Nonduality by David R. Loy

Author:David R. Loy
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Wisdom Publications

Summary of the Core Theory

This study of subject–object nonduality has reached its midpoint, for part 2 offers a different approach to the topic. The analyses of nondual perception, nondual action, and nondual thinking have given us a theory that part 2 defends and elaborates. We must prepare for what is to follow by summarizing what has been done.

We began by noticing something interesting. Several important Asian philosophical systems, which have many similarities and many differences, make the same claim that the true nature of reality is nondual. Then are they perhaps referring to the same experience? Chapter 1 distinguished five different meanings of nonduality and discussed three of them: thinking that does not employ dualistic concepts, the nonplurality of phenomena “in” the world, and the nondifference of subject and object. We observed that all three claims are found in Mahāyāna Buddhism, Advaita Vedānta, and Taoism, which we have since referred to as “nondualistic systems.” These three nonduality claims are closely related. The critique of thinking that employs dualistic categories (being vs. nonbeing, pure vs. impure, etc.) usually expands to encompass all conceptual thinking, for such thinking acts as a superimposition which distorts our immediate experience. That is why we experience the world dualistically in the second sense, as a collection of discrete objects (including me) interacting causally in space and time. Negating dualistic thinking leads to experiencing the world as a unity, variously called Brahman, Dharmakāya, Tao, the One Mind, and so on. But what is the relationship between this whole and the subject that experiences it? The Whole is not truly whole if the subject is separate from it. This leads to the third sense of nonduality, the denial that subject and object are truly distinguishable. The rest of this work is devoted to understanding that extraordinary and counterintuitive claim, which is not just an objective evaluation; the nondualistic systems also agree that our usual sense of duality — the sense of separation (hence alienation) between myself and the world “I” am “in” — is the root delusion that needs to be overcome.

The preceding three chapters have explored what the claim of subject–object nonduality means in three different modes of our experience. It is significant that in each case we were able to utilize concepts ready at hand in the nondualist traditions. In chapter 2 it was the Indian epistemological distinction between savikalpa and nirvikalpa perception (prapañca is a related term); in chapter 3 it was the wei-wu-wei of Taoism; and in chapter 4 it was the prajñā of Mahāyāna Buddhism. In the process of unpacking the unfamiliar and counterintuitive implications of these concepts — clarifying what the claim is and using comparisons to situate it in Western thought — we have been in danger of losing the forest for the trees. We must see clearly the relationships among these three in order to attain an overview. The “architectonic” of their parallels is as important as the sum of their individual claims. If, as discussed in the introduction, the

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