ANNOUNCEMENT: New Book
Dear Colleagues,
I would like to announce to you my recent book. Two of my previous books intersected the argumentative maneuvers of Nagarjuna’s mūlamadhyamakakārikā and Jacque Derrida’s “deconstruction” according to various scenarios. Derrida on the Mend (Purdue UP), which was said to be “pioneering” in terms of this surprising yet convincing comparison—Fred J. Streng was so kind as to call it “a brilliant and dynamic cross-cultural analysis”—demonstrated how Derrida’s strategies duplicated Nagarjuna’s in many detailed and intricate ways. On Deconstructing Life-Worlds: Buddhism, Christianity, Culture (Scholars P, AAR; Oxford P) trained the deconstruction of self-identity—in both Buddhist and Derridean terms—directly upon my own “personal” life-worlds, and proceeded to find, in my very Italian Catholic Christianity, several congenial resources that likewise radically “abnegate” the self.
My new book, Facing Up to Real Doctrinal Difference: How Some Thought-Motifs from Derrida Can Nourish the Catholic-Buddhist Encounter (Angelico P, 224 pp), involves the Interfaith Dialogue in which I have been intensely engaged, as teacher and meditation practitioner, for many years. The parts of my new book that I think may interest some of you are those which refine the differences between Theravada and Mahayana by pitting them both—in oppositional ways—against Catholicism’s Theism. Theravada’s Nirvana, Mahayana’s Dharmakaya, and Catholic Christianity’s celestial Beatitude are all said to be “unconditioned,” but what each tradition means by the “unconditioned” differs significantly. During the pertaining journeys towards “Ultimates,” the roles of “self-power” and “other-power” crisscross each other, and cross “Other-power” in complicated ways—all treated at length. Given that the doctrinal paradigms of Theravada, Mahayana, Vajrayana, and Catholic Christianity are—each of them—“inclusivist,” each assigning a status to the “others” within their own “true” paradigm, how each of the paradigms does so may also interest some of our H-Net Buddhism colleagues (especially since the paradigms have internal recalcitrancies and variants!). A third area of possible interest may be the book’s phenomenology of the now popular “joint-meditation,” where Buddhists and Catholics—often vowed monastics--“sit” together in Oriental-form meditation. There are now, for example, more than a few Jesuits, Trappists, Benedictines (both monks and nuns), etc., who, after sufficient training, are certified--by established Japanese Zen Masters--as sensei, and a few of them, after much longer training, certified as rōshi. I apply the notions of Derridean “chiasm,” “double-bind,” and “obverse overlap” to joint-meditation and the Dialogue in general, but not in ways most readers would anticipate (or at least so I think).
In the Buddhist-Christian Dialogue nowadays, including the Buddhist-Catholic Dialogue, the notions of “dual belonging” and “common ground” are very trendy. Catholic “dual belongers” claim to be Buddhist and Catholic at the same time. “Common ground” is achieved by a reduction of the unique teachings of each religion to what are said to be the “lowest common denominators” they share. Sometimes this “common ground” is labeled “Uni-Spirit.” My book, on the contrary, adopts and adapts a Derridean formulation of “irreducible difference” in order to found “samenesses” not on fabricated common ground but on difference. Irreducible difference between Buddhism and Catholicism “appoints” their superjacent “samenesses”—sometimes very fertile samenesses that are mutually beneficial. Buddhist scholars and Catholic theologians (including a Consultore of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue) have heartily commended my book, but more to the point, here, I furnish commendations from two well-known Buddhist monk-scholars:
-----“Participants in interreligious dialogue between Christianity and Buddhism often proceed from the assumption that to achieve mutual understanding they must dilute their differences and postulate a unifying truth that can comfortably accommodate the discrepancies between these two great spiritual traditions. In this book, Robert Magliola, a practicing Catholic who long lived in Asia and practices meditation with Asian Buddhists, takes a very different approach, one that does not try to gloss over doctrinal friction. While remaining faithful to the teachings of the Catholic Church and reliable in his accounts of Buddhist doctrine, he attempts to show how mutual respect, appreciation, and even love can coexist with honest, frank, and clear recognition of the real substantive differences between Buddhism and Christianity regarding the premises and prospects of human salvation.”
—Ven. Bhikkhu Bodhi, Buddhist monk, scholar, and translator from the Pali canon (BPS, Wisdom P, etc.); president, Buddhist Publication Society (1988-2010), Sri Lanka; president, Buddhist Association of the United States (2013- ); founding chair, Buddhist Global Relief.
-----“Robert Magliola demonstrates a well-rounded understanding of the three main Buddhist traditions—Theravada, Mahayana, and Vajrayana—contextualized within an encounter of the Buddhist-Christian dialogue. This scholarly study provides a valuable contribution to the growing interest not only in the concept of diversity-versus-commonality of Buddhism, but also helps both the layperson and the scholar to better understand the religions having the two largest monastic bases in the world.”
__Ven. Dr. Sak Dhammadipa (Fa Yao), abbot, Chuang Yen Monastery, N.Y. (2008-2015); abbot, Temple of Enlightenment, N.Y. (2012- ).
My book is available via Amazon (worldwide) in hard copy, paperback, and Kindle e-book. Here is the link to Angelico Press’s pertaining webpage:
www.angelicopress.com/magliola-real-doctrinal-difference
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With best wishes,
Robert Magliola, interfaith advisor, Ling Jiou (Jiù) Shan Buddhist Center, Flushing, N.Y.; affiliate, Comunità Vangelo e Zen, Desio, Italy; prof. of philosophy and religious studies, Interfaith Graduate School of Philosophy & Religions, Assumption U. of Thailand (retired); formerly, chair prof. of Graduate School of Liberal Arts, National Taiwan University.
