energy as “a force that knows not stint nor stay, which is urgent, active, compelling, and alive.” Otto does not specify a unique emotion through which the energy of the holy is given. But since he thinks such energy is present in the feeling of God’s wrath, it’s likely that energy is perceived as much by a kind of numinous fear as the element of awefulness for which Otto also cites God’s wrath as an example.
[14] See Otto (1958: pp. 18 and 23) for his discussion of the feeling of the wrath of God.
[15] Otto (1958: p. 31) writes that the numen “may appear to the mind an object of horror and dread, but at the same time it is no less something that allures with a potent charm, and the creature, who trembles before it, utterly cowed and cast down, has always at the same time the impulse to turn to it, nay even to make it somehow his own. The ‘mystery’ is for him not merely something to be wondered at but something that entrances him; and beside that in it which bewilders and confounds, he feels a something that captivates and transports him with a strange ravishment, rising often enough to the pitch of dizzy intoxication; it is the Dionysiac-element in the numen.”
[16] Otto (1958: p. 32) writes that the numinous “is the object of search and desire and yearning.” Otto (1958: p. 34) writes that the experience of the numinous “gives the peace that passes understanding.” Otto (1958: pp. 54-55) writes of “when the close presence of the numen, intercourse with it, and enduring possession of it, becomes an object of craving, is even desired as the summum bonum.”
[17] Otto (1958: p. 32) writes that we desire the numen “for its own sake and not only for the sake of the aid and backing that men expect from it in the natural sphere.” Otto (1958: p. 33) writes of the development of religious history, “Possession of and by the numen becomes an end in itself; it begins to be sought for its own sake; and the wildest and most artificial methods of asceticism are put into practice to attain it. In a word, the vita religiosa begins; and to remain in these strange and bizarre states of numinous possession becomes a good in itself, even a way of salvation, wholly different from the profane goods pursued by means of magic.” Otto (1958: p. 33) writes that the numen is experienced “as something that bestows upon man a beatitude beyond compare.”
See also Otto (1958: pp. 50-59) for his discussion of the value of the numen and numinous experience. Otto (1958: p. 51) writes that the numen has an “objective and ultimate” value. Otto (1958: p. 52) suggests the term augustus (i.e., august) for the “supreme worth and value” of the numen and numinous experience. Otto (1958: p. 52) writes that the numen is “‘august’ (augustum) in so far as it is recognized as possessing in itself objective value that claims our homage.” Thus, the numen can be characterized as the “mysterium tremendum fascinans et augustum,” i.e., the tremendous, fascinating, and august mystery. For more about the connection between the holy and value, see Because God Says So: On Divine Command Theory by Spencer Case.
[18] Otto (1958: pp. 31-40) analyzes the fascinans dimension of the numen. Otto (1958: p. 31) writes that the numen “is in one of its aspects the element of daunting ‘awefulness’ and ‘majesty’…but it is clear that it has at the same time another aspect, in which it shows itself as something uniquely attractive and fascinating.” Otto (1958: p. 31) writes that numinous emotion experiences the fascinans dimension of the numen—for instance, experiences God—as absolute and complete “love, mercy, pity, comfort.”
[19] “Joy” is arguably the best colloquial term to summarize the range of “happy” emotions Otto believes are provoked by the fascinating aspect of the holy. Examples of these emotions mentioned by Otto are love, comfort, peace, and the like.
[20] Otto (1958: p. 31) writes, “These two qualities, the daunting and the fascinating, now combine in a strange harmony of contrasts” which results in a “dual character of the numinous consciousness.” Thus, the numinous has a similar emotionally ambivalent (i.e., attractive and repulsive) structure as the experience of the sublime. Otto (1958: pp. 41-49) considers the sublime a this-worldly analogy or symbol for the other-worldly numen. For more about the sublime, see Kant’s Theory of the Sublime by Matthew Sanderson.
[21] Otto thinks that religious feeling is itself proof of the holy as an objective reality, just as the subjective experience of romantic love is perhaps evidence of the beloved’s worth and value.
[22] For more on the idea of believing in God without a rational argument, see “Properly Basic” Belief in God: Believing in God without an Argument by Jamie B. Turner.
[23] Otto (1958: p. 6) writes that he is going “to suggest this unnamed Something to the reader as far as we may, so that he may himself feel it.” Otto (1958: p. 7) writes that the reader “must be guided and led on by consideration and discussion of the matter through the ways of his own mind, until he reach the point at which ‘the numinous’ [the holy] in him perforce begins to stir, to start into life and into consciousness….In other words our X cannot, strictly speaking, be taught, it can only be evoked, awakened in the mind; as everything that comes ‘of the spirit’ must be awakened.” Otto (1958: p. 8) writes, “The reader is invited to direct his mind to a moment of deeply-felt religious experience, as little as possible qualified by other forms of consciousness. Whoever cannot do this, whoever knows no such moments in his experience, is requested to read no farther; for it is not easy to discuss questions of religious psychology with one who can recollect the emotions of his adolescence, the discomforts of indigestion, or, say, social feelings, but cannot recall any intrinsically religious feelings.” Otto (1958: p. 10) writes that religious feeling “must be directly experienced in oneself to be understood.”
[24] See Netland (2022) for an example of this criticism.
References
Otto, Rudolf. (1917/1958). The Idea of the Holy. Oxford University Press.
Otto, Rudolf. (1932/2016). Mysticism East and West. Wipf and Stock.
Proudfoot, Wayne. (1985). Religious Experience. University of California Press.
Stace, W. T. (1960). Mysticism and Philosophy. Macmillan.
Yandell, Keith. (1994). The Epistemology of Religious Experience. Cambridge University Press.
Related Essays
Philosophy of Mysticism: Do Mystical Experiences Justify Religious Beliefs? by Matthew Sanderson
Richard Swinburne on Religious Experience by Matthew Sanderson
William James on Mystical Experience by Matthew Sanderson
“Properly Basic” Belief in God: Believing in God without an Argument by Jamie B. Turner
Seemings: Justifying Beliefs Based on How Things Seem by Kaj André Zeller
Epistemic Justification: What is Rational Belief? by Todd R. Long
Because God Says So: On Divine Command Theory by Spencer Case
Kant’s Theory of the Sublime by Matthew Sanderson
About the Author
Matthew Sanderson is Professor of Philosophy and Ethics at West Shore Community College in Scottville, Michigan. He specializes in philosophy of religion, aesthetics, and 19th and 20th-century continental philosophy. philpeople.org/profiles/matthew-sanderson
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