RT Article
T1 Seemings, Virtue, and Acquired Contemplation
JF Philosophia Christi
VO 25
IS 2
SP 297
OP 316
A1 Duttweiler, Thomas
LA English
YR 2023
UL https://ixtheo.de/Record/1883175925
AB Sarah Coakley, drawing on the insights of John of the Cross, has recently argued that God may have redemptive moral and epistemic purposes in remaining hidden from people during a "dark night of the soul," and that experiences of spiritual darkness can be taken as a mode of religious experience. In this paper, I explore what sort of epistemic model of religious experience is needed to underwrite Coakley's argument. I argue that one influential externalist model - that of William Alston - is unsatisfactory, and advance in its place an internalist, phenomenal conservative approach bolstered by considerations from responsibilist virtue epistemology. I argue that such an approach can much more satisfactorily accommodate contemplative experiences than can that of Alston and thus can buttress Coakley's response to the problem of divine hiddenness.
DO 10.5840/pc202325228