Abstract

Mysticism has traditionally been the enemy of the sciences, and the closer that philosophy allies itself with the sciences, the greater the philosophical tendency has been to attack mysticism as a possible avenue towards knowledge and/or understanding. Science and (modern) philosophy generally aim for full epistemic disclosure, and, conversely, mysticism either aims at the regulation of esoteric knowledge, or claims such knowledge to be untransferable. Thus the mystic is contemporarily seen by philosophers as a variety of 'private language' speaker, although the plausibility of such a position is seemingly foreclosed by Wittgenstein's work in the Philosophical Investigations . I reexamine Wittgenstein's conclusion on the matter of private language, and argue that so-called 'ineffable' experience, far from being a 'beetle in a box', can play a viable role in our public language-games, via renewed efforts at articulation. I claim, further, that there is nothing which must a priori (conceptually) remain unsaid.