Comparative Theories of Nonduality: The Search for a Middle Way

Description

It is a commonplace that while Asia is nondualistic, the West, because of its uncritical reliance on Greek-derived intellectual standards, is dualistic. Dualism is a deep-seated habit of thinking and acting in all spheres of life through the prism of binary opposites leads to paralyzing practical and theoretical difficulties. Asia can provide no assistance for the foreseeable future because the West finds Asian nondualism, especially that of Mahayana Buddhism, too alien and nihilistic. On the other hand, postmodern thought, which purports to deliver us from the dualisms embedded in modernity, turns out to be merely a pseudo-postmodernism. This book's novel idea is that the West already contains within one of its more marginalized roots, that of ancient Hebrew culture, a pre-philosophical form of nondualism which makes possible a new form of nondualism, one to which the West can subscribe. This new nondualism, inspired by Buddhism but not identical to it, is an epistemological, ontological, metaphysical, and praxical middle way both for the West and also between East and West.

Milton Scarborough is Emeritus Professor of Religion and Philosophy at Centre College, Kentucky, USA.

'Not only does this elegant and intelligent book help to free theology from its long domination by a discredited form of dualistic Platonism, but it does this through an important contribution to Christian-Buddhist Dialogue. This is achieved by an illuminating discussion of phenomenology that shows how this tradition is congenial to a fresh reading of the poetry of the Hebraic sources-and by showing how phenomenology is the natural meeting-point for a conversation with the great Eastern philosophers who have used its language to articulate some of the insights of their own non-dualist Zen tradition and to express their reservations about the dualism of traditional theology.' -- Michael McGhee, Senior Fellow, Department of Philosophy, University of Liverpool, UK "Scarborough's stimulating book offers and extended argument for what he terms a middle way that would have a far-reaching, even revolutionary impact on Western ways of thinking and acting. [His] achievement has significant ethical, religious, epistemological, and ontological dimensions, but it is the metaphysical dimension that Scarborough suggests crucially underlies and unifies the various other expressions of the middle way. [...] Comparative Theories of Nonduality creatively explores territory not even visible from the well trodden paths of most philosophical discourse. Scarborough interprets and integrates three distinctly different metaphysical perspectives in constructing his middle way: the ancient Hebrew worldview, Buddhist nondualism, and Polanyi and Merleau-Ponty as representatives of a minority perspective within Western Philosophy. [...] a distillation of a lifetime of thinking and teaching that I find both unique and largely persuasive. It is a book that deserves serious attention. [...] Comparative Theories of Nonduality is a brave, ground-breaking work." -- Tradition and Discovery, Walter Gulick