| This dissertation draws upon theories in both religious and psychological studies as a context within which to carry out an empirical study of the relationship between creativity and religious experience. A survey of literature in history and phenomenology of religion, process thought, American pragmatism, object relations theory, and humanistic and social psychology reveals various ways scholars have construed a relationship between creativity and religious experience. This dissertation takes on the previously neglected project of examining these different theories in conjunction with one another and empirically testing the purported relationship.; Three hundred and fifty-eight participants completed five creativity scales used to assess motivational, personality, and biographical characteristics of personal creativity (The Work Preference Inventory, How Do You Think?, The Preference Inventory, The Imagination Tutoring Scale, and Sample of Creative Activities ) and two scales on religious experience (The Mysticism Scale , and The Perceiving Sacredness in Life Scale).; The hypotheses were that the different aspects of creativity would positively correlate with one another, that the two types of religious experience would positively correlate with each other, and that each of the creativity scales would correlate positively with each of the religious experience scales. All three hypotheses were supported. Positive significant correlations were found between all of the creativity scales, between the two religious experience scales, and between each creativity scale and the two religious experience scales. Creativity correlated more strongly with mystical experience than with perceiving sacredness—the highest correlation being between participating in creative activities and introvertive mysticism. Correlations between creativity and religious experience were generally higher for participants with panentheistic views of God than those with theistic views. Creativity and religious experience correlated most strongly with aspects of personal, as opposed to institutional, religious commitment. Complementary explanations for these relationships were found in the religious and psychological theories explored.; The results of this study can serve to ground religious experience by connecting it with, though not reducing it to, other human experiences, and to highlight, without supernaturalizing, the sacred dimension of creativity. Heeding this relationship could open new ways of accessing the divine and new ways of encouraging and understanding creativity. |
