1) Oneness as a Metaphysical View
The ‗oneness of nature‘ is a popular idea in eco-spirituality, believed to figure
predominantly in Eastern religions and to have been all but forgotten in the West. The
idea of oneness is transmitted through the well-known image of Indra‘s Net, which is
cited in many places as evidence of the convergence between the Buddhist view of reality
and that of deep ecology.81 Portraying an infinite net with a jewel at each node, the
metaphor depicts the universe as a web of interrelated phenomena, where every being and
every aspect of reality reflects—or even contains—all others within it. Thus, the feeling
of separateness between oneself and the world, and between one being and another, is
just an illusion, and to use an oft-repeated cliché, in reality ‗all is one.‘
Whether this idea appears in academic or in popular contexts, there is often an
appeal to a ‗new paradigm‘ in twentieth-century science, in particular, physics, which, is
believed to reveal a similar idea of reality as interconnected, and therefore, to run parallel
to the wisdom of ancient spiritual traditions. One of the earliest ‗parallelist‘ works, Fritjof
Capra‘s The Tao of Physics, draws on the intuitions of physicists like Heisenberg and
Bohr to suggest that ―the basic oneness of the universe is not only the central
characteristic of mystical experience, but is also one of the most important revelations of
modern physics‖ (Capra 1982, 142). This idea has cropped up repeatedly in
environmentalism, in Buddhist studies, and in popular science, and there has been
copious material published on these alleged parallels, by scholars in all these fields.82
In this section, I shall explore these alleged similarities, paying particular
attention to three areas where there is said to be convergence. Both in Mahāyāna
Buddhism and in deep ecology, it is held that there is first, an emphasis on oneness, and
on wholes over parts, second, there is priority given to relations rather than things, and
finally, there is the belief in the truth of assertions such as ―everything is related to
everything,‖ or even that ―humans are one with nature.‖ In all three premises, however,
there are major discrepancies with Buddhism, which, I shall argue, can lead to a deep
misconstrual of the Mahāyāna if overlooked.
81 For example; Barnhill 2001; Halifax 1990; Macy 1990; Zimmerman 2006.
82 For example; Capra 1982; Mansfield 2008; Ricard and Thuan 2001; Wallace 2003;