Revelatory Events (eBook)

Three Case Studies of the Emergence of New Spiritual Paths

Ann Taves (Autor)

eBook Download: PDF | EPUB

2016
Princeton University Press (Verlag)
978-1-4008-8446-9 (ISBN)

Infos

Ann Taves is professor of religious studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Her books include Religious Experience Reconsidered and Fits, Trances, and Visions: Experiencing Religion and Explaining Experience from Wesley to James (both Princeton).

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A leading scholar sheds critical light on the seemingly revelatory events behind new religions and spiritual movementsUnseen presences. Apparitions. Hearing voices. Although some people would find such experiences to be distressing and seek clinical help, others perceive them as transformative. Occasionally, these unusual phenomena give rise to new spiritual paths or religious movements. Revelatory Events provides fresh insights into what is perhaps the bedrock of all religious belief-the claim that otherworldly powers are active in human affairs.Ann Taves looks at Mormonism, Alcoholics Anonymous, and A Course in Miracles-three cases in which insiders claimed that a spiritual presence guided the emergence of a new spiritual path. In the 1820s, Joseph Smith, Jr., reportedly translated the Book of Mormon from ancient gold plates unearthed with the help of an angel. Bill Wilson cofounded AA after having an ecstatic experience while hospitalized for alcoholism in 1934. Helen Schucman scribed the words of an inner voice that she attributed to Jesus, which formed the basis of her 1976 best-selling self-study course. In each case, Taves argues, the sense of a guiding presence emerged through a complex, creative interaction between a founding figure with unusual mental abilities and an initial set of collaborators who were drawn into the process by diverse motives of their own.A major work of scholarship, this compelling and accessible book traces the very human processes behind such events.

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 25.10.2016
• Zusatzinfo: 20 halftones. 2 line illus. 4 tables. 1 map.
• Verlagsort: Princeton
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Geschichte ► Teilgebiete der Geschichte ► Religionsgeschichte
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Religion / Theologie ► Christentum
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Soziologie ► Spezielle Soziologien
• Schlagworte: AA • A Course In Miracles • Alcoholics Anonymous • alcoholism • alternate selves • Analogy • anonymity • Autobiography • awareness • Benedict Groeschel • Bill W. • Bill Wilson • Book of Commandments • Book of Mormon • Case study • Catholic Church • Catholicism • Christianity • Christian Science • Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints • Clergy • Cognition • Consciousness • David Whitmer • Default Mode Network • deity • Delusion • Discernment • Dissemination • Emergence • emergent groups • Emile Durkheim • Explanation • Ezra Booth • First Vision • God • golden plates • group behavior • group formation • Helen Schucman • higher power • His Family • hypnosis • Hypnotic induction • Identity (social science) • Illustration • Indication (medicine) • Inquiry • Insider • internal voice • Joseph Smith • Josiah • Judith Skutch • Kenneth Wapnick • Literature • Lucy Harris • Lucy Mack Smith • Major religious groups • Martin Harris (Latter Day Saints) • Mental representation • mormonism • mormons • Motivation • narrative • Nephite • New Religious Movement • New Thought • Oliver Cowdery • Oxford Group • Parapsychology • perennial philosophy • Phenomena • phenomenon • Photograph • Physician • primary source • printing • Protestantism • psychic • psychologist • Psychology • Publication • Reincarnation • Religion • Religious Belief • religious experience • religious movements • religious text • Revelation • revelatory experience • sacred history • Seer stone (Latter Day Saints) • self-agency • self-deception • sobriety • Social Identity Approach • Social Science • spiritual experience • Spiritualism • Spirituality • spiritual journey • spiritual path • spiritual presence • Spiritual transformation • study group • Subjectivity • Suggestion • suprahuman entities • suprahuman entity • The Big Book (Alcoholics Anonymous) • Their Lives • Theology • theory • The Various • Thought • Twelve-step program • Twelve Steps • Twelve Tradition • Twelve Traditions • Uncertainty • Understanding • Urim and Thummim • Vision • Voice • William Thetford • Workbook • Writing
• ISBN-10: 1-4008-8446-2 / 1400884462
• ISBN-13: 978-1-4008-8446-9 / 9781400884469