B9 hummingbird hovering (talk | contribs) →What is nondual exactly?: Loy (1988: p.3) contrasts his view of the historicity of nonduality in its evocations, The East and The West, as follows: |
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Pritscher (2001: p.16) attributes a salient view on nondual realization to [[David Loy|Loy]] (b.1947), an author of a groundbreaking work on comparative philosophy of nondual theologies i.e. Loy (1988)<ref>Loy, David (1988). ''Nonduality: A Study in Comparative Philosophy'', New Haven, Conn: Yale University Press.</ref>: <blockquote>"According to David Loy, when you realize that the nature of your mind and the [U]niverse are nondual, you are enlightened."<ref>Pritscher, Conrad P. (2001). ''Quantum learning beyond duality''. Volume 113 of Value inquiry book series. Rodopi. ISBN 9042013877, 9789042013872. Source: [http://books.google.com.au/books?id=1-McfrykKkoC&pg=PA17&dq=zen+nondual&hl=en&ei=KeHQS-2tCIqTkAX437SJDA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CDkQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=zen%20nondual&f=false] (accessed: Friday April 23, 2010), p.16</ref></blockquote> |
Pritscher (2001: p.16) attributes a salient view on nondual realization to [[David Loy|Loy]] (b.1947), an author of a groundbreaking work on comparative philosophy of nondual theologies i.e. Loy (1988)<ref>Loy, David (1988). ''Nonduality: A Study in Comparative Philosophy'', New Haven, Conn: Yale University Press.</ref>: <blockquote>"According to David Loy, when you realize that the nature of your mind and the [U]niverse are nondual, you are enlightened."<ref>Pritscher, Conrad P. (2001). ''Quantum learning beyond duality''. Volume 113 of Value inquiry book series. Rodopi. ISBN 9042013877, 9789042013872. Source: [http://books.google.com.au/books?id=1-McfrykKkoC&pg=PA17&dq=zen+nondual&hl=en&ei=KeHQS-2tCIqTkAX437SJDA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CDkQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=zen%20nondual&f=false] (accessed: Friday April 23, 2010), p.16</ref></blockquote> |
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Loy (1988: p.3) contrasts his view of the historicity of nonduality in some of its evocations in the experience of the peoples of [[The East]] and [[The West]] |
Loy (1988: p.3) contrasts his view of the historicity of nonduality in some of its evocations in the experience of the peoples of [[The East]] and [[The West]] as follows: |
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<blockquote>"...[the seed of nonduality] however often sown, has never found fertile soil [in the West], because it has been too antithetical to those other vigorous sprouts that have grown into modern science and technology. In the Eastern tradition...we encounter a different situation. There the seeds of seer-seen nonduality not only sprouted but matured into a variety (some might say a jungle) of impressive philosophical species. By no means do all these [Eastern] systems assert the nonduality of subject and object, but it is significant that three which do - Buddhism, Vedanta and Taoism - have probably been the most influential."<ref>Loy, David (1988). ''Nonduality: A Study in Comparative Philosophy'', New Haven, Conn: Yale University Press, p.3</ref></blockquote> |
<blockquote>"...[the seed of nonduality] however often sown, has never found fertile soil [in the West], because it has been too antithetical to those other vigorous sprouts that have grown into modern science and technology. In the Eastern tradition...we encounter a different situation. There the seeds of seer-seen nonduality not only sprouted but matured into a variety (some might say a jungle) of impressive philosophical species. By no means do all these [Eastern] systems assert the nonduality of subject and object, but it is significant that three which do - Buddhism, Vedanta and Taoism - have probably been the most influential."<ref>Loy, David (1988). ''Nonduality: A Study in Comparative Philosophy'', New Haven, Conn: Yale University Press, p.3</ref></blockquote> |
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Revision as of 16:07, 1 May 2010
Nondualism is the implication that things appear distinct while not being separate. The word's origin is the Latin duo meaning "two". The term can refer to a belief, condition, theory, practice, or quality.
What is nondual exactly?
Pritscher (2001: p.16) attributes a salient view on nondual realization to Loy (b.1947), an author of a groundbreaking work on comparative philosophy of nondual theologies i.e. Loy (1988)[1]:
"According to David Loy, when you realize that the nature of your mind and the [U]niverse are nondual, you are enlightened."[2]
Loy (1988: p.3) contrasts his view of the historicity of nonduality in some of its evocations in the experience of the peoples of The East and The West as follows:
"...[the seed of nonduality] however often sown, has never found fertile soil [in the West], because it has been too antithetical to those other vigorous sprouts that have grown into modern science and technology. In the Eastern tradition...we encounter a different situation. There the seeds of seer-seen nonduality not only sprouted but matured into a variety (some might say a jungle) of impressive philosophical species. By no means do all these [Eastern] systems assert the nonduality of subject and object, but it is significant that three which do - Buddhism, Vedanta and Taoism - have probably been the most influential."[3]
Nondualism may be viewed as the understanding or belief that dualism or dichotomy are illusory phenomena. Examples of dualisms include self/other, mind/body, male/female, good/evil, active/passive, and many others. It is accessible as a belief, theory, condition, as part of a tradition, as a practice, or as the quality of union with reality.
A nondual philosophical or religious perspective or theory maintains that there is no fundamental distinction between mind and matter, or that the entire phenomenological world is a unified whole (with reality being described variously as the Void, the Is, Emptiness, the mind of God, and Atman or Brahman in Hinduism). Nontheism provides related conceptual and philosophical information. A nondual perspective does not contend that the phenomenological world is an illusion but rather that our divided or dualistic view of the phenomenological world can be an illusion.
Many traditions (generally originating in Asia) state that the true condition or nature of reality is nondualistic, and that strict conceptual dichotomies are either unreal projections of a contracted, unenlightened mind or (at best) inaccurate conveniences. The American philosopher William James saw nondualism as the culmination of the British Empirical tradition, and coined a word for it, sciousness, or consciousness without consciousness of self. But few of his contemporaries accepted his premise that nondualism was prime reality. While attitudes towards the experience of duality and self may vary, nondual traditions converge on the view that the damaged or contracted ego, or sense of personal separateness, is ultimately said to be an illusion. As such many nondual traditions have significant overlap with mysticism.
Nondualism may also be viewed as a practice, namely the practice of self-inquiry into one's own being as set forth by Ramana Maharshi, which is intended to lead a person to realize the nondual nature of existence.
Nondualism can refer to one of two types of quality.[citation needed] One is the quality of union with reality, God, the Absolute. This quality is knowable and can be gained spontaneously and via practice of inquiry. A second quality is absolute by nature, or to put it in words, "conceptual absence of 'neither Yes nor No'," as Wei Wu Wei wrote. This latter quality is beyond the quality of union. It may be viewed as unknowable.
Accessibility is not relevant to the second quality mentioned in the paragraph above, since, according to that quality, an essential part of its gaining includes the realisation that the entire apparent existence of the individual who would gain access to understanding nondualism is in fact merely illusional. Achieving the second of these qualities therefore implies the extinguishing of the ego-sense that was seeking it:
- "What is the significance of the statement 'No one can get enlightenment"? ... Enlightenment is the annihilation of the 'one' who 'wants' enlightenment. If there is enlightenment ... it means that the 'one' [ie individual ego] who had earlier wanted enlightenment has been annihilated. So no 'one' can achieve enlightenment, and therefore no 'one' can enjoy enlightenment. [...] if you get [a] million dollars then there will be someone [an ego-sense] to enjoy that million dollars. But if you go after enlightenment and enlightenment happens, there will be no 'one' [ie, no individual ego-sense] to enjoy enlightenment." [4] (note) The enjoyment of both these examples is the event that transforms/annihilates the 'one' who 'existed' before the event.
Others feel the non-attainable enlightenment contradiction is an empty argument though. This is given as the fact that the self is in a state of constant flux or change, e.g. Mindstream doctrine and is so never the same from one moment to the next.
Nondualism versus monism
The philosophical concept of monism is similar to nondualism. Indeed, the terms are used as congruent by many scholars. Some forms of monism hold that all phenomena are actually of the same substance. Other forms of monism including attributive monism and idealism are similar concepts to nondualism. Nondualism proper holds that different phenomena are inseparable or that there is no hard line between them, but not that they are the same. The distinction between these two types of views is considered critical in Zen, Madhyamika, and Dzogchen, all of which are nondualisms proper. Some later philosophical approaches also attempt to undermine traditional dichotomies, with the view they are fundamentally invalid or inaccurate. For example, one typical form of deconstruction is the critique of binary oppositions within a text while problematization questions the context or situation in which concepts such as dualisms occur.
Nondualism versus solipsism
Nondualism superficially resembles solipsism, but from a nondual perspective solipsism mistakenly fails to consider subjectivity itself. Upon careful examination of the referent of "I," i.e. one's status as a separate observer of the perceptual field, one finds that one must be in as much doubt about it, too, as solipsists are about the existence of other minds and the rest of "the external world." (One way to see this is to consider that, due to the conundrum posed by one's own subjectivity becoming a perceptual object to itself, there is no way to validate one's "self-existence" except through the eyes of others—the independent existence of which is already solipsistically suspect!) Nondualism ultimately suggests that the referent of "I" is in fact an artificial construct (merely the border separating "inner" from "outer," in a sense), the transcendence of which constitutes enlightenment.
Nondual awareness
Craig, et.al. (1998: p.476) convey a 'stream of consciousness' or 'mindstream' as a procession of mote events of consciousness (C) with algebraic notation C1, C2 and C3 thus to demonstrate the immediacy of nondual awareness:
That nondual awareness is the only possible self-awareness is defended by a reductio argument. If a further awareness C2, having C1 as content, is required for self-awareness, then since there would be no awareness of C2 without awareness C3, ad infinitum, there could be no self-awareness, that is, unless the self is to be understood as limited to past awareness only. For self-awareness to be an immediate awareness, self-awareness has to be nondual.[5]
To the Nondualist, reality is ultimately neither physical nor mental. Instead, it is an ineffable state or realization. This ultimate reality can be called "Spirit" (Sri Aurobindo), "Brahman" (Shankara), "God", "Shunyata" (Emptiness), "The One" (Plotinus), "The Self" (Ramana Maharshi), "The Dao" (Lao Zi), "The Absolute" (Schelling) or simply "The Nondual" (F. H. Bradley). Ram Dass calls it the "third plane"—any phrase will be insufficient, he maintains, so any phrase will do. The theory of Sri Aurobindo has been described as Integral advaita.
Nisargadatta (1897 – 1981) is reported by Powell (1994, 2006: p.97) stating thus:
...When a stage is reached that one feels deeply that whatever is being done is happening and one has not got anything to do with it, then it becomes such a deep conviction that whatever is happening is not happening really. And that whatever seems to be happening is also an illusion. That may be final. In other words, totally apart from whatever seems to be happening, when one stops thinking that one is living, and gets the feeling that one is being lived, that whatever one is doing one is not doing but one is made to do, then that is a sort of criterion.[6]
Nondual religious and spiritual traditions and teachings
Advaita
![](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e0/Ramana_3_sw.jpg/220px-Ramana_3_sw.jpg)
Advaita (Sanskrit a, not; dvaita, dual) is a nondual tradition from India, with Advaita Vedanta, a branch of Hinduism, as its philosophical arm. Advaita may be rendered in English as 'nondual', 'not-two' or 'peerless' and though there are monist themes in the most recent sections of the ancient Rig Veda (Mandala 1 and Mandala 10), that is, the sections that were finalized or interpolated last; nonduality finds its first sophisticated exposition in the "Tat Tvam Asi" of the venerable Chandogya Upanishad (6.8.7)[7], an upanishad favoured by subsequent proponents of Advaita Vedanta. Gauḍapāda (c.600 CE) furthered this philosophical theory that was later consolidated by Sri Adi Shankaracharya in the 8th century CE. Most smarthas are adherents to this theory of nonduality. Further to this, Craig, et.al. (1998: p.476) hold that the nonduality of the Advaita Vedantins is of the identity of Brahman and the Atman where the identity is "objectless consciousness, as awareness nondualistically self-aware":
Advaita Vedānta is a scripturally derived philosophy centred on the proposition, first found in early Upaniṣads (800-300 BC), that Brahman - the Absolute, the supreme reality - and the self (ātman) are identical. The identity is understood as an objectless consciousness, as awareness nondualistically self-aware. Arguments in support of the view that nondual awareness is the sole reality are developed by classical and modern Advaitins, from Gauḍapāda (c.600 AD) and Śaṅkara (c.700 AD), in hundreds of texts. Some of these are suggested in Upaniṣads.[8]
Buddhism
Though popular discourse both etic and emic as well as the discourse of scholarship with which it intersects, employ the term "Buddhism" for the Buddhadharma (and often employ the term uncritically), it is salient to be mindful that the Buddhadharma is not a monolithic tradition[9] but a continuum of a number of sub-traditions and praxis-lineages (or sadhana-lineages), many of which tout a number of nondualities proper in various sub-traditions and 'vehicles' (Sanskrit: yana); refer Wallace (2007: pp.106-107).[10]
Nonduality as coincidence or interpenetration of Shunyata (Openness) and Prajna (Wisdom)
Huntington & Wangchen (1995: p.119) hold where 'emptiness' is a gloss of Shunyata (Sanskrit) and 'wisdom' is a gloss of Prajna (Sanskrit):
With the actualization of emptiness, manifest in wisdom as an effect, the bodhisattva gains access to the nondualistic knowledge of a buddha. It may be that this concept seems particularly abstruse because it is associated not so much with a way of knowing as with a way of being, for we have seen the justification underlying claims to knowledge of this type is necessarily immersed in a certain form of life...a kind of nondualistic knowledge is present wherever a particular epistemic act is embedded in an intuitive awareness of the unique context through which two apparently discrete phenomena are intimately related, as is usually the case, for example, when we speak of a cause and its effect.[11]
Further to the coincidence or nonduality of Shunyata and Prajna within the 'Pure-and-perfect-Mind' (Wylie: byang chub sems[12]; Sanskrit: Bodhicitta), Günther & Trungpa (1975: p.30) state that:
We cannot predicate anything of prajna except to say that when it is properly prajna it must be as open as that which it perceives. In this sense we might say that subjective and objective poles, (prajna and shunyata) coincide. With this understanding, rather than saying that prajna is shunyata, we can try to describe the experience by saying that it has gone beyond the dualism of subject and object.[13]
Buddhism general
All schools of Buddhism teach No-Self (Pali anatta, Sanskrit anatman). Non-Self in Buddhism is the Non-Duality of Subject and Object, which is very explicitly stated by the Buddha in verses such as “In seeing, there is just seeing. No seer and nothing seen. In hearing, there is just hearing. No hearer and nothing heard.” (Bahiya Sutta, Udana 1.10). Non-Duality in Buddhism does not constitute merging with a supreme Brahman, but realising that the duality of a self/subject/agent/watcher/doer in relation to the object/world is an illusion.[14]
Within the Mahayana presentation, the two truths may also refer to specific perceived phenomenon instead of categorizing teachings. Conventional truths would be the appearances of mistaken awareness - the awareness itself when mistaken - together with the objects that appear to it or alternatively put the appearance that includes a duality of apprehender and apprehended and objects perceived within that. Ultimate truths, then, are phenomenon free from the duality of apprehender and apprehended.[15]
In the Mahayana Buddhist canon, the Diamond Sutra presents an accessible nondual view of "self" and "beings", while the Heart Sutra asserts shunyata — the "emptiness" of all "form" and simultaneously the "form" of all "emptiness". The Lotus Sutra's parable of the Burning House implies that all talk of Duality or Non-Duality by Buddhas and Bodhisattvas is merely Skillful Means (Sanskrit upaya kausala) meant to lead the deluded to a much higher truth. The fullest philosophical exposition is the Madhyamaka; by contrast many laconic pronouncements are delivered as koans. Advanced views and practices are found in the Mahamudra and Maha Ati, which emphasize the vividness and spaciousness of nondual awareness.
Mahayana Buddhism, in particular, tempers the view of nonduality (wisdom) with respect for the experience of duality (compassion) — ordinary dualistic experience, populated with selves and others (sentient beings), is tended with care, always "now". This approach is itself regarded as a means to disperse the confusions of duality (i.e. as a path). In Theravada, that respect is expressed cautiously as non-harming, while in the Vajrayana, it is expressed boldly as enjoyment (especially in tantra).
Sung-bae Park (1983: p. 147) identifies essence-function as an East Asian Buddhist strategy to convey nonduality:
Since the t'i-yung or "essence-function" construction is originally used by East Asian Buddhists to show a non-dualistic and non-discriminate nature in their enlightenment experience, it should not exclude any other frameworks such as neng-so or "subject-object" constructions. Nevertheless the essence-function construction must be distinguished from the subject-object construction from a scholastic perspective because the two are completely different from each other in terms of their way of thinking.[16]
Vajrayana
Yab-yum
![](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/11/Chakrasamvara_Vajravarahi.jpg/220px-Chakrasamvara_Vajravarahi.jpg)
Gross (2009: p.207) a leading Feminist theologian identifies the nondual import of yab-yum iconography where His ever-so-skillful 'method' (upaya) really enjoys Her ever-so-spacious 'wisdom' (prajna), a wisdom where wisdom-in-reciprocity enjoys method; where His-Her enjoining is coincident in 'great bliss' (mahasukha):
...a vital point must be made, especially given that the yab-yum image is always said to be an image in which the partners are in sexual union...[t]hough it may seem paradoxical and difficult to understand, this image, nevertheless, is not literally about sex, as in sexual intercourse. It is about nonduality, which is visually represented by the yab-yum icon.[17]
Indigenous Americans: a story of nondual gender and nondual biological sexual designation
Burrus & Keller (2006: p.71-72) in their work of transdisciplinary theological colloquia, convey the casestudies of Indigenous Americans which sing-a-song of nondual gender and nondual biological sexual designation and the natural spectrum of possibility:
However objective it may seem, even the scientific framework for defining the "two sexes" is a cultural construction. As Judith Butler has shown, the dominant American ideology of the body affirms the existence of two sexes, two genders, and two basic sexualities that are treated as naturally distinct. But biological sex is not ideologically independent of the other terms; our culture defines our genetics, object-oriented genital joining, and other gender practices in binary fashion in order to identify us dualistically as either male/masculine or female/feminine (where "normal" males and females are heterosexual). Violations of these norms are deemed unnatural. So doctors have tended to define genetic sex dualistically, as XX or XY, and to label violations of the genetic dualism (such as XXY and XO people), including "mismatches" between genetics, hormones, and appearance, as "diseased." But as Anne Fausto-Sterling describes, there is a spectrum of such deviations, naturally occurring bodies with non-dual genital combinations and diverse physicals expressions. Hidden among the males and females living in America are so-called "true hermaphrodites," who possess both ova and testes, "genetically male" (XY) people with Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome who look like and are usually raised as women, "genotypically female" (XX) children whose genitalia are virilized at puberty, and "genotypically male" (XY) children who are anatomically female or androgynous at birth but at puberty develop testes, a fused scrotum, and secondary male sex characteristics.[18]
Though the inclusion of nondual bodies, genders and sexual designations and other biological florescence, are by definition qualified for inclusion in this article and such inclusion is rarefied, especially when understood as as embodying a syncretic and wholistic ideal, a "a one-sex/body, multi-gender model that reflected ancient gender norms" and which is metaphorically apt in many spiritual nondual traditions as Burrus & Keller (2006: p.71) state:
...the dominant ideology of the body in the premodern West was a one-sex/body, multi-gender model that reflected ancient gender norms for the distribution of power. Only with the rise of Western medicine and genetics has sex been conceived as dual and ontologically stable--male and female.[19]
![](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c5/Catlin_-_Dance_to_the_berdache.jpg/220px-Catlin_-_Dance_to_the_berdache.jpg)
Burrus & Keller (2006: p.73) further to the greater cultural context of mainland America and the diverse two-spirit cultures of the Indigenous American peoples, convey the spiritual view of the Diné or Navajo peoples in relation to the ideal that "all humans were spiritually androgynous":
...eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Navajo had a three-sex, multigender system that included the nádleehí, a "two-spirit" (bi-gender) person who had one of three anatomical birth-sexes (male, female, or androgynous), but was identified by a combination of masculine and feminine gender-attributes. Because Native Americans typically thought birth sex matured over time and defined gender primarily based on work preference, "two-spirit" people included non-dually sexed persons; born-males who adopted women's work, manners, and speech patterns; born-females who took up men's work and mannerisms; or those born either male or female who combined elements of women and men's cultural roles. Finally, the Navajo did not denounce the nádleehí as unnatural because gender or sex practices did not fit an individual's birth-sex; rather, they thought that all humans were spiritually androgynous, so they treated the nádleehí as a special but natural gender.[20]
Dzogchen
Introduction
Dzogchen is a relatively esoteric (to date) tradition concerned with the "natural state", and emphasizing direct experience. This tradition is found in the Nyingma tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, where it is classified as the highest of this lineage's nine yanas, or vehicles of practice. Similar teachings are also found in the non-Buddhist Bön tradition, where it is also given the nomenclature "Dzogchen" and in one evocation the ninth in a nine vehicle system. The nine vehicles in both the Bonpo and Buddhadharma traditions are different but they mutially inform. In Dzogchen, for both the Bonpo and Nyingmapa, the primordial state, the state of nondual awareness, is called rigpa.
The Dzogchen practitioner realizes that appearance and emptiness are inseparable. One must transcend dualistic thoughts to perceive the true nature of one's pure mind. This primordial nature is clear light, unproduced and unchanging, free from all defilements. One's ordinary mind is caught up in dualistic conceptions, but the pure mind is unafflicted by delusions. Through meditation, the Dzogchen practitioner experiences that thoughts have no substance. Mental phenomena arise and fall in the mind, but fundamentally they are empty. The practitioner then considers where the mind itself resides. The mind can not exist in the ever-changing external phenomena and through careful examination one realizes that the mind is emptiness. All dualistic conceptions disappear with this understanding.[21]
Ground-of-Being
'Ground [of Being]' (Tibetan: གཞི, Wylie: gzhi)[22] (pronounced: zhi) is an essential cultural token of the Dzogchen tradition of both the Bonpo[23] and the Nyingmapa.[24] It is a seminal conceptual point and focus of praxis foregrounded in the Dzogchen literature (particularly the Seventeen Tantras) and sadhana (Sanskrit) lineages and may be apprised as a memetic conduit for the continuum[-of-being] to enter into the concept-less Dzogchen nondual 'awareness', 'rigpa' (Wylie: rig pa; IAST: vidyā)[25], Dzogchen-as-process where the praxis albeit 'natural' (Wylie: lhan skyes; IAST: sahaja)[26] and 'effortless' (Wylie: lhun grub; IAST: anābhoga)[27] has the sense of 'spontaneity'.[28][29] The Gankyil is the polysemic teaching tool employed in the Dzogchen tradition to iconographically signify the triune of the Ground, a symbol of primordial nonduality.
![](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/9b/Sam_Taeguk.jpg/180px-Sam_Taeguk.jpg)
Bonpo Dzogchen
Svabhava (Sanskrit; Wylie: rang bzhin) is very important in the nontheistic theology of the Bonpo Dzogchen 'Great Perfection' tradition where it is part of a technical language to render macrocosm and microcosm into nonduality, as Rossi (1999: p.58) states:
"The View of the Great Perfection further acknowledges the ontological identity of the macrocosmic and microcosmic realities through the threefold axiom of Condition (ngang), Ultimate Nature (rang bzhin) and Identity (bdag nyid). The Condition (ngang) is the Basis of all (kun gzhi)--primordially pure (ka dag) and not generated by primary and instrumental causes. It is the origin of all phenomena. The Ultimate Nature (rang bzhin) is said to be unaltered (ma bcos pa), because the Basis [gzhi] is spontaneously accomplished (lhun grub) in terms of its innate potential (rtsal) for manifestation (rol pa). The non-duality between the Ultimate Nature (i.e., the unaltered appearance of all phenomena) and the Condition (i.e., the Basis of all [kun gzhi]) is called the Identity (bdag nyid). This unicum of primordial purity (ka dag) and spontaneous accomplishment (lhun grub) is the Way of Being (gnas lugs) of the Pure-and-Perfect-Mind [byang chub (kyi) sems]."[30]
Zen
Zen is a non-dual tradition. It can be considered a religion, a philosophy, or simply a practice depending on one's perspective. It has also been described as a way of life, work, and an art form. Zen practitioners deny the usefulness of such labels, calling them, "The finger pointing at the moon." Tozan, one of the founders of Soto Zen in China, had a teaching known as the Five Ranks of the Real and the Ideal, which points out the necessity of not getting caught in the duality between Absolute and Relative/Samsara and Nirvana, and describes the stages of further transcendence into fully realising the Absolute in all activities.
Christianity
![](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/48/Padre-Pio-young.jpg/220px-Padre-Pio-young.jpg)
The God of traditional Christianity is absolute and infinite. The devil or adversary is an opposing character, but is subordinate to God. The Christian faith thus considers God and the devil to be two distinct, opposing persons, though unequal. Traditional Christianity, with its emphasis on the struggle between good and evil, is decidedly incompatible with nondualistic thinking. Some mystical forms of Christianity can be non-dual, particularly those most closely related to Judaism.
Griffiths' (1906 – 1993) form of Vedanta-inspired or nondual Christianity has been given the nomenclature 'Wisdom Christianity' or 'Sapiential Christianity'.[31][32] Barnhart (1999: p.238) explores Christian nondual experience in a dedicated volume and states that he gives it the gloss of "unitive" experience and "perennial philosophy".[33]
Further, Barnhart (2009) holds that:
"It is quite possible that nonduality will emerge as the theological principle of a rebirth of sapiential Christianity ('wisdom Christianity') in our time."[34]
The Catholic Church, for example, teach in their Catechism that evil - and any manifestations of it - exists in the sense that "only the whole of the Christian faith can constitute a response"[35]. That is, the search or struggle for ones truth is in a sense a search for non-dualism. Sin is a manifestation of erring from that search, Jesus represents hope to find/follow that search and the unity of the Holy Spirit represents divine faith (regardless of brand) in all of us. Perceiving the devil is a corruption of faith and a descent into dualistic thinking. The Holy Office have historically struggled to maintain a non-dualistic message through the times of the Galileo affair and Protestant Reformation. The politics surrounding the papacy of Pope Pius XII and his 1943 papal encyclical Mystici Corporis published during World War II are also characteristic of this struggle. See also Hitler's Pope and The Myth of Hitler's Pope.
Saint Francis of Assisi (c.1181 - 1226), often called the "most Christ-like" of the Catholic Saints with his gift of spirit of the divine stigmata, embodies a nonduality with his beloved scapegoat, sacrificial or eucharistic Christ, the Lamb-of-God, as Egan (1991: p.217) making reference to Canticle of Brother Sun which may be viewed as a nondual ecological testament[36], states:
In September 1224 on Mount Alvernia, he [ that is Saint Francis] received that "final seal" (Dante), the first documented stigmata in Christian history. He bore now the wounds of the crucified Christ not only in spirit, but also on his body. During two more years of increasingly painful illness, Francis composed his classic hymn, Canticle of Brother Sun, which expressed profound Christian love for God and creation. Francis's participation in the hierarchical, sacramental Church never wavered. He had embraced fully the crucified and eucharistic Christ whose wounds he wore on his person. Having renounced the world, he wanted only to have, to know, and to be totally like Christ crucified. In this way, he found all things in God and God in all things.[37]
A Course in Miracles or ACIM is a modern day Christian non-dualistic teaching that is not inclusive of physical reality. Physical reality is denied valid existence all together accept as a wrong (or evil) mis-thought. This tradition states, "Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists. Herein lies the peace of God."[38]
Christian Science is very similar to "ACIM" above. In a glossary of terms written by the founder, Mary Baker Eddy, matter is defined as illusion and when defining individual identity she writes "There is but one I, or Us, but one divine Principle, or Mind, governing all existence".[39]
Gnosticism
Since its beginning, Gnosticism has been characterized by many dualisms and dualities, including the doctrine of a separate God and Manichaean (good/evil) dualism. The discovery in 1945 of the Gospel of Thomas, however, has led some scholars to believe that Jesus' original teaching may have been one accurately characterized as nondualism.[40]
An English rendering from The Gospel of Thomas that showcases a nondual vision of reconciling opposites which are also preserved, that is "make the two one":
When you make the two one, and when you make the inside like the outside and the outside like the inside, and the above like the below, and when you make the male and the female one and the same...then you will enter [the Kingdom].[41]
The Gospel of Philip also conveys nondualism:
- "Light and Darkness, life and death, right and left, are brothers of one another. They are inseparable. Because of this neither are the good good, nor evil evil, nor is life life, nor death death. For this reason each one will dissolve into its earliest origin. But those who are exalted above the world are indissoluble, eternal." [42]
A Course in Miracles
A Course in Miracles is a an expression of nondualism that is independent of any religious denomination. For instance in a workshop entitled 'The Real World' led by two of its more prominent teachers, Kenneth Wapnick and Gloria Wapnick, Gloria explains how discordant the course is from the teachings of Christianity:
"The course is very clear in that God did not create the physical world or universe - or anything physical. It parts ways right at the beginning. If you start with the theology of the course, there's nowhere you can reconcile from the beginning, because the first book of Genesis talks about God creating the world, and then the animals and humans, et cetera. The course parts company at page one with the Bible."[43]
A Course in Miracles presents an interpretation of nondualism that recognises only "God" (i.e. absolute reality) as existing in any way, and nothing else existing at all. In a book entitled The Disappearance of the Universe, which explains and elaborates on A Course in Miracles, it says in its second chapter that we "don't even exist in an individual way - not on any level. There is no separated or individual soul. There is no Atman, as the Hindus call it, except as a mis-thought in the mind. There is only God."[44] A verse from the course itself that displays its interpretation of nondualism is found in Chapter 14:
"The first in time means nothing, but the First in eternity is God the Father, Who is both First and One. Beyond the First there is no other, for there is no order, no second or third, and nothing but the First."[45]
It is important to recognize that statements like, "nothing but god exists at all." is sharply divergent from traditional concepts of nondualism. In traditional nondualism the world is taken as a unified whole without distinctions between this and that. That lack of distinction extends to distinctions between god and not god. The only thing that is considered not valid in traditional nondualism is confused, contracted, noninclusive points of view. From a psychological perspective the statement "we don't even exist in an individual way - not on any level" would be considered dissociative and a denial of an obvious truth. From the perspective of traditional nondualism dividing the world into god and other things that do not really exist is to create a world based on an extreme dualistic dichotomy with a sharp division between physical reality and some other absolute reality that stands separate from physical reality. This is most likely the view of ACIM because ACIM is a reworking of Christian dualism.
Judaism
Judaism has within it a strong and very ancient mystical tradition that is deeply nondualistic. "Ein Sof" or infinite nothingness is considered the ground face of all that is. God is considered beyond all proposition or preconception. The physical world is seen as emanating from the nothingness as the many faces "partsufim" of god that are all a part of the sacred nothingness. Sometimes the faces are referred to as colored spheres "sphirot" that are the same as chakras in eastern traditions. sphirot are seen as eminations or fruit of the tree of life in the sacred garden of paradise. The tree exists and emanates through many, sometimes infinite, stages or levels of reality. All is considered one nondualistic whole. nothingness and somethingness are considered one united and inseparable thing. Duality is seen as an illusion of brokenness or contraction and enlightenment is the act of inner restoration or repair "tikkun" of god's unity.
Sikhism
Sikhism is a monotheistic religion which holds the view of non-dualism. A principle cause of suffering in Sikhism is the ego (ahankar in Punjabi), the delusion of identifying oneself as an individual separate from the surroundings. From the ego arises the desires, pride, emotional attachments, anger, lust, etc., thus putting humans on the path of destruction. According to Sikhism the true nature of all humans is the same as God, and everything that originates with God. The goal of a Sikh is to conquer the ego and realize your true nature or self, which is the same as God's.
Islam
Sufism (Arabic تصوف taṣawwuf, meaning "Mysticism") is often considered a mystical tradition of Islam. There are a number of different Sufi orders that follow the teachings of particular spiritual masters, but the bond that unites all Sufis is the concept of ego annihilation (removal of the subject/object dichotomy between humankind and the divine) through various spiritual exercises and a persistent, ever-increasing longing for union with the divine. "The goal," as Reza Aslan writes, "is to create an inseparable union between the individual and the Divine."
The central doctrine of Sufism, sometimes called Wahdat-ul-Wujood or Wahdat al-Wujud or Unity of Being, is the Sufi understanding of Tawhid (the oneness of God; absolute monotheism). Put very simply, for Sufis, Tawhid implies that all phenomena are manifestations of a single reality, or Wujud (being), which is indeed al-Haq (Truth, God). The essence of Being/Truth/God is devoid of every form and quality, and hence unmanifest, yet it is inseparable from every form and phenomenon, either material or spiritual. It is often understood to imply that every phenomenon is an aspect of Truth and at the same time attribution of existence to it is false. The chief aim of all Sufis then is to let go of all notions of duality (and therefore of the individual self also), and realize the divine unity which is considered to be the truth.
Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi, (1207–1273), one of the most famous Sufi masters and poets, has written that what humans perceive as duality is in fact a veil, masking the reality of the Oneness of existence. "All desires, preferences, affections, and loves people have for all sorts of things," he writes, are veils. He continues: "When one passes beyond this world and sees that Sovereign (God) without these 'veils,' then one will realize that all those things were 'veils' and 'coverings' and that what they were seeking was in reality that One." The veils, or rather, duality, exists for a purpose, however, Rumi contends. If God as the divine, singular essence of all existence were to be made fully manifest to us, he counsels, we would not be able to bear it and would immediately cease to exist as individuals.
Taoism
Taoism's wu wei (Chinese wu, not; wei, doing) is a term with various translations (e.g. inaction, non-action, nothing doing, without ado) and interpretations designed to distinguish it from passivity. From a nondual perspective, it refers to activity that does not imply an "I". The concept of Yin and Yang, often mistakenly conceived of as a symbol of dualism, is actually meant to convey the notion that all apparent opposites are complementary parts of a non-dual whole. The Tao Te Ching has been seen as a nondualist text; from that perspective, the term "Tao" could be interpreted as a name for the Ultimate Reality (which, as the Tao Te Ching itself notes, is not the reality itself).
Notes
- ^ Loy, David (1988). Nonduality: A Study in Comparative Philosophy, New Haven, Conn: Yale University Press.
- ^ Pritscher, Conrad P. (2001). Quantum learning beyond duality. Volume 113 of Value inquiry book series. Rodopi. ISBN 9042013877, 9789042013872. Source: [1] (accessed: Friday April 23, 2010), p.16
- ^ Loy, David (1988). Nonduality: A Study in Comparative Philosophy, New Haven, Conn: Yale University Press, p.3
- ^ Ramesh Balsekar, Who cares?, p. 11; italics and quotation marks as in original
- ^ Craig, Edward (general editor) (1998). Routledge encyclopedia of philosophy: Luther to Nifo, Volume 6. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 0415073103, 9780415073103. Source: [2] (accessed: Thursday April 22, 2010), p.476
- ^ Nisargadatta Maharaj (principal dialogian) & Powell, Robert (editor) (1994, 2006). The Ultimate Medicine, Source: [3] (accessed: Friday April 23, 2010), p.97
- ^ Raphael, Edwin (1992). The pathway of non-duality, Advaitavada: an approach to some key-points of Gaudapada's Asparśavāda and Śaṁkara's Advaita Vedanta by means of a series of questions answered by an Asparśin. Iia: Philosophy Series. Motilal Banarsidass. ISBN 8120809297, 9788120809291. Source: [4] (accessed: Tuesday April 27, 2010), p.Back Cover
- ^ Craig, Edward (general editor) (1998). Routledge encyclopedia of philosophy: Luther to Nifo, Volume 6. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 0415073103, 9780415073103. Source: [5] (accessed: Thursday April 22, 2010), p.476
- ^ Robinson, B.A. (2008). A brief discussion of Buddhist traditions: East & West. Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance. Source: [6] (accessed: Thursday April 22, 2010)
- ^ Wallace, B. Alan (c2007). "Buddhist Nontheism, Polytheism, and Monotheism." Cited in: Wallace, B. Alan (2007). Contemplative science: where Buddhism and neuroscience converge.The Columbia series in science and religion. Columbia University Press. ISBN 0231138342, 9780231138345. Source: [7] (accessed: Friday April 23, 2010), pp.106-107
- ^ Huntington, C. W. & Wangchen, Namgyal (1995). The Emptiness of Emptiness: An Introduction to Early Madhyamika. National Foreign Language Center Technical Reports. University of Hawaii Press. ISBN 0824817125, 9780824817121. Source: [8] (accessed: Thursday April 22, 2010), p.119
- ^ Dharma Dictionary (2008). "byang chub sems". Source: [9] (accessed: Friday April 23, 2010)
- ^ Guenther, Herbert V. & Trungpa, Chögyam (1975). The dawn of tantra. Routledge. ISBN 0877730598, 9780877730590. Source: [10] (accessed: Thursday April 22, 2010)
- ^ "Enlightenment in Buddhism and Advaita Vedanta: Are Nirvana and Moksha the Same?". Retrieved 2009-12-20.
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- ^ Rossi, Donatella (1999). The Philosophical View of the Great Perfection in the Tibetan Bon Religion. Ithaca, New York: Snow Lion. ISBN 1-55939-129-4, p.58
- ^ Barnhart, Bruno (2007). The future of wisdom: toward a rebirth of sapiential Christianity. Continuum. ISBN 0826427677, 9780826427670
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- ^ "Workshop on "The Real World"". Retrieved 2009-04-01.
- ^ The Disappearance of the Universe, Gary Renard, page 33
- ^ A Course in Miracles, 3rd edition, page 279 or Chapter 14, Section IV, Paragraph 1, verses 7-8
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