Feminism, Constructivism and Numinous Experience

The article argues that numinous consciousness, which Rudolf Otto described as the immediate, unique essence of religious experience, is actually shaped by conceptual and ideological frameworks. Drawing on constructivist epistemology and feminist religious studies, it demonstrates that androcentric (male-centered) epistemological and value structures make such experiences intelligible and acceptable within patriarchal religious traditions. In contrast, contemporary gynocentric (female-centered) spiritualities, where women treat their psychobiological difference as a necessary medium for religious experience, do not seek to protect the holy from the limitations of immanence.

Study at a glance

Abstract

This article brings together constructivist epistemology and feminist study of religion to provide phenomenological evidence that numinous consciousness is not the immediate,sui generisessence of religious experience that Rudolf Otto believed it to be. Whilst there are certain peculiarities in the Ottonian scheme that might make numinous consciousness unusually resistant to conceptual and ideological mediation, it can be shown that androcentric epistemological and axiological structures make the experience intelligible and worthy of accommodation within a given patriarchal religious tradition. By contrast, contemporary gynocentric spiritualities in which women celebrate their psychobiological difference as itself a necessary medium of religious experience, have no interest in protecting the holy from the limitations of its immanence.