Pantheism and Non-Dual Idealism
In the linked post, I offered a proof for the existence of God along the lines of Anselm’s ontological argument, albeit adjusted for the metaphysical position of modal pantheism. Concordantly, I concluded that, as long as we define God as “the totality of Being (i.e., existence itself)” we can ascribe to God the property of necessary existence in virtue of the fact that the claim “existence exists,” is tautological, and therefore, necessarily true. Even if I failed in that regard, at the very minimum, I established that God does exist insofar as “the totality of Being,” is a real thing out there in the world which satisfies the ontological candidacy of “that than which nothing greater can be conceived,” (a self-evidently valid definition of God).
In that post, I intentionally argued for my position in a manner that did not need much of a metaphysical commitment to any particular ontological view of reality (namely because it was one of the first posts, and I didn’t want to overload the reader with a bunch of new information all at once). In other words, when I argued that God was “the totality of Being,” I chose to remain relatively non-committal about precisely what this “totality of Being,” entailed.
In this post, however, I intend to bridge the modal pantheism of that post, with an explicit idealist ontology. Put simply, the purpose of this post is meant to demonstrate precisely how “the totality of Being” is of an Idealist nature.
God is Pure Mind
The “totality of Being,” of course, refers to the aggregate of existence such that anything beyond the aggregate is necessarily non-existent. As a result, another way to phrase the “totality of Being,” is simply to refer to it as “that which alone is real,” and wouldn’t you know it, that is precisely the definition which I have attributed to Pure Mind in the previous part of this post.
Consequentially, the “totality of Being” is a definition that corresponds equally to two conceptions in my philosophy. The first concept is the concept of God. The second concept is the concept of Pure Mind. Insofar as these two terms converge on the same definition, we may reasonably conclude that they are both referring to the same ontology. God and Pure Mind are one and the same.
“God,” is the title; “Pure Mind,” is the nature or essence underlying the title.
We may, of course, ask ourselves why the ontology of “Pure Mind” deserves a title such as “God.” After all, besides being able to fulfil an old, dead philosopher’s definition of what God is, why should we consider “Pure Mind,” anything worthy of the title “God?”
The answer is quite simple: “Pure Mind,” fulfils, albeit in non-stereotypical ways, the ontological properties often ascribed to the traditional conception of God Himself. Pure Mind is omnipresent, it is transcendent, it is omnipotent, and it is omniscient. It is omnipresent in that it encompasses all Space and Time; it is transcendent in that, in-itself, it exists beyond all Space and Time; it is omnipotent in that it is numerically identical to all power, efficacy and change that has happened, will happen or will ever happen, but also transcends any conception of power which is exclusively tied down to spatial-temporal limitations; finally, it is omniscient in that it is numerically identical to all the knowledge that has ever existed, exists, or will ever exists, but also transcends any conception of knowledge which is exclusively tied down to spatial-temporal limitations.
Beyond these few properties, “Pure Mind,” also serves many of the essential roles which an Ultimate Divinity like “God,” is conceptualized to serve. For instance, the role of being an explanatory ground of all Being is something that “God,” usually serves in traditional Western Theology. In my ontology, “Pure Mind,” serves as a similar role as the ground of all being, specifically by functioning as the substratum of all reality, and therefore as the ontological primitive source of all explanations for existence. Of course, whereas Christian theology often emphasizes a strict Creator-Creation distinction, my philosophy is more pantheistic/panentheistic in nature, in that it emphasizes the essential unity of Immanent Reality and the Transcendent Pure Mind.
Ultimately, however, the most convincing argument I can offer as to why “Pure Mind,” merits the title of “God,” is that this notion is not original. For thousands of years, the religion of Advaita Vedanta has equated the concept of Pure Awareness, Pure Consciousness, Pure Mind, with the Ultimate Reality of Brahman.
My definition of God as “Pure Mind,” is nothing more than a recapitulation of an ancient wisdom that has already been discovered long before me, and which is currently the centre of many religious traditions around the world. Nothing that I am saying, therefore, is especially radical.
(None of this will make sense until part IX-X of this series: I have stated in part I of this series, and will state again in part IX-X, that Pure Mind is a Void. That would imply that God is also a Void, and that “that which alone is real,” is also a Void. All of these things are true, insofar as the “Void,” is just one way to look at the same fundamental thing. The Void is one side of the coin; the other side is Reality. Like potentiality and actuality, both refer to the same thing but are conceptually different aspects of that same thing).
The Theological Bias of Anthropomorphism
The only reason a person would be apprehensive toward designating “Pure Mind,” the title of “God,” is because “Pure Mind,” does not exhibit the anthropomorphic, personal features that many Westerners are accustomed to associating with God. However, this does not really constitute a valid objection to the notion that “God,” is “Pure Mind.”
Similarly, objections against the notion that “God,” is “Pure Mind,” which are based on the objectionability of worshipping an entity which cannot respond to prayers or worship are equally bad. These objections presuppose the anthropomorphic bias that God is somehow meant to answer prayers or listen and consciously appreciate worship like a human would. In other word, it is not an objection, as much as it is a form of begging the question by assuming only anthropomorphic God(s) are valid philosophical candidates for the status of Ultimate Divinity.
Caveat
Overall, the argument for modal pantheism in my “A Proof of God’s Existence Part I,” carries over quite nicely unto an idealist framework, but there is one little caveat that I would be remiss not to mention.
In “A Proof of God’s Existence Part I,” I attributed the property of necessary existence to God and/or the property of being self-caused/self-necessitated. I would like to qualify this statement as it pertains to “Pure Mind.”
Ultimately, “Pure Mind,” is beyond predicates such as these. All predicates carry with them the trappings of dualistic modes of thinking, and as such can only inhere falsely (or at least not completely truthfully) on the ontology of “Pure Mind.”
In the next part of this series, I intend to discuss the intersection between the Principle of Sufficient Reason and the metaphysical position of non-dual Idealism. In that section, I will clarify precisely why the attribute of Self-causation and Self-necessitation, as well as the property of necessary existence is not something that we can properly ascribe to “Pure Mind.” For now, it will suffice to say this: “Pure Mind,” is beyond the Principle of Sufficient Reason, and as such it beyond any conception of necessity, self-necessitation, or self-causation. In fact, we have already seen a glimpse of how “Pure Mind,” is beyond the attribute of “self-causation,” since the very concept of “Causality,” is nothing more than product of Spatial-Temporal modes of cognition, something which “Pure Mind,” is beyond from. Pure Mind transcends Causality, so it cannot be “self-caused.”
Pure and simple, “Pure Mind,” just is. “Pure Mind,” is the Absolute. “Pure Mind,” is unconditioned, and in it there subsists no predicates which can adequately describe it. Ascriptions like “necessary existence,” or “Uncaused Cause,” or “Self-caused cause,” or so on are 1. only approximations, and 2. not even necessarily the best approximations we have at hand. As far as I’m concerned the best approximation we have at hand is the following: “transcendent.”
Pure Mind is “transcendent,” in the sense that it is beyond Reason, beyond logic, it simply is. This is not a hindrance or limitation, on the contrary it is a testament to the complete unbound freedom of Pure Mind–that it no longer is bound to the constraints of Reason or Logic, but in fact supersedes them. But again, more on all of this in the next instalment.
Conclusion/preview
The last post ran a little long, so I will end this post early, since I believe I have presented an adequate argument in favor of non-dual idealist pantheism.
In the next instalment of this series I will demonstrate the intersection between the Principle of Sufficient Reason, and Idealism. Specifically, I will explain how the former can serve as a groundwork from which to derive the latter, namely through the aid of Schopenhauer’s “Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason.” I will then conclude that post by explaining the advantages involved in articulating the position of idealism in this way.
Leave a Reply