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The Mystical Experience: with an Emphasis on Wittgenstein and Zen

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 October 2008

Charles H. Cox  and
Jean W. Cox
Charles H. Cox
Affiliation:
Sonoma, California
Jean W. Cox
Affiliation:
Sonoma, California
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Extract

Mysticism and the mystical experience seemingly play little or no part in our Western tradition. Certainly there is no mystical tradition in the West such as Zen Buddhism, nor is there any great understanding of or influence from the writings of Heraclitus, Spinoza, or the mystical passages in the early work of Wittgenstein. Mysticism has been generally misunderstood in the West, and it has even evoked the attacks of philosophers and theologians.1 Mysticism to many conjures up images of monks meditating in caves; it is generally pictured as esoteric, otherworldly, irrational, and at best irrelevant to the daily lives of human beings. If what we say below is correct, it will be seen that mysticism is none of these but is rather a singular human experience that lies at the foundations of civilization.

Type
Articles
Information
Religious Studies , Volume 12 , Issue 4 , December 1976 , pp. 483 - 491
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1976

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References

page 483 note 1 The Humanist 34 (September/October 1974), passim.

page 484 note 1 Hakuin, , ‘The Song of Zazen’, quoted in Zenkai Shibayama, A Flower Does Not Talk (Tokyo, Charles E. Tuttle Company, 1970), p. 67.Google Scholar

page 485 note 1 Wittgenstein, Ludwig, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (London, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1961).Google Scholar Hereafter referred to as Tractatus. Quotations will be as translated unless otherwise noted.

page 485 note 2 Wittgenstein Notebooks 1914–1916, ed. von Wright, G. H. and Anscombe, G. E. M., trans. Anscombe, G. E. M. (New York, Harper and Brothers, 1961).Google Scholar Passages from the Notebooks are used sparingly and with care as they were but provisional thoughts and were never published by Wittgenstein.

page 485 note 3 ‘Wittgenstein's 1929 Lecture on Ethics’, reprinted in Philosophical Review 74 (1965), 3–12.Google Scholar

page 485 note 4 We herein assume and do not argue that Wittgenstein was a mystic. It seems clear enough from the text of his early work. For a paper arguing this point see McGuiness, B. F., ‘The Mysticism of the Tractatus’, Philosophical Review 75 (1966), 305–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 485 note 5 Wittgenstein, ‘Lecture on Ethics’, p. 8.

page 485 note 6 Wittgenstein, , Tractatus, 6. 44.Google Scholar Our translation.

page 486 note 1 Ibid. 6.45.

page 486 note 2 This point is made in another context by Professor Strawson, P. F. in his Individuals (New York, Anchor Books, 1959), p. xiv.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 486 note 3 Wheelwright, Philip, Heraclitus (New York, Atheneum, 1968), pp. 29–39Google Scholar passim.

page 486 note 4 Kapleau, Philip, The Three Pillars of Zen (New York, Harper and Row, 1966), p. 228.Google Scholar

page 487 note 1 Wittgenstein, , Tractatus, 6. 44.Google Scholar

page 487 note 2 Shibayama, , A Flower Does Not Talk, p. 205.Google Scholar

page 488 note 1 Wittgenstein, , Notebooks, p. 75.3.Google Scholar

page 488 note 2 Ibid. 75.2.

page 488 note 3 Wittgenstein, , Tractatus, 6.4311.Google Scholar

page 488 note 4 Ibid. 5.64 and Notebooks, p. 82.1.

page 488 note 5 Wittgenstein, , Notebooks, p. 82.2.Google Scholar

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page 488 note 7 Ibid. 5.621.

page 488 note 8 Ibid. 1.1.

page 488 note 9 Ibid. 5.641.

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page 489 note 1 Kapleau, , Three Pillars o Zen, p. 207.Google Scholar

page 489 note 2 From Dogen's Shobogenzo quoted in Three Pillars of Zen, p. 205.

page 489 note 3 Wittgenstein, , Tractatus, 6.431.Google Scholar

page 489 note 4 Kapleau, , Three Pillars of Zen, p. 207.Google Scholar

page 489 note 5 Dylan, Bob, ‘Chimes of Freedom’, in Bob Dylan Songbook (New York, M. Witmark and Sons, 1965)Google Scholar, verse 3, line 2.

page 489 note 6 Goddard, D., A Buddhist Bible (New York, E. P. Dutton and Co., 1938), pp. 38–9.Google Scholar This verse is also quoted in the last chapter of Professor Herbert Fingarette's monumental work, The Self in Transformation (New York, Basic Books, 1963).Google Scholar

page 490 note 1 Wittgenstein, , Tractatus, 6.431–6.4311.Google Scholar

page 490 note 2 Wittgenstein, ‘Lecture on Ethics’, p. 8.

page 490 note 3 Traherne, Thomas, Centuries of Meditation (London, P. J. and A. E. Dobell, 1908), p. 19.Google Scholar Quoted in Suzuki, D. T., Mysticism: Christian and Buddhist (New York, Collier Books, 1957), pp. 79–80.Google Scholar