Thursday, July 06, 2006
social ecology and dialogical philosophy
2. Some philosophical foundations:
In order to broaden the interpretation of the concept of diversity, Arne Naess utilizes various concepts extracted form Spinoza’s philosophy. This combination of Naess and Spinoza is particularly engaging for Spinoza has always held a special fascination for ecological oriented thinkers. Spinoza's God or Nature (Deus sive Nature) intrigued those who attempted to ground an ecological ethics on strictly secular, non-religious principles. This last statement should be understood in the context of the distinction between religion (as an organized institution and a theology) and religiosity (the personal or communal relationship with the divinity).
As Naess writes in Spinoza And The deep Ecology Movement , “The deterioration of life conditions on earth has motivated many people to take up the philosophical and religious basis for their action in favor of the preservation of the richness and diversity of life on earth” (pg.2) The confluence of theology, ethics and ecology has been called Theological Ecology. One earlier version of ecological theology can be found in the works of the Jewish theologian, A. J. Heschel. Heschel, in his book The Sabbath renders a quasi-poetic description of the religious and the political meaning of the category of the “holy” when it is associated with the category of “time”.
For Heschel, the dichotomy is between time and space, not space and spirit. This is important because based on the concept of time, which is, by convention, a measurable category, Heschel provided the foundations for a religious social agenda. There is an inherent difficulty in conceiving a politics of the "spirit". Time, in contrast, is part and parcel of the concrete day-to-day life of individuals and societies. Heschel's argument was for the primacy of time, or the life of connection with the "eternal" over the life of acquisitive matter. The time-eternal in contrast to the materialistic realm of Capitalism. One immediate result from this is the call for less exploitation of natural resources and the devotion of more time to what in psychological terms is known as "leisure".
According to Naess, an intimation of ecological thought appears in Spinoza’s concept that the identity of God with Nature is expressed in the affirmation that God is actually present in, and expresses “himself” through each existing being. God is a constitutive part of the things themselves. In other words, the identity of god and nature is not merely an abstract intellectual construct but a practical systemic assumption of the Spinozistic thesis. Naess writes “The Ethics furnishes no basis for assuming that the immanent God expresses its nature, essence or power (all key Spinozian concepts) in any other way other than through each existing being” (pg. 5)
The ecological implications of this are very important. For Spinoza, the practical application of the love of God-Nature is manifested in a relational attitude, in a type of I-Thou relationship to the natural realm, (Buber) or an enlightened approach to the insentients and all other living beings (Zen), not in a devotional, ritualistic religious system. This relational attitude can also be coasted in political terms as a deep-ecology. In Naesse’s words: “Therefore, Amor Intellectualis Dei must somehow be a love of these existing particular beings of our everyday life-parts of the total richness and diversity of life forms on earth.” (Pg. 5) Later “Love of the immanent God, is love of God’s expression. If a being expresses God’s nature or essence, love of God cannot be different form love of such a being” (pg. 6) The question with political implications is: what sort of social behavior is appropriate for those who believe in a God-Nature system?
Naess makes the point that for Spinoza, the immanent presence of God in nature is actually the presence of God’s power, essence or nature in that being. Power and essence are the forms by which God expresses his being. In mystical kabbalah, God is also said to be present in nature, but the form of that presence takes a more abstract and “spiritual” term, it is call the Shekhina or immanent –yet at the same time transcendent- presence of divinity within each and every object and being in nature. In Kabbalah, God is present in every object in the form of “seeds of Holiness” that must be released from their natural encapsulation. The release of the sparks or seeds of godliness is done through an ethical relationship with nature as a whole. In that sense Spinoza and the Kabbalah share a similar perspective. For Spinoza however, God is present thorough its own nature and therefore is not apart from, but is a part of, and the same as nature. In reverse we can say that nature is present in God not as a part of, that would be pan-entheism, but as the same as God himself. As Naess puts it “ God is not apart from God’s expressions” (pg. 6) Naess again states the conclusion that “In light of the above argumentation, the Intellectualis Amor Dei may be interpreted as Loving understanding of particular beings. ” By focusing on the “particular beings” issue, we can infer from Spinoza the need to protect and encourage the diversity of each member of the ecological habitat. This connects the generalized aspects of environmentalism in Spinoza's philosophical approach, with the issue of diversity as interpreted in social ecology. Therefore we can follow Spinoza's thought to arrive at the foundations for a political programme of social ecology.
Can the claim be made that the goals of Naesse’s deep ecology are in accordance with Spinoza’s premises? Naess writes ”The philosophical aim of the deep ecology movement, as I see it, may be formulated in a way no different from that of Spinoza when he speaks about God or nature and the role of particulars” Again the issue of particulars, the quandary of diversity.
Naess recognized however that Spinoza’s Ethics cannot be easily translated into concrete policy formulations. Naess writes “The Ethics does not go into politics, but does express views on community.” (Pg11) It is important that Naess sees Spinoza as establishing views on the issue of community, contrasting the term “community” with “politics”. Building on the prior distinction between gemeinshaft and geselshaft, Buber made the same basic distinctions in his analysis of the regenerating of society. Naesse’s view of Spinoza is important because I argue that are precisely those views on community that render Spinoza valuable for our analysis of diversity and urbanism. More specifically, interpreting Spinoza’s views about particulars and diversity, we begin to intimate a position closer to the goals of social ecology. I argue that Spinoza's contentions, when modified with key concepts from other philosophers of community such as Martin Buber, become an adequate basis upon which to contribute to the resolution of the ethical dilemmas of diversity and its public policy spatial implications.
Whatever divergences can be found between specific policies advocated by Naess' deep ecology movement, and philosophical formulations found in Spinoza, may be the result of the different ways in which we, in our time, and under the current environmental circumstances, have come to know and understand the reality of ecological systems. We may want to make the intellectual jump and assume that Spinoza himself, under these same conditions, and knowing what we know today, would have interpreted his own philosophy more closely to the specific policy terms of communal ecology. After all, the love of particulars implies their preservation and care. In short, we can say that at the very least, Spinoza serves the social ecology movement as a heuristic tool.
As I stated above, it is very fruitful to attempt to combine some of Naesse’s Spinoza with Buber and outline a philosophical basis for the understanding of the issue of diversity in the public realm. We will look now at some concrete samples of ethical dilemmas raised by issues of spatial policy at the national and urban spheres and as a conclusion I will suggest that we review again the Hasidic relative communal success in the application of the rules of spatial propinquity in the modern western city.
As mentioned above, Naesse’s interpretation of Spinoza becomes the more relevant and meaningful when modified through a combination of other “dialogical” philosophical theories. In this article I will attempt to show how Spinoza can be interpreted and justified through a reading of Buber and other philosophers of encounter and community.
Some philosophical aspects of ecological theory, in particular, ethics, offer fascinating policy implications in the areas of urbanism, cultural policy, ethnic and race relations, class analysis and environmentalism. In particular, some aspects of ecological ethics can help us re-evaluate the validity and legitimacy of the concept we coined earlier in this paper concerning the “continuum territory-ethnicity-culture.” Ultimately, ethics is the study of inter-relationships, that is, behavior towards the “other” and the principles that inform it.
Ecological ethics deals with interactions at two levels: Interpersonal and Environmental. When both these levels are combined we refer to it as Ecological Ethics.
Briefly stated, there are three ethical paradigms of relevance in the context of ecological ethics. These paradigms are identified in accordance with what’s perceived to be their central grounding, or the main justificatory principle informing their conceptual perspectives. The three paradigms are Monism, Dualism and Utilitarianism.
The importance of Monism in the context of this analysis is that Spinoza was considered a Monist. A monist perspective tends to identify self with nature. For a monist, the whole of being is one. The one being is encompassed within the realm of one single substance, with which is identified as one and the same. There are various degrees of exactness to this. For some monists, the unity of being is manifested not necessarily in ontological terms, but mainly in ecological, or mutual dependency terms. (as in some of the environmentalist discourse). In monism, being all one substance, the ethical treatment of the inanimate or insentients is not a separate category from the ethical treatment of fellow sentient beings. This point is forcefully insisted upon by most Buddhist views of nature-human interrelationships. Whatever ethical principles apply to man, apply to nature as well and vice versa. It is in this sense that Naess finds Spinoza, the philosopher of the love of nature, to be particularly relevant to the deep ecology movement. I will argue later that Buber’s realm of “the between”, offers a novel approach to the dilemma of monism versus dualism. One realm which is neither, but which encompasses and transcends both.
In contrast to Monism, a dualist perspective posits a clear categorical distinction between the substance of nature, within which man’s corporeality falls, and the nature of the soul, or the immaterial essence of man. Dualism also varies in degrees of exactness. If Spinoza is the principal monist, Descartes is the main figure representing the dualist perspective. The soul, for a dualist, belongs in a higher hierarchically perspective superior and above nature. For a dualist the ethical concerns of man do not fully coincide with those of nature.
Utilitarianism is a more conventional view of ethics, and in it, the major concern is with the maximization of benefits (however defined) from the utilization, or the lack of utilization, of nature. Utilitarians, depending on their view as to the physical capacities of nature and sustainable development, may find themselves in any policy end of the debate.
It is important to introduce one more important distinction. Oftentimes, the ethical structure of ecological thought is coasted in terms of anthropocentrism versus bio-centrism. This distinction is very important because the contrariness of both positions, collapses in Spinoza’s monism. Anthropocentrists and biocentrists are found in both the dualist and utilitarian models. For that reason, Spinoza's monism represents a more adequate foundation for ecological communitarianism. Spinoza could be regarded as an eco-centrist.
The term “Dialogue” is based on Buber’s conceptualizations. Buber’s categories of I-Thou and I-It can assume, in my view, a central role in deep ecology ethics, particularly, when mediated through Naesse’s Spinoza. Ecological ethics is the ethics of dialogue . It is important to reconsider the use of the term “relationship” when referring to Buber. For Buber the mutuality that the term dialogue entails should be understood more as a “turn” or “attitude” towards the world rather than an active approach towards a relationship. Intentional approaches are part of the definition of an IT . Turn is a Thou. This distinction places Buber closer to Zen’s attitude towards the world of the sentient and insentient beings.
In Buber’s terms, there are two basic attitudinal categories with regards to the other: I-Thou and I-It. An It is generally an object serving a specified utilitarian goal or purpose of the user. In contrast, a Thou refers to a fully open, non-manipulative, non-utilitarian and reciprocal relationship. Dialogue is the categorical opposite of reification, manipulation or exploitation. According to Buber, both the isolated I and the collectivist We, are illusory categories of identity. There is only the I of the I-Thou or I-It pair. In Buber’s terms however, the I of the I-Thou continuum constitutes genuine personhood and the higher level of ethical relationships. There is an I-It relationship attitude towards God and there is an I-Thou relationship attitude towards God.
In practical terms, no human society can survive without the “It”, but it is only within the I-Thou dyad that the I emerges as genuine person. Personhood, or identity, emerges only from within the context of the I-Thou relational-behavior. In ecological ethics, identity is defined in terms of the relation and attitude towards nature, that is, the ethical confirmation of nature constitutes identity, and there can be no “selfhood” outside of dialogue with nature.
Zen’s concern with the no-self is identical to Buber’s interpretation. For Buber there is no self in an I-It relationship. The self that emerges during the between of the I-Thou relationship is akin to Zen’s enlightened mind.
In Buber’s terms there are three levels for dialogue and two basic inter-relational attitudes: The levels for dialogue are between man and nature, between man and man, and between man and the realm of the Spiritual. The two relational postures that apply to each of the three realms are I-Thou and I-It. All dialogue centers around man’s attitude towards the “other”. Dialogue requires a form of paradoxical intentionality and reciprocity, however intentionality and reciprocity easily slip into the realm of the It.
This is important in terms of Spinoza’s contention that love of nature does not imply reciprocal love back from nature. According to Buber, non-humans do posses a capacity to reciprocate (in their own way and from where they stand), but lack the ability of conscious dialogical intentionality. It is man’s duty then, as is his vocation and reward, to be called upon to assume the entire responsibility for that relationship with nature. In this model, responsibility connotes not only the duty to protect and preserve alterity, but in essence, it is a general attitude, or borrowing John Dewey’s term, an “orientation” towards nature holding the promise of what in deep ecology is referred to as “self realization.”
From Buber’s perspective, self realization can only be attained through self-transcendence. That is, to the extent that the self is oriented, not inwards, but dialogically towards the other, it becomes possible for the I to attain true ontological identity. In Buddhism, the concept of compassion serves exactly in the same capacity as Buber’s dialogue, that is, as that human attitude centered on an introspective attitude towards the core of the self, while at the same time, seeing the inter-personal as a pre-condition for introspection. In the Dalai Lama’s words, it is exactly when compassion is put to play that the enlightenment achieved through introspection acquires its deepest meaning. Both for Buber and for Zen, the I, apart form the I of the I-Thou dyad can not be said to posses ontological reality. This represents the deep-ecology meaning of the concept of dialogue.
Genuine dialogue, writes Buber, cannot be generated if preceded by willful intention. In Naess’s words, “Intentions are objectivations of purposes before they are realized” . Also in Buddhism we can see the parallel to this in the concept of detachment and the spiritual freedom it generates. From this discussion we can say that the reference to intentionality in the context of dialogue, must be understood to allude to the overall-life-orientation of man towards others. The transcending of utilitarian manipulations is also encapsulated in Spinoza's dictum that love of God-nature, is its own reward.
In this regard, Frankl added, “We have said that religion is genuine only where it is existential...now, we have seen that the existentiality of religiousness has to be matched by its spontaneity...Intentionality would thwart the effect..” It is in this sense that the relationship man-nature is the more profoundly open to dialogical realization. It is also this aspect of dialogue that is at the center of ecological thought. The issue then is to reassess the relationship towards nature as constituting a radically more profound dialogue between man and nature, beyond the recreational, observational or even mere preservationist stands. In Buddhism intentionality towards enlightenment is a paradoxical category given that enlightenment cannot be willed but it also cannot be obtained without a determined human attitude towards the path leading to enlightenment.
This argument strongly supports the claims of deep ecology with respect to man’s attitude towards nature. In Victor Frankl’s terms, “human existence -at least as long as it has not been neurotically distorted- is always directed to something, or someone other than itself -be it a meaning to fulfill or another human being to encounter lovingly...What is called “self-actualization” is ultimately an effect, the unintentional by-product, of “self transcendence.” In different terms also Levinas defined personhood in terms of the attitude towards the other, however not with the unintentional modifier encounter in Frenkel. .
Some have raised criticisms to the concept of self-realization in ecological ethics. The argument is that deep ecology’s misses the point by emphasizing the “self,” a predicate which does not account for the fact that “selves” are constructions in the wider context of cultural practices. Critics claim that Deep ecology seems at times to be working out of a Cartesian notion of autonomous selves. But as we have seen, Naess's reliance on Spinoza and Spinoza's conceptual connection to Buber weakens the substance of that criticism. For Spinoza, according to Naess, the most important imperative was the knowledge of God. But, according to Spinoza, knowledge is derived through an act of rational love. (amore Deus rational) (Particularly parts IV and V of the Ethics, and Spinoza’s earlier works, in which political its political principles are partially derived from his underlying metaphysics.) Therefore, no doubt remains that for Spinoza, in order to fulfill our highest rationalist goals we must pursue a thorough ecological ethics. When placed within the context of ecological ethics, Spinoza’s Love is the equivalent of Buber’s Thou. The Love of God is the love of and within nature.
Buber's derivation of identity from within relational situations, provides a strong philosophical support to the ecological model of identity. In this same vein, Heschel, in the Sabbath, writes that while in the western world the intellectual task has been centered on the task of knowing oneself (from Philosophy to Psychoanalysis), the Biblical call was to know God first, that is, self transcendence towards the other. (Contrast for instance the title of one of Rollo May’s books “Man’s Search for Himself” with one of Heschel’s “Man in Search of God.”) Frankl refers to this when he remarks that the derivation of self identity results from acts of self-transcendence. In general, we can say that the intellectual task for deep ecology is to incorporate an ethics of self realization through dialogue.
One of ecological thought's main tenets is the rejection of strict utilitarian views of nature. Buber attempted to establish social conditions under which non-utilitarianism in the daily life of a community would be applicable. Buber introduced concepts drawn from libertarian communitarianism in order to exemplify a possible application of dialogical attitudes in the realm of the social. Dialogue is a social category, but sometimes may also be interpreted as referring to the interpersonal as in the case of only a pair of participants. Buber wanted to see the dialogical principle applied within small communities and in a modified manner, applied to society as a whole. The global application of dialogue was formulated through the advocacy of the notion of small communal self-managed cooperative societies linking with each other through a federation of larger autonomous bodies.
Buber found that his Dialogical formulations translated into a social philosophy in the context of positions encountered mainly within the traditions of pacifist-anarchism. Buber, influenced by the anarchist philosopher Gustav Landauer , developed a clear political programme. Buber also found that the dialogical aspects of ecological theory find a basis in Kant’s imperative to treat each individual always as an end, never as a means or as a tool.
An interesting connection can be made here between Buber and some concepts developed by Wittgenstein. Wittgenstein wrote that Ethics and Aesthetics are one and the same thing. Inasmuch as both concepts refer to forms of intentional relationship towards the “other,” it is fitting to say that both are but different aspects of the same reality. (This conception also has implications for an understanding of the cultural connections between national conceptions of ethics and the cultural aesthetic expressions manifested in national or ethnic arts, music and literature.) Without engaging in a thorough discussion on the Tractatus, Wittgenstein’s use of Spinoza’s term Sub Species Aeternitatis in connection with the sameness of aesthetics and ethics reinforces the view that for Wittgenstein, the connection between the two was Spinozian in essence.
Although religion and theology can contribute to the concept of deep ecology, the ecological model at play is not theology but Spinoza’s modified form of monism. Spinoza’s monism is a profoundly secular (non-theistic) spirituality where God and Nature are identified as one and the same substance. It is precisely within this secular context that, following Arne Naess, a strong foundation for ecological ethics can be established in the philosophy of Spinoza. Spinoza’s monism represents the first and most thorough attempt to theorize the relationship between a monistic conception of nature and the ethical imperatives derived thereof.
Furthermore, it is in this particular field of ethical-ecology that other philosophies of the “other” find full political expression. In particular, the philosophies of the other as in Levinas as well as elements of Whitehead’s Process philosophy. As mentioned above, it is within the realm of ecology that a “unified field” gets established and the manifold contributions of Spinoza and Buber, Levinas and Whitehead, Wittgenstein, Frankl and Kant, meet, interact, and bear fruit in the form of critical approaches to ecological policy. In its more secular sense also the philosophies of Buddhism belong in this tradition.
In order to broaden the interpretation of the concept of diversity, Arne Naess utilizes various concepts extracted form Spinoza’s philosophy. This combination of Naess and Spinoza is particularly engaging for Spinoza has always held a special fascination for ecological oriented thinkers. Spinoza's God or Nature (Deus sive Nature) intrigued those who attempted to ground an ecological ethics on strictly secular, non-religious principles. This last statement should be understood in the context of the distinction between religion (as an organized institution and a theology) and religiosity (the personal or communal relationship with the divinity).
As Naess writes in Spinoza And The deep Ecology Movement , “The deterioration of life conditions on earth has motivated many people to take up the philosophical and religious basis for their action in favor of the preservation of the richness and diversity of life on earth” (pg.2) The confluence of theology, ethics and ecology has been called Theological Ecology. One earlier version of ecological theology can be found in the works of the Jewish theologian, A. J. Heschel. Heschel, in his book The Sabbath renders a quasi-poetic description of the religious and the political meaning of the category of the “holy” when it is associated with the category of “time”.
For Heschel, the dichotomy is between time and space, not space and spirit. This is important because based on the concept of time, which is, by convention, a measurable category, Heschel provided the foundations for a religious social agenda. There is an inherent difficulty in conceiving a politics of the "spirit". Time, in contrast, is part and parcel of the concrete day-to-day life of individuals and societies. Heschel's argument was for the primacy of time, or the life of connection with the "eternal" over the life of acquisitive matter. The time-eternal in contrast to the materialistic realm of Capitalism. One immediate result from this is the call for less exploitation of natural resources and the devotion of more time to what in psychological terms is known as "leisure".
According to Naess, an intimation of ecological thought appears in Spinoza’s concept that the identity of God with Nature is expressed in the affirmation that God is actually present in, and expresses “himself” through each existing being. God is a constitutive part of the things themselves. In other words, the identity of god and nature is not merely an abstract intellectual construct but a practical systemic assumption of the Spinozistic thesis. Naess writes “The Ethics furnishes no basis for assuming that the immanent God expresses its nature, essence or power (all key Spinozian concepts) in any other way other than through each existing being” (pg. 5)
The ecological implications of this are very important. For Spinoza, the practical application of the love of God-Nature is manifested in a relational attitude, in a type of I-Thou relationship to the natural realm, (Buber) or an enlightened approach to the insentients and all other living beings (Zen), not in a devotional, ritualistic religious system. This relational attitude can also be coasted in political terms as a deep-ecology. In Naesse’s words: “Therefore, Amor Intellectualis Dei must somehow be a love of these existing particular beings of our everyday life-parts of the total richness and diversity of life forms on earth.” (Pg. 5) Later “Love of the immanent God, is love of God’s expression. If a being expresses God’s nature or essence, love of God cannot be different form love of such a being” (pg. 6) The question with political implications is: what sort of social behavior is appropriate for those who believe in a God-Nature system?
Naess makes the point that for Spinoza, the immanent presence of God in nature is actually the presence of God’s power, essence or nature in that being. Power and essence are the forms by which God expresses his being. In mystical kabbalah, God is also said to be present in nature, but the form of that presence takes a more abstract and “spiritual” term, it is call the Shekhina or immanent –yet at the same time transcendent- presence of divinity within each and every object and being in nature. In Kabbalah, God is present in every object in the form of “seeds of Holiness” that must be released from their natural encapsulation. The release of the sparks or seeds of godliness is done through an ethical relationship with nature as a whole. In that sense Spinoza and the Kabbalah share a similar perspective. For Spinoza however, God is present thorough its own nature and therefore is not apart from, but is a part of, and the same as nature. In reverse we can say that nature is present in God not as a part of, that would be pan-entheism, but as the same as God himself. As Naess puts it “ God is not apart from God’s expressions” (pg. 6) Naess again states the conclusion that “In light of the above argumentation, the Intellectualis Amor Dei may be interpreted as Loving understanding of particular beings. ” By focusing on the “particular beings” issue, we can infer from Spinoza the need to protect and encourage the diversity of each member of the ecological habitat. This connects the generalized aspects of environmentalism in Spinoza's philosophical approach, with the issue of diversity as interpreted in social ecology. Therefore we can follow Spinoza's thought to arrive at the foundations for a political programme of social ecology.
Can the claim be made that the goals of Naesse’s deep ecology are in accordance with Spinoza’s premises? Naess writes ”The philosophical aim of the deep ecology movement, as I see it, may be formulated in a way no different from that of Spinoza when he speaks about God or nature and the role of particulars” Again the issue of particulars, the quandary of diversity.
Naess recognized however that Spinoza’s Ethics cannot be easily translated into concrete policy formulations. Naess writes “The Ethics does not go into politics, but does express views on community.” (Pg11) It is important that Naess sees Spinoza as establishing views on the issue of community, contrasting the term “community” with “politics”. Building on the prior distinction between gemeinshaft and geselshaft, Buber made the same basic distinctions in his analysis of the regenerating of society. Naesse’s view of Spinoza is important because I argue that are precisely those views on community that render Spinoza valuable for our analysis of diversity and urbanism. More specifically, interpreting Spinoza’s views about particulars and diversity, we begin to intimate a position closer to the goals of social ecology. I argue that Spinoza's contentions, when modified with key concepts from other philosophers of community such as Martin Buber, become an adequate basis upon which to contribute to the resolution of the ethical dilemmas of diversity and its public policy spatial implications.
Whatever divergences can be found between specific policies advocated by Naess' deep ecology movement, and philosophical formulations found in Spinoza, may be the result of the different ways in which we, in our time, and under the current environmental circumstances, have come to know and understand the reality of ecological systems. We may want to make the intellectual jump and assume that Spinoza himself, under these same conditions, and knowing what we know today, would have interpreted his own philosophy more closely to the specific policy terms of communal ecology. After all, the love of particulars implies their preservation and care. In short, we can say that at the very least, Spinoza serves the social ecology movement as a heuristic tool.
As I stated above, it is very fruitful to attempt to combine some of Naesse’s Spinoza with Buber and outline a philosophical basis for the understanding of the issue of diversity in the public realm. We will look now at some concrete samples of ethical dilemmas raised by issues of spatial policy at the national and urban spheres and as a conclusion I will suggest that we review again the Hasidic relative communal success in the application of the rules of spatial propinquity in the modern western city.
As mentioned above, Naesse’s interpretation of Spinoza becomes the more relevant and meaningful when modified through a combination of other “dialogical” philosophical theories. In this article I will attempt to show how Spinoza can be interpreted and justified through a reading of Buber and other philosophers of encounter and community.
Some philosophical aspects of ecological theory, in particular, ethics, offer fascinating policy implications in the areas of urbanism, cultural policy, ethnic and race relations, class analysis and environmentalism. In particular, some aspects of ecological ethics can help us re-evaluate the validity and legitimacy of the concept we coined earlier in this paper concerning the “continuum territory-ethnicity-culture.” Ultimately, ethics is the study of inter-relationships, that is, behavior towards the “other” and the principles that inform it.
Ecological ethics deals with interactions at two levels: Interpersonal and Environmental. When both these levels are combined we refer to it as Ecological Ethics.
Briefly stated, there are three ethical paradigms of relevance in the context of ecological ethics. These paradigms are identified in accordance with what’s perceived to be their central grounding, or the main justificatory principle informing their conceptual perspectives. The three paradigms are Monism, Dualism and Utilitarianism.
The importance of Monism in the context of this analysis is that Spinoza was considered a Monist. A monist perspective tends to identify self with nature. For a monist, the whole of being is one. The one being is encompassed within the realm of one single substance, with which is identified as one and the same. There are various degrees of exactness to this. For some monists, the unity of being is manifested not necessarily in ontological terms, but mainly in ecological, or mutual dependency terms. (as in some of the environmentalist discourse). In monism, being all one substance, the ethical treatment of the inanimate or insentients is not a separate category from the ethical treatment of fellow sentient beings. This point is forcefully insisted upon by most Buddhist views of nature-human interrelationships. Whatever ethical principles apply to man, apply to nature as well and vice versa. It is in this sense that Naess finds Spinoza, the philosopher of the love of nature, to be particularly relevant to the deep ecology movement. I will argue later that Buber’s realm of “the between”, offers a novel approach to the dilemma of monism versus dualism. One realm which is neither, but which encompasses and transcends both.
In contrast to Monism, a dualist perspective posits a clear categorical distinction between the substance of nature, within which man’s corporeality falls, and the nature of the soul, or the immaterial essence of man. Dualism also varies in degrees of exactness. If Spinoza is the principal monist, Descartes is the main figure representing the dualist perspective. The soul, for a dualist, belongs in a higher hierarchically perspective superior and above nature. For a dualist the ethical concerns of man do not fully coincide with those of nature.
Utilitarianism is a more conventional view of ethics, and in it, the major concern is with the maximization of benefits (however defined) from the utilization, or the lack of utilization, of nature. Utilitarians, depending on their view as to the physical capacities of nature and sustainable development, may find themselves in any policy end of the debate.
It is important to introduce one more important distinction. Oftentimes, the ethical structure of ecological thought is coasted in terms of anthropocentrism versus bio-centrism. This distinction is very important because the contrariness of both positions, collapses in Spinoza’s monism. Anthropocentrists and biocentrists are found in both the dualist and utilitarian models. For that reason, Spinoza's monism represents a more adequate foundation for ecological communitarianism. Spinoza could be regarded as an eco-centrist.
The term “Dialogue” is based on Buber’s conceptualizations. Buber’s categories of I-Thou and I-It can assume, in my view, a central role in deep ecology ethics, particularly, when mediated through Naesse’s Spinoza. Ecological ethics is the ethics of dialogue . It is important to reconsider the use of the term “relationship” when referring to Buber. For Buber the mutuality that the term dialogue entails should be understood more as a “turn” or “attitude” towards the world rather than an active approach towards a relationship. Intentional approaches are part of the definition of an IT . Turn is a Thou. This distinction places Buber closer to Zen’s attitude towards the world of the sentient and insentient beings.
In Buber’s terms, there are two basic attitudinal categories with regards to the other: I-Thou and I-It. An It is generally an object serving a specified utilitarian goal or purpose of the user. In contrast, a Thou refers to a fully open, non-manipulative, non-utilitarian and reciprocal relationship. Dialogue is the categorical opposite of reification, manipulation or exploitation. According to Buber, both the isolated I and the collectivist We, are illusory categories of identity. There is only the I of the I-Thou or I-It pair. In Buber’s terms however, the I of the I-Thou continuum constitutes genuine personhood and the higher level of ethical relationships. There is an I-It relationship attitude towards God and there is an I-Thou relationship attitude towards God.
In practical terms, no human society can survive without the “It”, but it is only within the I-Thou dyad that the I emerges as genuine person. Personhood, or identity, emerges only from within the context of the I-Thou relational-behavior. In ecological ethics, identity is defined in terms of the relation and attitude towards nature, that is, the ethical confirmation of nature constitutes identity, and there can be no “selfhood” outside of dialogue with nature.
Zen’s concern with the no-self is identical to Buber’s interpretation. For Buber there is no self in an I-It relationship. The self that emerges during the between of the I-Thou relationship is akin to Zen’s enlightened mind.
In Buber’s terms there are three levels for dialogue and two basic inter-relational attitudes: The levels for dialogue are between man and nature, between man and man, and between man and the realm of the Spiritual. The two relational postures that apply to each of the three realms are I-Thou and I-It. All dialogue centers around man’s attitude towards the “other”. Dialogue requires a form of paradoxical intentionality and reciprocity, however intentionality and reciprocity easily slip into the realm of the It.
This is important in terms of Spinoza’s contention that love of nature does not imply reciprocal love back from nature. According to Buber, non-humans do posses a capacity to reciprocate (in their own way and from where they stand), but lack the ability of conscious dialogical intentionality. It is man’s duty then, as is his vocation and reward, to be called upon to assume the entire responsibility for that relationship with nature. In this model, responsibility connotes not only the duty to protect and preserve alterity, but in essence, it is a general attitude, or borrowing John Dewey’s term, an “orientation” towards nature holding the promise of what in deep ecology is referred to as “self realization.”
From Buber’s perspective, self realization can only be attained through self-transcendence. That is, to the extent that the self is oriented, not inwards, but dialogically towards the other, it becomes possible for the I to attain true ontological identity. In Buddhism, the concept of compassion serves exactly in the same capacity as Buber’s dialogue, that is, as that human attitude centered on an introspective attitude towards the core of the self, while at the same time, seeing the inter-personal as a pre-condition for introspection. In the Dalai Lama’s words, it is exactly when compassion is put to play that the enlightenment achieved through introspection acquires its deepest meaning. Both for Buber and for Zen, the I, apart form the I of the I-Thou dyad can not be said to posses ontological reality. This represents the deep-ecology meaning of the concept of dialogue.
Genuine dialogue, writes Buber, cannot be generated if preceded by willful intention. In Naess’s words, “Intentions are objectivations of purposes before they are realized” . Also in Buddhism we can see the parallel to this in the concept of detachment and the spiritual freedom it generates. From this discussion we can say that the reference to intentionality in the context of dialogue, must be understood to allude to the overall-life-orientation of man towards others. The transcending of utilitarian manipulations is also encapsulated in Spinoza's dictum that love of God-nature, is its own reward.
In this regard, Frankl added, “We have said that religion is genuine only where it is existential...now, we have seen that the existentiality of religiousness has to be matched by its spontaneity...Intentionality would thwart the effect..” It is in this sense that the relationship man-nature is the more profoundly open to dialogical realization. It is also this aspect of dialogue that is at the center of ecological thought. The issue then is to reassess the relationship towards nature as constituting a radically more profound dialogue between man and nature, beyond the recreational, observational or even mere preservationist stands. In Buddhism intentionality towards enlightenment is a paradoxical category given that enlightenment cannot be willed but it also cannot be obtained without a determined human attitude towards the path leading to enlightenment.
This argument strongly supports the claims of deep ecology with respect to man’s attitude towards nature. In Victor Frankl’s terms, “human existence -at least as long as it has not been neurotically distorted- is always directed to something, or someone other than itself -be it a meaning to fulfill or another human being to encounter lovingly...What is called “self-actualization” is ultimately an effect, the unintentional by-product, of “self transcendence.” In different terms also Levinas defined personhood in terms of the attitude towards the other, however not with the unintentional modifier encounter in Frenkel. .
Some have raised criticisms to the concept of self-realization in ecological ethics. The argument is that deep ecology’s misses the point by emphasizing the “self,” a predicate which does not account for the fact that “selves” are constructions in the wider context of cultural practices. Critics claim that Deep ecology seems at times to be working out of a Cartesian notion of autonomous selves. But as we have seen, Naess's reliance on Spinoza and Spinoza's conceptual connection to Buber weakens the substance of that criticism. For Spinoza, according to Naess, the most important imperative was the knowledge of God. But, according to Spinoza, knowledge is derived through an act of rational love. (amore Deus rational) (Particularly parts IV and V of the Ethics, and Spinoza’s earlier works, in which political its political principles are partially derived from his underlying metaphysics.) Therefore, no doubt remains that for Spinoza, in order to fulfill our highest rationalist goals we must pursue a thorough ecological ethics. When placed within the context of ecological ethics, Spinoza’s Love is the equivalent of Buber’s Thou. The Love of God is the love of and within nature.
Buber's derivation of identity from within relational situations, provides a strong philosophical support to the ecological model of identity. In this same vein, Heschel, in the Sabbath, writes that while in the western world the intellectual task has been centered on the task of knowing oneself (from Philosophy to Psychoanalysis), the Biblical call was to know God first, that is, self transcendence towards the other. (Contrast for instance the title of one of Rollo May’s books “Man’s Search for Himself” with one of Heschel’s “Man in Search of God.”) Frankl refers to this when he remarks that the derivation of self identity results from acts of self-transcendence. In general, we can say that the intellectual task for deep ecology is to incorporate an ethics of self realization through dialogue.
One of ecological thought's main tenets is the rejection of strict utilitarian views of nature. Buber attempted to establish social conditions under which non-utilitarianism in the daily life of a community would be applicable. Buber introduced concepts drawn from libertarian communitarianism in order to exemplify a possible application of dialogical attitudes in the realm of the social. Dialogue is a social category, but sometimes may also be interpreted as referring to the interpersonal as in the case of only a pair of participants. Buber wanted to see the dialogical principle applied within small communities and in a modified manner, applied to society as a whole. The global application of dialogue was formulated through the advocacy of the notion of small communal self-managed cooperative societies linking with each other through a federation of larger autonomous bodies.
Buber found that his Dialogical formulations translated into a social philosophy in the context of positions encountered mainly within the traditions of pacifist-anarchism. Buber, influenced by the anarchist philosopher Gustav Landauer , developed a clear political programme. Buber also found that the dialogical aspects of ecological theory find a basis in Kant’s imperative to treat each individual always as an end, never as a means or as a tool.
An interesting connection can be made here between Buber and some concepts developed by Wittgenstein. Wittgenstein wrote that Ethics and Aesthetics are one and the same thing. Inasmuch as both concepts refer to forms of intentional relationship towards the “other,” it is fitting to say that both are but different aspects of the same reality. (This conception also has implications for an understanding of the cultural connections between national conceptions of ethics and the cultural aesthetic expressions manifested in national or ethnic arts, music and literature.) Without engaging in a thorough discussion on the Tractatus, Wittgenstein’s use of Spinoza’s term Sub Species Aeternitatis in connection with the sameness of aesthetics and ethics reinforces the view that for Wittgenstein, the connection between the two was Spinozian in essence.
Although religion and theology can contribute to the concept of deep ecology, the ecological model at play is not theology but Spinoza’s modified form of monism. Spinoza’s monism is a profoundly secular (non-theistic) spirituality where God and Nature are identified as one and the same substance. It is precisely within this secular context that, following Arne Naess, a strong foundation for ecological ethics can be established in the philosophy of Spinoza. Spinoza’s monism represents the first and most thorough attempt to theorize the relationship between a monistic conception of nature and the ethical imperatives derived thereof.
Furthermore, it is in this particular field of ethical-ecology that other philosophies of the “other” find full political expression. In particular, the philosophies of the other as in Levinas as well as elements of Whitehead’s Process philosophy. As mentioned above, it is within the realm of ecology that a “unified field” gets established and the manifold contributions of Spinoza and Buber, Levinas and Whitehead, Wittgenstein, Frankl and Kant, meet, interact, and bear fruit in the form of critical approaches to ecological policy. In its more secular sense also the philosophies of Buddhism belong in this tradition.
religious communications from a buberian dialogical perspective
Please find all essays related to Dialogical Ecology at our new Blogsite: http://dialogicalecology.blogspot.com
thank you
notes and thoughts...
----------CHAPTERS abstracts--------------
1. Dialogue as the practice of non-attachment-engagedeness:
Dialogical Ecology is the practice of engagement with the whole of existence with the whole of being. It is only through engagement that enlightenment can be found. There is no I without Thou and therefore the enlightened I needs the enlightened Thou. Dialogical ecology is the practice of non-attached-engagedness with the three realms of life: with other people, with nature and with the “spiritual”. That trilogy serves only as a functional aid, since in reality, the three are one and the same: life. Dialogue is the first principle for human existence because all real life is encounter. However, not all encounters are dialogical. To be dialogical, an encounter must be practiced on the basis of the principles of non-attachment as explained within the Zen tradition and as articulated by Martin Buber’s I-You. Dialogue is a way to engage the other, and it does not depend on the response that it generates from the other. Dialogue is engaging in encounter, not the engaged encounter. It is process and it creates through the process. Dialogue cannot be measured nor it is to be deemed successful on the basis of the quality of the response. To expect or demand a response is to automatically converts the “other” into an It, it is to freeze the process. By converting the other into an It, it is not the dialogical I the one who is engaging the other. From that we could argue that the purest form of dialogue is with the realm of nature.
2. The Relationship with God:
To the extent that the concept and/or the reality of a personal and communal relationship with a God is posited or needed or desired, the practice of dialogical ecology entails a god-engagement or religiosity without and instead of religion, (religiosity and Spinozean knowledge of the third kind.). Religion is an institutional system of practices and beliefs and we raise the question whether institutionalism and relationships can conjoin together happily ever after. What is the relationship between religious experiences and ritual practices?. Practices engender their own experiences and experiences engender their own practices. Neither is the same all the time. Neither is proprietary nor exclusive and neither is univocally limited by the other. A red flower is always red but not all flowers grow to be red and not all reds are limited to the form and content that is a flower. To argue that a religious experience engendered only this or that kind of practice or that a given practice alone is able to recreate and sustain the original experience, it is a sad attempt to narrow and confine our practices, it is to posit non-existent pairs of exclusivity. It is diminishing so considerably the expansion of spirituality in the world. In Hebrew the term for narrow (Tzar) is the same as that for sorrow and we have transformed our infinite universe into a narrow ridge. Proscribed religious practices are frozen remnants of an original religious experience. One common mistake: It does not matter how one feels about the practices themselves or what feeling they engender in the practitioner, for the measure of all things excellent is not the feeling they engender or the feeling brought into them. Enlightment is not a feeling, it is a whole being experience and practice, it is existence. Original experiences can be reenacted. What one cannot do is re-experienced original experiences through a pre-set and proscribed reenactment. Original experiences open up to us through the re-experience itself. Impossible to predict or plan, one is open to the experience in the everyday-every moment of quotidian mindful life. Proscribed reenactment practices have a good use: they confine experiences to memory, lest we forget, and to a storage place for communal use. And that is good. What we should never do is make this good into an idol. Idolatry is an error. Rituals have a social function, sometimes for good, often exploited for ill. What proscribed reenactments do not do, is springing back the original experiences, even when the original experiences sprung e practices. Our working assumption is that what we are seeking is the genuiness of the original experience itself, new original experiences, that is, the relationship is the goal. Without a true practice, the experience is a fleeting and passing cloud in the spiritual mind. But performances of pre-determined, everlasting and universally applicable practices confine seekers to the role of stage performers, whereas the real play is outside the doors, at the open field where one engages the world without the comfort of a script. In the practice of dialogue, the true practice, one is his/her own playwright. We practice pointing directly outside of rituals, texts and teachers. We hide our faces if we meet the buddha on the road and cover our ears when a messiah preaches. The messiah is he/she who is always in the process of coming, and it is this messiah who we love. Its always coming and is never here. Buddha is the process of I and Us becoming and is never out there.
3. Reverence/owe without worship or idolatry, (the poetry of the insentient)
No need to posit a hierarchy of moments but not all practices are equal. Positing difference is not necessarily a hierarchical statement. Each moment is perfect as is, but differently so. There are a multiplicity of perfections. Therefore not all is the same or means the same. We do break away from quotidian practices for special practices at special times and places. We recognize that it is indeed the quotidian that is the true practice but there are different types of practices for different types of persons or needs or experiences. Mindfulness is practiced in and as everything within the quotidian and therefore life is practice. Nonetheless we stop for special practice moments. Not all relationships are the same.
4. God As A Concept:
To the extend that a conceptual construct of a God is posited, needed or desired, dialogical ecology means faith without belief. The most fundamental religious beliefs are not rationally tenable. At the same time the universe devoid of the God-concept is not rationally tenable. We are left with faith but without belief. We should only believe in that which we can prove. That which remains unproven or un-provable by definition, should remain as an article of faith. The moment that belief is confirmed we no longer need faith, and world without faith is despair.
5. Celebration without rituals/sacraments.
Some subscribe to the idea of antinomianism. If they’re told that God is in heaven, they look for it on earth, if they’re told to stand, they sit, if to wear robes, they wear jeans or get naked. I understand the point. There is no reason why to accept the ritualistic practices proscribed by others. The pint may be well taken but it’s a futile one: the issue is not the changing of rituals, the issue is the rituals themselves. After all, if one believes that god is on earth, why couldn’t god be in heaven?, if one believes in robes, why not in suits then?. Let us channel the desire to break free from ritualistic constraints into the real search for a whole relationship with god. All we need to do is to find god as is, right here, present between us. God is between the You and the I.
6. Dialogue/encounter with the “divine” instead of sacramental prayer. Petitional prayer as I-It. Encounter with the whole.
7. Blessedness without or instead of sacredness/holiness,
8. Community without priesthood/institutions/temples
General notes…
What is dialogical ecology? why the ecology added to dialogue, why dialogue in ecology? (the poetry of the insentients) because this is the idea and principles of an engaged dialogism. taken from the concept of an engaged buddhism, dialogue is not just a theory of engagement with the world, but a practice and that is what dialogical ecology does.
the idea that detachment is manifested in dialogue. that meditation is a path to..dialogue..that dialogue serves as a method for detachment. that meditation prepares the i-thou self. that dialogue is the expression of the goal of meditation. the engagement with the world is done in a dialogical manner which is the zen principle of mindfulness, meditation and its goal, detachment.
Dialogue is a theory concerning engagement with the world. there are many theories about this. in buber, dialogue and engagement are one and the same thing or, if using engagement in the buddhist sense, they are one and the same thing.. dialogue is defined as engagement done on the basis of the principles that describe buddhist detachment. to apply the principles of buberian dialogue one must learn the principles of detachment, and to understand what detachment really is one must learn the principles if dialogical engagement. detachment is dialoguing, the principles that describe detachment are the same as those that describe dialogue and each helps the other in their need for specificity and concreteness..
1. The principles of Dialogue: I-Thou and I-It. The three realms of relationship: person-person, person to nature, person to the spiritual beings. In each of these spheres when we speak Thou we are lead to GOD. There is no direct path to God that "skips" the world (the three spheres). There is a personal god but god is not a person. There is no I and there is no We. I exists only within the relationship and is defined by the pair in which it finds itself.. Same with Zen's denial of the self. Parting from that point is the path to liberation. The importance of this denial is crucial in Zen and in Buber.
2. What does dialogue serve as an answer to?: mysticism, individualism, collectivism. Origin in Jewish mysticism: It is the relationship that breaks the vessels and that relationship is systematic. We try to bring the same kind of systematic behavior-relationship to the relationship with nature. The models of relationship between cosmos and god that inform our ecological ethics. . pantheism, panentheism, dichotomy totaliter aliter, partial presence-partial identity, (immanent transcendence or transcendental immanence). etc. There is godliness, god in everything, as everything, everything in it, multiple and single, but no creator god and no god that can have a "name", that is, a god that can be named and thus defined as a this or that. A God without a religion. A God that exists in the between, not inside of me or outside of me, not here or there in space or outside of nature, not above nor bellow. god is not a father or brother or anything else, God is just God and I related to "him" as an eternal Thou. To make God eternal Thou implies the paradoxical religion of the dialogue. In that sense Zen is genial and the koans are part of this process.
3. The manifesto of Buberian dialogical ecology. Buber the ecologist, because ecology is where all of Buber's strands tie together. Buber was the ecologist otherwise it's all "patch work", without the whole being. Ecology as the whole of existence with the whole being.
4. How does it connect to Zen? Zen is a direct pointing outside of text and outside of ritual. A special transmission outside the scriptures (religious rituals or institutions). No dependence on words or letters. Direct pointing to the mind and heart. To see one's True Nature is to experience awakening (enlightenment). it is a guided experiential practice. The "guidedness" is important because it is in that sense that it connects with Buber's guidedness. Buber is the same direct I-Thou but in both cases the encounter must follow a certain path.. Connect with Spinoza and scholarship to support and compare. Buber gives Zen the community pre-"imperative". Zen offers Buber the enlightened self pre-"imperative". Neither can reach its stated goal without what the other offers it, or put together it is a differently defined goal. Zen does not need the relationship and Buber does not need the enlightened I. Put together it creates a new dimension. The I cannot be prepared for speaking Thou but it must recognize the opportunity that each encounter brings. The mindfulness of Zen is a perpetual type of awareness that helps or prompts a Thou response. God as process of a community relationship, created through the relationship. Process means that the God is seeking not finding. Whatever you found, if you did, then it is not God, you must kill the Buddha. Do it as the Buddha did not as he taught. That is the directness of Zen. The world is perfect as is, the moment is the eternity, therefore there is nothing to improve in the world. the improvement must be in the understanding (Spinoza and Zen) and understanding of the third kind happens only in a relationship, a dialogue.
Buber: "The world is not comprehensible, but it is embraceable: through the embracing of one of its beings. Each thing and being has a twofold nature: passive, absorbable, usable, dissectible, comparable, combinable, rationalizable, and the other, the active, non-absorbable, unusable, undissectible, incomparable, non combinable, non rationalizable. This is the confronting, the shaping, the bestowing of things. He who truly experiences a thing so that it springs up to meet him and embraces him of itself has in that thing known the world..." the non-sentient beings of Dosho. The seeing with the hear and listening with the eye in Loorie. Martin Buber. to comprehend the depth of this analysis one must shed light to it through Zen, Judaism and dialogism. At the same time through this, light is shed on Judaism, Zen and dialogism. It is the merger or fusion. Buber spoke more out of a Zen tradition than Judaism, and that made for the intellectual confusion on the part of readers. Buber's fusion creates a new paradigm, one that is not only the sum total of both its parts. My contributions to it, will add to this in the content and practice sense as well. Zen is the essence of Buddhism. Buber saw hasidism as the essence of Judaism and Dialogue as the essence of hasidism. He wanted a direct pointing outside of conventional institutional tradition.
Dialogue is not only verbal, it is encounter with the whole being. Prayer is not just verbal, it is the same definition, I am a prayer. To do dialogical prayer means to dialogue instead of institutionalized prayer. There is no need to sacralize nature since that offers no protection and it is idolatric attachment. This is what we want to explore, describe, and live by in our daily lives. This is where Buberian Dialogism comes in: it gives us the path..
Add my defining synthesis: Buber's communitarian synthesis to Zen, and Zen quotidian spirituality to Buber's "mystical" dialogism..
The Dialogical Ecology can be defined as the path of speaking thou to nature. Thou without an I over there or over here. A non-reciprocal relationship still allows for Thou speaking even when the other does not respond. The other creates its own response its own language. To speak Thou without parting from or towards an I is the deep teaching of Zen. Zen prepares the I in a paradoxical way to be able to speak Thou.
What does that mean in terms of concrete relationship to nature. Is it the poetical or quasi mystical approach of Loori? is the Nahman, or Gordon approach? The pre-imperative that Buber offers Zen becomes the post-imperative of creating a community. I-Thou can only be implemented in the context of a dialogical community. Not a Sangha, but a kibbutz. Buber defined that as religious socialism, the dialogical community. In this community nature functions as Buber's vital center to which the members relate in order for them to relate to each other. Community here is not a choice or alternative or an added benefit. it is an imperative of the enlightened dialogical life. There is no way to live mindfully and to speak Thou unless the relationship within society is altered. This relationship is what Landauer meant when he spoke of revolution via a change in relationships. A true dialogue affirms nothing in terms of guidance, what it does instead is it preclude certain things from a genuine relationship. From that which is precluded there is a logical progression into an environmental policy. This the dialogical environmental policy is a corollary of the relationships between persons. If we preclude capitalism as Itness then the relationship to nature will preclude its exploitation for the purposes of capitalism. We need a society where capitalism is not practiced and its fruits not sought, therefore there will be "no market", no demand, no need or acceptance of capitalistic exploitation of nature.
compare with Zen. confluence of fields. tales and concepts about rituals (the vessel-halacha) and about approach to nature. (in Zuzuki's comparison of the poem about a flower)
added: 1/8/06
The mind of the past is ungraspable;
the mind of the future is ungraspable;
the mind of the present is ungraspable.
- Diamond Sutra
both the mind is ungraspable and the concept of time is ungraspable. the mind of the time means the essence of time. This open the doors to enlightenment
Everything just as it is, as it is, as is. Flowers in bloom. Nothing to add. - Robert Aitken, Roshi, As it Is
it is instead of fabrications. knowing this opens the door to peace and enlightenment.
Two come about because of One, but don't cling to the One either! So long as the mind does not stir, the ten thousand things stay blameless; no blame, no phenomena, no stirring, no mind.
The viewer disappears along with the scene, the scene follows the viewer into oblivion, for scene becomes scene only through the viewer, viewer becomes viewer because of the scene. - Seng-ts'an, 600 Hsin-Hsin-Ming: Inscription on Trust in the Mind Translated by Burton Watson Found in Entering the Stream, p. 149 Edited by Samuel Bercholz and Sherab Chodzin Kohn
dialogue and attachment.
Shame on you Shakyamuni for setting the precedent of leaving home. Did you think it was not there-- in your wife's lovely face in your baby's laughter? Did you think you had to go elsewhere to find it? - Judyth Collin The Layman's Lament From What Book, 1998, p. 52 Edited by Gary Gach
make sense buddhist wise, "as is"..
rituals, like commercials, are the manipulation of the spiritual, or mind-agenda by the ones in control.. the ones in control are not necessarily bad people, they are just in control.. they define what's important or worth bearing in mind, or how to do it or when.. etc, for the rest of us. they define the initial and the reenacting experience. but each has to have its own in dialogue. temples block the view, our religion is not one of temples it is one of the fields and fresh air. don't make nature a vessel of the temple, that confines our relationship to nature to the model of temple-type relationships. make temple part of nature and that way you can obviate its confines. Temple vesselness is an It. Buddha as messiah or christ and that's the source of happiness? if you meet the buddha on the road, dialogue with him, ask if you can help her.. does enlightenment bring to dialogue or dialogue to enlightenment. is dialogue a condition for enlightenment or is a result of the enlightenment? do enlightened people by virtue of being so, relate to the world in a dialogical manner? do the chapters first in a simpler manner and do the appendix in a scholarly manner... all teachings are about a basic and same religious experience but describe them on the baiss of what they know from their own cultures. except zen? trying to go to the basic after having recognized that fact?
think not only with the brain, even with the fingers, dialogue with the whole because not only dialogue with the brain, dialogue with the fingers. The definition of man is not the seeker of god but the one who aches for him, or because of his distance from him, and doesn't even know that he aches or if he does, what it is he aches for at all (buberian insights) (unamuno on spinoza). What is the IT?.. attachment, addiction, anchoring in the circumstantial self, manipulation, (through quantum biology we know the it makes me an IT), it narrows the scopes of relationship to a one narrow given area. analyze the Sabbath. the book, by themes and sub-themes like buber's, but the themes should be item by item to make up a coherent whole: temples, shabat, prayer, god, etc, etc.,, and in each deal with my analysis from my own perspective. all the topics that around them I will build my argument and that provide direct concrete existential answers and practical guidance to the reader.
the issue is not god without religion or religion without god (buddhism). the issue is the relationship or approach, (pursuit, advances, references and contextualized) to the other in the dialogical mode.
great literature is to situate a culture into created situations where the culture has to find a way to express or manifest itself. it is like: how do you love in japanese? the more one knows a culture the more one can be creative placing, bringing, staging the characters into more extreme, funny or unusual situations. the reader learns about the culture but in great literature it will extracts universal lessons as well.
whatever happens in the mind or the body is just one of those unconfortable or bummer things that happens and one can deal, handle, endure for a while, with pacience and whatever it is it should not bring it to a state of panic.
"Always do what you are afraid to do."
Ralph Waldo Emerson
In every religion we face the issue of the often times conflicting demands between foundational theology and time and space dependent-interpretations. Since it is difficult to determine which interpretation is or is not authoritative, what is hoped for is that the founder of the religion, being by definition the source of authority, would have put in place a procedural system from which authority could be seamlessly derived. What that procedure may entail is an agreed upon system for the ordination of those entrusted with the interpretation of the original teaching, such as a priesthood, and a procedure the priesthood itself must follow for deriving amendments that could be considered "constitutional". From that perspective, sometimes authority is confirmed more by the procedure that was followed than by the derived content of the interpretation. This is the beginning of institutional religion, and, at least in my view, the compromising of any true religion. In Judaism for instance, the Halacha is a long process of interpretation by rabbis and it is often not clear how faithful it stands to the original source. For instance, when the temple in Jerusalem was destroyed and the site taken over, the rabbis moved the physical center elsewhere and when the temple rituals were no longer available for worship, the rabbis replaced them with the prayer book and other festivals. The changes were not a deviation of the original but a natural evolution in response to circumstances. The option would have been to close shop and adopt the religion of the conquerors. the key here is that the changes were done in accordance with the foundational procedure and in that sense they represent the original religion. same applies to the Sunnas in Islam and to Church councils in Catholicism. The disparity in ethical behaviors (not in ethical theories) between strands of Buddhism can either be a sign of a dynamic, living religion, or, conversely, a reflection on the weakness of the institutionalized factors of the religion.
1. Dialogue as the practice of non-attachment-engagedeness:
Dialogical Ecology is the practice of engagement with the whole of existence with the whole of being. It is only through engagement that enlightenment can be found. There is no I without Thou and therefore the enlightened I needs the enlightened Thou. Dialogical ecology is the practice of non-attached-engagedness with the three realms of life: with other people, with nature and with the “spiritual”. That trilogy serves only as a functional aid, since in reality, the three are one and the same: life. Dialogue is the first principle for human existence because all real life is encounter. However, not all encounters are dialogical. To be dialogical, an encounter must be practiced on the basis of the principles of non-attachment as explained within the Zen tradition and as articulated by Martin Buber’s I-You. Dialogue is a way to engage the other, and it does not depend on the response that it generates from the other. Dialogue is engaging in encounter, not the engaged encounter. It is process and it creates through the process. Dialogue cannot be measured nor it is to be deemed successful on the basis of the quality of the response. To expect or demand a response is to automatically converts the “other” into an It, it is to freeze the process. By converting the other into an It, it is not the dialogical I the one who is engaging the other. From that we could argue that the purest form of dialogue is with the realm of nature.
2. The Relationship with God:
To the extent that the concept and/or the reality of a personal and communal relationship with a God is posited or needed or desired, the practice of dialogical ecology entails a god-engagement or religiosity without and instead of religion, (religiosity and Spinozean knowledge of the third kind.). Religion is an institutional system of practices and beliefs and we raise the question whether institutionalism and relationships can conjoin together happily ever after. What is the relationship between religious experiences and ritual practices?. Practices engender their own experiences and experiences engender their own practices. Neither is the same all the time. Neither is proprietary nor exclusive and neither is univocally limited by the other. A red flower is always red but not all flowers grow to be red and not all reds are limited to the form and content that is a flower. To argue that a religious experience engendered only this or that kind of practice or that a given practice alone is able to recreate and sustain the original experience, it is a sad attempt to narrow and confine our practices, it is to posit non-existent pairs of exclusivity. It is diminishing so considerably the expansion of spirituality in the world. In Hebrew the term for narrow (Tzar) is the same as that for sorrow and we have transformed our infinite universe into a narrow ridge. Proscribed religious practices are frozen remnants of an original religious experience. One common mistake: It does not matter how one feels about the practices themselves or what feeling they engender in the practitioner, for the measure of all things excellent is not the feeling they engender or the feeling brought into them. Enlightment is not a feeling, it is a whole being experience and practice, it is existence. Original experiences can be reenacted. What one cannot do is re-experienced original experiences through a pre-set and proscribed reenactment. Original experiences open up to us through the re-experience itself. Impossible to predict or plan, one is open to the experience in the everyday-every moment of quotidian mindful life. Proscribed reenactment practices have a good use: they confine experiences to memory, lest we forget, and to a storage place for communal use. And that is good. What we should never do is make this good into an idol. Idolatry is an error. Rituals have a social function, sometimes for good, often exploited for ill. What proscribed reenactments do not do, is springing back the original experiences, even when the original experiences sprung e practices. Our working assumption is that what we are seeking is the genuiness of the original experience itself, new original experiences, that is, the relationship is the goal. Without a true practice, the experience is a fleeting and passing cloud in the spiritual mind. But performances of pre-determined, everlasting and universally applicable practices confine seekers to the role of stage performers, whereas the real play is outside the doors, at the open field where one engages the world without the comfort of a script. In the practice of dialogue, the true practice, one is his/her own playwright. We practice pointing directly outside of rituals, texts and teachers. We hide our faces if we meet the buddha on the road and cover our ears when a messiah preaches. The messiah is he/she who is always in the process of coming, and it is this messiah who we love. Its always coming and is never here. Buddha is the process of I and Us becoming and is never out there.
3. Reverence/owe without worship or idolatry, (the poetry of the insentient)
No need to posit a hierarchy of moments but not all practices are equal. Positing difference is not necessarily a hierarchical statement. Each moment is perfect as is, but differently so. There are a multiplicity of perfections. Therefore not all is the same or means the same. We do break away from quotidian practices for special practices at special times and places. We recognize that it is indeed the quotidian that is the true practice but there are different types of practices for different types of persons or needs or experiences. Mindfulness is practiced in and as everything within the quotidian and therefore life is practice. Nonetheless we stop for special practice moments. Not all relationships are the same.
4. God As A Concept:
To the extend that a conceptual construct of a God is posited, needed or desired, dialogical ecology means faith without belief. The most fundamental religious beliefs are not rationally tenable. At the same time the universe devoid of the God-concept is not rationally tenable. We are left with faith but without belief. We should only believe in that which we can prove. That which remains unproven or un-provable by definition, should remain as an article of faith. The moment that belief is confirmed we no longer need faith, and world without faith is despair.
5. Celebration without rituals/sacraments.
Some subscribe to the idea of antinomianism. If they’re told that God is in heaven, they look for it on earth, if they’re told to stand, they sit, if to wear robes, they wear jeans or get naked. I understand the point. There is no reason why to accept the ritualistic practices proscribed by others. The pint may be well taken but it’s a futile one: the issue is not the changing of rituals, the issue is the rituals themselves. After all, if one believes that god is on earth, why couldn’t god be in heaven?, if one believes in robes, why not in suits then?. Let us channel the desire to break free from ritualistic constraints into the real search for a whole relationship with god. All we need to do is to find god as is, right here, present between us. God is between the You and the I.
6. Dialogue/encounter with the “divine” instead of sacramental prayer. Petitional prayer as I-It. Encounter with the whole.
7. Blessedness without or instead of sacredness/holiness,
8. Community without priesthood/institutions/temples
General notes…
What is dialogical ecology? why the ecology added to dialogue, why dialogue in ecology? (the poetry of the insentients) because this is the idea and principles of an engaged dialogism. taken from the concept of an engaged buddhism, dialogue is not just a theory of engagement with the world, but a practice and that is what dialogical ecology does.
the idea that detachment is manifested in dialogue. that meditation is a path to..dialogue..that dialogue serves as a method for detachment. that meditation prepares the i-thou self. that dialogue is the expression of the goal of meditation. the engagement with the world is done in a dialogical manner which is the zen principle of mindfulness, meditation and its goal, detachment.
Dialogue is a theory concerning engagement with the world. there are many theories about this. in buber, dialogue and engagement are one and the same thing or, if using engagement in the buddhist sense, they are one and the same thing.. dialogue is defined as engagement done on the basis of the principles that describe buddhist detachment. to apply the principles of buberian dialogue one must learn the principles of detachment, and to understand what detachment really is one must learn the principles if dialogical engagement. detachment is dialoguing, the principles that describe detachment are the same as those that describe dialogue and each helps the other in their need for specificity and concreteness..
1. The principles of Dialogue: I-Thou and I-It. The three realms of relationship: person-person, person to nature, person to the spiritual beings. In each of these spheres when we speak Thou we are lead to GOD. There is no direct path to God that "skips" the world (the three spheres). There is a personal god but god is not a person. There is no I and there is no We. I exists only within the relationship and is defined by the pair in which it finds itself.. Same with Zen's denial of the self. Parting from that point is the path to liberation. The importance of this denial is crucial in Zen and in Buber.
2. What does dialogue serve as an answer to?: mysticism, individualism, collectivism. Origin in Jewish mysticism: It is the relationship that breaks the vessels and that relationship is systematic. We try to bring the same kind of systematic behavior-relationship to the relationship with nature. The models of relationship between cosmos and god that inform our ecological ethics. . pantheism, panentheism, dichotomy totaliter aliter, partial presence-partial identity, (immanent transcendence or transcendental immanence). etc. There is godliness, god in everything, as everything, everything in it, multiple and single, but no creator god and no god that can have a "name", that is, a god that can be named and thus defined as a this or that. A God without a religion. A God that exists in the between, not inside of me or outside of me, not here or there in space or outside of nature, not above nor bellow. god is not a father or brother or anything else, God is just God and I related to "him" as an eternal Thou. To make God eternal Thou implies the paradoxical religion of the dialogue. In that sense Zen is genial and the koans are part of this process.
3. The manifesto of Buberian dialogical ecology. Buber the ecologist, because ecology is where all of Buber's strands tie together. Buber was the ecologist otherwise it's all "patch work", without the whole being. Ecology as the whole of existence with the whole being.
4. How does it connect to Zen? Zen is a direct pointing outside of text and outside of ritual. A special transmission outside the scriptures (religious rituals or institutions). No dependence on words or letters. Direct pointing to the mind and heart. To see one's True Nature is to experience awakening (enlightenment). it is a guided experiential practice. The "guidedness" is important because it is in that sense that it connects with Buber's guidedness. Buber is the same direct I-Thou but in both cases the encounter must follow a certain path.. Connect with Spinoza and scholarship to support and compare. Buber gives Zen the community pre-"imperative". Zen offers Buber the enlightened self pre-"imperative". Neither can reach its stated goal without what the other offers it, or put together it is a differently defined goal. Zen does not need the relationship and Buber does not need the enlightened I. Put together it creates a new dimension. The I cannot be prepared for speaking Thou but it must recognize the opportunity that each encounter brings. The mindfulness of Zen is a perpetual type of awareness that helps or prompts a Thou response. God as process of a community relationship, created through the relationship. Process means that the God is seeking not finding. Whatever you found, if you did, then it is not God, you must kill the Buddha. Do it as the Buddha did not as he taught. That is the directness of Zen. The world is perfect as is, the moment is the eternity, therefore there is nothing to improve in the world. the improvement must be in the understanding (Spinoza and Zen) and understanding of the third kind happens only in a relationship, a dialogue.
Buber: "The world is not comprehensible, but it is embraceable: through the embracing of one of its beings. Each thing and being has a twofold nature: passive, absorbable, usable, dissectible, comparable, combinable, rationalizable, and the other, the active, non-absorbable, unusable, undissectible, incomparable, non combinable, non rationalizable. This is the confronting, the shaping, the bestowing of things. He who truly experiences a thing so that it springs up to meet him and embraces him of itself has in that thing known the world..." the non-sentient beings of Dosho. The seeing with the hear and listening with the eye in Loorie. Martin Buber. to comprehend the depth of this analysis one must shed light to it through Zen, Judaism and dialogism. At the same time through this, light is shed on Judaism, Zen and dialogism. It is the merger or fusion. Buber spoke more out of a Zen tradition than Judaism, and that made for the intellectual confusion on the part of readers. Buber's fusion creates a new paradigm, one that is not only the sum total of both its parts. My contributions to it, will add to this in the content and practice sense as well. Zen is the essence of Buddhism. Buber saw hasidism as the essence of Judaism and Dialogue as the essence of hasidism. He wanted a direct pointing outside of conventional institutional tradition.
Dialogue is not only verbal, it is encounter with the whole being. Prayer is not just verbal, it is the same definition, I am a prayer. To do dialogical prayer means to dialogue instead of institutionalized prayer. There is no need to sacralize nature since that offers no protection and it is idolatric attachment. This is what we want to explore, describe, and live by in our daily lives. This is where Buberian Dialogism comes in: it gives us the path..
Add my defining synthesis: Buber's communitarian synthesis to Zen, and Zen quotidian spirituality to Buber's "mystical" dialogism..
The Dialogical Ecology can be defined as the path of speaking thou to nature. Thou without an I over there or over here. A non-reciprocal relationship still allows for Thou speaking even when the other does not respond. The other creates its own response its own language. To speak Thou without parting from or towards an I is the deep teaching of Zen. Zen prepares the I in a paradoxical way to be able to speak Thou.
What does that mean in terms of concrete relationship to nature. Is it the poetical or quasi mystical approach of Loori? is the Nahman, or Gordon approach? The pre-imperative that Buber offers Zen becomes the post-imperative of creating a community. I-Thou can only be implemented in the context of a dialogical community. Not a Sangha, but a kibbutz. Buber defined that as religious socialism, the dialogical community. In this community nature functions as Buber's vital center to which the members relate in order for them to relate to each other. Community here is not a choice or alternative or an added benefit. it is an imperative of the enlightened dialogical life. There is no way to live mindfully and to speak Thou unless the relationship within society is altered. This relationship is what Landauer meant when he spoke of revolution via a change in relationships. A true dialogue affirms nothing in terms of guidance, what it does instead is it preclude certain things from a genuine relationship. From that which is precluded there is a logical progression into an environmental policy. This the dialogical environmental policy is a corollary of the relationships between persons. If we preclude capitalism as Itness then the relationship to nature will preclude its exploitation for the purposes of capitalism. We need a society where capitalism is not practiced and its fruits not sought, therefore there will be "no market", no demand, no need or acceptance of capitalistic exploitation of nature.
compare with Zen. confluence of fields. tales and concepts about rituals (the vessel-halacha) and about approach to nature. (in Zuzuki's comparison of the poem about a flower)
added: 1/8/06
The mind of the past is ungraspable;
the mind of the future is ungraspable;
the mind of the present is ungraspable.
- Diamond Sutra
both the mind is ungraspable and the concept of time is ungraspable. the mind of the time means the essence of time. This open the doors to enlightenment
Everything just as it is, as it is, as is. Flowers in bloom. Nothing to add. - Robert Aitken, Roshi, As it Is
it is instead of fabrications. knowing this opens the door to peace and enlightenment.
Two come about because of One, but don't cling to the One either! So long as the mind does not stir, the ten thousand things stay blameless; no blame, no phenomena, no stirring, no mind.
The viewer disappears along with the scene, the scene follows the viewer into oblivion, for scene becomes scene only through the viewer, viewer becomes viewer because of the scene. - Seng-ts'an, 600 Hsin-Hsin-Ming: Inscription on Trust in the Mind Translated by Burton Watson Found in Entering the Stream, p. 149 Edited by Samuel Bercholz and Sherab Chodzin Kohn
dialogue and attachment.
Shame on you Shakyamuni for setting the precedent of leaving home. Did you think it was not there-- in your wife's lovely face in your baby's laughter? Did you think you had to go elsewhere to find it? - Judyth Collin The Layman's Lament From What Book, 1998, p. 52 Edited by Gary Gach
make sense buddhist wise, "as is"..
rituals, like commercials, are the manipulation of the spiritual, or mind-agenda by the ones in control.. the ones in control are not necessarily bad people, they are just in control.. they define what's important or worth bearing in mind, or how to do it or when.. etc, for the rest of us. they define the initial and the reenacting experience. but each has to have its own in dialogue. temples block the view, our religion is not one of temples it is one of the fields and fresh air. don't make nature a vessel of the temple, that confines our relationship to nature to the model of temple-type relationships. make temple part of nature and that way you can obviate its confines. Temple vesselness is an It. Buddha as messiah or christ and that's the source of happiness? if you meet the buddha on the road, dialogue with him, ask if you can help her.. does enlightenment bring to dialogue or dialogue to enlightenment. is dialogue a condition for enlightenment or is a result of the enlightenment? do enlightened people by virtue of being so, relate to the world in a dialogical manner? do the chapters first in a simpler manner and do the appendix in a scholarly manner... all teachings are about a basic and same religious experience but describe them on the baiss of what they know from their own cultures. except zen? trying to go to the basic after having recognized that fact?
think not only with the brain, even with the fingers, dialogue with the whole because not only dialogue with the brain, dialogue with the fingers. The definition of man is not the seeker of god but the one who aches for him, or because of his distance from him, and doesn't even know that he aches or if he does, what it is he aches for at all (buberian insights) (unamuno on spinoza). What is the IT?.. attachment, addiction, anchoring in the circumstantial self, manipulation, (through quantum biology we know the it makes me an IT), it narrows the scopes of relationship to a one narrow given area. analyze the Sabbath. the book, by themes and sub-themes like buber's, but the themes should be item by item to make up a coherent whole: temples, shabat, prayer, god, etc, etc.,, and in each deal with my analysis from my own perspective. all the topics that around them I will build my argument and that provide direct concrete existential answers and practical guidance to the reader.
the issue is not god without religion or religion without god (buddhism). the issue is the relationship or approach, (pursuit, advances, references and contextualized) to the other in the dialogical mode.
great literature is to situate a culture into created situations where the culture has to find a way to express or manifest itself. it is like: how do you love in japanese? the more one knows a culture the more one can be creative placing, bringing, staging the characters into more extreme, funny or unusual situations. the reader learns about the culture but in great literature it will extracts universal lessons as well.
whatever happens in the mind or the body is just one of those unconfortable or bummer things that happens and one can deal, handle, endure for a while, with pacience and whatever it is it should not bring it to a state of panic.
"Always do what you are afraid to do."
Ralph Waldo Emerson
In every religion we face the issue of the often times conflicting demands between foundational theology and time and space dependent-interpretations. Since it is difficult to determine which interpretation is or is not authoritative, what is hoped for is that the founder of the religion, being by definition the source of authority, would have put in place a procedural system from which authority could be seamlessly derived. What that procedure may entail is an agreed upon system for the ordination of those entrusted with the interpretation of the original teaching, such as a priesthood, and a procedure the priesthood itself must follow for deriving amendments that could be considered "constitutional". From that perspective, sometimes authority is confirmed more by the procedure that was followed than by the derived content of the interpretation. This is the beginning of institutional religion, and, at least in my view, the compromising of any true religion. In Judaism for instance, the Halacha is a long process of interpretation by rabbis and it is often not clear how faithful it stands to the original source. For instance, when the temple in Jerusalem was destroyed and the site taken over, the rabbis moved the physical center elsewhere and when the temple rituals were no longer available for worship, the rabbis replaced them with the prayer book and other festivals. The changes were not a deviation of the original but a natural evolution in response to circumstances. The option would have been to close shop and adopt the religion of the conquerors. the key here is that the changes were done in accordance with the foundational procedure and in that sense they represent the original religion. same applies to the Sunnas in Islam and to Church councils in Catholicism. The disparity in ethical behaviors (not in ethical theories) between strands of Buddhism can either be a sign of a dynamic, living religion, or, conversely, a reflection on the weakness of the institutionalized factors of the religion.