Buddhist Romanticism

psychology of religion: religion as a this-worldly phenomenon serving thisworldly
needs and values. The Romantics, of course, would have
recognized their own view in this part of James’ legacy, even though he
himself had not intended to leave this particular legacy behind.
Thus, when gauging James as a transmitter of Romantic religion, we
have to look at the ways in which he voluntarily and involuntarily acted in
that role.
We have already noted some of the voluntary assumptions that he
shared with the Romantics:
• the mind is not only passive, but also active in shaping its awareness
of its environment,
• there is a single religious experience, marked by a strong feeling of
inner and outer unity,
• this feeling of unity comes after a mental state of surrender or open
receptivity,
• this feeling of unity helps to heal the basic spiritual illness, which is a
sense of division within the psyche,
• this experience is immanent because the human organism can know
only conditioned realities,
• the fact that this experience is immanent further means that it does not
heal the psyche once and for all, so that religious life is one of pursuing but
never fully achieving full psychological health,
• no single religious interpretation of this experience is authoritative,
• all religions should thus be tolerated to the extent that they foster a
healthy religious experience, and are tolerant of other religions,
• all religions should change to keep up with other changes in culture
and society, and
• there is much to learn from studying religions from the point of view
of the experience from which they grew.
By divorcing these values from their original worldview and
transmitting them as part of the field of psychology, James did a great deal
to keep Romantic religion alive and respectable into the 20th and 21st
centuries.
James’ involuntary contribution to the survival of Romantic religion
related to the issue of morality. On the one hand, he rejected the Romantic
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