Monism

Monism (from the Greek μόνος or "one") is the metaphysical and theological assertion that the entirety of the universe is of one essential essence, principle, substance or energy. Philosophically, monism exists in direct counterpoint to dualism, which holds that there are two kinds of substance, as well as from pluralism, which asserts that there are many kinds of substances in the universe. Monism is often closely related to pantheism, panentheism, as well as theism: any religious system which asserts the existence of an immanent God. Religious monism is also closely related to mysticism, where unity between human beings and god is paramount. The boundaries are more clear-cut for defining monism in philosophy than they are in religion. Particular religions and religious doctrines are usually described as having monistic features rather than examples of monism proper.

Related Terms

The concept of monism is most often confounded with pantheism, the religious and philosophical view that everything within the universe is subsumed within an all-encompassing, immanent God. Indeed, pantheism is monistic in that it reduces the physical universe to a singular principle. However, the terms can be differentiated since pantheists insist that the monistic essence which underlies the universe is exclusively divine. In contrast, monistic explanations are able to reduce all particulars to an essence which is not divine, as in the cases of materialism or idealism. Thus, monism is a usually a necessary condition for declaring a doctrine pantheistic, but not a sufficent one. It should be noted, however, that not all pantheists are monists. In some cases, pantheists believe that God produces polytheistic emanations, and thusly acknowledge that there are many kinds of things within the material world. In addition, monists can be deists, theists or panentheists, believing in a singular God that is both immanent in the universe as well as transcendent. There are monistic deists and panentheists in Hinduism (particularly in Advaita and Vishistadvaita traditions, respectively), as well as in Judaism (especially in the case of Kabballa) and in some contemporary Christian theologies.

Philosophical Monism

Greek Roots

Numerous pre-Socratic philosophers described reality as being monistic, in that they believed all things must spring from a single, primordial source. Some philosphers thought this substance was a natural principle, such as Thales, who believed it to be water, and Anaximanes, who claimed it was air. For Heraclitus, the principle was fire, which he saw as representative of the general principle that everything is in constant flux. For Pythagoras, the monistic principle was based in numbers as they related to the mathematical and geometrical stucture of the universe. Others hinted at even more abstract principles of oneness. For Leucippus of Miletus and his disciple Democritus of Abdera, all of reality was based on atomic structure or lack thereof. Anaximander labelled his conception of the monistic principle as Apeiron (meaning 'the unknown'), referring to the singular essence from which all reality is derived. This one thing, Anaximander contended, could never be known. Perhaps the most influential of these conceptions was that of Parmenides, who identified the idea of the One. This One characterized the totality of Reality: a perfect, unmoving sphere, which is unchanging, and wholly undivided. Empedocles eventually ceased the stream of monistic theories when he divided reality into four elements: Earth, Air, Fire, Water.

Such abstract conceptualizations of oneness would reemerge in the metaphysical structures of Plato and his contemporaries. Plato often referred to the world as a "blessed god", characterizing this figure as the supreme, ideal Form embracing all other forms within itself. In a constantly changing world of evil, god represented the single, unchanging and perfected good. Likewise, Aristotle conceived of a First Mover: a solitary supreme being who is one, eternal, and responsible for the physical unity of the universe. The Stoics proclaimed that the universe proceeds from the evolution of an essential element in all things which they referred to as a "germ of reason". The germ of reason represented spirit and matter in absolute union, and all worldly particulars were derived from this entity and would return to it upon their destruction. Neoplatonists, particularly Plotinus, truly expounded upon this idea of oneness in a crypto-mystical context. Like Parmenides, Plotinus taught that there was a single, absolute unity which underlies all earthly forms and polarities, which he referred to as "The One." According to Plotinus, all realities were merely various degrees of emanations from this One. From The One emanates the Divine Mind (Nous), the Cosmic Soul (Psyche), and the World (Cosmos), among other things. Plotinus claimed that while this one cannot be cannot be descibed, it can be experienced; thus, encounter of the One was typically conceived of as the ultimate goal of mystical endeavour.

Modern Variations

Monism is often seen as partitioned into three basic types: substantial, attributive, and absolute. Substantial Monism refers to the belief in "one thing", holding that the entirety of reality is reducible to one substance. Attributive Monism refers to belief in "one category", holding that while there is only one kind of thing, there are many different individual things or beings within this category. Finally, Absolute Monism, holds that there is only one substance and only one being within the universe, and is limited exclusively to forms of idealistic monism.

Monism is further defined according to three kinds, Idealism, Neutral Monism, and Physicalism/materialism. Each of these positions subsumes other variations which elaborate on their postulations. Idealism or phenomenalism, holds that only mind is real, and all particular forms are merely perceptions within the mind or ideas. [Locke? Berkely?] The most noteworthy proponent of this line of thought was G.W.F. Hegel, conceives of the divine Idea as revealing itself through spatial or temporal creation. The absolute spirit is only available to human consciousness through rational human consciousness. This absolute progresses in its existence through a process of coming to know itself, a process which is aided through human intellectual progression. As humans gain wisdom in the spheres of science and speculative philosophy, they come to an eventual quasi-mystical union with the absolute spirit. This spirit is unintelligible without human consciousness, the medium through which it evolves. When humans do assist this spirit in full self-realization, they are purportedly merged with the oneness of this idea which is the fabric for the entire universe. This system can be considered monistic in that the Idea is a singular, sole reality. However, the reliance upon seemingly separate human consciousness for its own advancement may be a detriment to the monistic status of this theory. Reflexive monism, a later position developed by Max Velmans in 2000, as a method of resolving the difficulties associated with both dualist and reductionist agendas concerning consciousness, by viewing physical phenomena-as-perceived as being part of the contents of consciousness.

Neutral monism which holds that both the mental and the physical can be reduced to some sort of third substance, or energy. One of the foremost examples of this kind of monism is that of Baruch Spinoza, which has also been referred to as dual-aspect monism. Here, reality as a whole is considered to be one absolute substance, which Spinoza refers to as God. This totality can be perceived in two ways, however, either as God or as Nature. The single substance, then, is neither spirit or matter but possesses attributes of both. More contemporary theories which follow this line of thought include Anomalous monism, a position proposed by Donald Davidson in the 1970s as a way to resolve the mind-body problem. It could be considered (by the above definitions) either physicalism or neutral monism. Davidson holds that there is only physical matter, but that all mental objects and events are perfectly real and are identical with (some) physical matter. But physicalism retains a certain priority, inasmuch as (1) All mental things are physical, but not all physical things are mental, and (2) (As John Haugeland puts it) Once you take away all the atoms, there's nothing left. This monism was widely considered an advance over previous identity theories of mind and body, because it does not entail that one must be able to provide an actual method for redescribing any particular kind of mental entity in purely physical terms. Indeed there may be no such method. This type of monism is closely related to physicalism. This is a case of nonreductive physicalism, or perhaps emergent physicalism/materialism.

Physicalism or materialism, which holds that only the physical is real, and that the mental can be reduced to the physical. Hobbes was the first modern spokesperson for this theory, putting it forth in direct counterpoint to Descarte's dualism. Hobbes held that all entities, both living and non-living, consist only of one substance, physical matter. Hobbes considered the Cartesian notion of an incorporeal substance seperate from the physical to be incoherent, at best. Persons, he claimed, were not an admixture of spirit and corporeality, but rather corporeal beings alone. Thought and sensation, he claimed, was not an activity of the spirit but rather the effect of external stimuli upon the sense organs. Interestingly enough, Hobbes not only used logical reasoning to delineate his position, but also bolsters his arguments with Biblical scripture. He claims, for instance, that biblical terms such as "soul' and "spirit" refer to living, bodily creatures rather than incorporeal entities. Numerous lines of thought which followed from the work of Hobbes still exist in contemporary philosophy. Functionalism, like materialism, holds that the mental can ultimately be reduced to the physical, but also holds that all critical aspects of the mind are also reducible to some substrate-neutral "functional" level. Thus something need not be made out of neurons to have mental states. This is a popular stance in cognitive science and theories of artificial intelligence. Eliminativism, which holds that talk of the mental will eventually be proved as unscientific and completely discarded. Just as we no longer follow the ancient Greeks in saying that all matter is composed of earth, air, water, and fire, people of the future will no longer speak of "beliefs", "desires", and other mental states. A subcategory of eliminativism is radical behaviourism, a view held by B. F. Skinner. Similarly, Epiphenomenalism holds that all thoughts and sensations are generated directly by the brain, and that talk of the mind is simply a fiction of folk psychology and due for replacement.

Monism in religion

Hinduism

To the untrained interpreter, early Vedic Hinduism may appears to be polytheistic or henotheistic due to the sheer number of gods mentioned within the text; however, there is also a more monistic sentiment present. Phrases such as Ekam Sat, Vipraha Bahudha Vadanti (Truth is One, though the sages know it as many) (Rig Veda 1:164:46) suggest that early Hindus had some awareness of a deeper, more unified reality underlying the multiplicity of the both the physical and divine realms. In process remiscent of that of the Greeks, other parts of the book also provide numerous suggestions as to what this a monistic essence actually is such as hiranya-garbha (the golden germ), Agni (the Vedic deity who represents fire who was seen to be present within all things), narayana (the primordial man) and the phrase "tat tvam asi", which translates to "that thou art." Generally the concept of "that" is believed to refer to the oneness in the universe that subsumes all persons and objects. Nearing the end of the Vedas, the concept of Brahman is introduced, which would be expanded in the Upanishads, commentaries on the Vedas, and go on to become the sole referent for universal oneness in the Hindu tradition. Brahman is considered to be the sum total of all that ever is, was, or ever will be, includint the human soul, or Atman. Even the individual personal gods which have become so identifiable in both ancient and modern Hinduism are considered to be manifestations of this decidely monistic concept.

Nevertheless, the first system in Hinduism that clearly, unequivocably explicated absolute monism was that of Advaita (or nondualist) Vedanta (see Advaita Vedanta) as expounded by Adi Shankaracharya, a ninth century Hindu mystic and philosopher. Sankara provided the most original philosophy of Brahman, creating the advaita or nondualistic system which developed a sustained legacy in Hindu thought. For Sankara, Shankara, perhaps the most famous Vedantist, declared that all in the universe except for the highest, indescribable form of Brahman, is essentially an illusion. Thus, Brahman is the only thing that exists, a variation of pantheistic thought which is often called acosmic pantheism, the belief that the absolute God makes up the totality of reality, with the universe representing an unreal entity. Therefore, all the particulars of the spatial and temporal world are only functions of Brahman, appearing only because of human ignorance to the fact they are all functions of the one Brahman. The igorant perceiver views all particulars as independent realities rather than manifestations of Brahman. Sharkar also distinguishes two aspects of Brahman, nirguna (which cannot be perceived) and saguna (which can be perceived). Isvara, or the knowable, personal god, is considered to be a function of this latter category. Nirguna Brahman, meanwhile, transcends all spatial and temporal categories. Even Saguna Brahman reduces to Nirguna brahman in the end, and, like all other multiplicity experienced in the world, is not separate from Brahman. Ramanuja, the famous Hindu philosopher saint of the eleventh and twelvth centuries, argued in favour of a monism similar to that of Sankara, while adding that the level of God below Brahman must also be counted as real. Ramanuja still acknowledges the existence of nirguna and saguna brahman, and that the latter is dependent upon the former. This so-called qualified nondualism affirms the existence of a transcendent god which is the substance of the universe, but also beyond its particular contents, including God and humanity. Caitanya, another mystic saint of India, taught a form of monotheistic devotion to Krishna which also suggested a type of monism. For Caitanya, Krishna is the sole supreme entity in the universe, and all other conceptions of god are manifestations of Him, including the indescribable Brahman.

This general type of monism, monistic theism, which includes the concept of a personal God as a universal, omnipotent Supreme Being who is both Immanent and Transcendent, is prevalent in modern Hinduism through in the Vaishnavite and Saivite cults, whose followers devote their worship to the gods Vishnu and Shiva, respecitvely. Even the more overtly polytheistic sects of contemporary, such as the Smarta school, are monistic or "non-dualists", conceiving of the various deities as a heuristic devices by which to understand and connect with the one indescribable Brahman from which all is derived. While this may appear to be polytheistic, it is actually more closely related to concept of monistic emanations developed by neo-Platonic thinkers.

Buddhism

Nagarjuna, the Buddhist sage of the 2nd or 3rd Centure BCE, developed the concept of sunyata which could possibly be taken as an expression of monism. Sunyata refers to a state of emptiness which occurs upon attaining enlightenment. Specifically, all beings and natural phenomena, living or dead, are without any svabhāva, literally "own-nature" or "self-nature", and thus without any underlying essence and are essentially empty of being Therefore, Nagarjuna describes enlightenment as a stage in which reality can only be expressed by what it is not and what it does not contain. Since the entire illusory universe is characterized by this emptiness, sunyata could be considered a variation of acosmic monism. Similarly, Zen Buddhism offers another example which, due to paradoxical nature of Zen may or may not be considered monistic. The idea of Zen is described as infinitely kinetic and ultimately incapable of total comprehension by human thought. Even a description which conceives Zen as being oneness or all-pervasive is considered to be a limitation of the concept, however, like the sunyatas, it brings into question the reality of any given particular thing. In both of these examples from Buddhism, the monism discussed is merely a conceptual stage on the path toward enlightenment, the end-point about which no meaningful statements can be made.

Taoism

The concept of the Dao is one of the best examples of a truly monistic belief. For Lao-Tzu, author of the Tao-te-ching, the Tao is the grounds for all things, the universal creative, sustaining, and destructive principle which containing in itself the entirety of the cosmos, yet also embodying nothingness as its nature. All things are particular shades of the Dao, from which they originate, and to which they later return. Further, it is continually a part of all realities through natural laws and self-regulating principles. The Dao, however, can never be fully understood or defined, since it transcends conceptulalizations. It can only be subtly probed by humans through effortless action, which supposedly connects us with our personal reflection of the Dao from which we originated. This pervasive presence in all material realities and concepts marks the Dao as one of the most distinct examples of monism.

Judaism

It is a primary, axiomatic belief of religious Jewish thought that God is an absolute unity; see Negative theology, Divine simplicity. God is considered eternal (existing outside of time) which is not to be confused with everlasting (existing at every time), and relatedly, the view that God is immanent with, and simultaneously separate (transcendent) from, all created things is consistent with Torah; see Tzimtzum. Under both Judaism and Christianity the question of Monism is almost a moot point in that the omnipotence of God allows Him to separate from or maintain any property. However, Christian and Jewish theologians reexamining the Old Testament have recently noted that the Isrealites viewed human nature as something of union between personal and bodily existence. Such theories claim that soul and body were essentially tied together for the ancient Israelites, that if they were ever separated, (unlike in the Greek tradition) the human bearing them would cease to exist. Therefore, body and soul were seen just as parts of the complete human person. This is called "holism" as often as it is referred to as "monism". Materialism has often been seen as the best philosophical category for the Israelite worldview. M.E. Dahl, for instance, points out another possible interpretation of Genesis 2:7, noting that it may be that man is "not so much...made of 'dust of the earth'; he is dust" (Dahl, 71). Thus, in this interpretation, humans in the Hebrew bible could strictly be material entities, endowed with higher capacities than the animals. Furthermore, numerous Jewish terms for "soul" used in the Old Testament can also be interpreted to refer to an entity which is not necessarily separable from the physical body. For example nephesh, a Hebrew term commonly translated to soul, can also be read anatomically as "throat" or "stomach" in other parts of the Bible, as well as the general "vital force" within human bodies. With such interchangable definition, clear foundation for Old Testament dualism is not available, suggesting body and spirit may have been functionally integrated for the Isrealites. However, such interpretations should be encountered with some skepticism, as in later periods, and even within the Old Testament itself, Jewish theism is highly dualistic, affirming the existence of God wholly apart from His material creation. As seen in Ezekiel 37, among other places, the human body, even with all organs and tissues, is still lifeless without God's bestowal of the life-force upon it.

The Jewish mystic sect Kabbalah describes in God in terms which could be described as monistic. God, although He is the creator of spirit and matter, is constituted in neither substance. In order to remedy theological difficulties such an assertion creates, Kabbalists have come to acknowledge two aspects of God: God which is infinite and unknowable (Ein Sof) , and God which is revealed as that creator and sustainer of the universe and mankind. These two aspects of God complement one another through progressive emanation, as in the Plotinian conception of the one. Moses ben Jacob Cordovero, a Kabbalist theolgian, has suggested that all things are linked to God through these emanations, making all of existence part of God. Similarly, Schneur Zalman of Liadi hold that God is all that really exists, and that from God's perspective, all particulars are completely undifferentiated. Such perspectives suggest that Kabbalah espouses a form of monism.

Christianity

Formative Christian thinkers such as St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas, and John Calvin, among others, subscribed to a dualistic world-view, which acknowledged a cleft between the material world (including the human body) and the spiritual. However, thinkers such as Irish theologian John Scottus Eriugena (810-877) and German mystic Meister Eckhart (1260-1327?) did propound some monisitic elements in their writings. Euriugena upheld the Plotinian idea of one, ineffabile God from which lower levels of reality originate and to which they eventually return. Eurigena placed god not incomprehensible to human cognition, but also beyond His own comprehension. Hence, Eurigena came to the conclusion that God's impetus for creation of the cosmos and humanity was to manifest his own nature, which would have remained hidden had he not done so. This creation was carried out by way of God's ideas (or nous, in the Plotinian system), which Eurigena referred to as divine attributes. These ideas influenced Meister Eckhart, who developed a concept of the one, Absolute God he called "godhead". This God subsumes all of physical being, while also remaining completely transcendent. All of God's creation, therefore, is completely unified, and all beings, including humans as part of that creation, are identical with God. Thus, Eckart's theology can be considered monistic, the primary reason why it has largely been discredited by mainstream Christianity.

There also existed several strands of Christianity removed from orthodoxy that may be described as monistic in their stance. Valentinianism is commonly viewed as being a Gnostic heresy, most prevalent in the first centuries CE. However, while Gnostic traditions are typically regarded as dualistic, "a standard element in the interpretation of Valentinianism and similar forms of Gnosticism is the recognition that they are fundamentally monistic" (Schoedel, William, "Gnostic Monism and the Gospel of Truth" in Bentley Layton (ed.) The Rediscovery of Gnosticism, Vol.1: The School of Valentinus, E.J. Brill, Leiden.). As intimated above, Valentinian sources regularly proclaim God (which is more akin to an indescribable Neoplatonist monad than the typical Orthodox Christian conception of a transcendent entity nevertheless possessed of a recognisable persona) to be fundamental to all things, and that our perception of a material universe is simply a misperception of this same fundamental, "superior" one-ness. Inasmuch as materiality is occasionally described by the Valentinians as being exterior to the monad, this description is intended in an epistemological sense, as depicting a state of being that is ignorant of the true nature of the material universe. The depiction of differing states of knowledge or awareness in spatial terms is typical of Gnostic metaphor, especially within the Valentinian tradition.

Contemporary Christians inveigh against the 'dangers of monism', asserting that in order to resolve all things to a single substrate, one dissolves God in the process. Much Christian thought has insisted that while the universe is dependent on God for its existence, it is also of a separate substance from God. Some contend that this means that monism is false, while others argue that there is a distinction between Ultimate Essence, and the differentiated essences (substances), so that the "single substrate" essentially is God. Theological arguments can be made for this within Christianity, for example employing the Christian doctrine of "divine simplicity" (though a monistic interpretation of that doctrine would not be considered orthodox by the Roman Catholic Church). However, as Christianity has progressed into contemporary times and become subject to numerous philosophical critiques, they have also identified difficulties with traditional Chrisitian dualism. Many different sectors of Christianity have put forward the idea that dualism undermines traditional Christian orthopraxis. Theologians, for instance, have implicated spirit-body dualism in a similar seperation between religious and secular life, which suggests that certain aspects of life are not related to God and Christian mores. Ministers and pastors have made claims that dualism puts cerebralism on a pedestal, and therefore promotes quietistic intellectual endeavour above the life of the ordinary Christian. Liberation theologists, meanwhile, have accused dualism of creating an individualistic Christianity which has placed primacy upon the spiritual and denied the importance of the material and social world, detracting from pursuits in social justice.

As a result, Christian theologians have been more and more willing to accept monistic worldviews in recent times. These scholars stress the nondualistic roots of Christianity laid down within the Hebrew bible, hinting at the aforementioned unity of personal and bodily existence supposedly upheld by the Isrealites. Scholars such as Bruce Reichenbach, a Christian philosopher, have come to the conclusion that sould and body are not considered separate in the Pauline accounts within the New Testament, and as such, the bible upholds monism. Most of Reichenbach's arguments focus on the weaknesses of dualistic sentiments in the New Testament. This line of evidence focuses upon such nuances of that text such as the use of synechdoche, a literary device which applies the features of a part of a system to its whole, is common in the New Testament. For example, Jesus summarizes the law in such a way, telling his followers: "you shall love the Lord your God with all you heart, soul, mind, and strength." Each of these parts most certainly do not refer to different parts within the person with which god must be loved. Instead, they seem to serve as a reminder that God must be loved with the totality of our person; such a totality seems to preclude the separation of soul and body. More overtly monistic sentiments can be ascertained in passages such as Colossians 1.16-17 in which Paul writes: "For by him all things were created . . . And he is before all things and in him all things consist". This suggesst that Christ is the substance to which the entirety of the universe can be reduced.

However, such monism creates larger difficulties for commonplace Christian beliefs. Specifically, if the soul cannot survive apart from the body, then this seems to contradict the Christian doctrine which states that there is a period of time between the death and resurrection in which the soul exists apart from the dead body in the company of Christ. As a result, theological scholars such as Ray Anderson have adopted the doctrine of immediate resurrection, where the deceased Christian either receives a new body, is transformed into a spiritual mode of existence, or brought into a state of union with God at the very instant they die. Other theologians such as John Hick have adopted the so-called "extinction—re-creation" view which claims the whole person (soul and inseperable body) is completely annihilated at death. However, at a future time when the general resurrection occurs, God will bring deceased human beings into existence once again. As can be expected, both of these theories have been put under scrutiny by other Christian theologians and New Testament scholars.

Islam

The distinct separation between human beings and god in the Muslim tradition, and the subsequent resistance to anything monistic has remained the dominant perspective in Islam. Several glaring exception existed within the tradition of Sufism, or Islamic mysticism. Mansur Al-Hallaj (857-922), suggested a kind of monism in stating that the goal of mysticism was union with divine oneness. After a lifetime of mystical experiences, Al-Hallaj went so far as to suggest that he had become divine himself, and was promptly executed by mainstream Muslims in Baghdad. Monism was developed more systematically int the writings of Spanish Sufi mystic Ibn al-Arabi (1165-1240). After his mystical experiences, Al-Arabi preached that God is absolutely singular, and is identical with the entire span of reality with nothing existing other than God. According to al-Arabi, the desire within this totality (or "Celestial Man"), to know and become conscious leads to the creation of divine names such as Allah and later a human incarnation in the person of Mohammed. Thus, the absolute oneness exists even above God and His prophet. The goal for human beings, Al-Arabi prescribed was to reconnect with the absolute unity from which the universe was spawned. While Al-Arabi's teachings were promptly discarded by Muslim authorities, they have nonetheless had significant effect on subsequent Muslim mysticism.

Process Theology

Process Theology, a contemporary theological and philosophical movement that arose from the writings of mathematician Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947) can be described as monistic. Process philosophy can be described as panpsychism, where the ultimate reality from which the things in the universe (the entirety of which is God) are derived is not enduring a constant entity or entities. Rather, this reality (or realities) is consisted of something called "actual occasions", transitory units of psychic experience. These units are linked with actual occassions which have already occured by means of a backward looking physical pole which; in addition, they are also affected by future-looking, mental pole which which apprehends all the possible outcomes of the future and actualizes one outcome in the present. Each unit of experience, then, is both physical and mental, and is linked to all other occassions, which form the totality of the universe. Those things we experience in the world are created because all occassions are located in the mind of god and link together according to patterns determined by god rather than randomly. Thus, all reduces to these infinite instances in the mind of God, which marks Process theology as monistic. In addition, human properties of mind and body are extensions of one another. This, in combination with the idea that every instance contains a mental and physical pole, allows process philosophy to be classified as a form of dual aspect monism.

Significance of Monism

Monism is currently in vogue in philosophy and theology, more and more commonl being seen as a philosophical idea. Primarly, monism has drawn most of its appeal from criticisms of dualism, which has been implicated in the development of religious social injustices and intellectualism in the past. Monism has provided a means by which to avoid such difficulties. Perhaps this contemporary popularity represents the sentiment which seems to have pervaded a variety mystical traditions such as that of Sankara, Meister Eckhart, Kabbalah, and Ibn Al-Arabi, which usually describe the ultimate experience of divinity in terms of monistic union. However, this observation alone points to the difficulty of monism in religion, as well as in philosophy: as oneness is realized, the importance and even the very conception of the myriad things encountered in the physical world seems to be compromised. As such, monism, on some level or another, seems to deny particulars, mitigating its practicality outside of philosophical and theological spheres. Ultimately, monism's close relation to mystical and esoteric theological traditions might render it somewhat inaccessible to everyday practicioners of religion.

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Cooper, John W. Body, Soul & Life Everlasting: Biblical Anthropology and the Monism-Dualism Debate. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdman's Publishing Co. 1989.
• "Monism." Encyclopedia of Religion. Mercia Eliade, ed. New York: MacMillan Publishing, 1987. 57-65.

See also

• Baruch Spinoza
• Dualism
• Holism
• Idealism
• Mind-body problem
• Monotheism
• Panentheism
• Pantheism
• Physicalism
• Pluralism (philosophy of mind)
• Pre-Socratics
• Reductionism
• Theism

External links

• Catholic Encyclopedia - Monism
• Hinduism's Online Lexicon - (scroll down to find the definition of monism)

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