Is there such a thing as a universal human experience of the divine, or are all encounters shaped by culture, language, and power? In this video, we explore the classic debate between perennialism and constructivism, from William James and Mircea Eliade to Steven Katz, Talal Asad, and beyond. Drawing on philosophy, anthropology, psychology, and neuroscience, we look at how claims of universality are entangled with history and how particular traditions cultivate what we call “religious experience.”
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00:00 Perennialism vs Constructivism
00:58 Support Angela’s Symposium
07:21 Historical Debate
11:59 Perennialist Critique
15:54 Constructivist Critiques
23:52 Language, Training, and the Pedagogy of Presence
28:05 Psychology of Religion and the “Common Core” Hypothesis
33:23 Brains, Bodies, and the Neurophenomenology of Devotion
38:29 Conclusion
45:10 Support
REFERENCES
Asad, T. (1993). Genealogies of religion: Discipline and reasons of power in Christianity and Islam. Johns Hopkins University Press.
Beauregard, M., & Paquette, V. (2006). Neural correlates of a mystical experience in Carmelite nuns. Neuroscience Letters, 405(3), 186–190. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neulet.2006.06.060
Boyer, P. (2001). Religion explained: The evolutionary origins of religious thought. Basic Books.
d’Aquili, E., & Newberg, A. (1993). Religious and mystical states: A neuropsychological model. Zygon, 28(2), 177–200. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9744.1993.tb00918.x
d’Aquili, E., & Newberg, A. (1999). The mystical mind: Probing the biology of religious experience. Fortress Press.
Eliade, M. (1958). Patterns in comparative religion. Sheed & Ward.
Forman, R. K. C. (1990). The problem of pure consciousness: Mysticism and philosophy. Philosophy East and West, 40(4), 463–483. https://doi.org/10.2307/1399452
Forman, R. K. C. (1999). Mysticism, mind, consciousness. State University of New York Press.
Fuller, C. J. (1992). The camphor flame: Popular Hinduism and society in India. Princeton University Press.
Hood, R. W., Jr. (1975). The construction and preliminary validation of a measure of reported mystical experience. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 14(1), 29–41. https://doi.org/10.2307/1384454
Hood, R. W., Jr., Hill, P. C., & Spilka, B. (2001). The psychology of religion: An empirical approach (4th ed.). Guilford Press.
Hori, V. S. (1999). Teaching and learning in the Rinzai Zen monastery. Journal of Japanese Studies, 25(1), 5–39. https://doi.org/10.2307/133231
Humphrey, C., & Laidlaw, J. (1994). The archetypal actions of ritual: A theory of ritual illustrated by the Jain rite of worship. Clarendon Press.
James, W. (1902). The varieties of religious experience: A study in human nature. Longmans, Green.
Katz, S. T. (Ed.). (1978). Mysticism and philosophical analysis. Oxford University Press.
Keane, W. (2007). Christian moderns: Freedom and fetish in the mission encounter. University of California Press.
Luhrmann, T. M. (2012). When God talks back: Understanding the American evangelical relationship with God. Knopf.
Mahmood, S. (2005). Politics of piety: The Islamic revival and the feminist subject. Princeton University Press.
Meyer, B. (2009). Aesthetic formations: Media, religion and the senses. Palgrave Macmillan.
Meyer, B. (2011). Mediation and the genesis of presence. In D. Morgan (Ed.), Religion and material culture (pp. 84–102). Routledge.
Meyer, B. (2015). Sensational movies: Video, vision, and Christianity in Ghana. University of California Press.
Meyendorff, J. (1974). St. Gregory Palamas and Orthodox spirituality. St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press.
Pandian, A. (2009). Crooked stalks: Cultivating virtue in South India. Duke University Press.
Proudfoot, W. (1985). Religious experience. University of California Press.
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Published on September 28, 2025
