Sanatana Dharma As a Whiteheadian Religious Pluralism? more

Whiteheadian religious pluralism was first developed by John B. Cobb, Jr., and furthered recently by David Ray Griffin in the edited volume Deep Religious Pluralism.  Though the theory can be found in different forms in Cobb’s earlier writings, it is most cogently presented by Griffin and Cobb in this book, where they, in addition to a number of other scholars, explore the application of this hypothesis to various non-Western religious traditions. Jeffery Long’s article on Santanta Dharma as a Whiteheadian religious pluralism appears in this same volume.  Cobb and Griffin’s theory holds that there is a plurality of religious ultimates or ultimate religious categories (viz., God and Creativity) as opposed to a traditional one (e.g., God or Dao). God and Creativity are regarded as equally worthy of ultimate religious concern in their theory because they can account for both personal and impersonal absolutes (e.g., the God of Abraham and Buddhist sunyata or Emptiness) and determinate and indeterminate aspects of reality (e.g., Advaita Vedanta’s Saguna and Nirguna Brahman, Brahman with or without particular qualities). Neither ultimate is in complete control; rather, the two work together to carry the world forward. Their generic notion of a deity differs in important ways from other characterizations of God in the Abrahamic tradition, but it is still a powerful being who acts in the world and is experienced by people as good, caring, and uniquely omniscient. It is, to this extent, arguably compatible with the sacred texts of the three major theistic faiths of the West. Creativity, on the other hand, works as a generic category that can include non-theistic, non-personal, and non-dualistic religious ultimates such as the nameless, formless Dao of Daoism, the blissful Emptiness (sunyata) of Buddhism, and the unqualifiable nirguna Brahman of Hinduism. Creativity drives “the becoming of the world,” the divine being shapes it and inspires us toward moral and aesthetic improvement. In Whitehead’s philosophy, the world could not exist as it does without both of these ultimates working together, and Cobb argues that it is precisely these two ultimates that underlie the objects of religious worship, or concern, of the world’s various traditions. This religious pluralism is “deep” then insofar as these two ultimates can serve as the common metaphysical ground that enables a multiplicity of religious traditions (theistic and non-theistic) to be simultaneously true. Long attempts to utilize Sanatana Dharma in a similar way and thus attempts to develop a Hindu deep religious pluralism.