In natural meditation and contemplation there is a wonderful opportunity for inter-religious dialogue, mainly because natural contemplation affirms that there is a divine reality that is the infinitely good ground and end of all that exists in the present moment. This point was classically understood as uncontroversial. It was a point that many so many classical, medieval, and even modern, philosophers, Jewish, Christian, Pagan, Buddhist, Hindu, Jain, Sikh, Muslim agreed upon that it served as the fundamental purpose of being: seeking union with this reality.
While in natural meditation we may begin with something as simple as focusing on the breath and may not move much beyond that in a particular session we are also open to the divine reality that monotheists in various religions called God (English), Deus (Latin), Theos (Greek), YHWH or Elohim (Hebrew), Allah (Arabic). And ultimately, even in natural contemplation, the highest form of meditation is contemplation of the divine reality, understood as that reality which is infinitely good, wise, immaterial, omnipresent, and the first cause and ultimate end (telos) of all that is.
Natural contemplation seeks union with the divine reality primarily through reason but not in the way reason is typically understood. Natural contemplation utilizes an approach to seeking the divine through the way of negation, through purifying the mind, the intellect, and the heart, of what God isn’t rather than positing what God is. In a way, this approach to the divine reality creates a type of a bridge to mindfulness in Islam, precisely because in Islam mindfulness is always ultimately understood as in reference to one’s relationship with Allah, ever-merciful and all-holy.
And in particular, theologically speaking, Islam favors an approach to God that is ever so careful not to caricature or conceptualize Him in any way that might diminish His absolute transcendence over man. Apophatic theology or ‘negative’ theology, i.e. seeking God through negation of what He isn’t is similar in this way though clearly of its own accord doesn’t reach the sublime heights of contemplation that are possible within the context of the revealed, and living tradition.
Apophatic, or negative, theology is also incomplete from a Jewish or Christian perspective insofar as it doesn’t reference revealed tradition but relies on reason alone. In the West, there have been some pretty negative interpretations of this approach. One of Martin Luther’s criticisms of the Church he sought to reform was that it was too Aristotelian, and relied too much in theology upon natural reason. It is from Luther where we get the colorful comment that, reason is a whore and a great enemy of faith. Now that perspective doesn’t invade all of Christendom but it certainly popularized our conception of how to relate to God in the West: revealed tradition, i.e. the Bible (sola scriptura), alone.
But, that approach precludes the possibility of valuing the wisdom in other religious and philosophical traditions and sets one up to be in opposition of truth that exists and is communicated through other cultures. That is why it is helpful to use both the apophatic or philosophical (negative) way of seeking the divine reality in combination with the apophatic or faith-based way. It allows one greater opportunity to look to other traditions to enrich one’s own.
Look to other articles for a deeper exploration of mindfulness from within the context of particular religious traditions.