TY - BOOK AU - Engels,Jeremy David TI - The ethics of oneness: Emerson, Whitman, and the Bhagavad Gita SN - 9788195293117 AV - B906.M66 E64 2021 PY - 2024/// CY - New Delhi PB - Sanctum Books KW - Emerson, Ralph Waldo, KW - Whitman, Walt, KW - Bhagavadgita KW - Influence KW - Monism KW - Philosophy, American KW - 19th century KW - Moral and ethical aspects KW - Democracy KW - United States KW - Civilization KW - Indic influences N1 - Includes bibliographical references (pages 211-251) and index; Oversoul -- Cosmos -- Bodies -- Two visions -- Genius -- Democracy N2 - "Early to mid-nineteenth-century America experienced a cultural fascination with oneness or monism--the notion that individuals are not separate from divinity but, rather, that the individual soul is an incarnation of the universal soul. Everything is one. This buzz of monism was traceable in part to translations of the Vedas by Indian philosopher Rammohun Roy and found some of its fullest expression in the work of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Walt Whitman. This oneness tradition is what animates Jeremy David Engels--not only because we can't understand Emerson, Whitman, and other American philosophers without it, but because Engels thinks this tradition offers a way of thinking and acting that can meet the ethical challenges of everyday democracy in the present. The Ethics of Oneness is not only a brilliant study of the centrality of the Bhagavad Gita in the philosophy of Emerson and Whitman and a compelling reception history of the Gita in America, it is also a constructive project of moral and political philosophy intended to open possibilities for the present. If the lessons of oneness are taken to heart, Engels thinks, it ispossible to counter the pervasive, problematic American ideals of separation, competition, hierarchy, exclusion, and domination. For both Emerson and Whitman, American democracy requires a firm ontological foundation of oneness that is beyond question if it is to survive and thrive"-- ER -