Contexts and Dialogue: Yogacara Buddhism and Modern Psychology on the Subliminal Mind / Edition 1

by Tao Jiang

Overview

Are there Buddhist conceptions of the unconscious? If so, are they more Freudian, Jungian, or something else? If not, can Buddhist conceptions be reconciled with the Freudian, Jungian, or other models? These are some of the questions that have motivated modern scholarship to approach ālayavijñāna, the storehouse consciousness, formulated in Yogācāra Buddhism as a subliminal reservoir of tendencies, habits, and future possibilities.

Tao Jiang argues convincingly that such questions are inherently problematic because they frame their interpretations of the Buddhist notion largely in terms of responses to modern psychology. He proposes that, if we are to understand ālayavijñāna properly and compare it with the unconscious responsibly, we need to change the way the questions are posed so that ālayavijñāna and the unconscious can first be understood within their own contexts and then recontextualized within a dialogical setting. In so doing, certain paradigmatic assumptions embedded in the original frameworks of Buddhist and modern psychological theories are exposed. Jiang brings together Xuan Zang’s ālayavijñāna and Freud’s and Jung’s unconscious to focus on what the differences are in the thematic concerns of the three theories, why such differences exist in terms of their objectives, and how their methods of theorization contribute to these differences.

Contexts and Dialogue puts forth a fascinating, erudite, and carefully argued presentation of the subliminal mind. It proposes a new paradigm in comparative philosophy that examines the what, why, and how in navigating the similarities and differences of philosophical systems through contextualization and recontextualization.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780824831066
Publisher:	University of Hawaii Press, The
Publication date:	11/30/2006
Series:	Monographs of the Society for Asian and Comparative Philosophy , #21
Edition description:	New
Pages:	214
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Tao Jiang is assistant professor in the Department of Religion at Rutgers University.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments     ix
Introduction     1
The Origin of the Concept of Alayavijnana     21
Alayavijnana in the Cheng Weishi Lun: A Buddhist Theory of the Subliminal Mind     48
The Unconscious: Freud and Jung     87
Three Paradigms of the Subliminal Mind: Xuan Zang, Freud, and Jung     107
Accessibility of the Subliminal Mind: Transcendence versus Immanence     128
Conclusion: An Emerging New World as a New Context     145
Notes     155
Bibliography     177
Index     185