Knowledge, philosophy and mystics
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.26512/2358-82842019e28869Keywords:
mystical experiences; knowledge; William Payne Alston.Abstract
This paper aims to defend the possibility that Christian mystical experiences are a source of knowledge, based on the epistemology of William Payne Alston (1921-2009). Departing from the concept of knowledge as “true justified belief” and, in the spirit of the contemporary epistemological pluralism, one seeks to weaken that concept through broad conceptions of truth and epistemic justification. Both conceptions are built on some interpretations of the alstonian approaches of alethic realism and doxastic practices. Some reports of mystical experiences are presented in order to clarify the above-mentioned concepts. This paper concludes that the more the beliefs produced by the Christian mystical doxastic practice are epistemically justified, the more they will tend to count as knowledge. This means that this practice will have to fulfill the following criteria: 1) psycho-social rootedness; 2) internal and external coherence; and 3) significant self-support.
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