The Religion of Tomorrow: A Vision for the Future of the Great Traditions - More Inclusive, More Comprehensive, More Complete

by Ken Wilber

Overview

A provocative examination of how the great religious traditions can remain relevant in modern times by incorporating scientific truths learned about human nature over the last century

A single purpose lies at the heart of all the great religious traditions: awakening to the astonishing reality of the true nature of ourselves and the universe. At the same time, through centuries of cultural accretion and focus on myth and ritual as ends in themselves, this core insight has become obscured.
 
Here, Ken Wilber provides a path for re-envisioning a religion of the future that acknowledges the evolution of humanity in every realm while remaining faithful to that original spiritual vision. For the traditions to attract modern men and women, Wilber asserts, they must incorporate the extraordinary number of scientific truths learned about human nature in just the past hundred years—for example, about the mind and brain, emotions, and the growth of consciousness—that the ancients were simply unaware of and thus were unable to include in their meditative systems.

Taking Buddhism as an example, Wilber demonstrates how his comprehensive Integral Approach—which is already being applied to several world religions by some of their adherents—can avert a “cultural disaster of unparalleled proportions”: the utter neglect of the glorious upper reaches of human potential by the materialistic postmodern worldview. Moreover, he shows how we can apply this approach to our own spiritual practice. This, his most sweeping work since Sex, Ecology, Spirituality, is a thrilling call for wholeness, inclusiveness, and unity in the religions of tomorrow.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781611805727
Publisher:	Shambhala
Publication date:	05/01/2018
Pages:	816
Sales rank:	269,435
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.00(h) x 2.30(d)

About the Author

KEN WILBER is the founder of Integral Institute and the cofounder of Integral Life. He is an internationally acknowledged leader and the preeminent scholar of the Integral stage of human development. He is the author of more than twenty books, including A Brief History of Everything, A Theory of Everything, Integral Spirituality, No Boundary, Grace and Grit, and Sex, Ecology, Spirituality.

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

Part 1 A Fourth Turning of the Dharma

1 What Is a Fourth Turning? 19

2 What Does a Fourth Turning Involve? 36

An "Integral" View 36

Freedom and Fullness: Waking Up and Growing Up 50

Spiritual Intelligence versus Spiritual Experience 58

Summary 63

Understanding the "Culture Wars" 68

Shadow Work 70

Concluding Remarks 71

Part 2 States and Structures of Consciousness

3 The Fundamental States of Consciousness 81

States and Structures 82

States of Consciousness 85

States and Vantage Points 108

4 The Gross and Subtle States of Consciousness 124

The Gross (or Physical) State 125

The Subtle State 132

5 The Causal, Empty Witness, and Nondual States of Consciousness 146

The Causal State 146

The Supracausal Empty Witness or Consciousness as Such 159

The Nondual State 166

6 The Hidden Structures of Consciousness 180

The Importance of Structures of Consciousness in Spirituality 180

Ladder, Climber, View 186

7 The Structure-Stages of Development 197

Types of Spirituality 197

Spiritual Intelligence and Development in 1^st and 2^nd Tiers 198

Spiritual Intelligence and Development in 3^rd Tier 210

Part 3 Dysfunctional Shadow Elements in Development

8 Shadow Work 253

Addictions and Allergies 254

The 3-2-1 Process 257

"Flourishing" and Journaling 263

More on Shadow Material 267

The 3-2-1-0 Process, or Spiritual Transmutation 270

9 Dysfunctions of the 1^st-Tier Structure-Views 273

Overview 273

Infrared Archaic 282

Magenta Magic 289

Red Magic-Mythic 297

Amber Mythic 299

The Amber/Orange Mythic-Rational 310

Orange Rational 314

Green Pluralistic 321

10 Dysfunctions of the 2^nd-Tier Structure-Views 329

Teal Holistic and Turquoise Integral 332

How Many Levels Are There? 345

11 Dysfunctions of the 3^rd-Tier Structure-Views 352

Overview 352

Spiritual Bypassing 367

Indigo Para-Mind 369

Violet Meta-Mind 375

Ultraviolet Overmind 382

White Supermind 389

Conclusion 408

12 Dysfunctions of the Gross and Subtle States 413

Gross-State Dysfunctions 414

Subtle-State Dysfunctions 426

13 Dysfunctions of the Causal, Empty Witness, and Suchness States 448

Causal-State Dysfunctions 448

The Empty Witness Realm 459

Suchness Dysfunctions 467

Energy Malfunctions 477

Healthy and Unhealthy Drives 479

The Importance of Transference 483

Concluding Remarks on the Shadow 486

Part 4 Elements of an Integral Spirituality

14 Structures and States 493

Structures and Structure-Stages of Development 494

States and State-Stages (or Vantage Points) 527

15 Shadow Work, Quadrants, and Developmental Lines 534

Shadow Work 534

The 4 Quadrants 559

The 1-2-3 of Spirit 569

Developmental Lines (including Multiple Intelligences) 575

16 Miscellaneous Elements 580

Typologies 580

Polarity Therapy 586

Subtle Energy Dimensions 593

Network Sciences 599

Accelerated Developmental Approaches 601

The Technological Tie-In 604

The Miracle of "We" 609

A Higher "We" 616

17 Integral Semiotics and a New God-Talk 626

Integral Semiotics 626

Languages of the Divine 637

The Real impact of Interior Thinking 643

Conclusion: The Evolution of Nonduality 653

Notes 665

Bibliography 773

Index 778

Editorial Reviews

"Ken Wilber is a national treasure. No one is working at the integration of Eastern and Western wisdom literature with such depth or breadth of mind and heart as he." —Robert Kegan, Professor of Education, Harvard University Graduate School of Education, and author of In Over Our Heads

"When Ken Wilber’s thought walks through your mind, the door to the next higher level becomes visible. Anyone seeking to update the wisdom traditions of their lineage needs his reality and consciousness maps. The kabbalah of the future will lean on Ken’s work." —Reb Zalman Schachter-Shalomi

"Ken Wilber is today’s greatest philosopher and both critic and friend to authentic religion, a true postmodern Thomas Aquinas." —Father Richard Rohr, Center for Action and Contemplation

“The religion of tomorrow, according to Ken Wilber, will not be one religion, but all religions guiding their respective constituents toward oneness with Ultimate Reality. This book is Ken Wilber’s comprehensive synthesis of all the elements that make for human development from the Big Bang through the course of material and biological evolution. The recent discoveries of science, especially in the areas of developmental psychology and historical criticism, as well as mystical experience, have enabled him to bring together contemporary science, the wisdom of the world religions, and an integral presentation of the human condition with all its potential. The endless complexities of the evolutionary process gives way to a sublime simplicity, culminating in the spiritual and integral evolution of the human person toward unity with That Which Is.”—Thomas Keating, author of Open Mind, Open Heart

From the Publisher