A July 1963 Time magazine review of an expanded edition published that year ends with quotes about the book from Peirce and Santayana:

In 1913 Josiah Royce wrote a paper on George Fox which he described as "a fragmentary contribution to that study of the "Varieties of Religious Experience" which William James has so significantly brought to the attention of students of human nature". Royce described James' book as one which "with all its wealth of illustration, and in its courageous enterprise, has a certain classic beauty". He further considered the book to be reflective of "the manifoldness and of the breadth of the general psychological movement itself".

In 1986, Nicholas Lash criticised James's Varieties, challenging James's separation of the personal and institutional. Lash argues that religious geniuses such as St. Paul or Jesus, with whom James was particularly interested, did not have their religious experiences in isolation but within and influenced by a social and historical context. Ultimately, Lash argues that this comes from James's failure to overcome Cartesian dualism in his thought: while James believed he had succeeded in surpassing Descartes, he was still tied to a notion of an internal ego, distinct from the body or outside world, which undergoes experiences.

The book was cherished by Ludwig Wittgenstein who wrote to Bertrand Russell that "Whenever I have time now I read James’ Varieties of Religious Exp[erience]. This book does me a lot of good". It was one of the few books he recommended to his friend Maurice O'Connor Drury. The influence of James' book is seen from letters sent to him from his sister Hermione as he was serving at the front during World War 1. She was concerned about his well-being and wrote to him that "there will be time for you to be a Jamesian type after the war is over!". Brian McGuinness writes that Wittgenstein aspired to be the 'saintly' type described in the book.

In more recent years the book has continued to be positively reviewed. In 1951 William A. Christian called the book "still one of the best books on the psychological variables in the domain of religion" and in 1995 Stephen H. Webb remarked that "James is perhaps most read today for his sensitive descriptions of the bewildering diversity of religious forms".

The book has been described as philosophical, as opposed to merely psychological. Michael Hodges writes that James's book is "addressed to a philosophical audience" and in 1979 Gary T. Alexander wrote that the book is "seldom used in any substantive manner by current psychologists of religion, who, although often lauding the work as a creation of genius, tend to view it as primarily philosophical in nature".

See also

  • Cosmic Consciousness
  • Fideism
  • Mysticism
  • Religious experience

References

  • Internet Archive listings for Varieties of Religious Experience