An Enquiry into the Mystical Experiences of Julian of Norwich and Epistemic Injustice in Relation to Illness
Maisie Howard
Reinvention an International Journal of Undergraduate Research October 30, 2026 DOI: 10.31273/reinvention.v19i2.2554 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Mystical experience |
| Key points | Argues that automatically disbelieving a person's testimony of a mystical experience because they were ill at the time is an epistemic injustice that stereotypes them as unable to reason and silences them as untrustworthy knowers. Contends, using Julian of Norwich as a central case, that not all ill people who claim mystical experiences should be regarded as unreliable knowers and that experiences of God can be triggered by illness. |
Abstract
The focus of this paper is the epistemic injustice of automatically not believing someone’s testimony of a mystical experience simply because they had an illness at the time. This can lead to people diminishing the subject’s perceived epistemic credibility as they may be stereotyped as not being able to reason effectively due to their illness. This is epistemic injustice as a subject’s words are silenced because they are believed to be an untrustworthy knower due to a negative prejudice associated with a disadvantaged group to which they belong (such as having an illness). The revelations of Julian of Norwich provide the central focus of this paper, and I utilise research from a range of subjects, such as theology, philosophy, psychiatry and history, to reach my conclusion. I argue that not all people who are ill and claim to have had a mystical experience (such as Julian of Norwich) should be regarded as unreliable knowers, and that there can be experiences of God that have been triggered by an illness. This argument has important ramifications for how people with illnesses should be treated epistemically as well as the position that religion can have in medicine.
Comparable studies
Other theoretical and historical papers on mystical experience, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| Religious and Mystical Experiences as Artifacts of Temporal Lobe Function: A General Hypothesis | 1983 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| The Psychedelic Mystical Experience in the Human Encounter with Death | 1969 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Vectorial Cerebral Hemisphericity as Differential Sources for the Sensed Presence, Mystical Experiences and Religious Conversions | 1993 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| The epistemic innocence of psychedelic states. | 2016 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Mystical Experience and Religious Doctrine | 1982 | Theoretical or philosophical paper |