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Janz, B. - Mysticism & Understanding - Steven Katz and His Critics
Janz, B. - Mysticism & Understanding - Steven Katz and His Critics
Stanley Fish, Is There a Text in This Class? (Cambridge, MA; Harvard University Press,
1980),p.350,352.
2 H.-G. Gadamer, Truth and Method, 2nd cd. (New York; Crossroad, 1989), p. 389.
3 D. Hiley, J. Bohman and R. Shusterman, eds., The Interpretive Turn (Ithaca, NY; Cornell
University Press, 1991), p. 7.
Bruce Janz is Assistant Professor of Philosophy in Augustana University College, 4901 46 Ave
nue, Camrose, AB T4V 2R3.
While Steven Katz was not the first to apply universal "hermeneutics to
mysticism, he certainly gave its most eloquent expression, and has been the
focus of most of the subsequent debate. In his essay "Language, Epistemol
ogy, and Mysticism,"4 he argues that there is no "pure" mystical experience
at the core of the various interpretations, at least no core that is available ei
ther to the mystic or to the later interpreter.
If a measure of the success of a philosophical article is how much atten
tion it commands, Katz's article is a winner. Relatively little of the attention
has been positive, however. A host of writers have attacked Katz on a variety
of points. Gary Kessler and Norman Prigge,5 Peter Byrne,6 James Robert
son Price m,1 J. W. Forgie,8 Huston Smith,9 Donald Evans,10 Sallie B.
King,ll Robert Forman,12 Jonathan Shear,13 Michael Stoeber 14 Nelson
Pike 15 have all argued against various aspects or implications of Katz's pro}
4 Steven Katz, "Language, Epistemology, and Mysticism," in S. Katz, ed., Mysticism and
Philosaphical Analysis (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978), p. 22-74. For further work
by Katz on this, see also "The 'Conservative' Character of Mystical Experience," in
S. Katz, ed., Mysticism and Religious Traditions (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1983);
and S. Katz, Mysticism and LanifUage (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992).
5 Gary Kessler and Norman Prigge, "Is Mystical Experience Everywhere the Same?,"
Sophia, 21 (1982): 39-55.
6 Peter Byrne, "Mysticism, Identity, and Realism: A Debate Reviewed," Internalionaljournal
ofthePhilosaphy ofReligian, 16 (1984): 23744.
7 James Robertson Price, "The Objectivity of Mystical Truth Claims," Thom;sl, 49 (1985):
81-98.
8 J. W. Forgie, "Hyper-Kantianism in Recent Discussions of Mystical Experience," Religious
Studies,21 (1985): 205-18.
9 Huston Smith, "Is There a Perennial Philosophy?," journal ofthe American Academy of Reli
gian,55 (1897): 553-66.
10 Donald Evans, "Can Philosophers Limit \\-'hat Mystics Can Do? A Critique of Steven
Katz," Religious Studus, 25 (1988): 53-60.
II Sallie King, "Two Epistemological Models for the Interpretation of Mysticism," journal of
the American Academy ofReligion, 61 (1988): 257-79.
12 Robert Forman, "The Construction of Mystical Experience," Faith and Philosaphy, 5
(1988): 254-67, and Robert Forman, "Paramartha and Modern Constructivists on Mysti
cism: Epistemological Monomorphism versus Duomorphism," Philosaphy East and West,
39 (1989): 393418.
13 Jonathan Shear, "Mystical Experience, Hermeneutics, and Rationality," International
Philosaphical Quarterly, 30 (1990): 391-40 I.
14 Michael Stoeber, "Constructivist Epistemologies of Mysticism: A Critique and a Revi
sion," Religious Studies, 28 (1991): 107-16.
15 Nelson Pike, "Steven Katz on Christian Mysticism," in Mystic Unian: An Essay in the Phe
nomenology ofMysticism (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1992), p. 194-207. For other
discussions of Katz, see also J. Gill, "Mysticism and Mediation," Faith and Philosophy, 1
(1984): 111-21; GraceJantzen, "Mysticism and Experience," Religious Studus, 25 (1988):
295-315; Bernard McGinn, The Foundations of Mysticism (New York: Crossroad, 1991),
p. 321-24; A. Perovich, "Mysticism and the Philosophy of Science," Journal of Religion, 65
(1985); 63-82; and Wayne Proudfoot, ReligiottsExperience (Berkeley, CA: University of Cali
fornia Press, 1985), p. 122-54.
Janz / Steven Katz and his critics 79
16 James Horne, The Moral Mystic (Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 1983),
p.39-40.
80 Studies in Religion / Sciences Religieuses 24/1 1995
19 Ibid., p. 46.
21 Ibid.. p. 59.
Janz / Steven Katz and his critics 83
\\-'hile Katz does use words of this sort,30 and could therefore be taken in
isolated instances to be advocating a constructivist program, most times he
sounds quite different. For instance: "all experience is processed through,
organized by, and makes itself available to us in extremely complex episte
mological ways."31 This seems to be contextualization, not construction.
Katz resists reducing mystical experience to component elements that are
all naturally explainable. I myself do not believe he is driven to this kind of
reductionism. My argument later will try to establish a rapprochement be
tween purity and contextualism. But Shear's attempt seems to simply be a
misunderstanding of both hermeneutics and Katz's position.
Sallie King characterizes Katz's position as pluralist, as opposed to her
own "Buddhist-phenomenological model.,,32 But "pluralism" implies lack
of unity, while Katz is arguing for lack of purity. On the face of it, then, it
seems that King too has missed the point. In calling her model phenome
nological, however, she is clearly intending to address the question of pu
rity. She seems to be following a modified form of Ninian Smart's posi
tion. 33 It should be pointed out, though, that the most she can do (and per
28 Shear, "Mystical Experience," p. 392. Shear's use ofthe term "hermeneutics" is very dif
ferent from my use later in this article.
29 Ibid., p. 394.
30 Katz, "Language, Epistemology, and Mysticism," p. 59.
31 Ibid., p. 26.
32 Sallie King. "Interpretation of mysticism," p. 258. 271.
33 Ninian Smart, "Interpretation and Mystical Experience," in R. Woods, ed.. Understanding
Mysticism (Garden City, NY: Image Books, 1980). p. 78-91.
84 Studies in Religion / Sciences Religieuses 24/1 1995
haps, the most that can be done) is to argue that the pure experience is at
least possible.
We could go on, but the point is this: confusing the two issues of purity
and unity has led to misconstruing Katz's position. This misconstrual has its
most clear manifestation in the names used for that position. This should
not be taken as an apologetic for Katz; rather, I simply want to set the stage
to consider the debate in a new way.
2 Mysticism as epistemology
Much discussion in mysticism has been carried on over the epistemological
status of the experience the mystic has. Is the mystic's experience knowl
edge? Is it verifiable or communicable? The present debate, I would argue,
is also driven by epistemological concerns. Katz, on the one side, argues
that the experience happens within a context. That could make the mys
tic's experience almost a separate Wittgensteinian language game, not ac
cessible from other language games. Or it could reduce the experience to
the level of doctrine and tradition, making it accessible to anyone who
cares to take a first-year religious studies course. If a contextualized experi
ence is to be known, therefore, it entails either meta-mysticism-a mystical
leap between mystical language games-or no mysticism at all.
Either way, the concern affects the knowledge status of the experience.
The first option rules mysticism out of court as knowledge at all. Many
people find this unpalatable, because it is common to claim a kind of inner
rationality to the mystical experience. The experience is not irrational, but
super-rational, accessible only on its own terms. A contextualized mystical
experience could easily be an arbitrary experience, undistinguishable from
psychosis. The second option makes mystical knowledge trivial, simply a
way of accessing publicly available doctrines. The experience itself could
then be explained psychologically, and dismissed as an affectation of cer
tain personali ty types.
Katz meets some of these problems, as well as addressing the essentialist
critique, by recasting his position as a dialectic between the "radical" (that
is, the experience is completely unique-roughly equivalent to the essen
tialist position) and "conservative" (that is, the experience conserves the
tradition-the contextualist position).34 He even uses the term "herme
neutical" of this position, as I do. 35 In shifting his emphasis, he recognizes
that a balance must be struck between the two extremes. Unfortunately,
the answer (that there is a dialectic between the two extremes) seems to in
dicate a separation between "elements" within mysticism, and is far from
the unified experience that mystics actually report. His attempt at reconcili
ation has not seemed to satisty the critics.
So there are some problems with Katz's position, if we take it as operat
ing within the realm of knowledge claims, although I do not think that Katz
is ignorant of these problems. Despite them, there are benefits to advocat
ing the position that mystical experience is mediated or constructed by
doctrine, tradition or culture.
One seeming benefit is that it enables us to explain why mystics from dif
ferent backgrounds give different reports of their experiences. Buddhist
mystics, after all, rarely have visions of the Virgin Mary. Even outside the
visionary type of mysticism, experiences tend to confirm doctrinal posi
tions. Of course, given what I said earlier about the difference between the
purity and the unity of the mystical experience, this advantage looks better
than it actually is. Katz wants to argue for lack of purity; this benefit applies
to lack of unity (diversity). There would need to be some explicit argument
given for why the first entails the second, for the implication is not a logi
cally necessary one. Thus, we will have to look for better reasons for argu
ing for the contextual thesis.
Second, reports of mystics tend to confirm their own tradition. It is rare
that a mystic reports experiences that are at variance with his or her tradi
tion. Michael Stoeber does point out that mystics are sometimes heretics,36
but this heresy commonly pushes the boundaries of the stagnant metaphys
ics of a tradition, rather than denying that tradition. These heretics are rad
ical in the true sense of the word: they go to the root of the tradition, to re
cover it. 37 This is a much better reason. At least it deals with the conver
gence between theology and experience within a tradition.
A third benefit of the contextual, or mediated version of mystical experi
ence is that it undermines some of the traditional objections to mystical ex
perience. For instance, some might argue that mysticism makes for a hier
archical theology. There can be a two-tiered system-those who have had
the mystical experience (the elite) and those who have not (the seekers).
Contextualism can answer this objection by saying that the experience is
still within the public world of dogma and culture, and therefore confirms
that world. Essentialism's only answer is that this is just the way it is. Some
are blessed and some are not.
Furthermore, if mysticism is contextual, there could be an antidote to
the perennial charge against some forms of mysticism: quietism. If some
mystics are led to withdraw from the world, that is not the fault of the expe
rience, but of the theology and culture which made that experience pos
sible. And this theology or culture can be addressed in ways that the experi
ence cannot.
Of course, the critics do not object simply because of whim. The appeal
of the essentialist position differs for different critics, but there are some
important benefits to holding essentialism and denying contextualism:
One commonly mentioned benefit is this: while there are many differ
ences in the reports mystics give of their experiences, there are also many
similarities. The essentialist position takes these similarities seriously and
accounts for the differences through later interpretation. This reason, like
the first reason for the contextual thesis, is not compelling because it con
fuses the purity/unity distinction. Similarities do not entail purity any more
than differences entail lack of purity.
Second, it ensures that mystical experience is not reduced to cultural ex
perience. If mysticism is mediated by theology, tradition or culture, the fear
is that it will be regarded as nothing more than an intense appreciation of
that theology, tradition or culture. Mysticism will in some way become "nat
ural," and that will take something important away from the experience.
Third, it ensures that the mystical experience is unique, not reducible to
psychological experience. The mystic is not simply a particular brand of
psychotic or religious fanatic. If the experience is naturalized, however, that
danger exists.
Fourth, following from the previous two reasons, if mysticism is reduc
ible, it is also explainable. A hallmark of mysticism is mystery and paradox;
yet, if we find that it is reallyjust intensely felt theology, or psychological ab
erration, we can ignore the question of the meaningfulness of the experi
ence. This isJonathan Shear's concern. 38
Finally, if mystical experience is mediated by expectations of some sort,
it seems difficult to account for the reports of many mystics, that there is a
"pure consciousness" in the experience. It is not an intentional experience
at all.
The concerns of both sides seem legitimate. Furthermore, the argu
ments for one side or the other seem to rely in part on a conceptual confu
sion (purity/unity) and mislabelling of positions. This is not to say that
there are no good arguments for each side; in fact, I think there are. How
ever, they seem to balance each other out. How are we to decide between
them? I would like to suggest one reason for the impasse, and propose a
way out.
39 It should be noted that, when I refer to the metaphor of sensation, I mean the traditional
empiricist position that sensation is primitive, the building blocks for later interpreta
tion. Much discussion of mysticism has assumed this version of sensation. I realize that it
is quite possible that sensation is itself hermeneutical, but that is not how most scholars
of mysticism have taken it. This is, after all, a metaphor which is assumed in making the
mystical experience into an epistemological event, and so the issue concerns what episte
mology has been inherited, not which one could be consciously argued for. One good
source that argues for the hermeneutical nature of sensation is Graeme Nicholson, Seeing
and Reading (Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press International, 1984).
88 Studies in Religion / Sciences Religieuses 24/1 1995
world. But just as this view of sensation has been questioned, so too this
view of mysticism has been questioned by Katz and others.
Finally, the discussion about mysticism has been driven, in part, by the
question of whether mystical knowledge is legitimate. This stems from the
early philosophical discussions of mysticism, as a branch of the "religious
experience" argument for the existence of God or for the legitimacy of a
particular religion. While mystical insights have for centuries been ap
propriated enthusiastically by mainstream philosophers (often without giv
ing the true source its due recognition), mystical experience has been harder
to deal with. It is relatively recent that respectable philosophers have been
able to talk about mystical experience without being accused of falling into
psychology or, worse yet, religion.
But how did philosophy deal with mystical experience when it began to
take it seriously? By using its own metaphors. And the most important, the
most ready metaphor, was that of knowledge. But knowledge comes with its
own metaphors, which are often based on sensation. Walter Ong does a
marvellous job of showing the pervasiveness and usefulness of the sensory
metaphors for knowledge.40 The argument, then, goes like this: mystical
experience provides knowledge, just as other experience provides knowl
edge; knowledge is not only normally derived from sensation, but is best
understood through sensory metaphors; therefore, mystical experience is
best understood through sensory metaphors.
There are, though, differences between the mystical experience and the
empiricist version of sensation. Sensation is, after all, only a metaphor for
the mystical experience, albeit one that has held such powerful sway that
most people simply assume that the mystical experience is just another
kind of sensation.
One difference is that the mystic does not report the experience as one
which requires further understanding, but as one characterized as pure un
derstanding. The mystic does not have the sensation first and understand it
later. The "raw data" of the experience does not require any inbred func
tions of the mind, like judgment, memory or whatever, to be understood.
Any empiricist must combine an active mind and passive sensations. This is
not what happens in mystical experience, though. The experience is the
understanding. This is a very important difference, for it collapses the tra
ditional empiricist/pragmatist structure of mysticism (critiqued by, among
others, GraceJantzen 41 ) and opens the door for characterizing mystical ex
perience as hermeneutical. We need an account that deals with mysticism
40 Walter Ong, "I See What You Say: Sense Analogues for Intellect," in Interfaces of the Word
(Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1977), p. 121-44.
41 Jantzen. "Mysticism and Experience." p. 313-15.
Janz / Steven Katz and his critics 89
as understanding at its most basic level, not as knowledge that has been
constructed from some raw data. It is this hermeneutical model I favour.
There is another difference. Many mystics report that there is conscious
ness without any object at all. Sensation typically is intentional-it is of
something. Scholars who recognize the non-intentional nature of many
mystical experiences, but still hold on to the sensation metaphor, are likely
simply to drop the "object" and retain the "subject." Or, if there is an ob
ject, it is an onto/theological one. It is a metaphysical thing, like the objects
of normal sensation. The point is that the subject/object split is tacitly
maintained in the metaphor used, even though the scholar may try in
other ways to transcend that distinction. Sallie King goes partway in resolv
ing this subject/object split by relying on Husserlian descriptive phenome
nology. My modification of her position (which actually turns out to argue
against her conclusion that there is a core to mystical experience) is that
phenomenology must be hermeneutical, not simply descriptive.
It is important to note in this analysis that I am not suggesting that most
analyses of mysticism claim that mysticism is like sensation, and therefore
falls into the traditional empiricist distinction between the knowing subject
and the empirical object of that knowledge. Many theorists explicitly reject
the idea that mysticism is a subject/object type of experience. However,
they may be implicitly committed to that split, in that they may hold that
mystical experience gives or forms the basis for knowledge. It is this con
nection I really take issue with, because the metaphor of many discussions
of knowledge has been sensory. Thus, the problem does not lie in the claim
that mysticism is like sensation, but that mysticism is knowledge, which is
like sensation. The fact that some mystics report sensory-type experiences
is used as a support of the epistemological character of the experience.
Identitying the places where mysticism is not like sensation could argue
for a "neo-Kantian" version of sensation, but that is not the only conclu
sion possible. It might also mean that mysticism is more like an act in which
experience and understanding are co-temporaneous-like reading, for in
stance. If a person does not understand at least at some basic level while
reading, the person is not reading but only looking. The idea that the mys
tical experience is hermeneutical, like textual experience, opens up inter
esting possibilities. These are well expressed in another context by one of
Paul Ricoeur's works on interpretation theory.42 In a series of lectures,
Ricoeur argues that reading a text consists of the tension and in terplay be
tween two parts, variously portrayed as code and message, meaning and
event, langue and parole. In each case, the message is imbedded in the code,
but the code exists only through the message. Which is more real? The
42 Paul Ricoeur, Interpretation Theory: Discourse and the Surplus of Meaning (Fort Worth, TX:
Texas Christian University Press, 1976).
90 Studies in Religion / Sciences Religieuses 24/1 1995
true that all mystics report the same thing, although there are similarities.
To decide that the experiences are all the same is itself a philosophical deci
sion not derivable from the evidence alone. A contextualist will always be
able to see mediation and context; an essentialist will always be able to see
the primitive experience. Simply asserting one or the other will not solve
the issue.
I believe that it is possible both to understand that the experience hap
pens within a tradition and to regard it as unique. While it is not true that
all mystical experiences happen within a tradition that encourages the ex
perience, most do. While it is not true that all mystics have experiences that
are part of their religious or cultural heritage, most do. And very few have
experiences that actually contradict their heritage, St. Paul's experience
notwithstanding. Even in his case, one could argue that the vision ex
tended, rather than negated, his Jewish heritage. This is a hallmark of mys
tical experience, that the edges of orthodoxy are pushed; but this is not
necessarily a contradiction of orthodoxy. It could be a deepening or
grounding of orthodoxy.
Changing from the metaphor of sensation to the metaphor of under
standing a text is the first step in breaking the impasse. The metaphor of
sensation is a useful one, and should not be thrown out; however, it is a par
tial one. The danger has been that we have forgotten that it is just a meta
phor. So, this second metaphor should be put in tension with the first.
How is mysticism like reading a novel? There is the obvious parallel be
tween the understanding that characterizes both. It is immediate, and at
the best of times, it can "take over." I am not suggesting that reading a
novel is a form of mystical insight; this is just a metaphor. But a good novel
can create a new consciousness. It is an event. The reader can become lost
in a new world. The mystic typically is called back to the experience, as the
reader is called back to a good book. Both find new things all the time. For
both, the understanding is one of opening new possibilities when before all
possibilities were stagnant or non-existent. The mystical experience, like
the novel, is new. unique and exciting.
And yet ... it exists in a context. It works only because the mystic, or the
reader, is ready for the experience. It works because the mystic has come to
terms with his or her existence, and found that existence to be lacking.
This may be a conscious realization or something that is only realized when
the experience highlights life as it is, and as it could be. The novel, and the
mystical experience. then. might be something that has had a long prepara
tion, or it might take the person by surprise.
Of course, reading the novel is not an act of pure consciousness. Meta
phors can only be pushed so far. Nevertheless, the very act of setting up an
alternate metaphor to the sensation image highlights the fact that these are
only metaphors that open up some ways of understanding, but close off
92 Studies in Religion / Sciences Religieuses 24/1 1995
others. The problem for both Katz and most of his critics is that they forget
the metaphor. Is the mystical experience really primitive or is it really con
structed? This is a false dichotomy, brought on by the metaphor of sensa
tion. Like the novel, the mystical experience can be both.
Why should anyone prefer this hermeneutical account to either the es
sentialist or the contextualist account? Mainly because it avoids the prob
lems of either pole of the debate, it gives an account that recognizes the sig
nificance of the uniqueness of the mystic's understanding while at the same
time recognizing what most mystics would claim about themselves, that
they are rooted in a tradition. Robert Forman 44 critiques both sides (which
he calls "perennialism" and "constructivism") and proposes a solution
which incorporates "forgetting." I believe my hermeneutical account in
corporates his answer, as I will try to show in the next section.
44 Robert Forman, "Of Deserts and Doors: Methodology of the Study of Mysticism," Sophia,
32 (1993): 31-44.
45 I am aware that Derrida has rejected the idea that deconstruction is a kind of apophatic the
ology. The best treatment of the negativity in theology and deconstruction, that avoids the
route of apophatic theology but affirms the relevance of deconstruction for theology is
It Hart, The Trespass ofthe Sign (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989).
46 Forman, "The Construction of Mystical Experience," Faith and Phiwsophy, p. 254-67, and
Forman, "Of Deserts and Doors," p. 31-44.
Janz / Steven Katz and his critics 93
God (going as far in one place as saying that he must be rid of God in order
to see God). A famous Zen Buddhist aphorism is "If you see the Buddha on
the road, kill him." Examples of this type of forgetting could be compounded
from StJohn of the Cross,Jacob Boehme and many other mystics.
Now, is this forgetting an attempt to negate one's knowledge? Is the mys
tic yearning for a time before knowledge? Is pure experience something
that happens in the denial of experience or in the transcendence of experi
ence? I would contend that the mystic's knowledge is part of the necessary
path that brings him or her to the place where that knowledge can be given
up. It is a Hegelian Aujhelntng, the simultaneous transcending and destruc
tion of a state, which recognizes that state was necessary for the higher one
to take place. There is plenty of evidence that mystics travel a path-the
dark night of the soul, the eight-fold path-to mystical insight. Of course,
not everyone who has a mystical experience has followed this path. Never
theless, it seems clear that the experience of most mystics was necessary in
order to arrive at the place where mystical experience can happen. This is
contextualized experience necessary for understanding, but which does
not reduce to doctrine or tradition. And recognition of this contextualiza
tion is important both for the mystic and for the later interpreter.
This can be put in another way for some mystics. The path the mystic takes
to enlightenment is often one of struggle with the seeming contradictions of
received theology, tradition, or culture. The mystic (from the perspective of
Western theology for the moment) cannot make coherent the love of God
with the evil in the world, or the oneness of God with the fragmentation of
creation. This problem becomes an all-consuming existential issue. The an
swer, if it comes (and there are no guarantees). comes as the solution to this
problem. Some mysticism can be seen as a kind of existential release to an ir
resolvable dilemma. Because of the high stakes, this is not simply Ar
chimedes' intellectual "Eureka" upon realizing how to determine the mass
of Hiero's crown. The problem has taken over the person's very being, and
therefore so does the answer. It is understanding-perhaps understanding
that defies ready communication-but understanding nonetheless. And this
understanding is multifaceted: emotional, intellectual, volitional.
While this is not an explanation of the mystical experience, it is a contex
tualization. It does help both the mystic and the scholar to understand the
path that led to the experience. The understanding is unique, yet situated.
Michael Stoeber47 seems to be sympathetic to this as well. Although he
seems caught up in the sensory analogy (along with an unfortunate tend
ency to regard mystical experience as a kind of information processing-a
computer metaphor that does more harm than good), his critique of the
A last word: is this hermeneutical metaphor necessarily true for all mysti
cism? I do not think so. I have no desire to give a totalizing account, to give
a new "essence" of mysticism, to require that mystics must live up to myac
count or they are not mystics. I give a narrative, a metaphor that I believe
makes sense of much mystical experience. There will always be some who
will appeal to a personal mystical experience, and on that basis claim that
my account is wrong or irrelevant, that the hermeneutic metaphor is also
only partial. This partiality is, of course, something I admit. The preroga
tive of the mystic is to break through the totalization of rational or non
rational accounts, whether essentialist, contextualist or hermeneutical. For
a scholar to deny that would be hybris.
50 Ibid., p. 113.