A group blog of scholars exploring Indian philosophy
Defenders of cross-cultural mystical experience are right to note that in many widely varying cultures, respected sages have referred to the experience of an ultimate nonduality: a perception that everything, including oneself, is ultimately one. But one might also then Continue reading Experiencing different ultimate unities
Pawel Odyniec, who is among the foremost experts on Vedānta and on K.C. Bhattacharya, organised a conference that looks extremely thought-provoking on May 22nd–24th. Please read more about the participants (among which Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad, James Madaio, Jessica Frazier, Karl-Stephan Bouthilette…) Continue reading Conference on “Spiritual exercises, self-transformation and liberation in philosophy, theology and religion”
I think one often learns the most about a philosopher from those points where her views change. With that in mind, I’d like to highlight a way I think my own thought has changed recently. Ten years ago on this Continue reading Who cares about phenomenological similarities?
There are likely a number of religious-studies scholars who would cringe and groan at Roland Griffiths’s studies of drug-induced mystical experience. I haven’t gone into their literature in a while, but I think it would be easy for them to Continue reading Mystical experience across cultures
Veṅkaṭanātha recognises two soteriological paths, namely bhakti (restricted to only few eligible people) and prapatti (being the only one accessible to normal people). In both cases, how can one get there? Prapatti, to begin with, cannot be sought for independently, Continue reading Veṅkaṭanātha on the pedagogy of emotions
Prof. R. D. Ranade, was a Mystic Philosopher, devoutly called ‘Gurudev’ by his disciples and followers. Born on July 3, 1886, at Jamkhandi village in Karnataka State of South India, Ramachandra Dattatray Ranade had theistic beliefs since childhood. In the Continue reading Prof. R.D. Ranade’s Philosophy of Rational Mysticism and morphic spiritual experiences. Guest Post by Charuta Kulkarni
I said previously of nondualism, “I’m not sure I can think of any other major philosophical idea that flowered so much in so many different places, more or less independently. I think that gives us prima facie reason to think Continue reading The reasons for nondualism
Within the Vidhiviveka, a Prābhākara-inclined Mīmāṃsaka debates with a Vedāntin about the meaning of Upaniṣadic sentences on the self. The Prābhākara insists that all sentences should be injunctive in character, and that Upaniṣadic sentences should also be interpreted in this Continue reading Could Upaniṣadic sentences be interpreted as prescriptions? A debate within Maṇḍana’s Vidhiviveka
The main thing which stroke me when I started working on the theory of emotions in Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta is that emotions can be useful and are not to be avoided. In other words, unlike some Sāṅkhya-Yoga philosophers, the Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta Continue reading Emotions in Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta philosophy: Distance and closeness
Gavin Hyman explains in his 2007 contribution to Martin’s Cambdride Companion to Atheism as well as in his 2010 A Short History of Atheism that atheism is always the refusal of a given form of theism. In particular, in European Continue reading Hyman’s analysis of atheism and some interesting Indian parallels