Panentheism
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Panentheism (
In panentheism, the universal
In philosophy
Ancient Greek philosophy
The religious beliefs of
Modern philosophy
Baruch Spinoza later claimed that "Whatsoever is, is in God, and without God nothing can be, or be conceived."[6] "Individual things are nothing but modifications of the attributes of God, or modes by which the attributes of God are expressed in a fixed and definite manner."[7] Though Spinoza has been called the "prophet"[8] and "prince"[9] of pantheism, in a letter to Henry Oldenburg Spinoza states that: "as to the view of certain people that I identify god with nature (taken as a kind of mass or corporeal matter), they are quite mistaken".[10] For Spinoza, our universe (cosmos) is a mode under two attributes of Thought and Extension. God has infinitely many other attributes which are not present in our world.
According to German philosopher
In 1828, the German philosopher
Philosophers who embraced panentheism have included
In religion
Buddhism
This section needs additional citations for verification. (January 2024) |
The Reverend Zen Master Soyen Shaku was the first Zen Buddhist Abbot to tour the United States in 1905–6. He wrote a series of essays collected into the book Zen For Americans. In the essay titled "The God Conception of Buddhism" he attempts to explain how a Buddhist looks at the ultimate without an anthropomorphic God figure while still being able to relate to the term God in a Buddhist sense:
At the outset, let me state that Buddhism is not atheistic as the term is ordinarily understood. It has certainly a God, the highest reality and truth, through which and in which this universe exists. However, the followers of Buddhism usually avoid the term God, for it savors so much of Christianity, whose spirit is not always exactly in accord with the Buddhist interpretation of religious experience. Again, Buddhism is not pantheistic in the sense that it identifies the universe with God. On the other hand, the Buddhist God is absolute and transcendent; this world, being merely its manifestation, is necessarily fragmental and imperfect. To define more exactly the Buddhist notion of the highest being, it may be convenient to borrow the term very happily coined by a modern German scholar, "panentheism," according to which God is πᾶν καὶ ἕν (all and one) and more than the totality of existence.[17][18]
The essay then goes on to explain first utilizing the term "God" for the American audience to get an initial understanding of what he means by "panentheism," and then discusses the terms that Buddhism uses in place of "God" such as
Pure land Buddhism
Christianity
This section needs additional citations for verification. (October 2021) |
Panentheism is also a feature of some Christian
Catholic panentheism
A number of ordained Catholic mystics (including Richard Rohr, David Steindl-Rast, and Thomas Keating) have suggested that panentheism is the original view of Christianity.[20][21][22] They hold that such a view is directly supported by mystical experience and the teachings of Jesus and Saint Paul. Richard Rohr surmises this in his 2019 book, The Universal Christ:
But Paul merely took incarnationalism to its universal and logical conclusions. We see that in his bold exclamation “There is only Christ. He is everything and he is in everything” (Colossians 3:11). If I were to write that today, people would call me a pantheist (the universe is God), whereas I am really a panentheist (God lies within all things, but also transcends them), exactly like both Jesus and Paul.[20]
Similarly, David Steindl-Rast posits that Christianity's original panentheism is being revealed through contemporary mystical insight:
What characterizes our moment in history is the collapse of Christian theism. Gratefulness mysticism makes us realize that Christianity never was theistic, but panentheistic. Faith in God as triune implied this from the very beginning; now we are becoming aware of it. It becomes obvious, at the same time, that we share this Trinitarian experience of divine life with all human beings as a spiritual undercurrent in all religions, an undercurrent older and more powerful than the various doctrines. At the core of interreligious dialogue flows this shared spirituality of gratefulness, a spirituality strong enough to restore to our broken world unity.[21]
This sentiment is mirrored in Thomas Keating's 1993 article, Clarifications Regarding Centering Prayer:
Pantheism is usually defined as the identification of God with creation in such a way that the two are indistinguishable. Panentheism means that God is present in all creation by virtue of his omnipresence and omnipotence, sustaining every creature in being without being identified with any creature. The latter understanding is what Jesus seems to have been describing when he prays "that all might be one, Father, as we are one" and "that they may also be in us" (John 17:22). Again and again, in the Last Supper discourse, he speaks of this oneness and his intentions to send his Spirit to dwell within us. If we understand the writings of the great mystics rightly, they experience God living within them all the time. Thus the affirmation of God's transcendence must always be balanced by the affirmation of his imminence both on the natural plane and on the plane of grace.[22]
Panentheism in other Christian confessions
Panentheistic conceptions of God occur amongst some modern theologians.
The former suggests two poles separated such as God influencing creation and it in turn its creator (Bangert 2006:168), whereas bipolarity completes God’s being implying interdependence between temporal and eternal poles. (Marbaniang 2011:133), in dealing with Whitehead’s approach, does not make this distinction. I use the term bipolar as a generic term to include suggestions of the structural definition of God’s transcendence and immanence; to for instance accommodate a present and future reality into which deity must reasonably fit and function, and yet maintain separation from this world and evil whilst remaining within it.[24]
Some argue that panentheism should also include the notion that God has always been related to some world or another, which denies the idea of creation out of nothing (
The Latter Day Saint movement teaches that the Light of Christ "proceeds from God through Christ and gives life and light to all things".[26]
Gnosticism
Hinduism
The earliest reference to panentheistic thought in
The most influential[35] and dominant[36] school of Indian philosophy, Advaita Vedanta, rejects theism and dualism by insisting that "Brahman [ultimate reality] is without parts or attributes...one without a second."[37] Since Brahman has no properties, contains no internal diversity and is identical with the whole reality it cannot be understood as an anthropomorphic personal God.[38] The relationship between Brahman and the creation is often thought to be panentheistic.[39]
Panentheism is also expressed in the Bhagavad Gita.[39] In verse IX.4, Krishna states:
By Me all this universe is pervaded through My unmanifested form.
All beings abide in Me but I do not abide in them.
Many schools of Hindu thought espouse
Shaktism, or Tantra, is regarded as an Indian prototype of Panentheism.[45] Shakti is considered to be the cosmos itself – she is the embodiment of energy and dynamism, and the motivating force behind all action and existence in the material universe. Shiva is her transcendent masculine aspect, providing the divine ground of all being. "There is no Shiva without Shakti, or Shakti without Shiva. The two ... in themselves are One."[46] Thus, it is She who becomes the time and space, the cosmos, it is She who becomes the five elements, and thus all animate life and inanimate forms. She is the primordial energy that holds all creation and destruction, all cycles of birth and death, all laws of cause and effect within Herself, and yet is greater than the sum total of all these. She is transcendent, but becomes immanent as the cosmos (Mula Prakriti). She, the Primordial Energy, directly becomes Matter.
Judaism
While mainstream Rabbinic Judaism is classically monotheistic, and follows in the footsteps of Maimonides (c. 1135–1204), the panentheistic conception of God can be found among certain mystical Jewish traditions. A leading scholar of Kabbalah, Moshe Idel[47] ascribes this doctrine to the kabbalistic system of Moses ben Jacob Cordovero (1522–1570) and in the eighteenth century to the Baal Shem Tov (c. 1700–1760), founder of the Hasidic movement, as well as his contemporaries, Rabbi Dov Ber, the Maggid of Mezeritch (died 1772), and Menahem Mendel, the Maggid of Bar. This may be said of many, if not most, subsequent Hasidic masters. There is some debate as to whether Isaac Luria (1534–1572) and Lurianic Kabbalah, with its doctrine of tzimtzum, can be regarded as panentheistic.
According to
Many scholars would argue that "panentheism" is the best single-word description of the philosophical theology of Baruch Spinoza.[49] It is therefore no surprise, that aspects of panentheism are also evident in the theology of Reconstructionist Judaism as presented in the writings of Mordecai Kaplan (1881–1983), who was strongly influenced by Spinoza.[50]
Sikhism
Many newer, contemporary
Islam
In Pre-Columbian America
The Mesoamerican empires of the Mayas, Aztecs as well as the South American Incas (Tahuatinsuyu) have typically been characterized as polytheistic, with strong male and female deities.[59] According to Charles C. Mann's history book 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus, only the lower classes of Aztec society were polytheistic. Philosopher James Maffie has argued that Aztec metaphysics was pantheistic rather than panentheistic, since Teotl was considered by Aztec philosophers to be the ultimate all-encompassing yet all-transcending force defined by its inherit duality.[60]
One exception can be modern
Konkōkyō
Konkokyo is a form of sectarian Japanese Shinto, and a faith within the Shinbutsu-shūgō tradition. Traditional Shintoism holds that an impersonal spirit manifests/penetrates the material world, giving all objects consciousness and spontaneously creating a system of natural mechanisms, forces, and phenomena (Musubi). Konkokyo deviates from traditional Shintoism by holding that this spirit (Comparable to Brahman), has a personal identity and mind. This personal form is non-different from the energy itself, not residing in any particular cosmological location. In Konkokyo, this god is named "Tenchi Kane no Kami-Sama" which can be translated directly as, "Spirit of the gilded/golden heavens and earth".
Though practitioners of Konkokyo are small in number (~300,000 globally), the sect has birthed or influenced a multiplicity of
See also
- Achintya Bheda Abheda, concept of qualified non-duality in Gaudiya Vaishnava Hinduism
- Brahman
- Christian Universalism
- Conceptions of God
- Creation Spirituality
- Divine simplicity
- Double-aspect theory
- Essence–energies distinction
- German idealism
- Henosis
- Kabbalah
- Neoplatonism
- Neutral monism
- Open theism
- The Over-Soul (1841), essay by Ralph Waldo Emerson
- Orthodox Christian theology
- Pantheism
- Pandeism
- Parabrahman
- Paramatman
- Philosophy of space and time
- Process theology
- Subud, spiritual movement founded by Muhammad Subuh Sumohadiwidjojo (1901–1987)
- Tawhid, concept of indivisible oneness in Islam
- People associated with panentheism
- Gregory Palamas (1296–1359), Byzantine Orthodox theologian and hesychast
- Baruch Spinoza (1632–1677), Dutch philosopher of Sephardi-Portuguese origin
- Alfred North Whitehead (1861–1947), English mathematician, philosopher, and father of process philosophy
- Charles Hartshorne (1897–2000), American philosopher and father of process theology
- Arthur Peacocke (1924–2006), British Anglican theologian and biochemist
- John B. Cobb (b. 1925), American theologian and philosopher
- Mordechai Nessyahu (1929–1997), Jewish-Israeli political theorist and philosopher of Cosmotheism
- Sallie McFague (1933–2019), American feminist theologian, author of Models of God and The Body of God
- William Luther Pierce (1933–2002), American political activist and self-proclaimed cosmotheist
- Rosemary Radford Ruether (b. 1936), American feminist theologian, author of Sexism and God-Talk and Gaia and God
- Jan Assmann (b. 1938), German Egyptologist, theorist of Cosmotheism
- Leonardo Boff (b. 1938), Brazilian liberation theologian and philosopher, former Franciscan priest, author of Ecology and Liberation: A New Paradigm
- Matthew Fox (priest) (b. 1940), American theologian, exponent of Creation Spirituality, expelled from the Dominican Order in 1993 and received into the Episcopal priesthood in 1994, author of Creation Spirituality, The Coming of the Cosmic Christ and A New Reformation: Creation Spirituality and the Transformation of Christianity
- Marcus Borg (1942–2015), American New Testament scholar and theologian, prominent member of the Jesus Seminar, author of The God We Never Knew
- Richard Rohr (b. 1943), American Franciscan priest and spiritual writer, author of Everything Belongs and The Universal Christ
- Carter Heyward (b. 1945), American feminist theologian and Episcopal priest, author of Touching our Strength and Saving Jesus from Those Who Are Right
- Norman Lowell (b. 1946), Maltese writer and politician, self-proclaimed cosmotheist
- John Polkinghorne (1930-2021), English theoretical physicist and theologian
- Michel Weber (b. 1963), Belgian philosopher
- Thomas Jay Oord (b. 1965), American theologian and philosopher
Citations
- ^ "panentheism". Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary. Retrieved 2024-04-14.
- ^ a b John Culp (2013): "Panentheism", in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Retrieved 18 March 2014.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-8028-2416-5.
- ^ "Pantheism and Panentheism in non-Western cultures", in: Britannica.
- ISBN 0-7487-0586-4.
- ^ Ethics, part I, prop. 15.
- ^ Ethics, part I, prop. 25S.
- ^ Picton, J. Allanson, "Pantheism: Its Story and Significance", 1905.
- ^ Fraser, Alexander Campbell, "Philosophy of Theism", William Blackwood and Sons, 1895, p. 163.
- ISBN 978-1-60459-156-9, letter 73.
- ISBN 978-0-15-684730-8, pp. 14 and 95.
- ^ Charles Hartshorne and William Reese, Philosophers Speak of God, Humanity Books, 1953, ch. 4.
- ISBN 978-1625648648. Retrieved 29 September 2015.
- ISBN 978-0567030160. Retrieved 29 September 2015.
- ISBN 0-8010-2724-1.
- ISBN 0-208-00498-X p. 348; cf. Michel Weber, Whitehead’s Pancreativism. The Basics. Foreword by Nicholas Rescher, Ontos Verlag, Frankfurt am Main and Paris, 2006.
- ^ "Zen for Americans". 1987.
- ^ Zen For Americans by Soyen Shaku, translated by Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki, 1906, pages 25–26. "Zen for Americans: The God-Conception of Buddhism". www.sacred-texts.com. Retrieved 2020-11-08.
- ISBN 978-0802809780. Retrieved 23 March 2018.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-5247-6210-0.
- ^ a b "Shared Spirituality". Gratefulness.org. Retrieved 2022-09-19.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-59056-352-6.
- ^ About Charles Hartshorne Archived 2007-11-14 at the Wayback Machine.
- ^ Potgieter, R., 2013, 'Keith Ward's Soft Panentheism', In die Skriflig/In Luce Verbi 47(1), Art. #581, 9 pages. https://dx.doi.org/10.4102/.
- ISBN 9781620320471. Retrieved 1 October 2015.
- ^ "Light of Christ", churchofjesuschrist.org.
- ^ "Now, he who spoke with Moses, the Jews, and the priests he says is the archont of Darkness, and the Christians, Jews, and pagans (ethnic) are one and the same, as they revere the same god. For in his aspirations he seduces them, as he is not the god of truth. And so therefore all those who put their hope in the god who spoke with Moses and the prophets have (this in store for themselves, namely) to be bound with him, because they did not put their hope in the god of truth. For that one spoke with them (only) according to their own aspirations." And elsewhere: "Now God has no part in this cosmos nor does he rejoice over it." Classical Texts: Acta Archelai, p. 76. (www.fas.harvard.edu/~iranian/Manicheism/Manicheism_II_Texts.pdf).
- Epinoia which comes out of him, who is called Life. [...] And the luminous Epinoia was hidden in Adam, in order that the archons might not know her, but that the Epinoia might be a correction of the deficiency of the mother. And the man came forth because of the shadow of the light which is in him. [...] And they took counsel with the whole array of archons and angels. [...] And they brought him (Adam) into the shadow of death, in order that they might form (him) again from earth [...] This is the tomb of the newly-formed body with which the robbers had clothed the man, the bond of forgetfulness; and he became a mortal man. [...] But the Epinoia of the light which was in him, she is the one who was to awaken his thinking. ([1]).
- ^ "Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy".
- ISBN 978-90-04-16373-7. Retrieved 10 July 2020.
- ISBN 978-8172112806. Retrieved 1 October 2015.
- ^ Oberlies (1998:155) gives an estimate of 1100 BC for the youngest hymns in book 10. Estimates for a terminus post quem of the earliest hymns are more uncertain. Oberlies (p. 158) based on 'cumulative evidence' sets wide range of 1700–1100 BC.
- ^ The Purusha Sukta in Daily Invocations by Swami Krishnananda.
- ^ Swami Krishnananda. A Short History of Religious and Philosophic Thought in India. Divine Life Society. p. 19.
- ISBN 81-208-1251-4.
- ^ "Gandhi And Mahayana Buddhism". Class.uidaho.edu. Retrieved 2011-06-10.
- ^ Wainwright, William. "Concepts of God". Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Retrieved 1 October 2015.
- ^ Wainwright, William, "Concepts of God", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2010 Edition).
- ^ ISBN 0567030164.
- ISBN 9048178002.
- ^ Chaitanya Charitamrita, A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Bhaktivedanta Book Trust.
- ^ The Doctrine of Vibration: An Analysis of Doctrines and Practices of Kashmir Shaivism, Mark S. G. Dyczkowski, p. 44.
- ^ Ksemaraja, trans. by Jaidev Singh, Spanda Karikas: The Divine Creative Pulsation, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, p. 119.
- ^ The Trika Śaivism of Kashmir, Moti Lal Pandit.
- ISBN 978-1-935244-03-5.
- ^ Subramanian, V. K., Saundaryalahari of Sankaracarya: Sanskrit Text in Devanagari with Roman Transliteration, English Translation, Explanatory Notes, Yantric Diagrams and Index. Motilal Banarsidass Publishers Pvt. Ltd. (Delhi, 1977; 6th ed. 1998). p. ix.
- ^ Hasidism: Between Ecstacy and Magic, SUNY, 1995, p. 17 f.
- ISBN 978-0742545649. Retrieved 17 August 2015.
- ISBN 978-94-007-5218-4. Retrieved 1 October 2015.
- ISBN 978-0-253-01075-9. Retrieved 1 October 2015.
- ISBN 978-1-932705-68-3.
- ISBN 978-0-231-51980-9.
- S2CID 154558545.
- ^ a b Singh, Nirbhai. Philosophy of Sikhism: Reality and its manifestations. Atlantic Publishers & Distri, 1990.
- ^ a b Chahal, Devinder Singh. "UNDERSTANDING OF THE FIRST STANZA OF OANKAR (ਓਅੰਕਾਰੁ) BANI."
- OCLC 190842786.
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- ^ Abiva, Huseyin. "Bektashi Thought & Practice". Bektashi Order of Dervishes. Retrieved 1 October 2015.
- ISBN 978-1622753963. Retrieved 17 August 2015.
- ISBN 9781607322238. Retrieved 17 August 2015.
- ISBN 978-0742513495. Retrieved 17 August 2015.
- ^ Russell Means, Where White Men Fear To Tread (Macmillan, 1993), pp. 3–4, 15, 17.
- ^ George Tinker, Spirit and Resistance: Political Theology and American Indian Liberation, 2004, p. 89. He defines the Sacred Other as "the Deep Mystery which creates and sustains all Creation".
- ISBN 9780520085602. Retrieved 17 August 2015.
- ^ The Peoples of the World Foundation. Education for and about Indigenous Peoples: The Cherokee People, retrieved 2008-03-24.
General and cited references
- Ankur Barua, "God’s Body at Work: Rāmānuja and Panentheism," in: International Journal of Hindu Studies, 14.1 (2010), pp. 1–30.
- Philip Clayton and Arthur Peacock (eds.), In Whom We Live and Move and Have Our Being; Panentheistic Reflections on God's Presence in a Scientific World, Eerdmans (2004)
- Bangert, B.C. (2006). Consenting to God and nature: Toward a theocentric, naturalistic, theological ethics, Princeton theological monograph ser. 55, Pickwick Publications, Eugene.
- Cooper, John W. (2006). Panentheism: The Other God of the Philosophers, Baker Academic ISBN 9780801027246
- Davis, Andrew M. and Philip Clayton (eds.) (2018). How I Found God in Everyone and Everywhere, Monkfish Book Publishing ISBN 9781939681881
- Thomas Jay Oord (2010). The Nature of Love: A Theology ISBN 978-0-8272-0828-5.
- Joseph Bracken, "Panentheism in the context of the theology and science dialogue", in: Open Theology, 1 (2014), 1–11 (online).
- Marbaniang, Domenic (2011). Epistemics of Divine Reality. POD. ISBN 9781105160776.
External links
- Culp, John. "Panentheism". In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
- Dr. Jay McDaniel on Panentheism
- Biblical Panentheism: The “Everywhere-ness” of God—God in all things, by Jon Zuck Archived 2008-02-19 at the Wayback Machine
- John Polkinghorne on Panentheism Archived May 10, 2021, at the Wayback Machine
- The Bible, Spiritual authority and Inspiration – Lecture by Tom Wright at Spiritual Minded