THE DIALOGICAL REVOLUTION IN GLOBAL CULTURE
by
Ashok Gangadean
A recurring theme in the global evolution of cultures is that all history has been a struggle between two competing paradigms or models of what it means to be human a struggle between the egocentric view of man and the emerging dialogical human being. From a variety of perspectives in religious life, scientific life, and cultural evolution in general it has been seen that human evolution has been moving through the ages from an egocentric culture to a dialogical form of life. This emergence of dialogical culture is seen to be accelerating on a global scale, and the collision and confrontation between the two visions and practices of human life are now at a critical juncture.
While egocentric culture leads increasingly to separations, divisions, strife, and polarizations in all aspects of human life, the emerging dialogical consciousness enhances communication, compassion, mutual nurturing and care for others and for the ecology. How we manage this dialogical turn in global culture is all important for our survival and sustainability on the planet. As the dialogical emergence advances, the egocentric forces also peak, bringing ever deeper fractures and fragmentations in all aspects of cultural life.
Awakening to this dialogical advance affects every aspect of our lives: our inner well being, our relations with others, our capacity to negotiate fundamental differences in our shared cultural space, our ability to honor and cultivate the human and natural ecology. This timely Conference (note: these remarks were prepared for the May 1997 La Casa di Maria Invitational) attempts both to understand the depth and importance of the dialogical consciousness and to put it into practice in our daily lives. It becomes clear that interreligious dialogue is at the very core of this dialogical turn the passage from the egocentric life to the dialogical life takes courage, since to truly open one's self dialogically to the other calls for the deepest transformation in how we exist: how we truly open to others who live in different worlds, in very different perspectives. This Conference attempts to understand the nature of this process of self-opening and seeks to explore how it may be put into practice in diverse aspects of our daily lives.
DIALOGUE: THE KEY TO GLOBAL ETHICS
Ashok GangadeanThe Global Dialogue Institute was founded to cultivate common ground in all aspects of cultural life through the awakening power of dialogue across and between different worlds. In the past two years the Institute has focused its attention on reaching out to corporate leaders in the business world who face the urgent task of understanding the powerful forces that arise when diverse cultural and religions worlds interact, and who see that ethics in the workplace must find more effective ways to cope creatively with interactions between diverse perspectives, ideologies, worldviews. In this essay I focus on the essential connection between the origin of ethics, the dialogical process, and the challenge of interreligious and intercultural interchange. I try to make the essential connection between ethics, the awakening and transforming power of the dialogical process between diverse worlds and the emergence of global ethics. We shall see that this dialogical process between religious and cultural worlds is the rational, moral and spiritual foundation of global ethics.
In these introductory remarks I would like to try to connect two or three themes that are usually not clearly connected, but which will be vital for understanding why the dialogical process and global ethics and interreligious dialogue are profoundly and inseparably connected. It is clear that we are living in a very exciting moment in history. Something profound and wonderful is happening, and this can be seen only if we can stand back and take a look at and somehow live through the spectrum of cultures and religions that have been evolving over the centuries. If we can do this and enter into alternative religious, cultural worlds, something amazing begins to show itself--a deep pattern centuries in the making. It begins to appear that the different religions and cultural worlds converge in a common theme of the birth of a new level of human consciousness, a new humanity. We begin to see as we look across religious worlds that they are all deeply concerned with a stage of being human that needs to be overcome.
In one way or another, it is clear that there has been an ego-centered way of being human and the different religious teachings converge on a consensus that egocentric life is the source of diverse human problems. The great world teachers through the ages attempt to show that the essence of our being human turns upon awakening a dialogical consciousness that overcomes the ego-centered way of being human. This can be seen, for example, deep in the Judaic tradition with the ultimate command to love God with all our heart and all our being. That injunction calls upon humans to open themselves in the deepest way to place the Divine Presence first and foremost in all life. This calls for a deep recentering that transforms our being to a dialogical way of life. This revolutionary re-centering in our innermost Self demands that we overcome an ego-centered view which places the ego-consciousness as the center of our human reality.
Clearly if we look at the life of Jesus, the deepest concern and command to love one another, to awaken spiritually, and to really go through a profound rebirth calls equally in this tradition of the Judaic ethic for a renovation of our being and the move to a dialogical consciousness. So right here in our Judeo-Christian roots we find already this call for the awakening of a new awareness that centers upon God and the Presence of God as the primary concern for human beings, which in turn calls for the deepest change in our lives. So the injunction to love one another may be seen already as the essence of the dialogical principle and the dialogical turn in living.
But really if we scan across the spectrum of cultures and look, say, into the Hindu worldview, clearly here too we find in a very different scenario, but yet relentlessly focusing on the same point, that the essence of our awakening has to do with overcoming ego-centered consciousness. In the Bhagavad Gita, for example, Lord Krishna takes Arjuna, who embodies the ego-consciousness, on the deep transformation and existential awakening into the higher consciousness that centers on the Divine Principle, one that really sees a profoundly interconnected reality, very different than the one shown in ego-awareness.
So also in the Buddhist awakening, the essence of Buddha's awakening, (and even the word "buddha" means awakened one), turns upon seeing through the emptiness and futility of living in a world that objectifies everything and creates artificial "entities," especially where the self is concerned. The Buddha's great awakening really shows that humans are not "entities" or objects of any kind and that this ego-self is empty or vacuous, an artificial construction of the ego-will. This ego construction of the self that seems to take itself as a separately existing entity is profoundly wrong and wrongful and is in fact the source of the deepest human suffering. So that the themes of sin and suffering in our human condition are directly traced to our ego-centered way of being, and the deepest call of these religious visions move us to dramatically transform our being to a dialogical, open, interactive, unified and holistic way of being a human.
So too if we look into the Chinese origins of the Tao or of the Confucian "Mandate of Heaven," these moral origins call us equally to awaken to a higher consciousness that can see the inter-relationality of humans and the Higher Law as the centering principle in human life. Equally in certain African traditions, the "Nommo," the call of the Original Word or Name in the Dogon worldview, and the Vital Force found to flow through all Nature calls us to honor and respect the Principle of Life that pulsates through every being and all of Nature. And so on.
Thus, when we stand back and achieve a truly global perspective, it is easier to see the deeper pattern of evolution of cultures and religions through the ages. Here we find a wealth of experimental results that have been tested through the centuries. This deeper pattern reveals that what is distilled and what survives in this evolution is the convergence on this theme that human beings have been in a profound awakening of a global awareness that is nothing less than the birthing of what we are as human beings. So let us contrast these two models or two paradigms of the human being--the egocentric human and the dialogical human. It is as if all history and cultural evolution is the interplay of these two paradigms or forces in the human nature.
On the one hand the ego-centered human takes itself to be a separately existing entity and builds its life and world and culture centered around that "reality." On the other hand the dialogical human somehow awakens to the realization that to be human is a profoundly interrelational, interconnected, interactive way of living and being. This dialogical turn in experience means that everything in human life requires the living through of this interactive, or, as the Buddhist would say, "co-arising," principle of reality itself. Thus at this deepest level of what is real, we see this collision and contrast and tension and dialectical playing out through history between the ego-centered culture and the dialogical way of life.
This brings us then to the question of the importance of interreligious dialogue. Religions are deeply established patterns of life that have been distilled over centuries and eons of ongoing cultural evolution and experimentation. Religious worldviews attempt to get to what is most fundamental in human culture and human reality. They are alternative, narrative, corporate expressions of what is profoundly first, the vital core of our cultural life. Hence, as we look across the spectrum of religions we find profoundly alternative ways of recognizing something nevertheless primordial and first that is the common source of our diverse worldviews.
This Primal Reality is so profound and deep that there is no one name that can approach it or exhaust it and no name has emerged in the evolution of global cultures to presume to name it. And yet it is important to have a word that may function as a candidate to help us focus our thoughts and attention on this deep common ground that begins to emerge out of interreligious dialogue. The point is that the great religions in their inner roots and the awakening forces of interreligious dialogue from the genuine mutual encounter of the great religions express the ground and foundation of cultural life.
A religion is a way of life that shapes a culture. Hence, if we can understand the interactions and interplay between and amongst religions, we will begin to understand that there is a profound common reality emerging from this creative encounter and also found right at the core of the diverse religions. I use the word "Logos" to indicate this profound, primordial word, from the Greek term meaning "the Word, Rational Principle"--though the word is Greek (of course the term must come from some language; Judaism might use Torah, Hinduism, Dharma, Taoism Tao, and so forth), it has, as seen, universal applicability. We need a truly global interreligious and intercultural Primal Word to help focus our experience on the common foundation and source of all religions and cultures. One thing that is remarkable that begins to emerge out of the interplay of world religions in dialogue is the recognition that there is a profound Logos, beyond any single narrative, beyond any single name, so profound in its infinitude, so deep in its Unity that it spawns a multiplicity of infinite possibilities and diversity. Thus Primal Unity in its infinitude plays out in infinite diversity, plurality, multiplicity, particularity and individuality. There is not the slightest contradiction between the Unity of Logos and the bottomless diversity and multiplicity in the unified field of Reality.
This to me is one of the greatest lessons of the centuries of interreligious dialogue and interaction--that Logos is so deep in its Unity that multiplicity and plurality and diversity is of the essence of this Unity. Right here we see the deepest seeds of the origin of dialogue and the evolution of dialogical consciousness. So if we rise to the global perspective between worlds we more readily see this historic pattern evolving. In this historic drama of Logos we see that human evolution inexorably moves beyond the egocentric culture to the dialogical awakening of global consciousness. This deeper story of human evolution could not be clearly seen until we advanced to the global perspective that comes from creative dialogue between worlds. What it comes down to is the ultimate principle of reality itself. The painful dialogical awakening of human life comes with this emergence of Logos in the human condition.
This Logos, this common ground at the source of all religious worlds is the source of the dialogical. Why? Because this Primal Word in its infinite depth and presence is so deep that nothing can stand outside of its sphere of influence and jurisdiction. This profound, primordial Logos, which is at the source of all religious worlds and cultures, places all things profoundly in mutual encounter and inter-relationality. The Space of Logos, the Field of Reality itself holds all things in original inter-action. Nothing can stand apart or alone. Nothing is atomic or existentially independent, as egocentric reason imagines.
Perhaps the deepest lesson that we might learn from the evolution of cultures is that human beings are essentially dialogical beings. We do not stand alone. The vision of a human being as an ego-centered, independently existing entity has simply been shown to be unacceptable and disastrous in the evolution of cultures--which brings us to the condition in which we are living, in what I call an exciting moment in this evolution over centuries. The birthing of this dialogical consciousness is peaking more and more and accelerating in contemporary times. And yet at the same time the counter egocentric forces of culture are also peaking. Something very urgent and critical is happening in our cultures such that our very survival and future sustainability are at stake.
It all turns on the question of our coming to a deeper awareness and practice of this dialogical awakening and turn in our lives. In this global story of Logos it is clear that humanity must now make the creative corporate turn to dialogical culture if we are to survive. We have arrived at a historic showdown between the two ways of being human. We must find the way to make the corporate transition from egocentric culture to awakened dialogical life. This is why the special skills that come from the creative play of global dialogue, of interreligious and intercultural dialogue, is vital now for our future flourishing.
I would like now to connect the question of the dialogical evolution coming through creative global dialogue and this new global consciousness that emerges from this process with what I will call the global mentality or the global mind. Of course when we hear the word "global" we tend first to think more of the physical dimension, the globe, the geographical sphere, and also the political sphere comprised of the different nations spread across the globe. So usually we speak of "global" in this context. But in the wider cultural sense "global" means a mentality that is open to recognize the plurality of profoundly different cultures, religious worlds, worldviews and perspectives. Thus in this philosophical and cultural dimension the term "global" means having to do with the relations and differences between multiple worlds, with the mutual encounter of the plurality of diverse worldviews and cultural forms of life in human evolution. This is what we call the "global" context and "global consciousness." Now it is easier to see that global consciousness or awareness is dialogical. When we speak here of "global ethics," for example, it is clearer that the essence of "global" is dialogical. And clearly interreligious dialogue fosters a global awakening.
I would like to stress that the dialogical turn is a deep change in our being. It is not simply standing where we are in our particular worldviews and speaking it out to others and listening to others from afar. The dialogical turn in living calls for a true risk, a willingness to let ourselves be vulnerable in our deepest being. This dialogical awakening calls upon us to open our selves and our patterns of interpreting reality, and a willingness to question, reconsider and revise at the deepest level the worldview in which we live. This of course includes all of our presumptions and assumptions that have been at the source of our way of life. So there is something deeply risky that appears dangerous and threatening to our very identity, our very "self," and to our most cherished habits of mind, when we truly open ourselves in this way.
However, this is precisely the kind of risk that more enlightened people in the business world are already used to facing in one way or another. For example, creative entrepreneurs who have been forced by new challenges to reconsider the deepest assumptions of their business practices and business enterprise are already in touch with this dialogical risk and entrepreneurial spirit. Thus when I speak of the global, I mean global in the sense of a disposition to be profoundly open to others, to other persons, to other religions, to other cultures, to other perspectives. I mean a willingness to revise and experiment and self-transform in an ongoing open-ended experimental or dialogical way. The global is the dialogical in practice, and we should see that it applies not only in the so-called international global scene as we are used to think of it, but in our deepest inner life this dialogical or global outlook is already at work in our personal and interpersonal relations, in the corporate life of our business, in the workplace, as well as in all aspects of life in society, both at the micro and the macro levels.
We should think of the global, therefore, as the dialogical in practice. The dialogical turn in awareness requires this open outlook--having the willingness to listen to the other, to encounter and enter creatively the perspectives of other, the willingness to critically question and even overcome what one has uncritically presumed and assumed. Further, what is remarkable in this global, dialogical outlook is that the willingness to take this personal risk and enter into other worldviews and perspectives always turns around to deeply enrich the participant, to deepen one's roots in one's own world. This dialogical awakening always comes home and deepens the inner Logos at the heart of one's tradition. In taking the risk of opening to dialogue the participant is graced in the deepest way.
I would like now to connect the global mind or mentality with the dialogical or global ethics. The term global ethics is being used in many ways right now, but for us the global ethics indicates this dialogical consciousness; that is the essential connection. And really if you look at the evolution of ethics through the lenses of the different religious worlds it becomes clear that the most important advances in moral consciousness through the ages, from Moses to Jesus to Buddha to Krishna to Lao Tsu and all the way across diverse cultures through the ages, has been the moving to a deeper dialogical being. In other words, ethics points to the deepest way in which we conduct our life, our mind, and our thinking. It is not only an external behavior, but the external behavior reflects a deeper inner transformation. Thus, the moral awakening of humanity over the past three thousand years, for example, has been pressing toward this global awakening and dialogical way of being. This is why, for example, whether it is in the injunction to love God with all one's heart or in Jesus' version of the global moral principle that we should love one another, or Buddha's principle of Dharma or compassion, to love all beings and all creatures and to tend to their suffering, we get many different formulations and different takes on what might be considered a principle of global ethics.
In other words, ethics is profoundly global and universal across the spectrum of cultures and religions. It is almost a redundancy to call it "global" ethics. Ethics is global ethics. So I would like to speak of the dialogical principle which I see as being at the heart of global ethics and all moral consciousness. If, for example, we had a formulation that we are responsible for the well-being of all creatures, of all beings, and we proposed it as a possible formulation of a principle of global ethics, we would naturally ask "why?" Why should I be responsible for all creatures, or anyone else other than myself and my immediate family? The direction of the answer is to be found in this dialogical or global consciousness that has been emerging.
We realize that in our deepest being we cannot stand alone, we are not human beings in isolation. But again in our deepest reality we are profoundly interactive and interconnected with those around us, not only with other human beings but with all creatures and even more so with nature and the "ecos" as such. We are woven together in a dialogical, interactive principle we can call the Reality Principle. Hence, the dialogical principle of global ethics derives right from the very core of the process of reality itself. Global ethics, thus, may be formulated in many alternative ways, but it is not something completely new. It has been emerging for centuries under many formulations in diverse religious and cultural worlds. We need to see those connections and that common ground in these alternative expressions.
The Golden Rule, for example, to do unto others as you would have others do unto you, the injunction to love God, the injunction not to harm other creatures, the positive injunction to take responsibility for the well-being and care of others and the environment, these are all profoundly connected in the dialogical principle. Thus, in our exploration of interreligious dialogue and global ethics, I hope it begins to be clear why global ethics is so profoundly connected with the project of interreligious dialogue. For global ethics is inherently dialogical, and the dialogical turn begins to emerge deeply when we see how interactions take place and have been taking place through the centuries between alternative religious worlds and cultures. Thus interreligious dialogue, global ethics and dialogical consciousness essentially co-arise in each other and in Logos.
I would like to add in conclusion that the Global Dialogue Institute focuses its attention on cultivating this dialogical awakening which is the moral pulse of global ethics. When we look at the state of our cultures and the present scene, I said at the beginning of my remarks that we are in a very exciting moment in history, on the threshold of a new century and a new millennium--and some of us think of a new consciousness, a new age, a new stage of human evolution. But we should also stress the great risks and dangers that we face at this moment; that is why it is so critical. If we look at our culture on the American scene, for example, we can see the evidence, the devastating evidence, of ego-logical culture at work in the profound ways of violence on all levels as humans abuse themselves and each other, through their addictions and their failures of relationships and the breakdown of values and the collisions of ideologies and the many forms of violence that erupts from egocentric practice.
On every level we see the evidence of the egocentric culture which always leads to separations, divisions, violence of all forms. So what is at stake is our very survival, and it is against this backdrop that the Global Dialogue Institute has developed its various projects of fostering global awakening in the fundamental areas of our culture. For it is clear that this awakening dialogical consciousness cannot just happen passively. It essentially requires the arousing of this human consciousness through the very dialogical process itself. This is the wonderful challenge--that the dialogical cannot be told to anyone, no one can passively receive it. It has to be a process in which one opens up one's being through the dialogical process itself--only thus will the emergence of global ethics begins to become a living reality.
So, our future is at risk, but it is the kind of risk that certain enterprising future-oriented business persons, for example, are used to facing and negotiating. And this is another exciting aspect, that leaders, visionary leaders in the business world, see that our very survival as humans is at stake. There is growing awareness among certain corporate leaders with moral vision that we have a positive responsibility to take the initiative in caring for each other in the widest possible scope of our corporate ecology. It is clearer now that it is a matter of our sustainability and survival. Clearly everything is at risk, and it is in this spirit that the Global Dialogue Institute is especially concerned to foster dialogical awakening and global awareness. So in conclusion as we prepare to engage in dialogue we must be prepared to question at the deepest level and to stand open in the presence of others and other views and be ready to engage and enter into other perspectives--for it will only deepen one's own self understanding in the end, and this is the very process out of which global ethics emerges.
About the Author: Ashok Gangadean is Professor of Philosophy at Haverford College, where he has taught for the past twenty seven years. He was the first Director of the Margaret Gest Center for Cross-Cultural Study of Religion at Haverford, and has participated in numerous professional conferences on interreligious dialogue and East-West comparative philosophy. He is the author of Meditative Reason: Toward Universal Grammar (1993), and expects his three new books to appear in 1996: (1) Between Worlds: The Global Emergence of Reason, (2) The Awakening of the Global Mind, and (3) Time, Truth and Logic.
Posted 1998; last revised December 2010 by Ingrid Shafer
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