The Perennial Philosophy and Christianity
My followers may be aware that I have temporarily retired from writing on Medium. I have been provoked into action, however, by a recent article by Matthew in which he argues against the concept of Perennialism, the suggestion that at their core all religions are saying the same thing, a worldview to which I subscribe and will therefore defend here. This follows an email exchange between him and me on the same theme, which he has just published (here).
In his article he says that “most Perennialists will engage in a combination of generalisation and dismissal of the importance of doctrines or statements that may contradict whatever is deemed to be part of the universal truth on the basis that it can’t be what they really meant. Metaphors are stretched in the direction needed to make them fit a round hole and quotes and allusions are taken out of context to serve whatever they need to in any given moment”. In our email correspondence, he has also said that it relies upon “a combination of selective reading and interpretation of those religions... If anything within religions disagrees with it, they aren’t really saying that, or what they actually meant was, or no we should ignore that”.
In what follows I shall probably be ‘guilty’ of some of these charges, although I don’t perceive them as problems, rather precisely what needs to be done in order to establish the central truth, if that is indeed what it is.
Matthew mentions many differences between various religions, but these are of course what Perennialists would call the outer layers, not the core. He doesn’t actually say what the central core of Perennialism is that he is denying. I’ll try to put it in my own words.
There is an ultimate ground of being, the source of everything that exists, which mysteriously is complete nothingness. Paradoxically this nothingness can also manifest itself as a complete fullness and unified oneness, a creative principle capable of manifesting the totality of everything that exists. In Hinduism these are called Brahman and at least in some traditions (the creator God) Brahma. In Kabbalah they are known as Ayin and En Sof (“EN SOF is the Absolute All to AYIN’s Absolute Nothing”¹.)
The Tao Te Ching opens with this statement: “The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao (because it is a mysterious nothingness). The nameless is the beginning of heaven and earth. The named is the mother of ten thousand things (i.e. the material universe and everything intervening)”. Note that here the ‘nameless’ precedes the creation of heaven (the spiritual realm).
From this viewpoint everything that exists is a manifestation of consciousness, therefore that nothing exists which is not some form of consciousness. The Perennial Philosophy is therefore an idealist tradition.
At some point in the descending process of manifestation individual spiritual entities are created. These are immortal, and in Hinduism are called atman, the equivalent of the soul in Christianity. Another more neutral term found in esoteric traditions would be a monad, a term coined or at least popularised by Gottfried Leibniz (see this Britannica article).
In Theosophy, the monad is said to be comprised of the two highest Principles, Atma (Spirit) and Buddhi (the Spiritual Soul). Although a duality, “they cannot function without each other. Atma needs Buddhi for a vehicle through which to manifest and Buddhi needs Atma to inform it. These two exist as a unit, not as a compound”². This will become especially relevant below in the Genesis story.
Human consciousness is the end product of the descent of this atman/soul/ monad through the various levels into a material body. (According to Genesis chapter 2 this was against the will of God. As far as I’m aware this idea does not appear in Hinduism.)
At some point the consciousness of human beings starts to feel dissatisfied with its existence in a body in the material world, recognises that it is a fallen soul, and therefore seeks to return to its original state. This is the goal of the spiritual path.
The most obvious and best known examples of this worldview are Hinduism and its offspring Buddhism. Matthew says: “In Hinduism from which Buddhism comes each person has a soul or a self, known as the Atman, which is ultimately part of an ultimate ground of being called Brahman. Buddhism rejects both of these, believing there is no individual self and no ultimate or supreme deity”. He is therefore trying to insist on their differences.
That is a correct description of Hinduism. For example the Chandogya Upanishad asserts the unity between Atman, the individual self, and Brahman. However, Brahman is not a deity in the conventional meaning of that word, rather the ultimate Ground of Being.
Buddhism may appear to deny the Hindu understanding, but it nevertheless seeks to achieve a liberated, free from rebirth, state of consciousness which can choose between being a Bodhisattva, a being who has attained enlightenment but can remain in existence in order to help others to achieve it, or to be reabsorbed into the ultimate source. As Matthew says, the word nirvana is ambiguous, but one thing said about it is that there is no longer any sense of self. In order to make the Bodhisattva choice, there has to remain a sense of individual self. That sounds pretty much like Atman/Brahman to me.
If we accept that this is the core of Perennialist belief, then we can say that anything that is added to this explains the differences between the various religious traditions. As Matthew says, “to suggest they are therefore all the same in content is simply wrong”. Indeed the content is different, but that is either because these are the additions to the core, not the core itself, or because they have perhaps misinterpreted the core.
Is Christianity a Perennialist Religion?
I’m sure that Matthew will say that it isn’t, since he is a Christian who believes that his religion is the truth. I would say that if it isn’t, it should be. That would be part of a new Reformation of Christianity that I have been arguing for in various Medium articles.
Let’s begin by examining the first three chapters of Genesis. I have written about this in detail in this article, but the following is a summary.
Genesis 1, without going into detail, describes the ‘creation’ of the various levels of the universe. Then at verse 26 the text says: “Then God said, ‘Let us make Adam* in our image, according to our likeness… So God created him* in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them”. (* The use of the word humankind in these places, as in some translations, is a mistaken assumption and a mistranslation of the Hebrew.)
The use of the word ‘image’ is strange. A better understanding would be ‘of the same nature as God’, thus Atman = Brahman as in Hinduism. Note that this being is described as them (thus plural), and both male and female.
This Adam appears to be what above I called atman or a monad, or in Christian terms a soul. It is a spiritual entity which has the potential to become a physical human.
Moving on to chapter 2, although some Christians think the Garden of Eden is a place on Earth, it is fairly obvious that it is ‘Heaven’ aka the spiritual realm. There the monad is separated into the male and female principles — atma/spirit/Adam and Buddhi/Soul/Eve — as described in the quote above.
The monad’s proper home was in the spiritual realm, and it was forbidden to eat of “the tree of knowledge of good and evil”. Since the consequence of this transgression will be that “in the day that you eat of it you shall die”, this suggests that the monad, which is eternal and immortal, if it incarnates into a physical body will obviously be forced to experience death, will have lost its immortal status.
The phrase ‘good and evil’ refers to the world of the opposites, the lower levels of the Great Chain of Being, as the One separates and divides. This tree of knowledge of good and evil is the psyche at these lower levels, remote from the divine source, as humans experience it when in a physical body.
According to the text, it is the female/soul principle (Eve) which is tempted to descend into the material world, and persuades the male principle (Atma/Spirit) to accompany her. The serpent symbolises the temptation to fall into the material world. The spiritual monad has then eaten of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, as pure consciousness from the spiritual realm incarnates into physical form, and experiences the world of the opposites (good and evil).
At the end of chapter 3 God creates great difficulties (v.24) to prevent eating from the tree of life, thus the return to immortality (v.22).
This interpretation is therefore consistent with the core of the Perennial Philosophy described above. If it seems strange, and contrary to Christian teachings, then I would suggest that it is something that Jesus believed, at least according to the Bible (see below).
Moving on now to the New Testament, Jesus’s primary teaching and its purpose is about entering the Kingdom of Heaven, which in Luke’s gospel (17.21) we are told is either ‘among you’ or ‘within you’. The Greek word is obviously ambiguous, but ‘within you’ fits more closely with Perennialism, since this suggests a state of consciousness one can realise.
Jesus also makes clear that it is an esoteric teaching, not available to everyone: “To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside, everything comes in parables” so that they will not understand (Mark 4.11). However, in Luke’s gospel (12.2) we are told that “nothing is covered up that will not be uncovered, and nothing secret that will not become known”, obviously at some unspecified point in the future.
The clearest reference to the core of the Perennial Philosophy in the gospels is the parable of the Prodigal Son. The story begins at Luke 15.11. There the younger of two sons asks to be given his birthright (the fact that he was a monad of the same nature as God), then takes it off to a distant country (the material world) where he squandered this birthright “in dissolute living”. At some point he comes to bitterly regret this decision, and seeks to return home to his loving father (to the spiritual realm, the life of the monad). Note that the father says that “this son of mine was dead and is alive again”, which seems to be a clear reference to Genesis chapters 2 and 3.
In Buddhism and Hinduism, the soul seeks to escape this world of suffering and illusion, and search for ‘enlightenment’, which fits neatly with this parable. Some Gnostics were so appalled by the material world that they concluded it was not created by the ultimate source but by a lesser deity known as the Demiurge. They sought escape by achieving gnosis (nirvana?enlightenment?), or direct knowledge. This again fits with the parable of the Prodigal Son.
In the Nag Hammadi Gospel of Thomas Jesus expresses the message of the parable even more starkly: “I am amazed at how this great wealth has made its home in this poverty”. This is immediately preceded by these words: “If the flesh came into being because of spirit, it is a wonder. But if spirit came into being because of the body, it is a wonder of wonders”. Here he is denying the later Christian suggestion that the soul is created (by God) at conception, thus the doctrine of no pre-existence.
Reincarnation is an important element in the Perennial Philosophy — in Hinduism, Buddhism, and esoteric traditions like Theosophy. Matthew says: “Contrary to what is sometimes claimed this was never a view in the Christian West”, and that “as far as the Abrahamic religions are concerned it has only ever existed in extremely esoteric forms deemed heretical by most believers”. I would of course say that this is a problem for the Christian West, if they indeed wish to seek the truth, and this majority of presumably exoteric believers would benefit from studying these extremely(!) esoteric forms. They might learn something. (In modern times the work of Dr. Ian Stevenson on past-life memories in children is extremely relevant.)
In order to reinforce his point, Matthew then claims that Origen did not believe in reincarnation, merely in the pre-existence of the soul. I believe he is wrong, and found two quotes which suggest otherwise — see this article.
He also mentions “the wealth of animistic, shamanic, pagan and other religious beliefs and superstitions that exist across the pre-modern world and in indigenous societies”, which is “a world most unlike the hierarchical and Christian system in which animals have souls, places and things have spirits and the world is alive with presences”.
I’m not sure what to make of this. I’m not aware of the Christian system he refers to, but hopefully he will enlighten me with some references. If, however, it says that “places and things have spirits and the world is alive with presences”, how is that different from the animism that he appears to be condemning? I also wonder whether he has sufficiently studied the spirituality of indigenous societies, especially the Native Americans. I especially recommend Blackfoot Physics by F. David Peat (an associate of David Bohm), and (Principles of) Native American Spirituality by Wa’ Na’ Nee’ Che (Dennis Renault) and Timothy Freke.
Matthew concludes by saying that “ Perennialism is for the individualist”, something he has a great problem with — he prefers to submit to an external authority. He remains nevertheless an individual, as are we all, and we are all equally free to search for the truth, and free to choose our own path.
He has invited to me to begin another conversation about the historical Jesus. Watch this space.
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I hope you have enjoyed this article. I have written in the past about other topics, including spirituality, metaphysics, psychology, science, Christianity, and politics. All of those articles are on Medium, but the simplest way to see a guide to them is to visit my website (click here and here). My most recent articles, however, are only on Medium; for those please check out my lists.
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Footnotes:
- Z’ev ben Shimon Halevi, A Kabbalistic Universe, Rider & Company, 1977, p7
- Yvonne K. Burgess, Oneness and the Monad, The Theosophical Publishing House, 2009, p6
