This article examines Möminə Xatın as a metaphysical symbol of Azerbaijani female Sufism through an interdisciplinary analysis combining historical, architectural, and mystical perspectives. Within the broader framework of Sufi philosophy, the feminine is conceptualized as a central metaphysical principle associated with divine love, illumination, and spiritual proximity. The study explores how...
Abstract Apophatic theology in the Christian tradition connotes far more than a peak experience of union with the transcendent God who exceeds name and concept. For Christian thinkers East and West such experiences were considered an adumbration in time of the eschatological state as one of permanent beatitude, whether this state was considered more nearly in static terms (as in the West) or...
Abstract Simone Weil stands squarely within the apophatic tradition, but she also occupies an original position within it, having developed many themes in the wake of a mystical experience at the age of 29. One such theme, which originated in her meditation on Christ’s kenosis (Ph. 2:7) and how we can imitate it, is that of “decreation” (décréation). Another is attention (l’attention), which...
Abstract This paper examines how contemporary Christian contemplative discourse integrates two apparently opposed construals of religious experience: relational intimacy with a divine entity and non-conceptual states of pure awareness. We argue that relational intimacy is conceptualized through warmth, connection, spatial proximity, shared will, and resonance, underpinned by a linked goal...
The beginning of the twenty-first century has been marked by profound transformations in the ways reality, human beings, and society are understood. The rapid development of cognitive science, neuroscience, complexity theory, synergetics, quantum physics, digital technologies, and artificial intelligence has prompted a fundamental reconsideration of many traditional assumptions concerning the...
How did religious poets contribute to ideas about religion, tolerance, and spiritual truth in the Mughal Empire? This dissertation examines the poetry of Feyżī (1547–1595), the poet laureate of the Mughal emperor Akbar. Feyżī wrote during a period in which Emperor Akbar promoted a vision of peaceful coexistence among people of different religious backgrounds, known as ṣulḥ-i kull ("universal...
This research focuses on the symbols of mysticism and the psychology of mysticism in the novel Hilang Dalam Dekapan Semeru (Aditya, 2025). Mystical symbols such as the figure of a woman dressed in white, frankincense, offerings, dolls, free-range chicken eggs, seven-faced flowers, and the mystical experiences of climbers are analysed in the real world and the supernatural world in Javanese...
This study is grounded in the growing concern over the separation between artistic creativity and spiritual experience in contemporary scholarship. While imagination is often treated as a cognitive or aesthetic function, its deeper existential and transcendent dimensions remain underexplored. The objective of this research is to examine how artistic creation is shaped by imaginal experiences...
Dick’s psychobiographies foreground his complex identity, mystical experiences, and struggles with mental health. Psychobiographers like Gregg Rickman, Anthony Peake, Kyle Arnold, and Erik Davis apply varied lenses, from trauma and psychosis to precognition and psychoanalysis; their biotexts occupy a Phildickian asylum mundi that illustrates the hermeneutic challenges of interpreting a figure...
This chapter explores female sanctity from the medieval period through the early modern era, with a focus on the phenomenon of the “living saints” ( sante vive ). These charismatic figures, renowned for their abstinence, mystical experiences, prophetic abilities, and miracles, were venerated by the people and sought by princes as spiritual advisors, and their prophetic powers surpassed those of...
July 3, 2026Nikhat Jahan, Mohammad Aves, Rahul Kumar
This chapter will discuss the relationship between the esoteric mind in modern science and medicine. The discussion will be on where ancient esoteric thought is converging with contemporary scientific understanding of the mind and body. This will include looking at how traditional concepts of vital energy, subtle bodies and symbolic healing can relate to modern theories of consciousness,...
This chapter explores mystical experiences and esoteric belief systems by examining their influences in terms of cognition, emotion regulation, identity formation, and mental health. It also traces how historical marginalization of esotericism shaped thought processes through which individuals validate their mystical experiences. Within this context, mystical traditions are addressed as...
Philosophy does not fail when it becomes difficult; it fails when it becomes non-examinable. Original tool CBIT: a test for definition, method, evidence, and metaphor control. Published cases Dennett-style imitation, LLM consciousness, and quantum-consciousness overextension. Aim Defend interdisciplinary dialogue from method substitution and false depth. Boundary is not censorship; boundary is...
Journal of Psychoactive DrugsJuly 3, 2026Miguel Joaquim Soares Teles Couceiro, Victor José da Conceição Teixeira Amorim Rodrigues, Nuno Manuel Correia Torres
This case study explores the potential role of mystical-type experiences in ketamine-assisted psychotherapy (KAP). A patient with generalized anxiety disorder and migraines underwent four intramuscular KAP sessions (0.5-0.9 mg/kg). Outcomes were assessed using the Outcome Questionnaire-45 (OQ-45), the Hood Mysticism Scale (HMS), and interviews. Greater therapeutic gains followed sessions with...
Mystical experience in Rumi is compared to the directness of sight. It is not just about words. It is about knowing the Beloved. It is also compared to smelling a delightful aroma, and its interior or ‘heart’ aspect is emphasised. The Sufi’s pilgrimage is not merely an external destination but a journey inwards. It is there that God is found. In the Mathnawi , at least, he does not completely...
This opening chapter considers the nature of mysticism and asks whether it is, at base, the same, whatever its religious and cultural varieties, or whether there are different kinds of mystical experience which are distinct and different from one another. In this respect views on both sides are discussed, but there is a preference for Western, Muslim and Eastern Christian scholars who...
This article investigates the theoretical foundations of fractality as a cross-disciplinary concept bridging philosophy, aesthetics, and cognitive science. The primary aim is to explore how fractal models originally developed in mathematics by Benoît Mandelbrot can illuminate the structure of thought, consciousness, and cultural texts. Fractality is understood not only as a geometric property...
This study investigates how mystical experiences are articulated in digital environments, especially in religion-focused communities (“subreddits”) on Reddit, a popular social media platform. Classical theorists like William James argued that mystical experiences resist linguistic expression; in other words, according to the traditional scholarly view, these phenomena are inherently...
This study investigates the role of mythical narrative structure in constructing Sufi concepts through a literary analysis of selected Sufi stories. Focusing on four short narratives associated with early Sufi figures—Ibrahim ibn Adham, Shaqiq al-Balkhi, Sahl al-Tusturi, and Ibn Manazil—the research examines how language, symbolism, and narrative discourse contribute to the formation and...
Sufism, as a tradition of Islamic mysticism, places the human spiritual journey at the core of the divine quest. This article focuses on the experience of Baqa, the continuity of consciousness after the annihilation of the Fana self. As a phenomenon that can be analyzed through Husserl's Epoche method, which suspends empirical worldly assumptions to reveal the pure structure of consciousness....