Customer Reviews

All Else Is Bondage: Non-Volitional Living

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This classic melds many traditions into one profound source. Wei Wu Wei has boiled down non-dualistic wisdom into a gripping and clear text accessible to all who ponder its truths.

This final installment of the Wei Wu Wei series from Sentient Publications is one of the best. Wei Wu Wei shows us that somethings are indefineable and we must embrace uncertainty in the meanings we seek. Certainly not for the faint of heart but well worth it for anyone who strives to understand the world as we experience it. A must read for those of us who love a change in perspective.

In one of the earliest of his books the author keeps driving the same non-nail into the same non-coffin with the same non-hammer until it begins to sink in that we really are mistaken in what we have all agreed is the universe. If he goes too far, no harm done, for anyone who understands it that well will always be safe. When a dear friend of mine was with him seven years before his passing he seemed to forget he had written this book. I am grateful that he did.

I give this book 5 stars for the content rather than for the expression of that content. In short, the author repeats the same message so often as to annoy the alert reader. The book - like all his works - is written in snippets or short 'chapters' rather than as a coherent, argued statement; some day someone will write such a book, but, at present, I am unaware of one quite so sophisticated as this one. At the same time, the content is virtually incomprehensible without some prior reading on the noumenon-phenomenon distinction and, perhaps, some reading on Buddhism (Ch'an) and/or philosophical Taoism (though most translations - and many journal articles on Tao, are sheer rubbish). For those who persist, the book is richly rewarding, providing insights that map well onto subatomic physics, neuroscience, Taoism, Buddhism, and other areas of learning. This book is probably the best of those written by Terrence Gray ('Wu Wei Wu')