This chapter contains sections titled: The Epistemology of Religion and Conflicting Truth‐Claims The Relation Between Religions Works cited.

Schuon asserts that to transcend religious differences, we must explore the esoteric nature of the spiritual path back to the Divine Oneness at the heart of all ...

Strict constructivist philosophers conclude that no truth claims can be verified on the basis of mystical exploration due to the thoroughly conditioned character of such experiences. In response, Bede Griffiths’s life of dialogue between Christianity and Hinduism suggests that mystical knowing incorporates both conditioned and unconditioned elements. In the cross-culturally identifiable experience of self-transcendence in meditation, the relationship between the conditioned subject and the unconditioned sacred “object” is transformed, resulting in an intuitive knowledge for which different criteria of verifiability are (...) both needed and available. Griffiths’s multireligious experience thus supports the identification of common ground for various religions in mystical knowing. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Despite all fundamental divergences, the similarities formed between some interpretations of the later-Wittgenstein’s philosophy of religion and the tradition of Islamic Mysticism, can yet be philosophically recognized. These basic analogies are as follows: 1) The inextricability of belief and practice and the priority of practice over knowledge 2) The characterization of the core religious beliefs as the primal ground of man’s perception and understanding, in contrast to the view that considers fundamental religious beliefs as theoretical conclusions derived from (...) purely rational courses of reflection 3) A new practice-laden narrative of religious realism. Given that, one can even shed a new Wittgensteinian light on even the most abstract and metaphysical elements of the mystical worldview. If fundamental religious beliefs are interpreted not as metaphysical doctrines but as a set of descriptions arising from a specific form of practical life, then the ability to see a sort of transcendent and sacred unity in the whole universe will be based on a way of purposive engagement and wayfaring in the natural and social world. (shrink)

This study aimes to examine the basic codes of Manichaeism thought and to discuss whether the thoughts of Manichaeism followers disappeared after they were erased from the earth. In our research, religious phenomenology and comparative method were used in traces of the uninterrupted tradition of wisdom. In the study, an effort has been made to capture the traces of Manichaeism in later religions and thoughts by revealing the framework of the thought mechanism of Manichaeism, and thus, to draw attention (...) to the timeless flow and theme of the wisdom tradition. Some examples from the pre-Islamic and post-Islamic periods are presented in order to prove the thesis that Manichaeism continues its existence with its messages. In this discussion, I addressed that deep gnostic thoughts were not understood by the masses focused on reward and punishment, nor were they appreciated by the exoteric clergy. The study pointed out that esoteric thoughts were eliminated with the support of governments that derive their power from the masses. Afterwards, gnostic thoughts such as Manichaeism and Illuminationism were evaluated as the internal dynamics of the literature of hostility to matter, which disregards worldly life and even leads to extinction, preparing for their own end. The following common theme is underlined in the relationship established between Manichaeism and later gnostic or gnostic thoughts: The human soul, which is a piece of light, has fallen from the world of lights located in a supreme place to the lower material world and material human body, which has a demonic origin, and has fallen into forgetfulness, fainting, amnesia or heedlessness there, and has been awakened by gnostic messages or revelations sent by savior messengers, after this awakening, he embarked on a spiritual journey with eschatic practices and asceticism, and eventually reunited with his homeland and united with the source of light. While the Manichaean system of thought also has important commonalities with the spiritual gnosis, which became more evident in the post-Islamic periods and stands out with its opposition to matter, it broke away from the Zoroastrian thought, which sees matter as the perfect form of creation, and it also was noticed that it was the opposite the existential gnosis system of Islam, which sees matter as a manifestation and mirror of the creator. As a result, the study suggested that Manichaeism was nourished by previous religious traditions such as Zoroastrianism, Buddhism, and Christianity, proudly expressed this unity and closeness as an heir of eternal wisdom, and continued its existence through later religious and intellectual traditions, including Islam. Again, although it has no followers today, I concluded that Manichaeism continues to exist within the later religious thoughts with its gnostic messages, continues its effects under the guise of various mystical groups until today, and in the final analysis, the spirit and theme of eternal wisdom beyond time and space can continue to exist even if its followers disappear. (shrink)

That "The Classics of Western Spirituality" should regard the man Dante hailed as "beyond the human in contemplation," and St. Bonaventure believed to be the medieval rival of the greatest patristic contemplative worthy of a special volume is not surprising. Richard of St. Victor’s masterful analysis of the ascent of the mind to God in contemplative prayer and meditation, emphasizing the individual’s relationship to other individuals as the paradigm of how the Three Divine Persons are related in their inner life (...) of love, is at the same time of psychological interest for anyone attempting to identify and classify the various mystical states medieval philosophers felt were necessary to characterize their spiritual growth. Since the bulk of the present translation is devoted to Richard’s two major attempts to systematize the discipline needed to attain contemplation, known more generally as Benjamin Minor and Benjamin Major, one might wonder why the work is being reviewed in the present journal. But while the major interest of this volume will undoubtedly be for those interested in ascetic theology, for the influence of Richard on subsequent writers from St. Bonaventure to St. Teresa of Avila is profound, nevertheless the relatively short third portion of the work is of sufficient philosophical importance to merit at least a brief note, namely bk. 3 of The Trinity. One would hardly expect a work of this sort to come from the pen of a mystic, for what Richard sets out to do is nothing short of a purely rational or metaphysical analysis of the "Athanasian Creed," which was recited almost daily by the Canons of the Abbey of St. Victor during the twelfth century. Because the inner nature and life of the Trinity, unlike creation or the salvation history of God’s intervention in the affairs of man, is a necessary consequence of what medieval thinkers believed God to be, rather than what he chose to do, Richard was convinced that with sufficient ingenuity one could theorize fruitfully as to why God must possess the various attributes we believe him to have and which are set forth in the aforesaid "creed," which stresses both the unity of God, the divine nature and all the divine attributes, while continually reminding its confessor of the trinity of "persons." In the Anselmian tradition of "faith seeking understanding" Richard seeks "necessary reasons" why God should not only be one but three. Most medieval thinkers have considered the trinitarian character of the divine nature to be the most profound of all the mysteries of the Christian faith. While reason may at best refute objections to a trinity of persons in one divine nature, it can hardly be expected to provide positive support for the doctrine. Richard, on the contrary, believed that St. Anselm had found the key to the "divine processions" in the fact that God is perfect love, with all that this implies. It is obvious the experience of "love" as an interpersonal sharing of the deepest kind, something St. Paul enjoined upon the Christians of the "Church of Corinth," is a far cry from what Sartre seemed to have reached in writing L'etre et néant or what that term connotes to our age, but it is not unknown to contemporary psychologists. Duns Scotus described the "perfect lover" in a Richardian sense as "Perfecte diligens vult dilectum condiligi!" It is especially in bk. 3 of The Trinity that Richard argues that a personal nature that is "summum bonum" must contain more than one person, and need contain no more than three. For the philosopher of religion interested in Richard’s metaphysical analysis of the Godhead, it would be profitable to preface the reading of Zinn’s fine translation of bk. 3 with the selections from bk. 1.—A.B.W. (shrink)

From the 11th through 13th centuries, the mass of yogic techniques informed by the Yoganiruttara cycle of Buddhist Tantra flowed over the Himalayan range and extended to the Hexi Corridor. The Tibetan, Tangut, and Chinese peoples who had been exposed to such a yogic and tantric culture actively drew on Indian Buddhist legacies as taxonomical and conceptual device to structure and make sense of these cutting-edge contemplative techniques. One such discursive device was the Mahāmudrā rubric considered as the pinnacle (...) of a systematic presentation of both tantric and sūtric paths to ultimacy. In this article, I explore the sūtric path structure embedded within a 12th-century Tangut Mahāmudrā presentation—in the Keypoints of Mahāmudrā as the Ultimate along with its commentary—formulated under the Tibetan auspices. I analyze the relevance of the Keypoints exoteric expositions of Mahāmudrā to the Mahāyāna intellectual history through the lens of non-conceptual meditation scheme. In specific, I argue that the Tangut Mahāmudrā works under survey map out a “positive-mystical” paradigm of Buddhist soteriology shared across those Mahāyāna scholastic traditions inspired by the Buddha-nature doctrine to account for the tantric phenomenology. (shrink)

“Artworks are not being but a process of becoming” —Theodor W. Adorno, Aesthetic Theory In the everyday use of the concept, saying that something is grotesque rarely implies anything other than saying that something is a bit outside of the normal structure of language or meaning – that something is a peculiarity. But in its historical use the concept has often had more far reaching connotations. In different phases of history the grotesque has manifested its forms as a means of (...) subversive resistance against society’s prevailing notions of form and power. What aids this impact and distinguishes two of its basic stylistic features is the grotesque’s dissolution of form and its hyperbole. Such grotesqueries, however, soon solidify into new forms, new structures of meaning, hierarchy and practice, and in this sense the history of the grotesque is, on one hand, a continual opposition and transgression of the prevailing notions of art as well as of God and humanity, while on the other hand it offers continual resistance to its own solidifying process. As such the grotesque will not and cannot be contained in form without it losing the very thing that makes it grotesque. Even though it is somewhat easy to point out certain stylistic features of the grotesque, the sum of those features tell us very little about what is at play within it. Definitions concerned with the grotesque’s content rather than its form faces similar difficulties. Throughout history, expressions relating to the grotesque have been used in defense of a whole host of different social and cultural discourse including, for instance, Catholicism (See Erhard Schön’s Der Teufel mit der Sackpfeife , 1536), Protestantism (See Lucas Cranach’s Der Papstesel , 1523), a material folk culture (see Mikhail Bakhtin’s Rabelais and his World , 1984) and an idealistic romantic structure of meaning (see Wolfgang Kayser’s The Grotesque in Art and Literature , 1957). Thus though the grotesque cannot be reduced to the expression of certain forms or meanings, in order to examine what the grotesque is about one has to try to see how it’s relationship to flow and process and how, by maintaining this relationship, it attempts to avoid solidifying into form and meaning. The process of the grotesque alluded to here revolves around a play between periphery and center, the marginalized and the dominant. Most often this is expressed as a direct negation of the center of power. In the medieval grotesque tradition of the carnival, for example, it is expressed by its emphasis on the nether regions of the body as the center of creation of meaning. Spirit does not come from above, but from the belly, buttocks and genitals, and there is, expressed in this manner, a mockery of the predominant Christian notion of truth and meaning. Such inversions of the sites of meaning most often explicitly express an increased interest in materiality instead of ideal content which comes to the fore through the play between periphery and center. Even in early grotesque Renaissance art (for example in the works of Raphael) the depiction of the mythological or ideal reveals an exploration of the possibilities of the material. The works of art thus explore their own boundaries rather than act as vessels of the divine and in this way the grotesque explores the limits of form and materiality. This in turn brings to the fore a metaphysical dimension in the workings of the grotesque: It is an immanent exploration of its own boundaries. Materiality and metaphysics are joined together, because it is through the awareness of itself as a structuring (dis)order that it places itself in opposition to the prevailing notions of form and power. This way the grotesque expresses an awareness of the division of sign and reality and a search for this reality. It implicitly expresses the awareness that meaning is not something God-given and static, but fluctuating and man-made. In modern explorations of the history of the grotesque it is commonly seen as a form of realism that manifests a shift from the ideal towards the material, freeing art from representing some hidden higher order and instead making the work of art the very site of creation and meaning. Going even further, the grotesque actively opposes the notions of the ideal by marking a shift from an ahistorical view of the world towards the historical. However, this also makes clear why the grotesque has a tendency to solidify into new static forms of meaning, for by establishing itself as a subversive counterforce there is an idea of transgression and emancipation. That is why the grotesque often historicizes and relativizes only to repeat the mistakes of that which it negates: putting itself in the king’s chair. The exploration of the material seems to create new forms and notions of the ideal. The representation of an otherness outside the prevailing notions of meaning and truth becomes a positive manifestation of this otherness as truth itself. Thus the historical “truths” of the grotesque are superseded by history itself. When the expressions of the grotesque solidify into static form and meaning, they become mere objects like anything else in the world. Instead of being this elusive thing of process and flow, it becomes tangible to the existing hierarchy of power as well as history itself. In this way the grotesque can be expunged, included or simply revealed as yet another false notion of truth, which is precisely what has happened with the grotesque throughout the course of history. If from the beginning the expression of the grotesque has not already been in the service of some structure of meaning and truth, it has quickly been included or has quickly included itself in such a structure. But by doing so it rejects its own basis: the tension between periphery and center is replaced by the attempt to create a new center, a new structure of meaning and truth. The doubleness, ambiguity and flow of the grotesque are then rejected by the grotesque itself. THE NON-FORM OF FORM In the critical thinking of Theodor W. Adorno (1903-69) the problem of art, caught between a reductive and prevalent notion of truth and meaning and a peripheral and alienated otherness, is reexamined and reformulated. For Adorno, the instrumental rationality of Enlightenment itself reverts into a new form of mythology which is every bit as static and exclusive as the hierarchies of religion it supersedes. All is excluded that is non-identical to the instrumental mastery of the objects of the world, "For the Enlightenment, anything which cannot be resolved into numbers, and ultimately into one, is illusion; modern positivism consigns it to poetry." 1 As such the non-identical has been banished from the realm of thought and action, and banished specifically to the realm of art. But the realm of art is not able to provide a decent home for it because even modern art is not something entirely autonomous. While it is excluded from the notions of truth and meaning provided by instrumental rationality, it still originates from society. Just like instrumental rationality art is about mastery, structuring and exclusion. Therefore, the problem for art is that it cannot directly provide a space for the non-identical because its mode of operation is similar to that of instrumental rationality. Even worse, art has very few possibilities to free itself from this. If it becomes l’art pour l’art it is at the same time reduced to the very thing instrumental rationality claims it to be: a subjective judgment of taste.expressionism also stands as an example of this. Conversely, art cannot work within the framework of the identity-thinking of society, because any notion of freedom or emancipation would reproduce the exclusive practices of instrumental rationality. For example: Explicit socialist literature may establish itself in opposition to instrumental rationality while at the same time reproducing it. Its language may seem different, but in reality it merely provides a different set of reductive schematics for human life and experience. The problem for the art of the grotesque was, as I mentioned earlier, that far too often it was merely a symbolic manifestation of a notion of otherness—not otherness itself. Because of this the subversive character of the grotesque ends up shaping and containing otherness instead of providing a space for it. According to Adorno the only way to avoid this is to radicalize the grotesque. In order to avoid solidifying into form the work of art has to be an object which cannot be contained in thought or form—a non-form of form. The work of art has to work in a way that it strives for autonomy but without entirely leaving a discernible reality. In other words, it has to pull in two directions at once. Thus the work of art is a paradox. It is autonomous in the sense that it closes itself off from everything outside of the work of art, trying to shy away from the contaminating influence of the identity thinking of instrumental rationality. At the same time though the work of art is heteronomous in the sense that it originates from a specific historical context and is bound to be what society is not. Autonomy and heteronomy are inseparably intertwined. Unable to display otherness itself, but still trying to be a refuge for it, there is only one option for art: It has to turn against itself and destroy its own logic of form, thereby demonstrating how any representation of otherness is impossible. Art becomes a lamentation of the victims of the identity thinking of instrumental rationality and shows the traces of the otherness that is unable to appear. Adorno’s pessimistic theory of art and history stages art as a negative dialectical process where the work of art closes itself off and rejects everything outside, while the individual elements in the work of art destroys its very own logic of form from within: Artworks synthetize ununifiable, nonidentical elements that grind away at each other; they truly seek the identity of the identical and nonidentical processually because even their unity is only an element and not the magical formula of the whole […]. The resistance to them of otherness, on which they are nevertheless dependent compels them to articulate their own formal language, to leave not the smallest unformed particle as remnant. This reciprocity constitutes art’s dynamic; it is an irresolvable antithesis that is never brought to rest in the state of being. 2 Relative to a traditional understanding of the grotesque, Adorno radicalizes the tension between center and periphery, autonomy and heteronomy. In the traditional understanding of the grotesque, as we find it for example in the writings of Mikhail Bakhtin, the grotesque establishes the display of otherness as a new center of meaning and truth. However Adorno rejects such notions and argues instead for a modernism of the grotesque in which both center and periphery are included in a negative dialectical process and continually synthesizing and destabilizing each other’s positions. A modernism of the grotesque works on the inside of the sign or the artwork, continually outlining and questioning the boundaries between materiality and form. This moves the focus away from the relation between the sign or work of art as a conceptual manifestation on one side and the object it refers to on the other side. Instead it implicitly points to the amorphous mass from which the signs and thereby meaning have been carved, the remnants that have been left behind. Modernism of the grotesque does not imply that it is emancipatory or that it reconciles man with nature, and does not represent a new position or a new ideology. It merely remembers and insists on the double nature of man and art: to write or paint yourself or an artwork whole by inscribing meaning in life or by applying form on a canvas is at the same time both creation and destruction. The very signs we use to center meaning in our lives carry its own alienation in them. Meaning surfaces only when process and flow comes to a halt—solidifying, but at the same time excluding parts that do not fit into that particular structure of meaning. NOTHING DONE AND NOTHING UNDONE It has always been difficult for art historians to find a suitable category for the works of the Danish artist Leif Lage (b. 1933). In his paintings the sensitive figuration seems so fragile that it is on the verge of turning into abstraction. Or conversely: the figurative emerges cautiously and hesitantly out of abstraction. As an art critic once wrote, he can almost paint things away. 3 Working in some undefinable space between abstraction and figuration, the Lage’s works shy away from the realm of words, and as a result few critics have been able to write anything meaningful about his works. In fact even fewer have been able to write more than one or two pages. The Danish author and art critic Leif Hjernøe is one of those few, but even he starts off by saying how impossible it is to write about Lage, confessing that his works exist both as process and in a field of in-between which words cannot reach. He writes: Always you find yourself in a place where nothing is done and nothing left undone, and where the elements of the work of art rest in a continuous motion. Always there is the open wound, where infection rather than surgical intervention is considered as an opportunity. And the conflict between matter and antimatter makes all diagnoses uncertain and allows conditions of uncertainty to spread in a place of raw presence. 4 The art works against the diagnosis and the certainty. Words are being eaten up by what is outside the realm of words: tension, process and doubleness. An approach to an understanding of the work of Lage could be to follow his connection to Samuel Beckett (1906-89). One can note, therefore, that Lage has illustrated several of the Danish translations of Beckett’s works. Though one is an author and the other a painter both seek a place where figuration, where the word, erodes. For both this entails an attempt to question and examine and so move in behind the façade of the surface in an exploration of that something or nothing that may be behind representation. At the same time even in the vanishing point of figuration or words, the meaningless words or the disjointed lines still stand as signs of human activity—signs of movement in emptiness. With very few exceptions Lage’s artworks revolve around one motif: Man—most often “en face.” But unlike traditional portraitures Lage’s people are found within. The artworks do not sense the reality of appearances, but rather the existential dimensions within man. As a seismograph they are sensitive to the utmost subjectivity in order to display an objective, sensuous depiction of the very problem of subjectivity. Instead of a static façade of a man, Lage’s “en face” shows the process-character of man. The people in Lage’s paintings are always in process—in the midst of becoming or dissolving. I will take a closer look in the following at the ways in which Lage establishes this sense of being in constant process, of being in-between modes or categories. THE DOUBLENESS OF THE STROKE Lage’s etchings attract attention in particular for the tension conveyed there between the material and the form. The material physically opposes the violence of the needle. But instead of embracing the violence of the needle and the victory over matter—instead of making the artistic creation and figuration express a heroic mastery of the background it is made out of—Lage uses the stroke to express the very tension between stroke and material, figuration and background. In the drypoint etching Untitled from 1983, which illustrated the Danish translation of Beckett’s Ill Seen, Ill Said , the needle tears up the material in long rough lines: Together, the primarily horizontal and vertical lines form a face. Thus the force needed to etch a line in the metal-plate draws attention to itself: It is there in the absence of curves and nuances. Man emerges on the metal-plate after great exertion and in a very simplistic form. This way Lage enhances the nature of the material, as the material’s resistance is not something to overcome. On the contrary the figuration is smitten by its very resistance and as such expresses the violence of its own becoming. Even more pronounced is the fact that the lines do not just show the violence of creation—it actively erases figuration in the same process that creates it. For example the mouth consists of 8-10 horizontal strokes, of which some seem to be connected to each other as if the mouth has been quickly scratched out. The mouth speaks of the inability to speak. In the same way, the eyes are black holes due to a large amount of criss-cross cuts, which together form a dark middle. Those lines, at the same time, form the eyes of the figuration and scratch out the eyes of the figuration. The extroverted aspects of the face—connected to speech and sight—are portrayed as introverted as well. Just as the etchings down into the metal-plate makes something appear. Leif Lage, Untitled , 1983 (etching) The figuration of the etching is connected to creation. It expresses that something is wrought into existence out of nothing by sheer artistic force. However, this force is at the same time presented as a violence of creation, which makes it impossible for form to truly emerge. Herein lies one of the basic principles of Lage’s art, namely that art cannot be that nothing or something behind the realm of words or signs. Without form, art would lose its ability to express anything at all. Form is a necessity if art is to avoid becoming as devoid of expression as the reality is that we cannot reach behind the appearance of things. On the other hand, art cannot raise itself above its own material in joyous celebration of the beauty of form. This would use the material in the manner of an instrument and thus would suppress the otherness it attempts to rescue. When art becomes mere form, any traces of otherness will have dissolved. Then art would be a question of technique, in no way different from the instrumental rationality of society. Therefore art works in a particular space between form and non-form. As Hjernøe says of the works of Lage, it is in the center of the event, in the in-between where things neither are nor are not, "And everything takes place just before it changes character. As the blood just before it coagulates, as the milk just before it separates, as fried egg just before it turns white […]." 5 The precise emphasis on the in-between of Lage’s art points in particular to the work of art as both outside of and in time. The work of art is a singular point in time, but at the same time it is continually in process. In the borderland between form and non-form, between creation and destruction, it shimmers like a fata morgana . The work is done but at the same time undone. It is only there as a cry in response to the inability to come into being. Akin to the etching is the drawing, but while both, of course, use the stroke or line as their main instrument, the paper does not resist the line in the same sense as the metal-plate of the etching. As a result in Lage’s drawings the stroke frolics in a space with almost no tension at all. There is nothing there to keep the pencil stroke at bay, but at the same time this means that there is nothing there to keep it together. One of the more expressive examples of this is found in an untitled drawing from Tegninger og Text ( Drawings and Text ) from 1999. The drawing consists of one unbroken pencil stroke. It is as if the stroke is confused—it darts around on the paper making doodles on the way or gathers itself in more straight lines in the center of the paper. It is in this manner that the semblance of a body is established. A couple of small circles serve as eyes and are the reason that the rest can be read as both face and body instead of pure abstraction. In fact the unbroken stroke serves as both abstraction and figuration as on the one hand it is the stroke that seemingly outlines the shape of a figure, while on the other hand the unbroken stroke dissolves any truly recognizable figuration by continuously, without end or aim, overflowing the boundaries of the figure. Seen again here is a doubleness to the stroke and the act of creation. In the etching it was all about the tension between the resistance of the material which created the doubleness. Here it is the opposite. It is the lack of tension. The stroke is free to do anything, but has no aim: without some kind of resistance, there is nothing to hold figuration together. It threatens to dissolve into nothingness. Conversely, the drawing can also be seen as a process of becoming. Like a form of automatic writing, the pencil darts around until it finds a point of densification. But even in such an interpretation of the drawing, the figuration appears artificial—it points to itself as the result of the artistic act of creation. The stroke is primarily stroke and only secondarily figuration. With its wild movement it calls attention to itself as stroke. Thus the figuration never becomes something in its own right. It points to the basic principle of creation: Someone has drawn me, I am the result of artistic endeavors, and therefore I am not for myself but always overflowing the boundaries that contain me. It is the stroke that in the very same movement creates figuration and dissolves it. Leif Lage, Untitled , 1999 (drawing) THE LIGHTNESS OF COLOR, THE DENSITY OF PAPER Often the watercolor is used as a precursor for larger paintings, because it has an immediacy in which one can quickly paint the main lines of a composition. However, Lage’s watercolors are not temporary points in a process leading to another final painting. They are not sketches, later to be filled with details in another material. For him watercolor is an end in itself. This also implies that he doesn’t try to work against the paper’s absorption of the water color and its tendency to absorb detail. On the contrary, he examines the possibilities inherent in this blurring of the line and absorption of color. As in the previous examples, there are of course recognizable shapes in Lage’s water colors. But these shapes are rarely separable from color, line or even paper. In other words: the figurative and the abstract more or less become one. One of the reasons for this is that Lage often works on wetted paper which means that the paper hungrily absorbs color into its fabric instead of it being on top of the paper. The paper becomes line because it is the absorption of the color which, together with the brush stroke itself, separates the colors from each other. The line is also color and the color is also line, because there is no separation between the different colors other than the colors themselves. At times this results in almost complete abstraction. In such cases Lage add lines with a pencil as if he wants to hold some sort of figuration together. At other times it is the other way around: the strokes of the pencil are a being dissolved by the water color blurring out the figuration. Untitled 1 from 1999 displays various tones of green. The contour of the colors appears unusually rough. Most of all it is reminiscent of a shoreline which has found its form through the work of thousands of years between water and land. Pockets of resistance surface as islands not yet drowned in color—as paper or color not yet consumed by the dominant color. The shape of the colors does not seem created by the hand of the artist, but rather by the inner workings of the watercolor: color against color over time has resulted in this very image, as if it is all a part of a natural process of change and decay. Despite the fact that there are no strong differences in color there seems to be a struggle taking place in the watercolor. For example, inexplicable holes in the dark color, which cover most of the right side of the watercolor, appear as if the underlying color is eating away the dark color, or that the dark color is in the process of covering up the underlying color. The small pockets of resistance demonstrate a process and development that, almost as a happy accident, evokes a couple of small eyes and a large mouth. Behind the colors a few slanted lines can be discerned, but the hand of the artist has long ago disappeared behind the life of the colors. Thus the watercolor seems to be held at precisely the point in time where figuration randomly appears. The small eyes and wide mouth seemingly express the realization of the figuration’s temporality. It is just a moment in time, soon to be consumed again in the life of the colors. The nature, the background it stems from and is part of, moves on undeterred, continuing its everlasting process of creation and decay. In this sense, the watercolor provides an experience of how neither artist nor man is able to transcend the materiality they consist of. The colors of man, the materials man consists of are “becoming” and “progress” but also “decay” and “disappearance”. The artist’s pencil strokes have been eaten up long ago, and the figuration is living on borrowed time. Human or artistic activity is about creating form, transcending mere matter by shaping and applying meaning to it. But Untitled 1 shows the doubleness of such creation: the transience and fragility of human life. Should the figuration come into being, should it rise and transcend the material, which binds it to its temporal existence, it would become nothing because its very existence is conditioned by the life and work of the colors. In the same sense man cannot escape his own temporality. He too, for better or worse, must accept a life in the volatility of sensation. Leif Lage, Untitled 1 , 1999 (watercolor) In most of Lage’s watercolors there seem to be a stronger artistic control than in Untitled 1 . Most often both the arrangement of colors and the technique in which they are painted express the hand of the artist. An example of this is Untitled 2 from 1999. While figuration in Untitled 1 seemed to appear as a happy accident, the figuration is much more “created” in Untitled 2 . Here the most important parts of the figuration, the eyes, the mouth and part of the skull, are colored black and painted on top of the background’s play of colors. The background primarily consists of blue and yellow tones. Only parts of the paper are covered in color, however, which yet again stresses the act of painting: There is a surface which is being filled by color by an artist. The blue tones are concentrated in the figuration, while the yellow tones surround it. All this means that the figuration stands out more clearly in this watercolor. This is also underlined by the fact that the blue and dark tones cover part of the yellow tones as spots here and there. Thus it is not a background which is in the process of consuming figuration, but rather the emerging figuration which blots out the background. Such an understanding is even suggested by how the mouth and eyes are placed in the larger blue color field. The eyes and mouth are in the center of the watercolor, while the blue color field is placed from center out towards the left side. This gives the impression of a face turned slightly to the right and slightly upwards, which again makes the mouth appear to emerge from the paper. It also helps that the mouth cuts the center axis of the watercolor. In other words, the arrangement of the blue and black colors create some depth and perspective which gives the illusion of a figuration, seen partially in profile, emerging from the background. Seen in profile, the eyes and mouth seem extroverted—they almost seem as if they are put on top of the face. But at the same time they are painted as black holes, sucking in the gaze of the onlooker. The watercolor is even more challenging if one follows what may be the faint outline of the skull, which, on the right side of the watercolor, no longer works together with the blue color, but rather alone postulates the outline of the skull. If not the blue color field, but this line, is the outline of the skull, then all of a sudden the face is not in profile but “en face”—staring directly towards the onlooker. Outline and color seemingly work against each other and establish two different expressions. Without the slightly upward tilted expression of the profile, the eyes and mouth do not seem to emerge from the paper. On the contrary, seen “en face,” the eyes and mouth are really gaping pits of darkness. In this sense Untitled 2 is at the same time surface and depth of perspective. The line gives form but at the same time it dissolves the form created by the colors, and vice versa. Leif Lage, Untitled 2 , 1999 (watercolor) As the last example of Lage’s artistic method, I have chosen another untitled work (as indeed nearly all of Lage’s artworks are)—this time from 2000. This is perhaps one of the most figurative watercolors Lage has created, though that doesn’t tell us too much. The painting depicts a human face in blue and green tones on a yellow toned background. The colors create a clear demarcation between the figure and the background, which compensate for the watercolor’s lack of outline. Beneath the face darker tones imply the beginning of the torso, and nuances of color even hint at something which could be a collar. The hair is in even darker tones and its structure is emphasized using pencil strokes on top of the water color. One eye is marked by a brown spot with a darker spot in the middle, while the other eye is added by pencil. The mouth is a round, red dot. In Untitled from 2000 the work between abstraction and figuration is much less pronounced than in the previous examples cited here. Nonetheless the watercolor has a delicacy to it which almost makes the figuration disappear, even as it appears. This has something to do with the fact that all the individual brush strokes have dissolved. The only outlines are those created by the clash of colors. Even the red mouth seems to be more paint than mouth—unable to be formed truly as anything other than a speck of color with some small semblance to a mouth. In contrast to the other watercolors, there is no movement, no progress or decay, just a vibrating standstill. The figure is not emerging or disappearing but embedded in and as surface, and as such it makes the figure seem stuck in its condition rather than freed by the act of giving form: mouth open as a wound. Pencil strokes add detail and life to the hair as an attempt to help the figure emerge. But all this does is create two levels in the watercolor: The pencil strokes are put on top of the figuration rather than being part of it. Thus they end up highlighting the endless distance between the movement and form-giving of the pencil strokes and the static and stuck figure behind these strokes. Leif Lage, Untitled , 2000 (watercolor) MAN AND THE VIEW OF THE ONLOOKER Lage’s works seem at the same time to be an examination of tensions between form and material in art and a display of an image of man full of the same tensions. This is because the people who are emerging in Lage’s images are not just in his works, They are his works. This means that man is not something emerging from a background but is part of this background and vice versa. The art of Lage inscribes man in its surroundings and background. Man is not the ruler of nature. Man does not rise above matter; there is no truly transcendent position for man to occupy in the art of Lage. Instead man is a part of the very matter, it, at the same time, tries to distance itself from in order to distinguish itself from its surroundings. Man emerges in an attempt not to be line, stroke, color. In an attempt to free itself of matter. Should it succeed in this, however, it would turn into nothing. On the other hand, if man fully accepted itself as mere matter it would disappear in it—in instincts, urges and lack of reflection. The appearance of man is thus subject to a state of being in-between. Only in the tension between material and its negation can the outlines of man be traced. However this also means that in the art of Lage man is never something in itself but always in process—on the way to its freedom and its loss. However, Lage’s art is not just about showing the tensions inherent in man but also about showing such tension on the verge of breaking point. In the moment before everything is done, or when nothing yet has been done, the delicate tension between form and material has been stretched to its utmost in such a way that man’s character of process emerges and is contained on the paper or canvas. Therefore, Lage’s art contain traces of human life. Not only is it an autonomous unity of tensions where man is stretched out between its singularity and the surroundings it is a part of. It is also this pulsation between figuration and material which brings about the traces of human endeavor and activity. Even when man almost seems to have disappeared into the material, strokes and lines are still there as a reminder of human activity and potential creative power—as a reminder that hope is still possible and that man is still there. The view of the onlooker seeks out forms and meaning. It seeks outlines and edges. But first and foremost it is the eyes in Lage’s works of art that allow the onlooker to decode the figuration at play. This creates a distinctive relationship between the onlooker and the artwork. The onlooker tries to wrest the enigma from the artwork, tries to reduce it to solid, meaningful form. But the very same moment that hints at such a possibility sees the view of the onlooker confronted with a gaze of its own. The eyes of the figure in the work of art are most often dark pits, as if they were an illustration of the violence committed against the eyes of the onlookers and their search for meaning. Or as if they were a dark reflection of the onlooker’s failed attempts to delineate the traces of life in the artwork to a solid meaningful form. Therefore, the gaze of the figuration speaks not only of its own powerlessness but also of the powerlessness of the onlooker. When the view or sight has trouble finding solid meaningful forms, it has something to do with the fact that the precondition for sight, light, no longer stems from something transcendent. In Lage’s art there is nothing outside the works of art, nothing outside of human life, and as such nothing to shed light on the works of art or human life and reveal solid meaningful forms. All light comes from within. In a western context, light as a medium for sight is central to the understanding of meaning. People speak of the clarity of thought, while knowledge is tied together with enlightenment, and so forth. But the light no longer originates from a divine point of view. It originates from man, who has created himself in the image of God. The problem with this is that light always covers up its own base. Light illuminates something but at the same time it hides itself. 6 While it was previously God who was unknowable, now it is man. It is also problematic that sight and the medium of sight stem from the same place. Following this thought one can posit two final problems. Firstly, the immediacy and presence established by light by making forms and objects accessible to sight is fake. Light is not some independent entity which present things in a neutral manner for the onlooker. It is inextricably tied together with the gaze’s desire after meaning. In other words: Light perverts the appearance of things because it doesn’t originate from some objective entity which allows them to appear as they are. Instead light is based upon and originates from the subject and its conquering gaze, seeking out meaning and form constantly. Secondly, the joining of sight and light makes introspection within human life impossible. Everything can be illuminated by its use value for the subject but only as long as it is separated from the subject, as long as it is an object. But the subject itself cannot be illuminated. Lage’s art tears down such a dividing line between subject and matter, but it does so without reestablishing a divine position from where the light emanates. Therefore, the light in Lage’s art may not illuminate very well. It may not have the certainty presented by modern science or the religions of yesterday. But it does show what such light tries to hide, namely, the subject as it is in its material reality—inscribed in time and death, which are the basic conditions of materiality, but at the same time also full of life in its joy and will to create. For the onlooker the meeting of the gaze in Lage’s works of art is thus also a destruction of the view of the onlooker. The ability to see is challenged in a radical way. Those outlines will not solidify into static form, as if the light was too dim to see. Just as in Lage’s figurations, the view of the onlooker turns to black: turns towards the onlooker in recognition and becoming—or disappearance. NOTES Max Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adorno. Dialectic of Enlightenment . (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 2002): 4-5. Theodor W. Adorno. Aesthetic Theory . (London & New York, 2002): 176. Carsten Bach-Nielsen. “Mere glæde end gru.” Kristeligt Dagblad . September 24, 2002. Leif Hjernøe. “Den yderliggående inderlighed.” LEIF LAGE—Retrospektiv udstilling 1983 . (Copenhagen: Brøndum, 1983): 18. Ibid. Maurice Blanchot. The Infinite Conversation . (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993): 162-163. (shrink)

Translated by Drew S. Burk and Anthony Paul Smith. Excerpted from Struggle and Utopia at the End Times of Philosophy , (Minneapolis: Univocal Publishing, 2012). THE END TIMES OF PHILOSOPHY The phrase “end times of philosophy” is not a new version of the “end of philosophy” or the “end of history,” themes which have become quite vulgar and nourish all hopes of revenge and powerlessness. Moreover, philosophy itself does not stop proclaiming its own death, admitting itself to be half dead (...) and doing nothing but providing ammunition for its adversaries. With our sights set on clearing up this nuance, we differentiate philosophy as an institutional entity, and the philosophizability of the World and History, of “thought-world,” which universalizes the narrow concept of philosophy and that of “capital.” We also give an eschatological and apocalyptical cause to this end, of “times” or “ages” rather than those of philosophical practice. Last but not least, it is the Future itself in the performativity of its ultimatum that determines this end times, reversing these times from the Identity the Future accorded to it, withdrawing the thought-world from the lie of its death. Why this style of axioms and oracles, these more or less subtle distinctions, old and debased, with an appeal to the ultimata , to end times and last words? We fight to give, parallel to the concept of Hell, its new theoretical position, for its philosophical return and its non-philosophical transformation. No more so than any other word, Hell is not a metaphor here, just the Principle of Sufficient World. Every man, no doubt, has his “hell” readily available, connivance, control, conformism, domestication, schooling, alienation, extermination, exploitation, oppression, anxiety, etc. We have our little list that the Contemporaries established in the previous century in the same way one used to construct lists of virtues and vices or honors and wealth. They invented it for us without knowing it, for us-the-Futures who have as our responsibility to invent its use. In the Christian and Gnostic tradition, the struggle of the End Times takes place “on earth.” The most sophisticated of believers have it taking place in Heaven as well, above all in Heaven. The various kinds of gnosis imagine infinite falls and vertiginous highs, the vertigo of salvation. On Earth as in Heaven, a hell is available. The Marxists have the law of profit and the control of production, the class struggle Capital imposes on man. The Nietzscheans, the dull grumble of the struggle in the foundations of World and History, the domestication of man, the society of control. The phenomenologists, the capture of being, the most superficial amongst them, the age of suspicion. But all of these “hells” are taken from World, History, Society, and Religion. What we call Hell is no longer of the order of these specific and total intra-worldly generalities, it is both more singular and more universal, no longer being at all of the same order, it is the determinant Identity of these small hells strung out through history but unified here in the name of the last Humaneity. It is even found within the French idiom for hell [ enfer ], en-fer literally means “in-irons.” We are as much “in-irons” as we are “alive” [ en-Vie ]. We believe in Hell but as non-philosophers and it is even because we are non-philosophers that we can believe in it outside of any sort of religion. Hell is less mythological than ideological, it combines philosophizability with universal capital. Under what form? A single term could work for them without being a metaphor or something they would participate in by analogy, a more innovative and conjectural term than control, more universal than profit. It would denote the growing and permanent extortion of a surplus-value of communication, of speed and of urgency in change, in productivity and in work, in the pressure of images and slogans. It would be worse than solicitation, more tenacious than capture, more active and persecutory than control, softer and more insidious than a frontal attack, just as perverse as questioning and accusation, less brutal and offensive than extermination, less ritualized than inquisition, it would be soft and dispersed, instantaneous and vicious, it would be a crime without declared violence. Collusion and conformism, it would be afraid to show itself. Related to rumor, from which it borrows its infinite and tortuous ways. It is harassment. As a modernized form of Hell, perhaps harassment has a long future in front of it, of innocent torture, slow assassination, in short the fall, but radical with no way of recovering and which tolerates only salvation. THE PHILOSOPHICAL PAST OF NON-PHILOSOPHY Non-philosophy is thus Man as the utopian identity of the philosophical form of the World, a utopia destined to transform it. We still have to understand these equations, in particular that of the being-uni-versed from Man, and this book adheres to this by re-exposing non-philosophy in a different way via one of its new possibilities. It uses this opportunity to once again take up formulations that lead to objections answering certain external critics, as well as revisiting diverging interpretations specific to non-philosophers. A portion of this book is devoted to going through these theories via a strict or “lengthy” presentation of non-philosophy, and its defense against more expeditious solutions. This work of rectification is the occasion, merely the occasion, for refocusing non-philosophy on Man (the “Man-in-person,” “Humaneity”), and in a more innovative manner, on its utopian vocation established since the book Future Christ . As for this “occasion,” it is quite obvious. A school of posture, not to say a school of thought, supposes a minimum of closure from the most liberating of knowledge, a heritage, its utilization, and its no less certain dispersal. Within its development, a variety of interpretations will no doubt appear, deviations that are as much normalizations, and a struggle against this multiplication of divergent tendencies. These are perhaps not inevitable evils, especially here, merely a normal development according to the twisting paths of history. But the problem is made worse by the fact that this school of non-philosophers is that of utopia. Not the former attempts devoted to commenting on the worst authoritarian and criminal forms of the past and the present, but utopia as the determinant principle for human life, or to put it another way, of the Future as an irreducible presupposition of (for) thinking the World and History. Non-philosophers are engaged in an aleatory navigation between the respect for the most rigorous utopia, whose rules are not that of the reproductive imagination but those from the Future determining imagination itself, as well as the temptations, diversions, and remorse of history. Little by little, we will begin to understand that the Future as we understand it no longer has any temporal consistency or positive content, without being an empty form or a nothingness, but that it is foreclosed to past and present History, just as it is foreclosed to the place of places, the World, and that it is the only method for establishing the practice of thinking in a non-imaginary instance. Because it is the World and History that are imaginary and have a terrible materiality, it is not necessarily utopia. We will overlap two objectives here: the defense of non-philosophy against the (non-) philosophers that we are, only occasionally, and the introduction of philosophy to a rigorous future. Together they set out to definitively render, without any possible return to philosophical conformism or towards the facilities of the past and present, the non-philosophical enterprise understood as utopia or uchronia. Imagination and speculation, left to themselves and thus undistinguished, are quite good for participating in the grand game of History but have little value or worse for the Future which is unimaginable and unintelligible and must be maintained as such. MAN-IN-PERSON AS SUSPENSION OF THE PHILOSOPHICAL CHORA The point where philosophical resistance is concentrated is without a doubt the invention of the Name-of-Man, first name, oracular as much as axiomatic, of the determining cause for the non-philosophical posture. And that which concentrates the differends is the style of non-philosophy as identity that possesses the dual aspect, of discipline and of the oeuvre, of the theorem and of the oracle. But the real difficulty in understanding the simplicity of non-philosophy is profoundly hidden in the depths of philosophy itself. Because philosophy, from Parmenides to Derrida, even Levinas, continues to be a divided gesture, without a veritable immanence, transforming its thematic contents of transcendence in also forgetting to transform the operative transcendence in the element from which the ontology of surface is established which we will call, in memory of Plato, the chorismos. The general effect of the chora literally gives place to philosophy, demanding binding and sutures to which we will once and for all “oppose” the Man-in-person, his power of cloning, and his future being. All philosophy contains a hinter-philosophy in which it deploys its operations and weaves its tradition like an understudy of a topographical nature and in the best of cases being itself topological. Philosophy as well consists of two levels, its pre-ontological operative conditions on the one hand, and its superficial theme on the other, it too has its presupposed, but is not aware of it or erases it within the unity of appearance named Logos. Rightly, the Logos, and its flash or lightning nature, possesses a “dark precursor,” the chora, which is as much a virtual image, and philosophy, dazzled by its own lightning flash, seems to completely forget about it at the same time it sets itself up within it. Non-philosophy risks taking this same path, of confusing what it believes to be the real with its phantom double, contenting itself to working on the thematic level of philosophy, not its surface objects and its idle chatter (we stopped talking about this a long time ago and in any case they are merely simple materials for inducing a work of transformation), but the transcendence-form of its objects. In the end it risks, through precipitation, taking back up the heritage of philosophy, a heritage of a misunderstood presupposed, even more profound than the play of transcendences. This is what the imperative of the radicality of immanence meant, to treat immanence in an immanent manner, not to make a new object out of it. And from here we get non- (philosophy) and its refusal of the Platonic chorismos , symbol of all abstraction, and thus all transcendental appearance. There are no illusions. The message will leave a heritage in tattered pieces and interpretations. But it was difficult not to dispute the differend to its core. There will be complete confusion of the multiple, possible, and necessary effectuations of non-philosophy with its interpretations. The non-philosophical or human freedom of philosophical effectuation and the philosophical freedom of interpretation. Effectuations demand non-philosophy to return to zero from the point of view of its philosophical material and thus also but within these limits the formulation of its axioms , but in no way providing from the outset divergent interpretations of the aforementioned axioms. They are divergent because they do not take into account the material from which these axioms are derived within non-philosophy, and because they do not see themselves as symptoms of another vision of the World. The utterances of non-philosophy are not mathematical theorems and pure axioms, they merely have a mathematical aspect . They are, by their extraction or origin, mathematical and transcendental. And by their determined function in-Real, within non-philosophy, they are identically in-the-last-Humaneity entities which have an aspect of an axiom and an aspect of interpretation (or an oracular aspect as we say) that attempts (sometimes it is ourselves who provide the occasion) to isolate and transform, in complete freedom of interpretation. There will be an opportunity to complain about the complex character of the language of non-philosophy, an idiom saturated with classical references, sophisticated in a contemporary way. Its freedom of decision up against the whole of philosophy demands these effects of “complication” and “privatization,” as the saying goes. But it also demands fighting against the drift [ dérive ] of the pedagogical-all and the mediatic-all that leads philosophy into the shallow depths of opinion, which is the site of its impossible death. The noble idealism of “pop-philosophy” has been consumed into a “philo-reality;” against this we propose philo-fiction. Parricide, which is at the bottom of these interpretations and which we can judge as being quite fertile, although it has informed tradition, only takes place once or within one lone meaning. In regards to Parmenides, it was possible; Plato introduced the Other as non-being and language, bringing into existence the philosophical system of the World, but is it possible to repeat it again with the same fecundity in regards to non-philosophy, this time in introducing (non) religion or (non) art, still mixing them without taking into account this mixture, alternatively as a philosophical or religious resentment? If philosophy begins via a crime, it is no doubt obliged to continue down similar pathways, to the effect that the crimes of philosophy, once the founding crime has been committed, are a reaction of self-defense. It is undoubtedly from this that we get Marx’s declaration that history begins by tragedy and repeats itself or ends in farce. The preservation of rigor and fecundity is, in every respect, a psychologically difficult task within a theory such as non-philosophy. Having posited an essential objective of liberation in regards to philosophy and its services, one has often understood this objective as an authorization of providing particular interpretations of its axioms and ends up obliterating their scope. This ends up confusing, on one hand, two kinds of freedoms in regards to non-philosophy, the freedom of its interpretations and the freedom of its effectuations. On the other hand, any defense of “principles” against precipitated interpretations is immediately taxed with a will to orthodoxy, a prohibitive objection when we are dealing with, as is the case here, a heretical theory of thought. Nevertheless, it is time to stop confusing heresy as the cause of thought with an ideology of heresies, which is certainly not at all our object, but rather a form of normalization. As for the “disciplinary” aspect, which is not the only aspect, it demands something other than philosophical “answers to objections,” a precision in the definition and use of its procedures in the formation of utterances, since non-philosophy is neither a supplementary doctrine interior to philosophy nor a vision of the world but one whose priority is a “vision of Man,” or rather Man as “vision” that implies a theory and a practice of philosophy. In the end, struggle is only one aspect of non-philosophy, not its whole or telos, struggle coming only from its materiality. In particular, if the discipline of non-philosophy is inseparable from struggle, it is not a question of reducing the monomaniacal obsession of its “marching orders.” This would reduce its complexity and kill its indivisibility, deploying it in a “long march” and a form of Maoization whose philosophical presuppositions no longer have any pertinence here, a case of the One and the Two, which are now cloned and no longer tied together. More generally, non-philosophy is a complex thought composed of a multitude of aspects, which is to say, unilateral interpretations, of a philosophical origin but reduced by their determination in-the-last-instance . The “liberalism” of non-philosophy is merely one of the aspects of which it is capable, not an essence. Similarly, it is only capable of having a “Maoist” aspect. Let us generalize. The weakness of non-philosophy is due to a specific cause, the determination-in-the-last-Humaneity of a subject for the World. Everything that has a right to the philosophical city can be said about it in turn and in a retaliatory mode since Man contributes nothing of himself that Man takes from the World. We can consider non-philosophy as being pretentious, absurd, idealistic, empty, materialistic, formalistic, contradictory, modern, post-modern, Zen, Buddhist, Marxist; it endures or tolerates, perhaps “appeals” to, or at least renders possible, sarcasms, ironies, and insults without even talking about the misunderstandings, partly for the same reason as psychoanalysis. All of this goes beyond simple “deviations.” They are its aspects, which is to say, its “unilateral” philosophical interpretations in both senses of the word, being either sufficient coming from the mouth of philosophers, or reduced to their absolute dimension of sufficiency and totality in the mouths of non-philosophers, and both times due to the weakness and strength of Man-in-person as their determination only in-the-last-instance. The non-philosopher is certainly not a Saint Paul fantasizing about a new Church. The non-philosopher is either a (Saint) Sebastian whose flesh is pierced with as many arrows as there are Churches, or a Christ persecuted by a Saint Paul. What is engaged in here is the practice of retaliation. A negative rule of the non-philosophical ethics of outlawed discussion by way of argumentation (the sufficient is you, the orthodox one is always you, you are the fashionable one, and when a master you are someone else) that is founded on the confusion of effectuations of non-philosophy and of its overall interpretations. Retaliation is the law but as with any too-human law, it must acquire a dimension that displaces it, or rather emplaces it and takes away its authority but not all of its effectiveness. If the non-philosopher is only authorized by himself, which is to say by philosophy but limited by the Real-of-the-last-instance, its critique of other non-philosophers can merely be retaliatory under the same conditions, only by the Real limited in-the last-instance. THE TREE OF PHILOSOPHICAL SAINTLINESS The thematic horizon or material of these debates is in the relationships between philosophy, religion as gnosis, and non-philosophy. It is inevitable, regarding non-philosophers in general (whether they are non-philosophers by name or simply its neighbors) that we often end up evoking Marx’s Holy Family and imagining, arranged on the neighboring branches of the tree of philosophy and annexed, sometimes abusively, to non-philosophy, authors who would quite evidently and quite rightly refuse this label. So it is that we find, for example, a Saint Michel, a Saint Alain, a Saint Gilles 1 without even mentioning the youngest who aspire as well to the freedom of “saintliness” and who make their muted voices heard here. If there is a Holy Family of non-philosophers, it extends completely beyond these three, provided that the sectarian spirit can save us. This book is organized in the following manner: To begin, in order to recall the essential part of the problematic, we have organized a Summary of Non-Philosophy , a vade-mecum of notions and basic problems, in a classical style. Secondly, there is Clarifications On the Three Axioms of Non-Philosophy , designed to posit their proper use as much as to elucidate their meaning. Thirdly, an analysis of Philosophizability and Practicity , both being extreme constituents of philosophical material or the contents of the third axiom. Fourthly, the heart of this work: Let us Make a Tabula Rasa of the Future or of Utopia as Method . Fifthly, we have a theoretical outline of a non-institutional utopia, The International Organization of Non-Philosophy, L’Organisation Non-Philosophique Internationale, (ONPHI) already created in practice but under the conditions of possibility and functioning from which here we put into question “de jure,” thus not without a perplexity concerning “facts,” in any case, without the capability of “getting to the bottom of things.” Sixthly, an essay characterizing The Right and the Left of Non-Philosophy , a brief topology of several philosophizing and normalizing positions of proponents or tenants of this problematic. Seventhly, Rebel in the Soul: A Theory of Future Struggle , a systematic discussion starting from a confrontation of non-philosophical gnosis and non-religious gnosis to the extent that they pose, posed or perhaps still will pose themselves as rivals to non-philosophy in a mixture of fidelity and infidelity. Despite the fact that it can also be read as putting non-philosophy into perspective: it pits against a standard Platonism two contemporary appropriations of Gnosticism. On the basis of the paradigm of Man who never ceases to come as the Future-in-person, each one of these moments strives to reestablish not the “true” non-philosophy and its orthodoxy, but the minimal conditions to respect in order to allow for its maximum fecundity. And in order to bring about one of the last possibilities of its development, making explicit Humaneity as a utopia-for-the-World. In introducing these considerations in the form of a “testament” and “ultimatum,” we want to indicate two things: First, that this is the last time we will intervene in order to caution non-philosophers against the temptation of returning and looking backwards towards philosophy. Only a disillusioned nostalgia for the former World and its traditions barely remain permissible to us.… Secondly, that non-philosophy is also a sort of ultimatum for considering one’s life and transforming one’s thought from the perspective of a uni-version rather than a conversion. Man as future is this ultimatum in action, not an impatient self-proclaimed genius, and philosophy is his testament. It is obviously the ultimatum that determines this testament as “old” with a view towards a life that is, itself, non-testamentary. In and of itself, the “old” can never bear a veritable eschaton. Thus, this book intersects according to the logic of this paradigm, under the sign of the ultimate or “last” as future, philosophy as testament and cautionary note for maintaining the non-philosophical oeuvre as “future” or “utopian.” We will see that between these two dimensions it cradles a theory of struggle. In the end, this book envisions non-philosophers in multiple ways. It inevitably sees them as subjects of knowledge, most often academics insofar as life in the world demands, but above all as close relatives of three great human types. The analyst and political militant are quite obvious, for non-philosophy is close to psychoanalysis and Marxism insofar as it transforms the subject in transforming philosophy. Here again, one must have a sense not of certain nuances but of aspects (of the interpretations, albeit unilateralized) and not in order to construct a simple proletarization or militarization of thought as theory. To be rigorous, rather than authoritarian or spiteful, is its task. And lastly, non-philosophy is a close relative of the spiritual but definitely not the spiritualist. Those who are spiritual are not at all spiritualists, for the spiritual oscillate between fury and tranquil rage, they are great destroyers of the forces of Philosophy and the State, which are united under the name of Conformism. They haunt the margins of philosophy, gnosis, mysticism, science fiction and even religions. Spiritual types are not only abstract mystics and quietists; they are heretics for the World. The task is to bring their heresy to the capacity of utopia, and their utopia to the capacity of the paradigm. NOTES We will recognize allusions, and sometimes references, to closely related or distant themes, but which are related, in the work of Michel Henry, Alain Badiou and via the representative of “non-religious” gnosis of a Platonic origin, in Gilles Grelet. It goes without saying that these discussions are current and local, neither concerning the ensemble of doctrines nor prejudging the eventual evolution of certain amongst them. This concerns defining certain proximities with non-philosophy (rather than adversaries which in some sense they are) and typological and emblematic differends (rather than conflicts with a certain author). (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to provide an interpretation for Sartre’s account of the unity of consciousness in The Transcendence of the Ego. I will argue that it is only once The Transcendence of the Ego is read alongside other texts written around the same time, such as The Imaginary, that we can understand how Sartre believes it is possible for consciousness to be unified without an I. I begin by setting out the Kantian context that Sartre develops (...) for his views, before looking at Sartre’s arguments themselves. I then turn to some of the difficulties other readers have encountered with making sense of the arguments of the Transcendence of the Ego. I argue that it is only in relation to Sartre’s account of what he calls the illusion of immanence in The Imaginary, that we can make sense of Sartre’s account of consciousness, before reconstructing what I take to be Sartre’s position drawing on Sartre’s references to Bergson and Spinoza. (shrink)

This paper was inspired by Irigaray's suggestion that patriarchal discourse is essentially paranoid, based upon a repressed ambiguity and violence that continually threatens the unity and stability of the subject. Lewis Carroll's 'Locking-Glass World' is employed as the metaphor for a system of meaning that is in the process of breaking down and reveals its shadow side in chaos, violence and power struggles. It is argued that Alice represents an idealized feminine submission to the rules of patriarchal discourse that (...) appears safe and stable but renders the subject powerless to effect change. I contrast this with the encouragement neo-paganism gives its practitioners to construct alternative magical metaphors and to learn through experience. It is valuable for feminist theologians to privilege these flexible techniques in order to avoid the straitjacket of reifying discourse. The article makes the point that the mystical experience is anyway grounded in that which transcends language, and the excess of the mystic finds its expression best in an abundance of meaning and symbol. Irigaray and feminist neo-pagans can in their various ways serve as role models in the process of renegotiating Wonderland and creating a new 'Alice'. (shrink)

In Western religious traditions, God is conventionally conceived as a humanlike creator, lawgiver, and king, a being both accessible and actively present in history. Yet there is a concurrent tradition of a God who actively hides, leading to a tension between a God who is simultaneously accessible and yet inaccessible, both immanent and transcendent, present and absent. Western Gnostic, esoteric, and mystical thinking capitalizes on the hidden and hiding God. Histories of the Hidden God explores this tradition from (...) antiquity to today. The essays focus on three essential themes: the concealment of the hidden God; the human quest for the hidden God, and revelations of the hidden God. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to expose a basic flaw at the root of perennialism as a method for studying mysticism—its distinction between ‘exoteric’ and ‘esoteric’ components of mysticism and religion. Rather than being distinct, the specific ‘exoteric’ doctrines of a given mystic’s tradition penetrate the mystics’ knowledge-claims. Thus, the ‘esoteric’ dimension in a mystical tradition is permeated by that mystical tradition’s ‘exoteric’ doctrines, not by the transcultural and ahistorical perennial spine that (...) perennialists postulate. Contrary to what the perennialists suggest, there is no one underlying esoteric set of beliefs embedded in all traditional religions that all mystics share. Rather, in the different religious traditions of the world, there are genuinely different mysticisms with different beliefs, practices, values, and goals. Thus, the perennialist approach distorts the history of mysticism. It is better seen as a theology of religions than as an alleged discernment of timeless truths presented throughout the history of mysticism. (shrink)

Extensive review of academic writings on the convergence of religions (COR) in Nigeria shows that many online academic papers and related conversations gave more attention to its negative implications. Agreeably, Nigeria is the hotbed of religious crises in Africa. However, with the benefits of hindsight, filling the gap of insufficient capture of the positive impact of COR is considered in this exercise with three questions in view: (1) Where do religions meet? (2) Why do religions meet? (3) (...) What are the positive implications of their convergence in Nigeria? Answers were adequately captured with examples, scenarios, case studies, historical evidence, and concomitant academic literature. Overall, this exercise projected three arguments. Firstly, it posited that commitment to religion is not at the heart of COR in Nigeria, rather, COR is premised on personal or group interests. Secondly, it argued that positive reflections on the COR can promote inter-religious tolerance, peace, and unity. Thirdly, it proposed that the COR has far-reaching positive implications socially, politically, and economically. Lastly, it made brief recommendations for improved co-existence and nation-building. Contribution: This article contributes to inter-religious dialogue in Africa as it focuses on the social, political and economic value of religion in Nigeria. (shrink)

The sources of religious tolerance but also of religious nationalism in post-soviet Russia can be found basically in the group identification of nationality and religion. In crisis situations, the historical religion of the Russian society - Orthodoxy - becomes the criterion for identifying the national identity. However, despite the fact that the majority of Russians in our times consider themselves Orthodox, many of them are not believers. The observable effect of the “external belief” results in the fact (...) that the religion tends to become a matter of personal choice and an individual value. It assumes a nationalistic function and to become an ideology. As a result, the political elite considers religion as a means of achieving different non- religious purposes. The Russian Orthodox Church, the official church, is compelled to take this fact into consider- ation and even support it. This is why religious intolerance and religious nationalism in modern Russia are often directed towards religion. (shrink)

Baldwin and McNabb explore how non-Christian religious traditions can utilize Plantinga’s epistemology. This book pays particular attention to the question, if there are believers from differing religious traditions that can rightfully utilize his epistemology, does this somehow prevent a Plantingian’s creedal-specific belief from being warranted?

The discourse over secularization has undergone a pronounced change. In this context the debate over the social role of religions in post-modern societies started again about ten years ago and is still going on. This debate is also underway in political theory and political philosophy. Authors like Jürgen Habermas, Richard Rorty, Michael Walzer and Gianni Vattimo are key players in this debate. On the one hand, liberals such as Rorty tend to reduce religions to the private sphere. On (...) the other hand, a post-secular model has developed over the last decade. Habermas is probably the most well-known of these academics. In his view, deliberative democracy needs sources for motivation as an antidote, and religions could provide such a moral resource. The paper wants to explore this discourse about the social role of religion. This analysis will focus on the contribution of religions to the debate on justice. It will be argued, that religions could be interpreted as comprehensive social practices. More precisely, religions can be regarded as cultural practices through which people live and interpret their lives. The common characteristic of all religions is that they establish a comprehensive practice that enables discussion and reflection on a transcendent dimension of reality. In plural societies, in which different forms of reasons play an important role, religions as social practices could be one important social factor, especially when we are reflecting about the sources of global justice. (shrink)

Not only in philosophy but in religion as well, concepts such as God, World and Man are discussed quite considerably. Nevertheless, an understanding of these concepts requires careful, detailed and systematic analyses. One of the methods of achieving the same is to use a comparative framework. Within Islam, Wahdatul-Wujud is an important mystical and philosophical perspective that has witnessed a tumultuous journey. It has however played a dominant role in Islamic thought. Within Indian philosophy, Vedānta has played a very (...) influential role. Visistādvaita as a school of thought has also played a great role to interpret core philosophical concepts of Upanishads, Bhagavad Gita and Brahma Sutras. In this research paper, we attempt to provide a comparative analysis of Visistādvaita and Wahdatul-Wujud marking out the aspects of similarity and departures. What stands out as relevant and insightful as an implication of the comparative method is an understanding of these two approaches. Wahdatul-Wujud is redefined as a panentheistic philosophy which believes that God exists inside of everything, but is at the same time, transcendent of everything. In this type ofbelief, God is seen as an eternal spark of all things, the Prime Mover. Quite similarly, Visistādvaita, on the other hand is conceived as a Qualified Non- dualistic philosophy which believes in subsuming every diverse phenomena and experience under an underlying unity. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Occupy Religion:Theology of the Multitude and Interreligious DialogueJoerg RiegerOne of the big questions for the present is how to bring the different liberation movements together. The different liberation theologies, as is well known, have addressed various forms of oppression along the lines of gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, class, and other factors. What is it that brings us together without erasing our differences? This question has important implications for (...) interreligious dialogue, as we shall see.In our book Occupy Religion Kwok Pui-lan and I use the term “multitude” to reflect on unity and difference.1 This term, made prominent by political scientists and philosophers Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri,2 has deep roots in our theological traditions. Several decades ago, Korean Minjung theology noted the prominence of the notion of the multitude (this is how the term minjung can be translated into English) in the Bible. In the Gospels, the so-called ochlos (the Greek term for the masses or the common people) does not describe only the ones who are the recipients of Jesus’ transformative ministry; the ochlos also describes the participants in it and the agents of change. In addition, our Latin American colleagues have highlighted the importance of Greek term laos in the biblical traditions, which is also used to designate the common people rather than the elites.There is a distinct difference between the Greek notions of democracy and laocracy or ochlocracy. Democracy describes the rule of the demos, which is constituted by the elite citizens of a city-state. Lower-class citizens, women, and slaves are not part of this rule. Laocracy and ochlocracy, on the other hand, describe the rule of the common people, including the proverbial “least of these” of which Jesus speaks frequently. These common people include all those who have been and are being marginalized on the basis of their gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, and class. In the ministry of Jesus, which is informed by the ministry of Moses, Miriam, Hannah, and the prophets, the common people are organized and become agents. God values their diverse contributions to life. In the world of laocracy and ochlocracy, there are different ways of being productive in the community, and all of them are acknowledged and needed. As Hardt and Negri remind us, the multitude is not the uniform entity of what has often [End Page 167] been called “the people” in various nationalisms or fascisms. Neither is the multitude the undifferentiated mass or the mob.3What brings the various liberation movements together, therefore, is not uniformity or a request to surrender difference. What brings us together is “deep solidarity,” the recognition that we are all in the same boat under the conditions of global capitalism.4 This insight is related to the topic of class, which has consistently been pushed underground in the United States but which has recently reemerged in the context of the Occupy Wall Street movement. The now-familiar notion of the 99 percent versus the 1 percent is a reminder that the majority of people are benefitting less and less from the neoliberal market economy. This includes even members of the middle class, as they have seen their retirement accounts dwindle, their job security take ever-more severe hits, their benefits erode, and their political power fade. Furthermore, the aspects of gender, sexuality, race, and ethnicity are closely linked to class, as they all increase the disadvantages of people in the neoliberal market economy, thus boosting the reality of deep solidarity. Deep solidarity ties together members of the 99 percent across the lines of gender, sexuality, race, and ethnicity, and it thrives on difference, as they can now work together and make use of their various opportunities and gifts.Deep solidarity differs from conventional ideas of solidarity, which were often based on the idea that those who are privileged place themselves on the side of those without privilege. While it is still possible for members of the 1 percent to place themselves on the side of the 99 percent, the majority of us are now part of the 99 percent, and thus belong to classes that have something to gain from liberation. Class struggle, as... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Papirius and the Chickens, or Machiavelli on the Necessity of Interpreting ReligionJohn M. Najemy*No aspect of Machiavelli’s thought elicits a wider range of interpretations than religion, and one may wonder why his utterances on this subject appear to move in so many different directions and cause his readers to see such different things. One reason is of course his famous challenge to conventional piety in the advice to (...) princes (in chapter 18 of The Prince) that, while it is important to appear to be “all compassion, faith, integrity, humanity, and religione, and there is nothing more necessary for a prince than to appear to have the last of these,” these “qualities” can actually be “damaging” if a prince insists on observing them at all times. For it is sometimes necessary to act “against faith, against charity, against humanity, and against religione.” 1 Machiavelli probably never wrote more famous or infamous words than these, even though they express an obvious, and hardly original, truth about all politics. But the world of the later sixteenth- and seventeenth-century reformations and religious absolutisms could not tolerate such honesty, and Machiavelli’s reputation was quickly tarred with accusations of devilish immorality by the very societies that thought it was godly to burn heretics. On the issue of religion Machiavelli became, and to some extent remains, a convenient scapegoat often blamed for the decline of religion in the modern world, all of which has no doubt intensified the polemical and ideological nature of the debates surrounding his views of religion in general and Christianity in particular. [End Page 659]The polar positions in the interpretation of Machiavelli’s ideas about religion are represented by Leo Strauss and Sebastian de Grazia. For Strauss, Machiavelli was a “teacher of evil,” a “blasphemer,” and a purveyor of lessons of a “diabolical” and “soulless character” whose purpose was to sabotage the heritage of thought and morality inherited from both Christianity and Greek philosophy. 2 De Grazia, by contrast, has recently given us a Machiavelli who “discourses about God always in the conventional reverent attitude,” who “never questions that there is good and evil,” and who, “by associating virtuous political action with grace and glory... argues that through this kind of active and political virtue men conform to God’s desire.” “Behind Niccolò’s insistence on political action,” says de Grazia, “stands God. He grants His grace when it is earned—in political coin.” 3 Part of the fascination of Machiavelli scholarship is the mystery of how this most outspoken and direct of political thinkers—a writer who pulled no punches and minced no words—could be the common referent of such wildly different readings. But it is equally curious to observe how uncannily these extreme positions mirror each other. Both give us true believers, one in the Word, the other in the subversion of the Word; and in both cases a believer who is always of a piece, true to himself, and possessed of an unshakeable commitment—whether positive or negative—toward the transcendent truth of Christianity. In short, for all the obvious differences, the similarities between Strauss’s “diabolical” Machiavelli and de Grazia’s reverent “friend of God” remind one of the old myth that devils are after all only fallen angels.The papers in this forum should certainly remove any doubt about the importance of religion in Machiavelli’s thought. They remind us of the prominence of religious language and examples in Machiavelli’s texts: his call for the “redemption” of Italy in the last chapter of The Prince; the esteem in which he holds the heads and founders of religions, whom he declares, in Discourses 1.10, to be the most praised of all famous men; the crucial appeal to the figure of Moses as the prototype of both founders of states and liberators of enslaved peoples; the central role that Machiavelli attributes to religion among the factors responsible for Rome’s power, unity, and political success; and his provocative critique of Christianity, which leads him, in a number of places, to blame the Christian faith for the relative weakness of both modern states and the modern ethic of citizenship. 4 The authors... (shrink)

The efforts to prove God's existence in the history of thought have been one of the fundamental problems of philosophy and theology, and even the most important one. The evidences put furword to prove the existence of God constitute the center of philosophy of religion’s problems not only philosophy of religion, but also the disciplines such as theology-kalam and Islamic philosophy are also seriously concerned. When we look at the history of philosophy, it is clear that almost all (...) philosophers are interested in the evidence in favour of and against the existence of God. Especially in recent times, religious experience has often been regarded as evidence of the existence of God. Studies in the field of religious and mystical experience have put forward many arguments concerning the use of religious experience as evidence. However, this study has been limited to experience of sense and pure consciousness claims rather than examining all of these arguments. In this study firstly, the analogy between experience of sense and religious experience will be deal with, and then claims that conciousness can be emptied by a number of methods which are defended by mystics. In addition, it will be tried to defend the opinion that the mystical experiences which are the common point of the two approaches are valid. The main emphasis of the article will be that these arguments can be used as evidence for the existence of God.Summary: Religious experience - which has not been considered as one of the classical evidences regarding the existence of God before being popular by recent studies – is started to be called one of the arguments. The most important reason for not arguing religious experience among the evidences of God’s existence is that it is a personal experience and therefore contains subjective perspectives. However, many researchers, who refuse to accept the criticism raised against religious experience with restricting to subjectivity, emphasized the importance of religious experience by highlighting the objective aspects of such experiences. This emphasis was not only on its significance, but also on the fact that it had a cognitive feature and thus it could provide evidence for the existence of God. The argument of religious experience is generally defined as an effort for demonstrating to existence of God with reference to several feelings such as spiritual experiences of human in face of creator and sacred Being, encounter with God, uniting, and annihilating selfness in Him. The emergence of such efforts, especially after the XVIIIth century, indicates that the history of the evidence does not go back much earlier. However, even if notas evidence, it is possible to extend the traces of religious and mystical experience to the history of religions such as Buddhism and Hinduism. Considering a great amount of the previous literature focused on religious experience in the West, It is easily seen that such research is still new. The main purpose in addressing such a controversial issue is to make the argument on the religious experience more current and to show whether the religious experience would be able to use as evidence for the existence of God.First title of this study comprises many different claims such as Walter T. Stace’s The Argument from Unanimity Richard Swinburne’s The Principle of Credulity, William P. Alston’s Perceiving God, John Hick’s Experience-as. However, instead of briefly giving out very different claims, the study chooses to focus on two arguments which are less discussed and can be given in more detail. The first is the argument based on the analogy between the religious experience and the sense experience. The fundamental point of this argument is sense experience. With reference to the similarities between the sense experience and the religious experience, it can be argued that religious experience is also cognitive and may function as an evidence for the existence of God. In other words, being perceptual and noetic, namely cognitive, of sense experience is addressed as a similar side of religious experience. Whether it is imaginary or real, eventually, it is necessary for an experience to have an object and being experience of something. Therefore, the religious experience includes the perception of a Transcendent Being that is beyond and in excess of the individual who experiences. Perception of the sense experience will definitely be different from the perception of religious experience. Researchers who think that the five sense organs do not run the perception of Sacred Beings, identified broader and various meanings for the perception. Thereby, in this approach, where the semantic field of perception is expanded, it was contended that human beings were able to perceive the transcendent, eternal, and unlimited God, and this can be explained in the epistemological sense. In order to use religious experiences as an evidence for the existence of God, it is necessary to determine whether such experiences are caused by God rather than something else. This raises the issue of the validity of religious experience. The researchers in this area have propounded various criteria to identify whether religious experience is existed or not. Experiences, which do not meet the criteria, are not considered existed even if they claim to be religious experience.The second is the argument that discusses whether it is possible to suggest an evidence for the existence of God by utilizing pure consciousness events. In general, this argument claims that the consciousness gets clear, and thus, mystic or Sufi experiences the Divine One with pure consciousness by discharging consciousness from all sensual contents and removing it from secular desire and wishes. The argument, which claims the experience of Divine One is direct, therefore uninterpretable, and experienced by pure consciousness, believes clearing the consciousness of mystics from sensual qualities such as seeing, hearing, and tasting. It is stated that it is possible for mystics to empty their sensory images and get rid of them, and thus, their desires and wishes could be lost. Especially, the thinkers who are connected with the philosophy of perennialism and defend this approach, thought that people, who have distinct religion, culture, and beliefs in different parts of the world and in various time periods, had the same experience and considered such experiences were universal by suggesting that this similarity could be called as common essence.Even though the claim which offers that the events of pure consciousness are the same everywhere have been criticized in many respects, the advocates of this approach have argued that the experience has the common essence, but the interpretation is different. This relationship, which was tried to be established between experience and commentary, caused a lot of work for both the thinkers who put forward the claims of pure consciousness and the researchers who opposed it. However, examining the relationship between experience and interpretation requires serious studies in socio-psychological, cultural and religious fields. Therefore, in order not to exceed the limits of the article, the relationship between experience and interpretation is briefly mentioned.While discussing two arguments, the main claims of the arguments were addressed, and the criticisms directed to this argument were not discussed as much as possible. However, some fundamental criticisms have been mentioned shortly for a better understanding of the discussion. Since such western-oriented claims mostly were deployed in a western context, the study excluded the comparison of the claims across different cultures. (shrink)

Pythagoras and Pythagoreanism have a different position in the ancient philosophy tradition. The reason for this is the eclectical structure of Pythagoreanism which has syncretized from Orphism, Indian and Egyptian religions with philosophy. Orphism of these religions is especially important for affecting Pythagoreanism the most and giving to the ancient Greek religion a mystical content. Orphism which is a mystery cult is based on Orpheus, the poet, who sometimes is identified with Pythagoras in philosophy and the history (...) of religions. Orpheus, was attributed divine character by virtue of his beautiful voice and hymns in the ancient history, has brought many religious and philosophic elements such as reincarnation and unity with God to the Greek religion. The way of life and creeds of Orphism based on asceticism and wisdom, first affected Italian philosophy starting from Pythagoras and, later influenced both philosophy and the other religions such as Judaism and Christianity through Plato. The reason for this was the Orphism’s stronger theological structure than the Greek religion had. Thus, philosophy, the Miletus philosophers tried to purify from the Homeric religion, has regained some spirituality through Orphism and Pythagoras. Pythagoras, a philosopher and a religious leader, accepted students to his philosophy school by initiation in Crotone. In this way, Pythagoreanism gained the quality of both a school of philosophy and a community of mystery. In this school, Pythagoras constituted a strong natural philosophy based on the idea of arkhe consisting of numbers, and the system of mathematics and music. At the same time, for he was a religious leader, Pythagoras used his school both to teach philosophy and to celebrate the teletaic mystery rituals of Orphism. According to the Pythagoreans, as a master, Pythagoras has united with the spirit of Dionysos and has privileged to rise to the World-Soul of God. Due to this union, it has been believed that Pythagoras received revelations from Dionysos and knew the secrets of God’s spirit. Similarly, Pythagoras’ students of philosophy also joined these rituals. They, on the one hand, witnessed to the divine union of Pythagoras, on the other hand, experienced the communication with the subordinate gods, called daemons, allied to Dionysos. Through these mystical rituals in Pythagorean school, it was believed that the philosophical knowledge was not only a reasoning, but also a divine wisdom obtained from the divine word. Therefore, Pythagoreanism accepted that philosophy is from God and it is a way of life which rises the human to the divine level. According to Pythagoras philosophy, thinking about God is equal to dealing with natural philosophy. Because Pythagoreanism, that has a pantheistic belief in God, has acknowledged God and nature as the same. Additionally, the natural philosophy of the school was established on the Monad idea which has been accepted as the World-Soul. For Pythagoreanism, Monad is not a number, but it is the ONE as the source of all numbers and a theological principle. The ONE, which symbolizes God and the cosmic unity, brings into existence the life by limiting the chaos caused by the TWO. Similarly, the TWO, not a number but a principle, has been used in a positive sense in Anaximander and was called apeiron, meant “infiniteness”. But, for Pythagoras, infiniteness was a negative circumstance. For this reason, the TWO/Apeiron has been accepted as a female being which corresponds to limitless absence and evil. By Monad’s confinement the Apeiron had been passed into the cosmos, the cosmic harmony had been balanced and a spheric being had emerged. This is “unity” which corresponds with both the World Soul Monad and the nature in the Pythagorean philosophy. This study will discuss the notion of Monad which is known as the World-Soul and God in Pythagorean philosophy, from a perspective of the history of religions. In this context, the sources and knowledge of history of philosophy will be used by methods of the history of religions. Starting from Orphism, Monad will be discussed within similar mythical elements. Thus, the origin of the Pythagorean philosophy in ancient religions will be determined and the theological infrastructure will be shown. (shrink)

The dynamic of religious expression employs symbolic language, actions, and art. These symbols are symbols of transcendence because it is transcendence which is the unique referent that sets apart symbols which give rise to religious understanding from symbols which do not. The main objective of this book is to demonstrate that in Louis Dupre's work all religious expression, insofar as it has a transcendent reference, is intrinsically symbolic. Religious language is never purely objective nor purely subjective, but a dialectical (...) relation with a transcendent dimension. True to the teachings of Dupre, this book uncovers that without a transcendent referent, religious symbols lose their religious significance. This is the plight of the (late-post)modern condition which resulted from the fracturing of nature into its cosmic, human and transcendent components. To regain a sense of transcendence the believer is forced to make an inward turn akin to the mystical practice of past ages. This does not recover a sense of transcendence for culture but can do so for the believer's personal spiritual life. (shrink)

Why is beauty consoling? Ancient and Medieval Western philosophy was primarily concerned with beauty in relation to truth and goodness. The theistic religions assume a link between beauty, goodness and truth, all of which are viewed as Divine attributes. This is one reason for the iconoclasm that all three Abrahamic religions share to a greater or lesser degree. Yet, creative fictions of great artistic beauty aspire to a certain truthfulness. A work of the imagination may deepen or purify (...) our emotions such that we gain a clearer understanding of reality. Beauty is consoling because it resolves the contradictions of experience; art can be a conduit to a supreme transcendent unity. The Iconic Imagination is both a reflection on the redemptive potential of art, and an investigation of the traditions of occidental Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism and Islam in their confrontations with the particular power of art to represent the transcendent. Throughout, Hedley argues that the malaise of much contemporary reflection upon beauty is a consequence of the marginalisation of beauty's religious dimension. (shrink)

Mysticism denotes phenomena related with Divine experience. In religion it is perceived as a state in which a person seems to have passed beyond the normal parameters of human life and neither behaves nor expresses him/herself in the manner generally considered correct and acceptable in cultural or religious terms. I will approach the central theme of this paper from an ecumenical and multi-faith point of view. It entails demonstrating through the lives of certain figures, by no means conventional ones, (...) that female mysticism in the three big monotheistic religions contains a good degree of rebelliousness and transgresses, more or less openly, traditional doctrine. But it also goes beyond the platitudes of mystic experience itself. (shrink)

This article attempts an approach to discuss the mystery and the unity of the church and firstly, it underlined that the church cannot have a formal definition as the divine life extended from Christ's resurrected body into those who believe and receive the Holy Mysteria. At the same time, the process of becoming part of the church is a mystical one. In order for life in Christ to be possible, Christ must be formed in the human being. Becoming a (...) Christian is described in terms specific to the process of birth, its end being the formation of Christ in us. Then, the theme of unity is dealt with from an Eastern Orthodox perspective, not in isolation, but in connection with the Roman Catholic, Protestant and ecumenical concerns for unity and collaboration amongst Christians. The cosmic unifying vocation of the church was accomplished because of the five syntheses realised by her Head, our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Then there are references to the Theotokological aspect of the church, Holy Baptism as the bond of church unity; Holy Eucharist as the Mysterion of ecclesial unity, the ministry of the bishop for unity and the unity of Christians in the one Church. CONTRIBUTION: The author, having experience in ecumenical dialogues as a former member of the Commmission on World Mission and Evangelism and, at present, of the Commission on Faith and Order of the World Council of Churches, tried to offer a balanced perspective on the sensitive theme of the unity of the Christians in the one Church, referring to some of the main relevant sources, which facilitate dialogue, mutual knowledge and collaboration. (shrink)

Religions that center around a revelation--around a 'good book,' like the Torah or Gospels or Quran, which is seen as God's word--are widely regarded as irrational and dangerous: as based on outdated science and conducive to illiberal, inhumane moral attitudes. The Good and the Good Book defends revealed religion and shows how it can be reconciled with science and liberal morality. Fleischacker argues that revealed texts aim to teach neither scientific nor moral doctrines but a vision of what (...) life is about overall. Purely naturalistic ways of thinking cannot make much sense of our overall or ultimate good; revealed texts, by contrast, do precisely that. But these texts also need to be interpreted so as to accord with our independent understanding of morality. The delicate balance required for this process of interpretatio is discussed at some length. The book concludes with an account of how believers in one religion can respect believers in other religions, and secular people. (shrink)

The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam (1930) is Muhammad Iqbal's major philosophic work: a series of profound reflections on the perennial conflict among science, religion, and philosophy, culminating in new visions of the unity of human knowledge, of the human spirit, and of God. Iqbal's thought contributed significantly to the establishment of Pakistan, to the religious and political ideals of the Iranian Revolution, and to the survival of Muslim identity in parts of the former USSR. It now (...) serves as new bridge between East and West and between Islam and the other Religions of the Book. With a new Introduction by Javed Majeed, this edition of The Reconstruction opens the teachings of Iqbal to the modern, Western reader. It will be essential reading for all those interested in Islamic intellectual history, the renewal of Islam in the modern world, and political theory of Islam's relationship to the West. (shrink)

This paper will argue that the work of Slavoj Žižek can be fruitfully understood as a response to mystical theology as it has been received in two strands of 20th century French thought—psychoanalysis and phenomenology—and that Žižek's work in turn offers intriguing possibilities for the re-figuring of mystical theology by feminist philosophy of religion. Twentieth century French psychoanalysis is dominated by the work of Jacques Lacan and by his students Julia Kristeva and Luce Irigaray. All three of these figures (...) engage in significant ways with mystical theology—particularly with the works and figures of female mystics—as a crucial resource for theorising gender and subjectivity. A second strand of the 20th century French reception of mystical theology is the phenomenological tradition, specifically the work of Jacques Derrida. This paper will argue that, drawing on and challenging both of these elements of recent French engagement with mystical theology, Žižek's work offers a materialist ontology which seeks to locate transcendence within immanence and materiality, offering to feminist philosophy of religion the resources for re-thinking the relationship of the mystical to the material. (shrink)

The rituals practiced by the initiated and learned by the “chosen ones” so that they can be perpetuated, have generated the existence of two worlds. The first is that of immediate impact, on the first level of perception, amendable in its circumstantial data. The second world is the treasurer of recognizable factors in many similar situations, in stages different from manifestation and elements of the unique, the unusual. The second level has established itself as a human need to periodically immerse (...) in the sacred time. The initiation into the mysteries held by the world of the sacred is made by those who know how to practice it. They are the perfomers of narrative sequences, which are intended to reinstate the practices, rituals, customs, traditions and beliefs in today’s world. To support our claim, we are going to refer to four surveys, conducted on different, but conjunct topics which have confirmed the hypothesis formulated by us in the early 1990s: folk beliefs, ignored during the communist period and banned within the audiovisual, have merged with religious beliefs and have survived as a second level of perceiving the ritual sequence. The study highlights the syncretism of the two fields, religious faith and folk beliefs, and the role of mass media in promoting them in order to revitalize the collective memory and to contribute to the literacy of the younger generation. The principles of the Orthodox Christian catechesis explain the presence of the priest in the existential ceremonies. (shrink)

This paper first uncovers the subtle spiritual narcissism that has characterized historical approaches to religious diversity and discusses the shortcomings of the main forms of religious pluralism that have been proposed as its antidote: ecumenical, soteriological, postmodern, and metaphysical. It then argues that a participatory pluralism paves the way for an appreciation of religious diversity that eschews the dogmatism and competitiveness involved in privileging any particular tradition over the rest without falling into cultural-linguistic or naturalistic reductionisms. Discussion includes the question (...) of the validity of spiritual truths and the development of a participatory critical theory of religion. The essay concludes with an exploration of different scenarios for the future of religion– global religion, mutual transformation, interspiritual wisdom, and spirituality without religion–and proposes that such a future may be shaped by spiritually individuated persons engaged in processes of cosmological hybridization in the context of a common spiritual family. A participatory approach to spirituality turns the problem of religious plurality into a celebration of the critical spirit of pluralism. (shrink)

The absence of Islam from recent scholarship on Hegel's account of world religions is puzzling. In the first part of the article, we argue that Hegel's neglect of Islam in his systematic account of religious phenomena is not accidental and that he did not think of Islam as a determinate religion. Its size and believers aside, we suggest that it is not possible to assign any determinacy to Islam as a world-historical phenomenon under Hegel's rubric, because such (...) determinacy that applies to other religions would be in conflict with what Hegel takes to be Islam's emphasis on the negative moment of truth, its revolutionary tendencies, and its lack of any novel conceptual content as a response to Christianity. In the second part of the article, we point out how one could respond to Hegel's characterization of Islam when it is mentioned in relation to other religious traditions. First, we argue that Hegel overemphasizes the significance of Islam qua religion in explaining the history of Muslim peoples. More than that, Hegel does not see that the history of Islamic philosophy and science can be characterized by sublation and that it can be integrated into conceptual developments in the West on these terms. However, our critique of Hegel's Eurocentrism does not remain at this level, for in the third part of the article we argue for the significance of considering the response of Muslim philosophers to Hegel. In particular, we look at the responses by Mohammed al-Khosht and Mahmoud Haider, respectively. We conclude that Hegel's exclusion of Islam from any involvement in the history of the Concept indicates an undialectical commitment on his part and that to this extent being Hegelian today requires that we rectify this oversight. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Christianity and Human Rights: Influences and IssuesJohn D’Arcy MayChristianity and human rights: Influences and issues. Edited by Frances S. AdeneyArvind Sharma. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2007. xi + 228 pp.The existence of the “Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the World’s Religions” (UDHRWR) deserves to be more widely known, and this book not only reproduces the text, drawn up for a conference in Montreal (...) to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UNUDHR, 1948), but offers a point-by-point comparison of the two documents by Frances Adeney and a series of papers that illuminate the issues raised by such declarations from very different points of view. The premise of the whole undertaking is that religious perspectives were not adequately represented in the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, though even this is questioned by some of the contributors. The UDHRWR explicitly mentions the right to change one’s religion, asserting in article 18 (1): “There shall be no compulsion in religion. It is a matter of choice,” and it includes “the rights of nature and the earth” (art. 29 [1]; see also 24 [2]). Article 12 (4 and 5) also asserts the duty and the corresponding right of not denigrating the religions of others. Article 16 (5) mentions monasticism as an institution worthy of protection alongside marriage. [End Page 172]In an extremely detailed examination of the work of the Third Committee, which brought the original UN document to the floor of the General Assembly, Sumner B. Twiss finds abundant evidence that religious issues were debated at great length, with great respect, and from a wide range of cultural and religious backgrounds. The committee included representatives of Christian, Confucian, Marxist, Hindu, Buddhist, and Muslim traditions, and Twiss claims that it is a mistake to regard the document they produced as either Western or secular in intent. The question of the relationship between rights and duties was thoroughly debated, as were the social dimensions of both and the underlying theological and ideological issues. Although religious terminology was eventually omitted, this was agreed in an atmosphere of exemplary tolerance and mutual understanding. Twiss concludes: “The UDHRWR is redressing a nonexistent problem presumably posed by the UDHR” (p. 69).Nevertheless, in the present context of the desecularization or resacralization of the world, a more explicit treatment of religious aspects of human rights seems appropriate, and the papers collected here raise problems that are still with us. Frances Adeney introduces several of them: the distinction between public and private spheres, the relative weighting given to creation and sin, and the relationship between rights and duties. The specifically Christian contribution to the debate, in her view, is the insistence on the universality of human rights derived from the biblical conception of the human as the “image of God,” so that “Christians through the ages have assigned a transcendent worth to human beings” (p. 20). The dimension of community is signaled by the extension of the covenant from ethnic group to faith community, thus linking the covenant family of God to the unity of humankind. Whether this link is strong enough to secure the universality of human rights, however, remains an open question.The Christian ethicist Max Stackhouse counterposes to this the “profound individualism” implicit in human rights thinking: it is this, rather than abstract or absolute universals, that lays the basis for civil society and, in its Christian variants, “provides the safest havens for non-Christian religions to flourish without political control” (p. 49). It is the rights of each individual, not of communitarian entities, that are to be respected. The religions tend to be particularistic, but this does not mean that the sources of human rights thinking are necessarily secular humanist. Stackhouse leaves us with two very significant questions: “... whether we can form a global civil society that does not have a theologically based inner moral architecture,” and whether “human rights principles become more effective without attention to their roots and justifying ultimate legitimations” (p. 50). Terry Muck also confronts us with the tensions between universality and cultural specificity, the individual and the communal, arguing that religions all... (shrink)

This book contains programmatic essays that focus on broad-ranging proposals for re-envisioning a discipline of comparative philosophy of religions. It also contains a number of case studies focussing on the interpretation of particular religio-historical data from comparatively oriented philosophical perspectives.

I do not for a moment question the fact that many people have experiences of a special type which may be termed “religious”, The extent to which religious experience may be regarded as a reasonably common phenomenon in present-day Britain is shown clearly by David Hay in his Exploring Inner Space, Harmondsworth 1982. that such experiences often involve reference to something which appears to display a radical unlikeness to all else and that they are therefore in some sense inexpressible. Doubtless (...) the ideas I have put forward about the possible source of such unlikeness and ineffability might suggest models of God which would not find much theological approval, at least within any mainstream theistic tradition, since some sort of pantheism seems inevitably to be implied. But however this might be, the concept of radical unlikeness as it has been analyzed here can, I think, help us towards understanding certain problematic areas in religion quite apart from the issue of intelligibility, which has been the focus of this discussion. To begin with, radical unlikeness suggests a way in which the historical continuity of concepts of the transcendent might be upheld against the discontinuity suggested by the diversity of interpretations through which they have moved. Ancient and modern outlooks on, say, God differ enormously, as indeed do the range of co-temporal accounts at many particular moments. But, by and large, theologians firmly maintain that it is a single and unchanging phenomenon which is being dealt with. Unless we can point to some common element which is both specific enough to create a binding sense of common tradition, yet never completely expressed by any attempt at understanding it within that tradition (thus persistently demanding new attempts to apprehend it), then given the widely differing views of God within, for example, the Christian community, it is difficult to see how we could assume that in fact they all stemmed from the same source and were talking about the same thing. The idea of radical unlikeness could provide an element with just these required characteristics: it could be seen as what all the accounts attempt to net, with varying degrees of adequacy, within their offered interpretations. It could be seen as what remains constant, constantly elusive yet constantly generative of fresh attempts to apprehend it, throughout a history of intra-religious diversity. This sort of explanation could, presumably, be applied to the intra-religious diversity of the non-Christian traditions too.Secondly, radical unlikeness might suggest a possible way of understanding inter-religious diversity in a way which allows that whilst such diversity exists, whilst the differences between religions are real, they are grounded in a similar root-experience. It may, at first sight, seem difficult to continue thinking of the various religious traditions as truly separate phenomena if they are taken as being grounded on experiences whose ineffability stems from the unlikeness of experiencing things as a whole. Here we must stress again that if they are to be considered intelligible, radically unlike experiences cannot be considered completely so - or putting this another way, we cannot more than approach experience of totality. Sense can be given to religious claims of ineffability by suggesting experience of near totality, where we reach the last point on the scale of inclusiveness which complies with the logical criteria demanded of something for it to be possible for us to be aware of it. We might thus attempt an explanation of inter-religious diversity based on the view that Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, Islam etc. acquire their differences from the different elements included in their experience of near totality. Taking totality to be represented by the scale of one to ten, Hinduism might be seen as grounded on experience of 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-9-10, Buddhism on experience of 1-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10 and so on. The resulting dissimilarities are thus centred not on different types of experience, but on different areas of inclusiveness. This is, of course, to suppose that the various religious traditions are all based on the same degree (as opposed to the same elements) of inclusiveness, but it is by no means clear that such a supposition is justified. Continuing with our decimal analogy, might it not be suggested that whilst Christianity stemmed from experience of 2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10, Jainism was founded on a less extensive encounter with the divine (say 4-5-6-7-8-9-10)? It is, however, uncertain how we can compare and evaluate different religious traditions in such a way as to be able to comment on such claims. A definite danger of comparative religion is that by concentrating on establishing and exploring inter-religious likenesses, it may obscure the radical unlikeness of religious phenomena. It should be borne firmly in mind that such likenesses as may be established within comparative studies may not win religious phenomena a place within our understanding comparable to objects of more everyday concern. Statements found in the Old Testament, the Qur'an and the Vedas, for example, may, on occasion, be alike, but at the end of the day such things are often alike only, or chiefly, in so far as they display the same radical unlikeness in relation to the non-religious elements in our outlook.The analysis of radical unlikeness and ineffability which has been advanced might also suggest a way in which certain passages in religious writings could be understood, passages which at first sight can be seriously perplexing. If, for example, to return to the quotation given in the introductory section of this paper, we continue to think of accounts of the nature of Shiva as being attempts to describe some discrete, objective entity, then it is inevitable that either we will share the Puranic writer's puzzlement or that much of what we read about Shiva will appear as the muddled and extravagant thinking thrown up by an uncritical and over-fertile mythological imagination, consisting of little more than a hotch-potch of contradictory elements. But if we see such accounts as attempting to say something about everything, as symbols of near totality stemming from experiences which verge on the holistic, then what we read - with all its ambiguities - may become somewhat more meaningful. Thus W.D. O'Flaherty comments that Shiva “embodies all of life in all its detail at every minute” (Asceticism and Eroticism in the Mythology of Shiva, London 1973, p. 315). Similarly Alain Dani41ou sees Shiva, ultimately, in terms of his being "the supreme state of reality" beyond whom there is only "non-existence" (Hindu Polytheism, London 1964, p. 190).This analysis of ineffability and intelligibility seeks to introduce for debate a possible way of understanding the radical unlikeness which accounts of religious experience apparently attempt to speak about. It does not, however, claim to present an exhaustive treatment of the issues raised, on the contrary, I am conscious of many shortcomings and omissions. For instance, it remains to be seen under precisely what conditions something counts as being an elucidating likeness (presumably all experiences are, for example, temporal, yet temporality alone would not seem to offer a particularly elucidating comparison). Moreover, the degree to which appeal to likeness is allowed operation in actual accounts of religious experience needs to be explored. In addition, the notion of categorizing experiences according to the extent to which they approach a point of total inclusion requires careful clarification. To begin with, according to what criteria could we establish that one experience was more inclusive than another? However, such issues can only be mentioned here, any adequate consideration of them would require a separate paper.In conclusion, I would suggest that to use radical unlikeness and/or ineffability simply as devices by which to halt any process of investigation, proclaiming that the thing in question is not like anything and so is beyond all words, risks making unintelligible and placing beyond all further inquiry an important and extensive area of human experience. As William Alston put it, to label something ineffable in an unqualified way is to shirk the job of making explicit the ways in which it can be talked about. William P. Alston, “ineffability”, Philosophical Review 65 (1956), 522. It is surely more accurate to take ineffability as a “qualifier”I.T. Ramsey, Models and Mystery (Oxford 1964), p. 60. which “multiplies models without end”Ibid. than as an absolute which prevents the construction of any elucidating models. (shrink)

Trata das possibilidades de uma teologia ecumênica das religiões tendo como eixo articulador a preocupação pela paz, pela justiça e pela integridade da criação. O objetivo é analisar temas de destaque para o cenário das análises sociais e teológicas como: a) O valor do humano e da ética social para o diálogo interreligioso, b) As possibilidades de uma unidade aberta, convidativa e integradora no âmbito das religiões; c) A importância pública das religiões; d) As religiões como códigos de comunicação; e) (...) O poder do império e o poder do diálogo das religiões. Para isso, vamos contar com as contribuições de Hans Küng, Jürgen Moltmann, Julio de Santa Ana, Xavier Pikaza e José Comblin respectivamente. A proposição é que a perspectiva ecumênica, uma vez articulada com as dimensões sociais, políticas, econômicas e culturais, dentro dos variados contextos históricos, pode oferecer densidade e amplitude para a reflexão teológica. Os esforços que valorizam a capacidade de diálogo e de sensibilidade ecumênica e aqueles que destacam a importância pública das religiões partem da concepção de que a perspectiva ecumênica, tanto em nível prático quanto em nível teórico-metodológico, requer e possibilita uma compreensão mais apurada da realidade, um aperfeiçoamento de visões dialógicas e o cultivo de maior sensibilidade para a valorização da vida e para a promoção da paz e da justiça. Palavras-chave: Teologia das religiões. Ecoteologia. Paz e justiça. Ecumenismo.This paper focus on the possibilities of an ecumenical theology of religions, having as a its principal concern peace, justice and integrity of creation. It aims to analyze some central issues for the social and theological scenario, such as: a) humanity and social ethics for interreligious dialogue; b) the possibilities for an open, engaging and inviting interreligious unity; c) the public relevance of religions; d) religions as communicating codes; e) the imperial powers and the power of religious dialogue. We will take into account the contributions of Hans Küng, Jürgen Moltmann, Julio de Santa Ana, Xavier Pikaza and José Comblin. The study affirms that the ecumenical perspective, once articulated to social, political, economic and cultural dimensions, within the various theological contexts, can offer density and extension for the theological reflection. Efforts that value the capacity for dialogue and ecumenical sensibility and those that highlight the public importance of religions start from the conception that the ecumenical perspective, both in the practical and in the theoretical-methodological levels, requests and makes it possible for a deeper comprehension of the reality, an improvement of dialogic visions and the cultivation of more expressions of sensibility for the valorization of life and for the promotion of peace and justice. Key-words: Theology of religions. Ecotheology. Peace and justice. (shrink)

Hinduism and Zoroastrianism have strong historical bonds and share similar value-systems. As an instance, both of these religions are pro-life. Abortion has been explicitly mentioned in Zoroastrian Holy Scriptures including Avesta, Shayast-Nashayast and Arda Viraf Nameh. According to Zoroastrian moral teachings, abortion is evil for two reasons: killing an innocent and intrinsically good person, and the contamination caused by the dead body. In Hinduism, the key concepts involving moral deliberations on abortion are Ahimsa, Karma and reincarnation. Accordingly, abortion deliberately (...) disrupts the process of reincarnation, and killing an innocent human being is not only in contrast with the concept of Ahimsa, but also places a serious karmic burden on its agent. The most noteworthy similarity between Zoroastrianism and Hinduism is their pro-life approach. The concept of Asha in Zoroastrianism is like the concept of Dharma in Hinduism, referring to a superior law of the universe and the bright path of life for the believers. In terms of differences, Zoroastrianism is a religion boasting a God, a prophet, and a Holy book, while Hinduism lacks all these features. Instead of reincarnation and rebirth, Zoroastrianism, like Abrahamic religions, believes in the afterlife. Also, in contrast with the concept of Karma, in Zoroastrianism, Ahura Mazda can either punish or forgive sins. (shrink)

Although the Islamic religion is well known, many people are less familiar with Sufism—the esoteric component of Islam. The Secret of Islam explores the mystical path of Sufism, which focuses on love and compassion. Sections proceed through the levels of Sufism: Journey of the Disciple, Actions, Spiritual Journey of the Seeker, and Flowering of the Perfect Human.

From a social science perspective, a major purpose of religion is to organize the behavior of the community of believers in order to maximize its success as a collective. The underlying premise of this lecture is that religious authority will sanction violence and aggression when they are assessed to be an effective means of realizing the goals of the collective. Conversely, when violence and aggression become unhelpful or counter- productive for realizing community goals they are forbidden. This phenomenology (...) of religion and violence is applied to the history of Judaism, Christianity and Islam to demonstrate that none of these religions is inherently more or less apt to engage in violence. Their use of belligerent and irenic behaviors are more profoundly influenced by historical context and social needs than by theology. (shrink)

For the first time in English, Benebell Wen reveals the rich history and theoretical principles underlying the ancient practice of crafting Fu talismans, or magical sigils, in the Chinese Taoist tradition and gives detailed instructions for modern practitioners who would like to craft their own Fu. Fu talismans are ideograms and writings typically rendered on paper and empowered by means of invocations, ritual, and transferences of energy, or Qi. Talismans can be used for many purposes, such as strengthening or weakening (...) personality characteristics, finding love, earning more money, or easing emotional tensions in the home. The Tao of Craft shows how metaphysical energy can be harnessed to amplify, strengthen, weaken, dispel, or block other metaphysical energy and to rectify perceived imbalances in the material plane. Supported by an abundance of detailed charts and images, this book serves as a step-by-step handbook that gives readers the knowledge and confidence to craft their own Fu talismans for personal empowerment. Wen, author of Holistic Tarot, delves into historic and cultural contexts of the Fu, from the neolithic period of Chinese history to contemporary practices of esoteric Taoism. Providing a solid foundation in the principles of Eastern spellcrafting, she highlights the blending of Taoist metaphysical practices with Western approaches to magic by pointing out eclectic, integrating, and harmonizing facets from other cultures and religions. Historically, Fu talismans were used by medieval Chinese for alleviating illness; averting misfortune, magical attacks, and curses; defending against assaults; and avoiding poverty. This book shows Western practitioners that the skill and knowledge to develop an interactive relationship with spirit realms are still available to them today, and serves as a practical handbook for accumulating Qi energy from sources in the environment and channeling it in concentrated form into their own Fu talismans. (shrink)

The organic unity between the head and the vital arms of the octopus is proposed as a metaphor for science and religion as an academic field. While the specific object of the field is to pursue second-order reflections on existing and possible relations between sciences and religions, it is argued that several aspects of realism and normativity are constitutive to the field. The vital arms of the field are related to engagements with distinctive scientific theories, specialized philosophy (...) of science, representative theological proposals, and the input from the study of world religions. (shrink)

The article analyzes the structure and manifestations of everyday life as the sphere of the empirical life of the individual believer and the religious community. Patterns of everyday life are not confined to certain universal conceptual or value systems, as there is no ready-made standards and rules of their formation. Everyday life is intersubjective space of social relations in which religious individuals, communities, institutions self-identified based on form of reproduction of sociality. Religious everyday life determined by ordinary consciousness, practices, social (...) aspects of life in the religious community, which are constituted by communication. The main religious structures of everyday life is mental cut ordinary religious consciousness, religious practice, religious experience, religious communication, religious stereotypes. Everyday life is the sphere of interaction between the social and the transcendental worlds, in which religious practices are an integral social relationships and the objectification of religious experience through the prism of individual membership to a specific religion, a means of inclusion of transcendence in the context of everyday life. Religious practices reflect understanding of a religious individual objects of the supernatural world, which is achieved through social experience, intersubjective interaction, experience of transcendental reality. The everyday life of the believing personality is formed in the dynamics of tradition and innovation, the mechanism of interaction of which affects the space of social existence. It exists within the private and public space and time, differing openness within the life-world. Continuous modification of everyday life, change its fundamental structures is determined by the process of modern social and technical transformation of society. (shrink)

The Big Bang is a myth, says Paul Brockelman in this fascinating look at the spiritual side of modern cosmology. But it is a myth in the best sense--a fully realized creation story, one that, for all its scientific origins, has the power to transform us spiritually. In Cosmology and Creation, philosopher and religious scholar Brockelman seeks to bridge the gap between the scientific and the spiritual, to bring together the head and the heart. We have isolated the two realms (...) from each other for so long, he argues, that we have begun to lose a mystical sense of our place in the universe. But Brockelman believes that contemporary physics has advanced far beyond the mechanical view of nature, as propagated in the Enlightenment; the cosmology of the Big Bang has fostered a new way of understanding existence itself. To illustrate, he examines creation myths of the past, showing how they transcend simple explanations of the world to provide a deeper understanding of what our lives mean. And the fifteen-billion-year tale of the universe embraced by scientific cosmology serves precisely the same purpose, Brockelman claims; it bears a close resemblance to classic creation myths--and, indeed, it can transform our inner relationship with nature. The new scientific cosmology, Brockelman argues, offers something never before seen in human history: a scientifically accurate understanding of the entire universe and a spiritual vision of a "wider order of being" to which we all belong. Passionate and provocative, Cosmology and Creation promises to spark a lively debate about the new links between science and religion. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Save Us From Being Saved:Girard's Critical SoteriologySimon J. Taylor (bio)One of the most striking things about the work of René Girard is that it is an overarching critique of what it is to be saved. The paradox that Girard presents us with is that "salvation" is something from which we must be saved. This combination of salvation as something that must be avoided and something we desperately need appears (...) to have the characteristic of a "double bind," about which Girard has written so much.1 Are we then, even within Girard's own thesis, bound to the mimetic doubling of need and revulsion that can end only in the expulsion or death of a common victim? It is this question that I hope to explore in this article.Girard's Critique Of SalvationTo set out Girard's critique of salvation, it is first necessary to see that what he has come to call the victimage mechanism ("mécanisme victimaire") is, in fact, salvation. Girard's thesis states that desire is mimetic, based on the imitation of another's desire. "Desire is always an imitation of another desire, desire for the same object, and therefore, an inexhaustible source of conflicts and rivalries" (Girard 1978, 39). As the rivalry produced by this desire intensifies, it spreads and produces conflict and violence on a large scale. On an unlimited scale, Girard identifies this with the Hobbesian "war of all against all."2 And it is at this point that the victimage mechanism kicks in. It is at this point that the identification of a scapegoat and the expulsion or killing of the scapegoat produce unity and restore peace. It is this, in Girard's originary scene, that leads to the simultaneous origins of society and religion. In restoring unity to the group, and hence founding the community, the victim becomes sacred, a god. This in itself is an indicator of the salvific power that the scapegoat effects in the community. In order that the violence, once diverted, should not break out again, two things are necessary: ritual, specifically sacrifice, and myth. Ritual reenacts the founding murder upon which society is based, enabling the [End Page 21] participants to transfer their violence to another victim. Myth is the story told by the persecutors about the events that led to the creation of their community, that is, the founding murder. Thus, religion "dehumanizes violence; it protects man from his own violence by taking it out of his hands, transforming it into a transcendent and ever-present danger to be kept in check by the appropriate rites appropriately observed and by a modest and prudent demeanor.... religion protects man as long as its ultimate foundations are not revealed" (Girard 1978, 134–35). Salvation has happened, and a cult arises to disburse the effects of this salvation.It is important that we take this account of religion with full seriousness and do not regard it simply as the prologue to Girard's later promotion, even rehabilitation, of the Judaeo-Christian tradition. This is salvific: religion protects us from our own violence; it has mechanisms for bringing to an end outbreaks of that violence. Elsewhere Girard can speak of "the negative usefulness of religion as a social prop against anarchy and chaos" (Girard 1997, 162–63). This is salvation: violence is dealt with and human society can dwell in relative peace. Religion, on this account, is not "pie-in-the-sky," a transcendent deferral of gratification. It has real benefits to society today; it is attractive, elegant, and simple. What more could we want from religion?But Girard will not allow us to rest content with this account of religion. He is blunt when he declares that "most religions are based on a lie, which is the supposed guilt of the victim" (Girard 1993c, 32). Nietzsche wrote that "The sacrificial animal does not share the spectators' ideas about sacrifice, but one has never let it have its say,"3 and this is precisely the origin of Girard's critique of the salvation offered by religions based on scapegoating. Girard is attempting to let the sacrificial animal have its say. All too often, these... (shrink)

The cultural nature of religion is closely linked with the characteristics of religion. The interaction between religious culture and secular culture is shown as the alternation and coexistence of benign and malignant. In fact, the development of religious culture has a very close relationship with human beings in ancient times. Some activities of human worship, summarized and promoted from generation to generation, have gradually spread and developed widely among various nationalities and regions, and finally formed a series of (...) spiritual theories and behavior norms, which are more systematic. In terms of the external communication of religious culture, we should also pay attention to it. Although the help of mass media has appeared in this regard, it has had little effect. It enables the believers to change from passive to active, and understand and accept the religious culture more deeply. This paper analyzes the relationship between traditional religious culture and Chinese calligraphy art, and discusses how to better inherit Chinese calligraphy art. In religious and cultural communication, the eastward communication of calligraphy has existed in ancient times and has become mature, while the westward communication has become a focus of attention in recent years under the influence of comprehensive factors such as the national cultural development strategy and cultural soft power competition. (shrink)

Historically there were and there are specific religions, but there was not and there is no "religion at all". In order to explore the diverse world of religious phenomena, an appropriate notion is being developed in science, and its definition is undoubtedly of great heuristic significance. This concept is a product of the long-term development of cognition; in its diverse interpretations, it helps to comprehend the religious processes of both modernity and the past.

: Skepticism as doubts about religious knowledge played a significant role in the intellectual reflection of the fourth and fifth Islamic centuries, a period of considerable plurality within Islam on many levels. Such skepticism was directed at revealed knowledge that spelled out the customs and norms particular to the Islamic way of life. Doubts were pushed by theologians who, themselves caught within a web of "parity of evidence" between the various schools of Islam, saw little hope of verifying the superiority (...) of Muslim ways over those of other communities, and Muslim intellectuals who viewed the particular religio-moral practices of Islam as shamefully atavistic and primitive, seeking instead to table "visible" religion for an esoterically conceived one. Against such detractors, a significant scholar of the period, Abū l-Hasan al-'Āmirī, constructed a philosophical defense of exoteric Islam, arguing in Aristotelian terms for the superiority of religio-moral knowledge over philosophical knowledge in light of the greater benefit of the former to the welfare of society and the superiority of Islamic religio-moral knowledge, since, he claims, it squares with logic more than any other communal way of life. The argument, one of many seeking to come to terms with the intellectual vagaries of the day, demonstrates how skepticism pushed scholars to explore more profoundly the nature of religion. In al-'Āmirī's case, his argument, metaphysically based with mystical inclinations, set the stage for later articulations of Islamic religiosity that integrated the human mind into the arena of Islam's revealed way of life. (shrink)

In this paper I explore the history of the notion that to believe in religion is to believe in society by tracing instances in which, in the discourse of this current within nineteenth-century French republicanism, the term religion entered into the same semantic field as the notions of society and association. I analyze several groups and individuals who sought to define religion by invoking "association" and "society": the Saint-Simonians, P.-J.-B. Buchez, Pierre Leroux, Jean-Marie Guyau, and Emile Durkheim. (...) I conclude by suggesting that this way of thinking about religion not only illuminates the intellectual context in which Durkheim's religious sociology emerged, but also highlights a distinctly French social imaginary. (shrink)

_Philosophy and the Study of Religions: A Manifesto_ advocates a radical transformation of the discipline from its current, narrow focus on questions of God, to a fully global form of critical reflection on religions in all their variety and dimensions. Opens the discipline of philosophy of religion to the religious diversity that characterizes the world today Builds bridges between philosophy of religion and the other interpretative and explanatory approaches in the field of religious studies Provides a (...) manifesto for a global approach to the subject that is a practice-centred rather than a belief-centred activity Gives attention to reflexive critical studies of 'religion' as socially constructed and historically located. (shrink)

_Philosophy and the Study of Religions: A Manifesto_ advocates a radical transformation of the discipline from its current, narrow focus on questions of God, to a fully global form of critical reflection on religions in all their variety and dimensions. Opens the discipline of philosophy of religion to the religious diversity that characterizes the world today Builds bridges between philosophy of religion and the other interpretative and explanatory approaches in the field of religious studies Provides a (...) manifesto for a global approach to the subject that is a practice-centred rather than a belief-centred activity Gives attention to reflexive critical studies of 'religion' as socially constructed and historically located. (shrink)