Panikkar on Mysticism as a Middle Way between Contemplation and Action
Religions October 27, 2023 Abraham Vélez de Cea
Panikkar's philosophy of mysticism rejects both monistic views of oneness without a second and dualistic views of the divine as wholly other, instead proposing holistic experiences where the divine, the universe, and human consciousness are distinct yet constitutively interrelated. He argues that traditional dualisms—between this life and the next, worldly and heavenly existence, material and spiritual, body and soul, action and contemplation—have wrongly portrayed mysticism as negating life and escaping the world. Panikkar restores equilibrium among these diverse yet united aspects of Reality and the human condition. The article first introduces mysticism as an anthropological dimension involving holistic experiences, then examines pure consciousness and mystical experiences as results of mediating factors.