Unity in Diversity
Non-duality is one of those deceptively simple ideas which appeal to many of us and which we think we understand, but which, on reflection, we discover to be a very big idea indeed and one that it is hard to get our rational, language-based brains around. Philip Jacobs has been studying the non-dual or Advaita system of Indian philosophy for 35 years. For many of those years I've been attending the same classes at the Study Society at Colet House in west London. While some of us tend to enjoy the intellectual stimulation of a big idea but then go back to living our lives in what seems to be a world of duality, Philip has let the philosophy sink in and transform his outlook on the ups and downs of life in his relationships, his work and his health. In this book he shares that perspective in a simple, engaging way that is not seeking to preach or convert.

Has its name suggests, non-duality implies that everything is one. In particular, that there is ultimately no separation between the individual self or Atman and the divine self or Param Atman. We tend to think of everything that we are as being contained within our physical body and everything that is universal being contained within the cosmos that we can study with telescopes. When we can't find some separate divine entity within either, we are tempted to cling to some notion of a God entirely outside the universe or to become disillusioned atheists. Philip Jacobs shows us a simple framework in which the whole of physical existence is contained within a mental or subtle world and that in turn is within a causal world of potential. The whole of that is within the divine, not separate from it.

These boxes or levels, Jacobs tells us, are to help our understanding and are not real levels of separation. Ultimately, there is no separation. In that case, there is no such thing as bad luck or wrong decision. It is as if we are actors and not script writers in the cosmic drama, so we shouldn't judge things that happen to us as ultimately good or bad. As Sir Laurens van der Post once suggested, we have to learn to trust our bad luck as much as our good luck, as it's all part of the same thing. That can be a very hard lesson to accept as it implies that there is no such thing as free will. But if there is no separate ego, no individual self outside the undivided whole to do the willing, then it becomes a logical certainty.

Philip Jacobs is very honest in that he doesn't start speculating outside the realm of personal experience. He doesn't try to construct some intellectual explanation for why, if reality is non-dual, we find it so hard to see it that way. I am not so well-behaved and look for an explanation for the duality illusion in the way in which our brains work. For me, this is what the Adam and Eve story is about. It tells the tale of our mental evolution. Eating the apple of the tree of knowledge represents the dawn of language. Language gives names to things, this and that: I am this, I am not that; this is good that is bad. It gives us, as Genesis says, knowledge of good and evil. And with that knowledge comes a sense of separation from everything outside our little thinking ego: very useful for everyday thinking and speaking but something which leads to a fall from the paradise of unity into a world beset with misfortune, guilt and blame.

Philip Jacobs draws from his own life experience to show how this philosophy has helped him not so much to overcome failed relationships, bereavement, job loss and illness, but to see them as opportunities for personal growth. If we can let go of lesser levels of identity, we can find the true nature of our being that is ever present and beyond change and suffering. You might think that if everything is one unity, then what is the point of all the diversity of creation and the apparent suffering that goes with it? Jacobs answers this with the story from Rumi about a man in Baghdad who had vivid dreams of a fantastic treasure to be found in a particular house in Cairo. He sets out on a long journey and eventually reaches the house he dreamt about. The owner answers the door and says 'that's funny I too have had a vivid dream about a fantastic treasure but it is in a house in Baghdad.' He goes on to describe the first manÕs own home. The treasure is within us from the start but we have to go on lifeÕs journey to find it.

Martin Redfern is Senior Producer in the BBC Radio Science Unit. He is a member of the Board of Directors of the SMN and has been studying Advaita philosophy for 30 years.