Extreme Religious Behaviours

Part I: Theory

Chapter 1: The role of absorption in various religious phenomena

1.1 Another dimension of awareness

Our¹⁵ point of departure is the well-known fact that ordinary awareness is interpreted awareness. Already William James (as cited in Sacks 2012: 91) pointed out that “[o]ur normal waking consciousness, rational consciousness, as we call it, is but one special type of consciousness, whilst all about it, parted from it by the filmiest of screens, there lie potential forms of consciousness entirely different.” More recent authors express themselves in similar terms: “What I perceive are not the crude and ambiguous cues that impinge from the outside world onto my eyes and my ears and my fingers. I perceive something much richer ...