Coincidentally, I am reading “Schrödinger: Life and Thought” by Walter Moore. Schrödinger read everything written by Schopenhauer. He also read extensively on Buddhism and Vedanta.
He wrote “ The ego is only an aggregate of countless illusions, a phantom, a bubble sure to break. It is Karma. Acts and thoughts are forces integrating themselves into material and mental phenomena— into what we call objective and subjective appearances… The universe is the integration of acts and thoughts. Even swords and things of metal are manifestations of spirit. There is no birth and death, but the birth and death of Karma in some form or condition. There is reality, but there is no permanent individual…
Phantom succeeds to phantom as undulations to undulations over the ghostly sea of birth and death. And even as the storming of sea is motion of undulation, not of translation— even as it is the form of the wave only, not the wave itself, that travels— so in the passing of lives, there is only the rising and vanishing of forms,— forms mental, forms material. The fathomless Reality does not pass… Within every creature incarnate sleeps the Infinite Intelligence unevolved, hidden, unfelt, unknown — yet destined from eternities to awaken at last, to rend away the ghostly web of sensuous mind, to break it’s chrysalis of flesh, and pass to the extreme conquest of Space and Time.”
Moore comments “ Perhaps these thoughts occurred to Erwin when he made his great discovery of wave mechanics and found the reality of physics in wave motions, and also later when he found that this reality was part of an underlying unity of mind. Yet in the course of his life, belief in Vedanta remains strangely dissociated from both his interpretation of scientific work and his relations with other persons. He did not achieve a true integration of his beliefs with his act. The Bhagavad Gita teaches that there are three paths to salvation: The path of devotion, the path of works, and the path of knowledge. By inborn temperament and by early nurture Erwin was destined to follow the last of these paths. His intellect showed him the way, and throughout his life, he expressed in graceful essays his belief in Vedanta, but he remained what the Indians call Mahavit, a person who knows the theory, but has failed to achieve a practical realization of it in his own. From the Chandogya Upanishad : “I am a Mahavit, a knower of the word, and not an Atmavit, a knower of Atman.”
Yes, Vedanta includes broadly what all that has been said by Schopenhauer and Kastrup. The “ Analytic Idealism looks to be derivative of core vedantic statement “ Brahm Satya, Jagan Mitthya “ Vedanta goes beyond this to give an experience of what all are the myths . Once you transcend all the perceptions related to such myths after treading assiduously the paths of Karma, Bhakti , Dnyan and RajYogas you will arrive at the destination of Samadhi, immersing yourself in Samadhi and attaining the unison with Brahman . In between there are several things which are beyond the description of conventional languages and description. Largely the final achievements are individual’s self realization .
I assume that you mean it is compatible, which I agree with. But as you know I am unashamedly syncretist in my attitude.
I think we feel our through life, even if we have a sense of understanding. Something is always missing from our perception, like walking in the dark. It is as though a sensory input is missing, and our five senses are not enough to fully understand. The most extraordinary experience has multiple other perspectives. Sometimes we think we have an intuition, and I think the imagination is a door to that and the source of visions, dreams and prophecies. This is not so much a prediction as it is an emphasis or a giving of prominence to something.
That is why all of our religious traditions are “feeling” in a figurative sense in that area where our senses are insufficient. The words we read that are attributed to Jesus suggests to me that he was pointing to that, and the fact that we are one despite our diversity.
Your emphasis on feeling reminds me of Schleiermacher for whom religion is a matter of feeling—the “immediate self-consciousness” of the unity of the whole on which we are aware of our utter dependence. This unity and our dependence is our “God consciousness”. The relationship of dependence is “Bestimmtheit (conditionedness) of immediate self-consciousness”. God to Schleiermacher is “absolutely undivided oneness [Einheit]” not a conditioned particular being. Shleiermacher is attempting to put nondual awareness into words.
Have you read the Sermon on the Mount according to Vedanta by Swami Prabhavananda? A wonderful commentary. He tells the following story:
“…in about 1874 that Sri Ramakrishna interested himself actively in Christianity. A devotee who used to visit the Master at the Dakshineswar temple garden near Calcutta would explain the Bible to him in Bengali. One day, while Sri Ramakrishna was seated in the drawing-room ing-room of another devotee’s home, he saw a picture of the Madonna and Child. Absorbed in contemplation of this picture, he saw it suddenly become living and effulgent. An ecstatic love for Christ filled Sri Ramakrishna’s heart, and a vision came to him of a Christian church in which devotees were burning incense and lighting candles dles before Jesus.
For three days Sri Ramakrishna lived under the spell of this experience. On the fourth day, while he was walking in a grove at Dakshineswar, he saw a person of serene countenance approaching with his gaze fixed on him. From the inmost recesses of Sri Ramakrishna’s heart came the realization, “This is Jesus, who poured out his heart’s blood for the redemption of mankind. This is none other than Christ, the embodiment of love.” The Son of Man then embraced Sri Ramakrishna and entered into him, and Sri Ramakrishna went into samadhi, the state of transcendental dental consciousness. Thus was Sri Ramakrishna convinced of Christ’s divinity.”
Prabhavananda goes on to say that “ since the early days of our order, Christ has been honored and revered by our swamis as one of the greatest of illumined teachers. Many of our monks quote Christ’s words to explain and illustrate spiritual truths, perceiving an essential unity between his message and the message of our Hindu seers and sages.” And so do I.
Yes , there is complete unison of thoughts , beliefs and religions when someone starts realizing “ Advaita “ in it’s total manifestations. Ramakrishna had this realization from his early age and people surrounding him were well aware of his such unison with Maa Kaali . He often used to go in Samadhi / trance and emerging from it with more and more divine attributes. This is how his devotees called him Thakur meaning God in Bengali . His realization or visualization of Jesus crucification is well documented and is often referred by Swamis of Ramakrishna Mission order . Swami Sarvapriyananda , Vadant Society, NY holds a midnight prayer meeting on Christmas to honour this experience of Ramakrishna.
Right. From a philosophical standpoint, the challenge is to show how the nondual consciousness is compatible with the harmony of the world religions. Inspired by the Vedanta of the Ramakrishna Society, Aldous Huxley wrote the seminal “Perennial Philosophy”” PHILOSOPHIA PERENNIS—the phrase was coined by Leibniz; but the thing—the metaphysic that recognizes a divine Reality substantial to the world of things and lives and minds; the psychology that finds in the soul something similar to, or even identical with, divine Reality; the ethic that places man’s final end in the knowledge of the immanent and transcendent Ground of all being—the thing is immemorial and universal.”
Huxley goes on “ Based upon the direct experience of those who have fulfilled the necessary conditions of such knowledge, this teaching is expressed most succinctly in the Sanskrit formula, tat tvam asi (“ That art thou”); the Atman, or immanent eternal Self, is one with Brahman, the Absolute Principle of all existence; and the last end of every human being is to discover the fact for himself, to find out Who he really is.”
This is what we are doing. The principle of double love, embedded in the Torah and both preached and lived by Jesus, that is, 1) love God 2) love your neighbor, is based on the fact that ultimately God is, all else is illusion.
Those who see all creatures in themselves
And themselves in all creatures know no fear.
Those who see all creatures in themselves
And themselves in all creatures know no grief.
How can the multiplicity of life
Delude the one who sees its unity?
Non-being can never be and being can never not be. That is what you are. Bodies are born and die. You are Being itself~Consciousness itself. The body and the mind are reflections~images~ created in the image of God as it says in Genesis 1. They come and go. Becoming and fading away. Let them come and let them go.
The materialists have it backwards. Consciousness precedes mind and mind precedes matter. This is true both ontologically and historically. Cosmic mind precedes individual minds.”Cosmic conscious” is a misnomer for nondual consciousness which encompasses any conception of a bounded cosmos or universe. The meaning of he Sanskrit word Brahman is simply “The Vast”.That is what you are.