Description
Book SynopsisAn interpretive approach to the study of mystical experience. Compares the experiences of Meister Eckhart, Ibn Arabi, and Hui-neng to reveal commonalities that have provocative implications for our understanding of consciousness.
Trade Review“Jason Blum has given us a novel and very interesting attempt to offer a new take on the elusive subject of religious experience. The book is useful in many ways: it organizes, and criticizes, the main epistemological assumptions made by theories of mystical experience, and it argues Blum’s case over several rigorously constructed chapters. Recommended to anyone interested in religious experience.”
—Ivan Strenski,University of California, Riverside
“Jason Blum illustrates fascinating similarities and parallels in the writings of Ibn al-ʿArabi, Meister Eckhart, and Hui-neng with respect to their views on the metaphysical structure between the self and ultimacy and on the nature of mystical knowing, despite obvious major differences among these influential mystics. This insightful comparative study develops with rigorous precision and clarity a novel theoretical framework for the study of comparative mysticism, one that shows much originality and promise.”
—Michael Stoeber,Regis College, University of Toronto
“Jason Blum’s phenomenological approach to the analysis of mystical experiences is both original and substantial, contributing to the recent debates about the nature of those experiences with a more subtle and holistic attitude. It will become an important part of the ongoing methodological controversies.”
—Moshe Idel,Hebrew University and Shalom Hartman Institute
“This is a gem of a book. It is well written, tightly organized, and succinct in its formulations. It manages to take three very sophisticated mystical authors from three very different cultures and put them into critical conversation both with one another and with the ontological assumptions of the contemporary academy. The result is a wonderful example of the new comparativism.”
—Jeffrey J. Kripal,author of Comparing Religions: Coming to Terms
Table of ContentsContents
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Theory vs. Interpretation
1 The Problem of Context
2 An Interpretive Approach
3 Ibn al-ʿArabi and the Names of God
4 Meister Eckhart and the Breaking-Through into the Quiet Desert
5 Hui-neng and the Stink of Zen
Conclusion: Theory and Interpretation
Notes
Works Consulted
Index
