Researching the vertical dimension of life

Jonas Atlas in conversation with Jeffrey Kripal

Researching themes like spirituality and religion leads to particular conundrums. One of them is the fact that any discussion about religion is always framed within a particular worldview and thus, inevitably, always also brings along its own religious presuppositions. In this respect, it seems fair to say that the American view of religion started dominating the public debates about religion. For example, a concept like “being spiritual but not religious” is often discussed as if it has universal validity, even though it is strongly connected to the historical dynamics behind Transcendentalism, Theosophy and New Thought. So can we truly apply such concepts when talking about other religious traditions? And should we not be more aware of the history behind them and the specific approach they entail?

To discuss such questions I sat down with professor Jeffrey Kripal, who teaches at the department of religion at Rice University in Houston Texas and who is well known for his interesting writings on mysticism, esotericism and the paranormal.

We started our conversation with a reflection on Ramakrishna and how he does or does not fit contemporary categories of the study of religion, which led us into a discussion on how the ideas of transcendentalism found their way into academia; why those ideas arose specifically in the US at the end of the 18th century; how the comparative study of religions later on became strongly influenced by the counterculture and ecstatic psychedelic experiences; why it nonetheless remains difficult to seriously discuss the vertical dimension of life within academia; and what the future might hold in this respect considering the current approaches toward spirituality.

This podcast conversation is available in all major podcastapps. Those without a podcastapp, can listen here.