BOOK REVIEWS. 94 The Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, 2007, Vol. 39, No. 1. Copyright 2007 Transpersonal Institute

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1 BOOK REVIEWS WILBER, KEN. (2006). Integral spirituality: A startling new role for religion in the modern and postmodern world. Boston: Integral Books. xii+318 pp. ISBN , hardbound, $ Reviewed by Mark Forman. In his recently published Integral Spirituality, Ken Wilber (2006) asks this overarching question: What is the role of religion in the world today and what are the implications of Integral theory for that role? In order to answer this question, Wilber covers much familiar ground the relationship between quadrants, levels, lines, states, and types in his Integral model in addition to presenting a number of refinements and updates to the model (only several of which will be mentioned here). Wilber begins the text with an update to his Four Quadrant model. For readers unfamiliar with this model, it is the central frame around which other aspects of Wilber s thought and argumentation currently rest. According to Wilber, the Four Quadrants represent the four major perspectives with which we perceive reality. These include the 1 st -person subjective, the 2 nd -person intersubjective, the 3 rd -person objective, and the 3 rd -person interobjective. The subjective view is represented by the Upper Left (UL) Quadrant, the intersubjective by the Lower Left (LL) Quadrant, the objective by the Upper Right (UR) quadrant, and interobjective by the Lower Right (LR) quadrant. To illustrate the model further, we might use the example of a single thought that Wilber (1997) himself has given in the past. From the UL perspective, the thought has a certain subjective meaning and feeling that is known directly only by the thinker. From the UR perspective, the thought is reflected objectively in brain neurochemistry and brain wave activity. From the LL perspective, the thought is set within a cultural context and intersubjective value system. Finally, from the LR perspective, the thought can seen to be supported by a set of interobjective systems a natural ecosystem and economic and political systems. It is a key tenet of Wilber s work that the history of intellectual discourse is replete with attempts to reduce one quadrant perspective to another. Common examples would include the idea that our subjective mental experience is simply a product of neurological activity (e.g., epiphenomenalism) or that it can be understood entirely as a product of cultural learning (e.g., social constructivism). Wilber has long argued that these four basic perspectives are irreducible and that a comprehensive philosophy or epistemology needs to hold them all as valid. In the significant update to his model presented in Integral Spirituality, Wilber suggests that the Four Quadrants can be subdivided into what calls the eight primordial perspectives or eight zones (p. 34). This addition rests on the argument that each quadrant by itself can be seen from the inside or outside,or subjectively and objectively. Furthermore, each of these eight zones relates to Copyright 2007 Transpersonal Institute 94 The Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, 2007, Vol. 39, No. 1

2 a major research methodology. He refers to this application of the eight zones as Integral Methodological Pluralism (p. 33). For example, in the UL, subjective quadrant he argues that we find two major methodologies: phenomenology (zone #1) and structuralism (zone #2). Phenomenology explores individual experience in a direct and subjective manner. Structuralism looks in an objective manner for the patterns and structures shaping that intrapsychic experience. Wilber uses this division to make one of the central arguments of the text: That the esoteric spiritual traditions excel in zone #1 spiritual phenomenology but have not registered the importance of either zone #1 psychodynamic experience nor zone #2 structures. By zone #2 structures, Wilber means the stages of development he has historically labeled archaic (now infrared ), magic (now red ), mythic (now amber ), rational (now orange ), pluralistic (now green ), integral (now turquoise ), psychic (now indigo ) and so on, the colors being a reincorporation of his early spectrum metaphor of consciousness. According to Wilber, the practical outcome is that many spiritual traditions continue to translate 1 st person, phenomenological spiritual experience through selves and worldviews that are either mythic and ethnocentric or pluralistic and postmodern (the latter which he calls Boomeritis Buddhism, p. 105). He argues this lack of stage growth is a significant problem and that the world that needs people who translate spirituality through an integral or higher lens. Wilber makes a similar argument in relation to the LL, intersubjective quadrant. First he divides the quadrant into hermeneutics (zone #3) and enthnomethodology (zone #4). He defines hermeneutics as the process of intersubjective dialogue and interpretation that helps create cultural and group values. Ethnomethodology, on the other hand, examines the codes and processes of cultural groups in an objective way. Here Wilber argues that spiritual traditions are not aware of how zone #4 cultural factors impact and shape spiritual experience. They are therefore vulnerable to the postmodernist critique of the myth of the given (p. 176), which strongly challenges the idea that spiritual truth exists entirely a priori to culture and history. There is an implicit ethical and political message that Wilber is delivering here: Spiritual traditions that fail to see their beliefs as partly cultural constructions are illprepared for interfaith participation in our interconnected world. While Wilber has argued variations of this idea in the past (see Wilber, 1995, 2000), one wonders if the emphasis given to the topic in Integral Spirituality is an indirect response to Jorge Ferrer (2001), who has recently brought greater emphasis on cultural sensitivity to transpersonal theory. A third new idea presented here is that of state-stages. As many readers know, in the past Wilber has argued that there are zone #2, transpersonal stages of development. Spiritual adepts are those who break with the average stages of their societies to express these higher, spiritual stages. While Wilber maintains this argument for certain rare persons, he now suggests that the great majority of advanced spiritual practitioners have not. Instead he posits that what he has historically emphasized as temporary altered states actually develop and unfold in stages, from psychic to subtle to causal to nondual. He claims that much of Book Reviews 95

3 advanced spiritual practice involves moving through such state-stages instead of into higher structure-stages. A person can therefore be described as being capable of a mythic (amber) structure-stage and a psychic state-stage or as being capable of a rational (orange) structure-stage and a nondual state-stage and so on. Wilber, in fact, uses this last conception to redefine his notion of enlightenment. He states, Enlightenment is the realization of oneness with all states and all structures that are in existence at any given time (p. 241). He clarifies further, adding that enlightenment would involve indigo [post- Integral] altitude in the cognitive and self-related lines [identity, needs, morals, and values] as well as a mastery of the 4 or so major states (p. 246). Why this definition? The reason being and there is much behind this complex argument, so this is a simplification because Spirit-as-Form and Spirit-as- Emptiness are not separate, and because Spirit-as-Form evolves into new structure-stages, enlightenment must include a oneness with how Spirit has been evolving recently. In other words, one cannot hold the values of a 2 nd Century Christian in today s world, no matter how profound the spiritual experience, and said to be enlightened. Spirit has been on the move, so argues Wilber, and we need updated version of enlightenment that meets Spirit at its cutting edge. This definition dovetails with Wilber s central answer to his original question What role should religion play in today s world? and which is not given until near the end of the book. He argues that the central role of the religious traditions today is to continue to promote their zone #1 esoteric spiritual understandings and practices and, perhaps even more importantly, to act as a conveyer belt (p. 192) to help move people through more complex and encompassing zone #2 stages of development. He argues that the spiritual traditions, because of their powerful mythologies and historical authority, are uniquely positioned to meet practitioners early in development and move them forward. What to make of these arguments? Several worthwhile additions appear to stand out. The eight primordial perspectives and methodologies, for example, offer a fine clarification to the Four Quadrant model and might be well applied to the complexities of scholarly study. Wilber also makes a highly lucid argument about the limitations of the esoteric spiritual traditions and the ways in which they (and their adherents) could benefit from greater attention to psychodynamic forces (zone #1), stage development (zone #2) and to the nature of cultural constructivism (zone #4). On one level, and in his own highly rational fashion, Wilber can be seen here to be calling for a marriage of spiritual wisdom with the development of a more holistic self; one that can offer practical compassion in our increasingly complex global village. On the other hand, some of his other arguments, while provocative, invite questions and need further details. Several of these arise in relation to the idea of state-stages. For example, Wilber has long argued that repeated exposure to meditation and to altered states greatly increases the likelihood of stage 96 The Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, 2007, Vol. 39, No. 1

4 development. He restates this idea multiple times in this book. Yet he also seems to strongly retract this, to suggest that most spiritual practitioners do not grow in terms of stages. There is a contradictory dialogue here. While it certainly seems clear that a person can have a random spiritual experience and not move through structure-stages, it seems less clear how a person can be consistently immersed in deep spiritual states and not have at least some stage transformation in terms of identity and cognition as a result (altered states, by definition, directly effect those structures). Put another way, truly mythic (amber) structures are highly simplistic and easy to spot good examples are seen in fundamentalist preachers or mullahs. It is difficult to imagine a true fundamentalist in today s world who has any kind of consistent immersion experience with causal or nondual states. One could argue that such persons do exist, of course, but Wilber s own examples are not convincing enough. The only specific example Wilber gives of high state, lower structure development seems to be the Dalai Lama (p. 98), who he notes holds more traditional views towards the topic of sexuality, including views marginalizing to homosexuals. While the morally outmoded nature of such a belief is obvious, does this necessarily indicate lower structural development in the way Wilber is discussing or that the Dalai Lama (or others like him) would not qualify as enlightened in some sense? This seems very dicey. It would appear that by almost any standard the Dalai Lama manifests higher stage structures in many lines of development. And while one could argue that he is less developed in his psychosexual line (which is not included as necessary for enlightenment according to Wilber s stated definition), there might be less extreme explanations for his holding this or other more traditional views. He may be bending to cultural (LL) pressure around sexuality, may be playing a designated role as the spiritual leader of his traditional society, or he simply may have unconscious shadow or disowned sexual aspects of self the latter of which Wilber discusses at length in this text as being a problem for spiritual practitioners. More specific examples and exploration need to be brought to bear on the idea of state-stages and their relationship to structure-stages. Questions might also be brought to Wilber s idea of using the world s religions as developmental conveyer belts. The goal of moving persons out of ethnocentric and relativistic stages to more integrative and less projective ones is quite clearly an important one. However, to borrow his analogy, it is difficult to see how one might update the product made on the conveyer belt without also putting the original factory out of business. That is, as Wilber is clearly aware of, the foundation and glue of the world s religious traditions is the mythic and ethnocentric group identification that brings people together under the church roof. In the major civilizations that have pulled farthest away from mythic structures of meaning making namely, Europe religion has lost its organizing and moral authority. How can the religious systems accommodate rational, postmodern, and integral lenses without alienating exactly those persons who most need the stage transformation, especially those currently in or entering the mythic stage? The complexity of this real world task belies any easy answers. Book Reviews 97

5 In summary, Integral Spirituality offers a mix of ideas delivered with Wilber s patented crystalline clarity as well as some that invite dialogue about the devil in the details. There is great value, however, in wrestling with this latest contribution. REFERENCES FERRER, J. (2001). Revisioning transpersonal theory: A participatory vision of human spirituality. Albany, NY: SUNY Press. WILBER, K. (1995). Sex, ecology, and spirituality: The spirit of evolution. Boston: Shambhala. WILBER, K. (1997). The eye of spirit: An integral vision for a world gone slightly mad. Boston: Shambhala. WILBER, K. (2000). Integral psychology: Consciousness, spirit, psychology, therapy. Boston: Shambhala. WILBER, K. (2006). Integral spirituality: A startling new role for religion in the modern and postmodern world. Boston: Integral Books. The Author Ken Wilber is a major contributor to transpersonal psychology, the author of more than 20 books, and the developer of an integral model to embrace the scope of psychology, spirituality, science and society. He is the founder of the Integral Institute ( a visionary think tank based on his integral model. The Reviewer Mark Forman, Ph.D., teaches courses on transpersonal psychology and Wilber s Integral model at John F. Kennedy University and the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology. He is a post-doctoral resident at San Jose State University s Student Counseling Center. Mark is currently working on a book that applies Wilber s model to psychotherapy. 98 The Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, 2007, Vol. 39, No. 1