Enthusiasm – In enthusiasm – or possession – God is understood to be outside, other than or beyond the believer. A sacred power, being or will enters the body or mind of an individual and possesses it. A person capable of being possessed is sometimes called a medium. The deity, spirit or power uses such a person to communicate to the immanent world
Enthusiasm as a possession by a god. The human functions as the medium for communication (for the god wants to communicate something).
Lewis argues that ecstasy and possession are basically one and the same experience, ecstasy being merely one form which possession may take. The outward manifestation of the phenomenon is the same in that shamans appear to be possessed by spirits, act as their mediums, and even though they claim to have mastery over them, can lose that mastery
Ecstasy and possession (enthusiasm) as being the same.
Ecstasy, trance – In ecstasy the believer is understood to have a soul or spirit which can leave the body. In ecstasy the focus is on the soul leaving the body and to experience transcendental realities. This type of religious experience is characteristic for the shaman.
Ecstasy and trance as religious experience
Skeptics may hold that religious experience is an evolved feature of the human brain amenable to normal scientific study.
Can religious experiences be made scientific? That which is beyond thought (and is wholly subjective)?
See Steven Kotler referencing flow science as making the supernatural ("A gift from gods") into science.
Many religious and mystical traditions see religious experiences (particularly the knowledge which comes with them) as revelations caused by divine agency rather than ordinary natural processes. They are considered real encounters with God or gods, or real contact with higher-order realities of which humans are not ordinarily aware.[5
Religious experience as a revelation. As coming into contact with god(s) or other supernatural beings.
A religious experience (sometimes known as a spiritual experience, sacred experience, mystical experience) is a subjective experience which is interpreted within a religious framework.[1] The concept originated in the 19th century, as a defense against the growing rationalism of Western society.[2] William James popularised the concept.[2] In some religions, this may result in unverified personal gnosis.[3][4]
Religious experience (also mystical) emerged as a concept in te 19th century due to the dominant discourse of rationalism in the West.
See William James, but also Rilke who had a religious experience when going to Russia (and probably many others).
The Book of Hours was largely developed at the artist’s colony at Worpswede, but finished in Paris. It displays the turn towards mystical religiosity that was developing in the poet, in contrast to the naturalism popular at the time, after the religious inspiration he experienced in Russia. Soon thereafter, however, Rilke developed a highly practical approach to writing, encouraged by Rodin’s emphasis on objective observation. This rejuvenated inspiration resulted in a profound transformation of style, from the subjective and mystical incantations to his famous Ding-Gedichte, or thing-poems, that were published in the New Poems.
Naturalism was prevalent in the time of Rilke (circa 1900s). Rilke, however, had a mystical experience in Russia? (did he literally have an experience of unity and bliss?) He combined this mysticism with the objectivity that he learned from Auguste Rodin.
As a result, his writing had a mystical and objective bent to it. How exactly? Was this also present in his Apollo poems (1907)?