Knowing Beyond Knowledge

First Published and Thematic Focus

This title was first published in 2002. This book builds on contemporary discussion of mysticism and religious experience by examining the process and content of religious knowing in classical and modern Advaita.

Methodology and Theoretical Framework

Drawing from the work of William Alston and Alvin Plantinga, the author examines key streams of Advaita with special reference to the conditions, contexts, and scope of epistemic merit in religious experience. Forsthoefel uniquely employs specific analytical categories of contemporary Western epistemologies as heuristics to examine the cognitive dimension of religious experience in Indian Vedanta.

Analysis of Religious Experience in Indian Philosophy

Showing the developing nuances in the analysis of religious experience in the thought of Shankara and his immediate disciples (Suresvara and Padmapada) as well as in the teaching of Ramana Maharshi, an understudied but important South Indian saint of the 20th century, this book offers a substantial contribution to studies of Indian philosophy as well as to contemporary philosophy of religion.

Conclusion and Philosophical Implications

Using the tools of exegesis and comparative philosophy, Forsthoefel argues for a careful justification of claims following religious experience, even if such claims involve, as they do in the Advaita, a paradoxical “knowing beyond knowledge”.