Emanationism and Non-Duality: Part One

BUDDHISM, CHRISTIANITY, SUFISM, PB AND PLOTINUS

By Peter Holleran

   The following material is difficult and may require more than one pot of coffee to get through and yet still leave one with a headache. It represents a brief summary of the thinking of those much wise than I. Yet study of the sources referred to herein will yield the reader a rich reward. The motivations behind the creation of this section came from the article, "The Dark Night of the Soul: Spiritual Crises and Breakthroughs in Christian and Buddhist Traditions", which contains much material relevant to the topic at hand, and also several conversations held with Christian writers on the Dark Night who had a hard time understanding that oriental doctrines such as Buddhism or non-dualism could possibly have any similarity with the teaching of the transformation by divine love as described by St. John or with the Christian doctrine of the soul. I feel that they can, through the help of the philosophy provided by Plotinus and Paul Brunton (or PB as he preferred to be called), though my feeble intellect cringes at this task. But here goes.

   A conciliatory position to intellectually satisfy both East and West might be to say that the Soul is transcendental and infinite from the point of view of the ego, while ontologically distinct yet non-separate from the Absolute. Christian mystics tend to forget the first part of that statement, Vedantic philosophers the second. (In all this, however, we are tredding on dangerous ground: it has been said that when we say there is "not one iota" of difference between this and that, we are recalling the debate at the Council of Nicea in 325 as to whether Christ was the selfsame substance as God (homoousious) or distinct substance (homoiousios), where the difference between orthodoxy and heresy was only one letter (i) or iota!)

   Anthony Damiani argued that these problems can be reconciled by the Three Primal Hypostases doctrine of Plotinus. Damiani (and Brunton) held that Self or God-realization as commonly described in the scriptures and by most mystics, while most profound, is not really God-realization as such, but rather reunion or re-identification with man's transcendental, Divine Soul. This might first be realized as the Witness position, or as the soul in itself, as the innermost level of absorptive trance, the ultimate subject, also known as nirvikalpa or jnana nirvikalpa samadhi. On the philosophic path, in order to become a sage one must then come out of this state and realize the Soul under all conditions, both within and without, realizing the source of the World or World-Image to be the same as that of one's own self. This leads to non-dualism, or sahaj samadhi, the natural state, which is experienced as neither oneness or duality, but the "not-two", as it is often described in Zen. This full realization is what PB called the Overself, where the Soul now begins to realizes itself as a part of the All-Soul, or "Absolute Soul" (which some mystics in the ecstasy of their union interpret as God). From this point, the Soul, through deeper levels of silent absorption into the Void Mind, becomes "rapt in robes of glory," and may receive emanations or intuit something of the "Intellectual Principle" (Nous or Divine Mind) and the "One" from which it derives its being - but not before. As these are all non-conceptual, beyond ego (ahamkara), they may for most purposes be collectively considered as God, yet such further distinctions become meaningful from the point of view of the sage. In the Bible we find that "man was made in the image of God". Plotinus, following Plato and some other of the ancient philosopher-sages, taught that the Soul:

   "is an image of its source: that source is the brilliant, the authentic, the primarily existent, the thing self-sprung and self-intent; but its image, Soul, is a thing which can have no permanence except by attachment, by living in that other; the very nature of an image is that as a dependent it shall have its being in something else, if at all it exist apart from the original." (1)

   Thus, the One engenders eternally an eternal being (the Intellectual Principle, or the Divine Mind) which itself (through the Absolute Soul, or the Soul-essence integral to the Intellectual Principle) emanates Individual Souls which themselves, although eternal, are, however, but the image of their prior. In order for man, then to know anything of the Intellectual Principle he must first achieve union with his own individual divine Soul. Plotinus says:

   "If the Soul is questioned as to the nature of that Intellectual principle - the perfect and all-embracing, the primal self-knower - it has but to enter into that Principle, or to sink all its activity into that, and at once it shows itself to be in effective possession of those priors whose memory it has never lost; thus, as an image of the Intellectual principle, it can make itself the medium, by which to attain some vision of it; it draws upon that within itself which is most closely resemblant, as far as resemblance is possible between divine Intellect and any phase of the Soul...In order, then, to know what the Divine Mind is we must observe Soul and especially its most God-like phase....Those divinely possessed and inspired have at least the knowledge that they hold some greater thing within them though they cannot tell what it is." (2)

   Damiani comments:

   "The sage unites with his soul and he's permanently soul. He can get a glimpse of the Intellectual Principle but he cannot become the Intellectual Principle. He must return and be soul. He will always be soul. You, I, and everyone else. So the higher glimpse is not your glimpse of your soul [which may be what many experiences of non-duality and satori are], but the soul's experience of the Intellectual Principle. When you achieve identity with the soul, you can get a glimpse of that Void. You can call it the Intellectual Principle or you can call it the Absolute Soul in the Intellectual Principle. It doesn't matter what you call it, because the One, the Intellectual Principle, and the Absolute Soul of Plotinus - those three Primal Hypostases together - can be considered as the Void Mind. But this higher glimpse is distinct from the unity with the soul, the identity with your soul. It is a different kind of experience. You could know many things when you have achieved identity with your soul, but when you have the glimpse of the Intellectual Principle, the only thing you could know is that it is. Nothing else. So, in other words, you could know that God is after you have achieved union with the soul. Before that all you could know are the contents of the soul, and the soul itself." (3)

   The 'contents of the soul' would include the gross, subtle, and causal aspects of the being. The soul would be consciousness itself, or Being. Compared to the former the soul itself is experienced as void, or empty of all content. That is not, however, identical with the higher experience of the Void Mind described by Damiani and Brunton or of the Primal Hypostases by Plotinus. That is possible only after permanent union with the soul in sahaj has been achieved. Damiani points out that here is where much confusion has arisen in the Zen tradition, specifically because the terms "void" and "satori" have often been used to describe quite different levels of experience and insight. Only the greatest among the sages have penetrated into the Void Mind, while practitioners at varying stages of the path have had non-dual glimpses of the soul.

   "When PB speaks about what a philosopher sage is, he points out that the philosopher sage is a person who has achieved permanent union with his soul. He doesn't say that the philosopher sage is one who has achieved permanent union with the Intellectual Principle or with the Absolute Soul, but one who has achieved permanent identity with his soul. This soul that he speaks about, that is what he refers to as made in the image of God - in other words, the image of Intellectual Principle. And this is what the philosopher or the jnani is, he's that soul. He knows that his essence comes from the Intellectual Principle. He knows it, not intellectually, he knows it because his soul is a direct emanation from that, and the soul's self-cognition automatically includes the recognition of its principle - where it came from....When the philosopher sage says to you, "God is," he's not saying that my soul, even though it is cosmic and infinite, is God. He's speaking about the Intellectual Principle..." (4)

   This permanent union with the Soul or Spirit in sahaj is a great achievement and not just a glimpse. In Sufism it might be equated with the station called subsistence or union (baqa), or proximity (qurb), still only the twenty-first or thirtieth of forty stations, in the classification of Abu Sa'id. The later stations are considered as belonging to the journey in God as opposed to the journey to God. Thus, in Sufism, man as a tripartite being of body, soul (or anima), and Spirit, must undergo the spiritual work to transmute lead into gold, or slay the dragon to reach the treasure. In other words,

   "Man in his unregenerated and 'fallen' state..identifies himself with the soul that has not as yet experienced the liberating contact with the Spirit and..lives imprisoned in a world of sense impressions deriving from the body, along with the logical inferences drawn from that world, and in an unilluminated subjective labyrinth that is filled with passionate impulses. The spiritual path..means a radical transformation of the soul, made possible through the gift of revelation and initiation, until the soul becomes worthy of becoming the bride of the Spirit and entering into union with it...The Spirit is like the sky, shining and immutable above the horizons of the soul. It is a world which, although not yet God, is inseparable from Him so that to reach it is already to be in the front courtyard of paradise and the proximity of the Divine..To reach God, the soul must become God-like. Hence the significance of the spiritual stations and states that the soul must experience and the spiritual virtues which it must acquire and which mark the degrees of ascent of the soul to God. In fact, each virtue is a station through which the soul must pass and which it must experience in a permanent way." (5)

   For Sufism, the final station (maqam) or permanent non-dual state (tahwid) will be one's own, and not just in the nature of glimpses (ahwal), only after this transformation, which is not only of the intellect or knowing faculty but also of the will. The higher teachings of non-duality exist in Sufism, particularly in Ibn 'Al ‘Arabi, only they are generally veiled until one earns his way into the "courtyard". ‘Al ‘Arabi states:

   "If you know yourself as nothing, then you truly know your Lord. Otherwise, you know him not. [But] you cannot know your Lord by making yourself nothing. Many a wise man claims that in order to know one's Lord one must denude oneself of the signs of one's existence, efface one's identity, finally rid oneself of one's self. This is a mistake. How could a thing that does not exist try to get rid of its existence? ...If you think that to know Allah depends on your ridding yourself of yourself, then you are guilty of attributing partners to Him - the only unforgivable sin -because you are claiming that there is another existence besides Him, the All-Existent: that there is a you and He." (6)

   Plotinus, as well as the Sufis, in this view, can be seen as unique in reconciling the seeming opposition of emanationism, mysticism, and gnosticism with "non-duality" (Zen, ch'an, or advaita). (Non-duality is in quotes to emphasize that it is only posed to counter a belief in either oneness or duality, while, once again, the non-conceptual truth is neither).

   The above would thus explain how a sage such as Ramana Maharshi could remain a devotee and ecstatically proclaim, "Father, Father," and weep in front of the images of 321 Tamil saints praying for devotion (while at the same time, as a jnani, poke fun at those wishing to see the light of a million suns spoken of by saints and mystics). Maharshi maintained, in fact, that only the sage was a perfect devotee. Vaishnava Acharya Vallabacharya likewise said: "No one is superior to a Jnani who chants the name of the Divine." Ramana spoke of a stage in both inquiry (jnana) or meditation (bhakti) where the ripe ego becomes helpless and the divine must take over; Damiani says that the "Higher Will comes down" after the moral effort, or the great battle. This talk is similar in nature to that of the infused contemplation spoken of by St. John. The great metaphysician Sankara wrote both non-dual metaphysics but also devotional literature. Ramakrishna Paramahansa likewise taught advaita vedanta but also how one must weep for God and how God will work in the soul of the devotee.

   So Christian teachings of transformation by divine love and non-dual teachings such as advaita need not be seen in conflict, although prior to actual realization or significant spiritual maturity such a truth may largely remain conceptual. The path, however, is essentially a practical one. That is why Maharshi, for instance, demurred on questions of the absolute, saying first realize the Self (Divine Soul), the source of the "I", then see what further questions arise. Ramana was of the view that while bodies and jivas appear as many, the Self to be realized is One. Brunton and Plotinus appear at times to differ, making distinctions between Individual Souls and an Absolute Soul from which the former are emanated:

   " We must not believe that the plurality of Souls comes from the plurality of bodies. Particular Souls subsist as well as the universal Soul, independently of bodies, without the unity of the universal Soul absorbing the multiplicity of the particular Souls, or of the multiplicity of particular Souls splitting up the unity of the universal."-(Porphyry.)...The World-Soul is not divided, nor does it split itself up in order to give life to each individual thing. All things live by the Soul in its entirety; it is all-present everywhere like the Father Who begot it, both in its unity and in its universality " (v. I, 3)...The Soul cannot be divided quantitatively, nor can it have heterogeneous parts or limbs like a body. Individual Souls are not functions of the Universal Soul (iv. 3, 5)...It is the body, and not the Soul, which makes the illusory divisions. The Soul, even in its relations with the body, is only in appearance divided (iv. 2, I).... "All souls are one " (vi. 5, 9)."   (from "The System of Plotinus" on the Wisdom's Goldenrod website).

   The incomparable Sufi Ibn 'Arabi argued at the highest level against any such division, even provisional, as theorized by Plotinus at all:

   "If one believes that things exist in Allah - from Him or with Him - and that these things depend upon Allah for their existence, even so, such things are appearing to one as lords. Though their lord-ship may depend on Allah, still one who believes in them is guilty of recognizing some other lord as a partner of our Lord. It would be a grave error to consider any other existence as valid alongside of Allah the Self-Existent, even if the thing is seen as dependent on Allah for its existence...He will be guilty of the unforgivable sin of attributing partners to Allah..." (7)

   The differences between Plotinus and Ibn 'Arabi may be semantical; after all, Ibn 'Arabi was influenced by classical philosophy as well as Islamic tradition. From the point of view of the One, Plotinus does not admit of discreet or different levels of Reality much the same as 'Arabi.

   It may be helpful to round out our study by reading the comparison of Plotinus with Vedanta as given by Swami Krishnananda, disciple of the well-respected Swami Sivananda, founder of The Divine Life Society. He considers Plotinus the closest of the Greek philosophers to advaitic thought.

   Most would probably be in agreement that a mysterious infinitude abounds at this level in any case.

   The irreducable paradoxes of love/insight, one/many, identity/relatedness, duality/non-duality are perhaps not easily discerned within either Buddhist or Christian teachings, the former due to an emphasis on metaphysics and the non-conceptual nature of reality or Mind, and the latter due to its emphasis on divine love, faith, and emotional purgation. From this, however, there arises an unnecessary argument between those among the Buddhists who, seeing the transient nature of all phenomena, argue that there is no soul, and Christians who feel their tradition is superior because Buddhism teaches a life-denying Nirvana. Even Pope John Paul II made this error, inspite of the fact that a major text, the Lankavatara Sutra, says that "all things are in Nirvana from the beginning," which is hardly life denying. The Dalai Lama himself said that "he who denies his own existence is a fool." While Zen itself may be somewhat obscure, the higher Mahayana teachings are much closer to those of Christianity in matters of selfless service, compassion, and even philosophy. Of course, we are here talking about the esoteric, gnostic, and mystical Christian traditions, where Wisdom or Sophia is recognized, not modern evangelicalism, fundamentalism, or official Church doctrine, which do indeed believe in PB's "heaven for the perpetuated ego". As Kathleen Granville Damiani wrote in Gnostic Images of the Feminine:

   "In 1 Corinthians 1:23, Paul writes, "We are preaching a crucified Christ . . . a Christ who is the power and the Sophia of God." A few verses later (30) he continues, "By God's action Jesus Christ has become our Sophia." In 2:6-8, he continues: "But still we have a Sophia to offer those who have reached maturity: not a philosophy of our age, it is true, still less of the masters of our age, which are coming to their end. The hidden Sophia of God which we teach in our mysteries is the Sophia that God predestined to be for our glory before the ages began. She is a Sophia that none of the masters of this age have ever known." (S. Cady, M. Ronan, and H. Taussig, Sophia, 51)

   "Paul is the New Testament author who most explicitly proclaims Jesus to be Sophia but he is also one of the writers for whom the Gnostic movement is a real problem. Since Gnosticism downplayed Christ's historicity and resurrection and proclaimed that Christ as Wisdom could be realized individually, it was declared a heresy. Gnosticism was thus a major factor inhibiting the New Testament proclamation of Jesus as Sophia. So Paul's portrayal of Jesus as Sophia is explicit at times but generally downplayed."

   The Buddha's unique contribution, which Jesus in his brief time among his simple followers did not explain, was that metaphysical or ultra-mystical insight, was a step even beyond universal compassion, and necessary for advancing to Nirvana. For the benefit of the yogis, Buddha made clear that such insight was also beyond concentrative absorption and mystic bliss as well. He never, however, in his half-century of teaching, taught a doctrine of annihilation or the non-existence of the soul. Such teachings were product of schools which arose after him. Brunton writes:

   "Nirvana is not a state of mind which is to be produced but what is realized when the long cherished notion of "I" is given up. Nirvana, in short, is the miracle of egoless being. The Buddha's doctrine of the soul was stated in negative terms because he was controverting current misconceptions. He explained this in Alagadupama Majjhima, 1, 135: "Even in this present life, my brethren, I say that the soul is indefinable. Though I say and teach thus, there are those who accuse me falsely of being a nihilist, of teaching the non-existence and annihilation of the soul. That is what I am not and do not teach."" (8)

   Brunton further claims:

   "There is some kind of a distinction between his higher individuality and the Universal Infinite out of which he is rayed, whatever the Vedantins may say. And this distinction remains in his highest mystical state, which is not one of total absorption and utter destruction of this individuality but the mergence of its own will in the universal will, the closest intimacy of its own being with the universal being." (9)

   I.K. Taimni concurs:

   "..the separate individuality of each Purusa means merely that He is a separate center of consciousness in the Supreme Reality and not that his consciousness is separated from that of other Purusas and pursues its separate individual ends as in the case of ordinary individuals blinded by the illusion of a separate life." (10)

   This should satisfy the Christian mystic apologist, whose doctrinal roots reject merger, seeing the soul and God as ontologically distinct, yet demands fidelity and surrender of the soul to the divine, particularly in regards to the transformation of the will. What he may find surprising is that this and the above thoughts of Brunton are very similar to those brilliantly expressed in this hyperlinked excerpt from the Lankavatara Sutra.

   Soul remains Soul, according to the above creative interpretation, no matter the cultural or historical tradition. It is just that the confusion of ego (jiva) with Soul, and Soul with the God, must be thoroughly understood, which is a stumbling block for religious believers and mystics alike. East or West, the heart must open and Reason (Buddhi) be purified, for the ultimate nature of Mind in sahaj samadhi to be realized.

   Damiani, further elaborating on the writings of Brunton and Plotinus, gives his understanding of the esoteric reasoning why earth life and the waking state have always been considered essential for achieving enlightenment, and also why realization and even clear knowledge of the soul can not be achieved by trance alone, even in the highest state of such inversion, nirvikalpa samadhi (which, by his reasoning, would have to include even anami lok of the Radhasoami or Sant Mat tradition (described as the final inner realm but the first or only one beyond all light and sound):

   "In nirvikalpa there is no thought. There's nothing to understand. Without the fullness of the understanding that comes from penetrating into the World-Idea - in other words, the full development of the faculty of understanding which comes to a soul through the World-Idea - in the trance state one would be utterly unprepared to understand the mysterious Void...Or we can put it this way: It will take all the teaching that the World-Mind [God as manifesting the universe] can bring to bear upon the soul, in order for the soul to understand its origins, its own priors...that's what is necessary to become the sort of philosopher that not only understands the nature of the soul but also something about the prior principles that are, let's say, eternally generating it." (11)

   In short, "But in order to realize that eternal life and become a conscious and active participant in It, it is requisite for the Immortal Soul to be associated first with that which is mortal, finite and transient ere it can learn to recognize Eternity, the Infinite and the Spirit which will unite it to the Supreme." ("The System of Plotinus").

   To humble us even further before the fathomless depths of the Divine Mystery, we can say that even this grand realization and permanent union with the Soul in sahaj samadhi is not yet the perfection of a human being:

   Student: Would you say that the being that gets enlightened has become a perfect vehicle for the revelation of the soul?
   Damiani: "I don't think so. I think it's just starting. And you know, from what we've heard of people like the Buddha, it's a long, long development. It goes on for many, many millenia." (12)

   "So-named absorption in God, regarded as the goal of the Sufi seeker, is in fact only the beginning," warned Al Ghazzali. (13)

   Of course, it must be admitted that the more radical non-dualists of the present day, such as Adyashanti or "Sailor" Bob Adamson, and of the past, such as Zen Master Bankei, would consider much of the above as complete and total nonsense!

   [In a free on-line book, Christianity in the Crucible of East-West Dialogue, James Arraj gives a detailed comparison of Christian mysticism with that of Hinduism, Buddhism, Zen, and Islam , and concludes that while there are similarities there are distinct and irreconcilable differences as well.]

(1) Stephen MacKenna, Plotinus: The Enneads (Burdett, New York: Larson Publications, 1992), p. 446 (V.3.8)
(2) Ibid, p. 447,454 (V.3.8,V.3.9, V.3.14)
(3) Anthony Damiani, Looking Into Mind (Burdett, New York: Larson Publications, 1990), p. 201
(4) Ibid, p. 206-207
(5) Seyyed Hossein Nasr, Sufi Essays (Chicago, Illinois:KAZI Publications, 1999), p. 68-83
(6) Jerry Katz, ed., Essential Writings on Nonduality (Boulder, Colorado: Sentient Publications, 2007), p. 59
(7) Ibid, p. 60
(8) The Notebooks of Paul Brunton, op. cit., Vol. 14, 3.406
(9) Ibid, Vol. 16, 2.200
(10) I.K. Taimni, The Science of Yoga (Wheaton, Illinois: The Theosophical Publishing House, 1981 , p. 435
(11) Anthony Damiani, Living Wisdom (Burdett, New York: Larson Publications, 1996), p. 69
(12) Anthony Damiani, Standing In Your Own Way (Burdett, New York: Larson Publications, 1993), p. 253
(13) The Notebooks of Paul Brunton, op. cit., Vol. 10, 5.38

PART TWO