For many years I co-taught an undergraduate course on the psychology of religion. It was often difficult to find supporting texts for it that did justice to all the phenomena and issues from a psychological viewpoint while remaining open to wider disciplinary approaches. At the very least I needed these to include the theological and philosophical. Although not particularly committed to a psychological perspective, and certainly not an introduction to the psychology of religion as whole, had Jeff Astley's book been available at the time I should have been pleased to add it to our list of recommended reading. Equally well, it could be flagged as worthwhile reading on a philosophy, theology, or religious studies degree, or suit a wider, intellectually curious readership.
The book is appropriately billed as a ‘study guide’. With its companion volumes in the SCM series its purpose is to provide carefully guided introductions to a specific topic ‘aimed at undergraduates and other readers with a serious intent in learning’ (p. vii). In this case the topic is the highly contested category of religious and spiritual experience (RSE). Astley takes this to refer to a variety of ‘spiritual, religious, sacred, supernatural, transcendent or mystical experiences … that appear to the person undergoing them (or to others) to convey or imply some sort of contact with or knowledge about a power, presence or reality beyond themselves and their sense experience, and frequently beyond the realm of Nature, the physical or whatever is located in space-time’ (p. 3, italics in original). Using such a carefully crafted, comprehensive definition, he steers us skilfully through the terrain. Even-handed and hospitable in its treatment, the book is both a trustworthy, knowledgeable, and perceptive guide for the neophyte, and likely to open the eyes of his ‘other readers’ to issues and approaches otherwise overlooked.
Definitions out of the way, the text comprises a further nineteen, fairly short chapters, sensibly focussed on data, debates, and different disciplinary approaches. Each not only presents the issues in a clear and balanced way, but also, in quasi distance-learning fashion, includes exercises for the reader, referring frequently to key articles, well-selected guides to further reading, and the occasional glossary. The writing is clear and accessible throughout; the authorial voice modest and retiring.
Arguably, the meat of the book is in its third section where Astley addresses such questions as the objectivity of RSEs and their interpretation, challenges of cultural diversity, religious language and revelation, and much more. He skilfully deploys his obvious expertise to guide the reader through a conceptual, linguistic, confessional, and inter-disciplinary mine field. A particularly welcome chapter, for instance, complements the often transformative, synchronically dramatic, ‘experience’, with the slower burning, diachronic, life ‘experiences’, often cumulative, which are often as, if not more, profoundly spiritual and life-changing, drawing helpfully on scholars such as Keith Ward and John Cottingham. For my money, the maturing ability to appreciate Easter in ordinary over a lifetime's experience, in contrast to the Road to Damascus, grounds a more catholic understanding of the breadth of RSEs. (Or maybe this just reflects my prejudice that only those over forty can truly resonate to Wordsworth!) I also appreciated the careful treatment of the idea that RSEs are nothing but social and cultural constructions, (as opposed to the essentialist assumption that they evince intrinsic or built-in properties). Citing Ann Taves's suggestion, Astley argues that we might wish ‘to abandon the constructivist axiom that beliefs and attitudes are always formative of, rather than consequent to experience’ (p. 98). As he rightly asserts, the distinction between experience and interpretation is rarely clear cut with a complex interplay between the two. Again, I agree, and can only nuance this by adding that both essentialists and constructivists often seem trapped in the assumption of linear causality (experience A is followed by interpretation B, or experience A is consequent on interpretation B); psychological science, in contrast, is rapidly converging on the notion that all causality accounting for human behaviour is circular and temporally extended, back and forth, from world-to-mind-to-world, or mind-to-body and back again.
Philosophical arguments for the objective validity of RSEs, and the manner in which they are described, are also sensitively presented. I confess that my knee-jerk response to many of the former, especially those associated with some proponents of Reformed Epistemology, has been that they often seem contrived and smack of special pleading. As for the latter, I probably veer toward the Wilesian apophatic (p. 141): the more we become convinced of the infinite and transcendent nature of God, the more we are likely to view much religious language as worthless straw or even blasphemous. Astley, however, persuaded me to suspend my scepticism and appreciate that both of these debates are worth revisiting.
The book draws most of its inspiration from Christian literature and associated commentaries, although its overall treatment is applicable to RSEs in other faith traditions. Whether the balance would suit readers committed to or specialised in the study other religions I am unsure. There is also a chapter critiquing what is commonly a male dominated field and set of topics. Women's mysticism and religious experience have too often been ignored, and the whole construct of RSE can look quite different when not seen through male eyes. Again, the weight of coverage here might not satisfy everyone.
The last section itemises and illustrates the different disciplinary approaches to RSEs of psychology, philosophy, scripture, tradition, theology, sociology, and anthropology. Some of these chapters were brief and had something of a lecture handout feel, often merely showcasing selected, if seminal, papers. They also inevitably intersected, with appropriate cross referencing, with issues and debates discussed earlier, but I expect they will be helpful to those completely new to these subjects. Work on the cognitive neuroscience of RSEs was not discussed, a sensible omission given its often reductionist slant, but a useful reading guide to it was provided.
On the whole, this is religious studies at its best and a volume worth having. A sophisticated religious thinker, Astley walks several tightropes, carefully balancing between naïve evidentialism, confessional theology's fides quaerens intellectum, Protestant sola scriptura, reductive scientism, life-less analytic philosophy, and postmodern cultural constructivism. It is no mean feat to keep one's balance like this and to instruct at the same time.
