Thanks so much for your response! I was wondering if anyone had any thoughts on this....
As much as I would love to think it was A&P, the fact that I've been able to repeat the experience at will (unless one can do that with A&P???) and that it's never been accompanied with visions of light make me think it had to be the first jhana. I had what I believe was an A&P experience (at least a minor one) more recently and it felt completely different. That said, there's a lot in the descriptions of A&P that seem to fit that first experience... How confusing. I seem to remember that you mention that there are a lot of similarities between the samatha and vipassana jhanas in your book. It figures that most meditative traditions wouldn't distinguish between the two types of experience if they're really this similar.
I have been reading St. John of the Cross (thanks to your mention of it in your book) and St. Teresa's works and have found them very fascinating and helpful.
There are two reasons I feel compelled to investigate this particular context:
1. I was raised Catholic for the first 12 years of my life, and I was really into it, so even though I was an atheist for the next 15 years of my life, my mind is nonetheless deeply imprinted with the idea (and experience) of God. I figure that the reason my first jhana (or A&P) experience involved the notion of God (rather than the universe or something) is due to that imprinting. So basically, I'm thinking, why not continue making use of what's already there rather than constructing a whole new context (i.e. through noting practice). My theory is that doing so might make subsequent spiritual experiences and attainments easier than otherwise. I suppose that's a lazy shortcut, but heck, if the result is the same, why not take it???
2. Frankly, I find insight meditation really dry, irritating, and boring compared to meditating on the glory and grandeur, or even just the stillness, of God. Okay, so this is clearly making me seem even lazier than the above paragraph does and probably does nothing but prove what a jhana junkie I am (which I do not deny), and I realize that insight meditation can often be difficult and irritating, and that I just need to sit with it, and sometimes I do, but basically, my thinking is (as in the above paragraph), if there's a method to attaining nirvana that feels more fulfilling to me (and could be more effective for me, to boot), why not do it that way?
So basically, I asked my initial question because I had learned the progress of insight within a Buddhist context, and and was wondering how God fit into the picture, since the experiences of God and insight seem completely unrelated (e.g. what do vibrations and higher perceptual thresholds have to do with God??). Since posting this question, I've read more of St. John of the Cross, which has started to answer it for me, but I'm still not totally clear on how the two contexts overlap because they feel so different to me.
Thanks for any feedback on this.