..續本文上一頁William James, who gave the psychological study of religion its modern form a century ago, in 1902, with the publication of The Varieties of Religious Experience. James” broad sympathies extended beyond Western culture to include Buddhism and Hinduism, and beyond the “acceptable” religions of his time to include the Mental Culture movement, the 19th century”s version of the New Age. His interest in persity makes him seem amazingly post‐modern.

　　Still, James was influenced by the intellectual currents alive in his time, which shaped the way he converted his large mass of data into a psychology of religion. Although he spoke as a scientist, the current with the deepest influence on his thought was Romanticism.

　　He followed the Romantics in saying that the function of religious experience was to heal the sense of “pided self,” creating a more integrated self‐identity better able to function in society. However, to be scientific, the psychology of religion must not side for or against any truth claims concerning the content of religious experiences. For instance, many religious experiences produce a strong conviction in the oneness of the cosmos as a whole. Although scientific observers should accept the feeling of oneness as a fact, they shouldn”t take it as proof that the cosmos is indeed one. Instead, they should judge each experience by its effects on the personality. James was not disturbed by the many mutually contradictory truth‐claims that religious experiences have produced over the centuries. In his eyes, different temperaments need different truths as medicine to heal their psychological wounds.

　　Drawing on Methodism to provide two categories for classifying all religious experiences—conversion and sanctification—James gave a Romantic interpretation to both. For the Methodists, these categories applied specifically to the soul”s relationship to God. Conversion was the turning of the soul to God”s will; sanctification, the attunement of the soul to God”s will in all its actions. To apply these categories to other religions, James removed the references to God, leaving a more Romantic definition: conversion unifies the personality; sanctification represents the on‐going integration of that unification into daily life.

　　Also, James followed the Romantics in judging the effects of both types of experiences in this‐worldly terms. Conversion experiences are healthy when they foster healthy sanctification: the ability to maintain one”s integrity in the rough and tumble of daily life, acting as a moral and responsible member of human 40 society. In psychological terms, James saw conversion as simply an extreme example of the breakthroughs ordinarily encountered in adolescence. And he agreed with the Romantics that personal integration was a process to be pursued throughout life, rather than a goal to be achieved. Other writers who took up the psychology of religion after James devised a more scientific vocabulary to analyze their data. Still, they maintained many of the Romantic notions that James had introduced into the field.

　　For example, in Modern Man in Search of a Soul (1933), Carl Jung agreed that religion”s proper role lay in healing of pisions within the personality, although he saw the same basic split in everyone: the narrow, fearful ego vs. the wiser, more spacious unconscious. Thus he regarded religion as a primitive form of psychotherapy. In fact, he actually lay closer than James to the Romantics in his definition of psychic health. Quoting Schiller”s assertion that human beings are most human when they are at play, Jung saw the cultivation of spontaneity and fluidity both as a means for integrating the pided personality and as an expression of the healthy personality engaged in the unending process of integration, i…

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