What is the numinous?
What is the numinous? It cannot be described externally or objectively, but can only be approached through the emotions it provokes in us. Throughout The Idea of the Holy, Otto offers a variety of expressions (most of them in Latin) to give us a better idea about what the numinous is. Readers of this book should not expect a dry, impassioned text: the work is just as fervent as its subject matter, and Otto warns us that it was written for readers who either have already had a religious experience, or can at least sympathize with it. The numinous is the mysterium tremendum: a mystery that startles and shocks us as we experience the ganz andere (the wholly other). Otto contends that this primordial terror gave birth to the belief in gods, daemons, angels and spirits, and it also served as the inspiration of fables and myths: these aspects are all projections of a primary and ineffable experience. The theme of the wrath of God is closely linked to this mysterium tremendum. Experiencing th
