216 ARGUMENTS: MONOTHEISTIC CONCEPTIONSthey are that way or not. Using phenomenological descriptions, an atheist
and a theist can agree that experiences occur in which it at least seems to
the subject that she is perceving a powerful, holy being^1 distinct from
herself. They disagree over whether there is such a being that she perceives.
Thin description versus thick description
Members of monotheistic religious traditions report what they describe as
experience of God. Sometimes the phenomenologies of these experiences
are vanishingly thin, simply a matter of feeling forgiven or a sense that
they ought to perform some action. Only if one reasonably already takes
monotheism to be true, and even then only with various qualifications,
might one also reasonably take these experiences actually to be experiences
of God – at any rate reasonably in any sense in which it was not equally
reasonable not so to take them.
Other experiences described as experiences of God are, as it were,
phenomenologically thicker – the subjects report an awareness of a being of
majestic power, profound holiness, overwhelming purity, and deep love.
Such experiences are reported in various formal and informal mystical
traditions in Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant contexts, in all of the
Semitic monotheisms, and in Hindu monotheism. Similar reports are given
by persons not associated with any mystical tradition, sometimes by
persons not religious by any monotheistic standard. Sometimes these
experiences are sought and sometimes they simply occur. An earlier
chapter lists a few descriptions of such experiences.^2 The present question is
whether the occurrence of these phenomenologically richer experiences
provide any evidence that God exists. This question can be answered with
any care only if we ask and answer some other questions first. Here is a
series of relevant questions and answers. Throughout these questions and
answers, but not elsewhere, “religious experience” will simply mean
“experiences that, given their phenomenology, are, if reliable, experiences
of God.”
Experience as direct evidence
Question 1: what sort of experience are we asking about?
The relevant experiences are subject/consciousness/object in structure;
they involve a person having an experience which, providing that the