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Religious ecstasy

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For a related topic, see ecstasy (emotion).

Religious ecstasy is a state characterized by greatly reduced external awareness and expanded interior mental and spiritual awareness which is frequently accompanied by visions and emotional/intuitive (and sometimes physical) euphoria. There are many records of such experiences lasting several days, and some people claim to have experienced ecstasy over a period of three decades, or to have recurring experiences of ecstasy during their lifetime.

Religious ecstasy can be distinguished from spirit possession and hypnosis in that ecstasy is not accompanied by a loss of interior consciousness or will on the part of the subject experiencing it. Rather, the person experiencing ecstasy notices a dramatic heightening of awareness of the spiritual, and a total concentration of the will on it. If the ecstatic state comes about slowly, the subject may notice changes in his or her physiological responses. But, once brought into complete ecstasy, there is ordinarily no or very little external awareness of the physical state of the subject or the surroundings. Some external awareness remains in a partial religious ecstasy. Intense fear may accompany the initial stage of being drawn into ecstasy.

True religious ecstasy cannot be induced by natural means as can the trance-like state which is often called religious ecstasy. This can be deliberately induced using a variety of techniques, including prayer, meditation, Gospel music, breathing exercises, dancing, sweating, fasting, thirsting, and the consumption of coffee, wine, or psychotropic drugs. The particular technique that an individual uses to induce ecstasy is usually one that is associated with that individual's particular religious and cultural traditions. As a result, an ecstatic experience is usually interpreted within the context of a particular individual's religious and cultural traditions.

Achieving ecstatic trances is a major activity of shamans, who use ecstasy for such purposes as traveling to heaven or the underworld, guiding or otherwise interacting with spirits, clairvoyance, and healing. Some shamans use drugs from such plants as peyote and cannabis (also see cannabis (drug)) in their attempts to reach ecstasy, while others rely on such non-chemical means as ritual, music, dance, ascetic practices, or visual designs as aids to mental discipline. The rituals followed by some athletes in preparing for contests are dismissed as superstition, but this is a device of sports psychologists to help them to attain an ecstasy-like state.

Kriya yoga, a type of yoga popularized in the West by Paramahansa Yogananda, provides techniques to attain a state of ecstasy called Samadhi. According to practitioners, there are various stages of ecstasy, the highest of which is called Nirvikalpa Samadhi.

In the monotheistic tradition, ecstasy is usually associated with communion and oneness with God. Indeed, ecstasy is the primary vehicle for the type of prophetic visions and revelations found in the Bible. However, such experiences can also be personal mystical experiences with no significance to anyone but the person experiencing them.

In Buddhism, especially in the Pali Canon, there are 8 states of trance also called absorption. The first four of these states are called Rupa or materially oriented. The next four are called Arupa or non-material. These eight states are preliminary trances which lead up to final saturation which upon return to the phenomenal world manifests as enlightenment. It takes great effort and years of sustained meditation to reach even the first absorption, when the meditator characteristically notices the sustained lucidity of a non-material light enveloping him/her.

In Christianity, the ecstatic experiences of the Apostles Peter and Paul are recorded in Acts 10:10, 11:5 and 22:17.

In hagiography (writings on the subject of Christian saints) many instances are recorded in which saints are granted ecstasies. According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, religious ecstasy (called supernatural ecstasy) includes two elements: one, interior and invisible, in which the mind rivets its attention on a religious subject, and another, corporeal and visible, in which the activity of the senses is suspended, reducing the effect of external sensations upon the subject and rendering him or her resistant to awakening.

The Catholic Encyclopedia also asserts that there are a number of false views on the question of religious ecstasy:

  1. That during an ecstasy there is a lessening of intellectual power.
  2. That ecstasies are solely a product of violent emotions.
  3. That ecstasy is an entirely natural phenomenon, and that others such as Archimedes and Socrates achieved these natural ecstasies.
  4. That religious ecstasy is another form of lethargy or catalepsy.
  5. That ecstasy is related to the hypnotic state.
  6. That ecstasy is related to somnambulism or the trances of spirit mediums.
  7. That ecstasy is equivalent to the states produced by the use of narcotic drugs.

Notable individuals or movements

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