Welcome 2 SYNxronisation

How Consciousness creates the Material World ?

By Amit Goswami 

Book excerpt: The Philosophy of Monistic Idealism - Mysticism & Religion

go to part I : Mysticism

Religion

To arrive at an understanding of Truth, a mystic usually discovers and employs a particular methodology. The methodologies, or spiritual paths, have both similarities and differences. The differences, which are secondary to the universality of the mystical insight itself, contribute to the differences in the religions founded on the teachings of the mystics. For example, Buddhism developed from the teachings of the Buddha, Judaism from the teachings of Moses, Christianity from those of Jesus, Islam from those of Mohammed (although strictly speaking, Mohammed is regarded as the last of a whole lineage of prophets, including Moses and Jesus), and Taoism from the teachings of Lao Tzu. This rule however, is not without exception. Hinduism is not based on the teachings of a particular teacher but instead encompasses many paths, many teachings.

Mysticism involves a search for the truth about ultimate reality, but the function of the religion is somewhat different. The followers of a particular mystic (most often after the mystic's death) may recognize that the individual search for truth is not for everyone. Most people, lost in the illusion of their ego-separateness and busy in its pursuits, are not motivated to discover the truth themselves. How, then can the light of the mystic's realization be shared with these people?

The answer is, by simplifying it. The followers simplify the truth to make it accessible to the average person. Such a person is usually caught up in the demands of the daily life. Lacking the time and devotion necessary to understand the subtlety of transcendence, he or she cannot appreciate the importance of direct mystical experience. So, the purveyors of the mystic's truth replace direct experience of unitive consciousness with the idea of God. Unfortunately, God, the transcendent creator of the immanent world, is recast in the ordinary person's mind into the dualistic image of a mighty King in Heaven who rules the Earth below. Unavoidably, the mystic's message is diluted and distorted.

The mystic's well-meaning followers inadvertently play the role of the devil in an old joke: God and the devil were talking together when God picked up a piece of paper. " What does it say?" the devil inquired. "Truth", said God serenely. "Give it to me, " said the devil eagerly. " I'll organize it for you."

Yet, despite the difficulties and fallibilities of organization, the religion does convey the spirit of the mystic's message; this is what gives religion its vitality. After all, the value to mystics of realizing the transcendent nature of Reality is that they become secure in a mode of being in which such virtues as love become simple. How can you not love when there is one consciousness and you know that you and the other are not really separate?

But how does one motivate an ordinary person who does not realize oneness to love others? The mystic clearly sees that ignorance of the transcendent oneness is the barrier to love. The net effect of absence of love is suffering. To avoid suffering, counsels the mystic, we must turn inward and commence the journey to self-realization. In the religious context, this teaching is translated into the dictum that if we are to redeem ourselves, we must turn to God as the supreme value in our lives. The method of this redemption is a set of practices, based on the original teachings, that forms the moral code of the particular religion - the ten commandments and the Golden Rule of Christian ethics, the Buddhist precepts, the Koranic or Talmudic law, and so forth.

Of course, not all religions introduce the concept of God. In Buddhism, for example, there is no concept of God. On the other hand, in Hinduism there are many gods. Even in these cases, however, the above considerations of religion are evident. Thus we arrive at three universal aspects of all exoteric religions:

1. All religions start with the premise that there is a wrongness in the way we are. The wrongness is variously called ignorance, original sin, evil, or just suffering.
2. All religions promise an escape from this wrongness, provided the "way" is followed. The escape is variously called salvation, liberation from the wheel of suffering in the world, or an eternal life in the kingdom of God, Heaven.
3. The way consists of taking refuge in the religion and the community formed by the followers of the religion and following a prescribed code of ethics and social rules. Aside from how esoteric teaching of transcendence is compromised, it is in the codes of ethics and social rules that the various religions differ from one another.

Notice the essential dualism in the first premise: wrong and right (or evil and good). In contrast, the mystical journey consists in transcending all dualities, including the one of evil and good. Also notice that the second premise is turned by the clergy into carrots and sticks - heaven and hell. Mysticism, on the other hand, does not dichotomize heaven and hell; both are natural concomitants of how we live.

As you can see, when filtered by the world's religion, the monism of monistic idealism becomes ever more obscure, and dualistic ideas prevail. In the East, thanks to an endless supply of students of mysticism, monistic idealism in its esoteric form has popularly retained at least some passing familiarity and respect. In the West, however, mysticism has had relatively little impact. The dualism of Judeo-Christian monotheistic religions has dominated the popular psyche, supported by a powerful hierarchy of interpreters. Like mind-body Cartesian dualism, however, the dualism of God and the world does not seem to hold up to scientific scrutiny. As scientific data undermine religion, there is a tendancy to throw out the baby with the bathwater - the baby being the ethics and values that the religion teaches, ethics and values that continue to have validity and usefulness.

Exposing the illogic of dualistic religions need not result in the monistic philosophy of material realism. As we have seen, an alternative monism is available. In view of the way quantum physics has demolished material realism, monistic idealism may be the only viable monistic philosophy of reality. The other option is to give up on metaphysics entirely, which for a while was the direction in philosophy. The trend now seems to be reversing.

Now we must face the crucial question: is science compatible with monistic idealism? If not, we must abandon metaphysics when doing science, adding the looming crisis of faith. If yes, we must reformulate science in accordance with the demands of philosophy. In this book, we argue that monistic idealism is not only compatible with quantum physics but even essential to its interpretation. The paradoxes of the new physics disappear when we examine them from the point of view of monistic idealism. Furthermore, quantum physics combined with monistic idealism gives us a powerful paradigm with which we can resolve some of the paradoxes of mysticism, such as the question of transcendence and plurality (how does the one consciousness become many?). Our work points toward the beginnings of an idealist science and the revitalization of religions.