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Books > Religion & Spirituality > Aspects of religions (non-Christian) > Religious experience > Mysticism
Mystical Recognition relies on the insights of Albrecht's earlier
study Psychology of Mystical Consciousness, which are applied here
to the critical analysis of a representative corpus of mystical
texts - about 100 testimonies of numerous Christian and
non-Christian mystics across cultural and historical traditions.
Mystical Recognition aims at exploring the 'ontic fundament' by
which the psychological phenomena and responses are elicited in a
mystical event. While conceding that an individual mystical
experience is largely imbued with the beliefs and suppositions that
a mystic holds prior to a mystical experience, Albrecht insists
that a genuine mystical experience will always impart some impact
and cognitive insight that cannot reasonably be accounted for from
the subject's prior knowledge or the subjective domain of his/her
consciousness. Any genuine mystical event is caused by an 'impact'
imposed from beyond the confines of the individual self and thus
the manifestation of a living 'mystical relation' between the
experiencer and the All-encompassing. The discovery that the
'mystical relation' is an existential facticity and, as such, an
'ultimate phenomenon' (i.e. a phenomenon that 'is' - like 'life',
'spirit', or 'love' - but which cannot be rationally explained or
traced to a known source) is a unique pioneering achievement and
provides a new epistemological foundation for the understanding of
the spiritual nature of man. In the final chapter, Albrecht
juxtaposes his findings of his analyses of the corpus of mystical
records and of several original accounts of mystical experience
(including his own) critically to the conception of human 'Dasein'
as outlined by Heidegger's and Binswanger's 'hermeneutics of
Dasein', resulting in the claim that man is endowed with the
capacity of 'openness' which enables him/her to perceive and
respond to phenomena of 'transcendental Reality' 'arriving' in
his/her consciousness.
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