ENCOUNTERING THE ULTIMATE IN THE BHAGAVAD GITA: AN EXPERIENCE OF PRATYABHIJÑ (RECOGNITION)

Key Word: Hinduism; religious experience; constructivism; William Alston; John Hick; Alfred North Whitehead; Kashmiri Śaivism; Bhagavad Gita; Vaiavism; Vedanta

Is religious experience necessarily the product of one specific tradition? The constructivist approach to religious experience which prevails in the contemporary academy certainly suggests that this is the case. But is this not at odds with the idea of an ultimate reality that exists objectively and independently of what any given group of human beings may think about it? This paper argues that the phenomenon of religious conversion militates against the constructivist account.

Jeffery D. Long      The Author is from School of Social Sciences and Languages, VIT University, Tamilnadu, India