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[German Version] I. Religious Studies – II. Christianity – III. The Religions of India – IV. Buddhism I. Religious Studies Meditation is a general term for different, variously contextualized methods of training consciousness that are found in various religions. The term itself originated in the Platonic/Neoplatonic Christian tradition (Platonism, Neoplatonism), where it means “intensively focused thought.” The works of Hugh and Richard of St. Victor as well as Bonaventura and J. de Gerson treat meditation as a stage in the progress of the spiritual life: lectio – meditatio – ( o…

[German Version] Transcendental meditation (TM) is both a method of meditation and a ¶ socio-religious movement (New religious movements) with an Indian background but active throughout the world. As spiritual praxis, it preaches a form of mental training adapted to the mechanistic and physical paradigm of science; its goal is a psycho-social transformation of the world. Its methods derive from the tantric form (Tantra) of the Indian Japa tradition, in which short semantically meaningless formulas or mantras …

[German Version] I. The Concept – II. Religious Studies – III. History – IV. Philosophy of Religion – V. Practical Theology – VI. Islamic Mysticism – VII. Hindu Mysticism – VIII. Taoist Mysticism I. The Concept The concept of mysticism is closely linked to the development of the history of religion in Europe and the term must not be taken and applied uncritically as a general term for a phenomenologically determined group of phenomena in other religions (see also II, 3 below). Attempts at definition are either phenomenolog…

[English Version] . T.M. ist sowohl Meditationsmethode (Meditation) als auch eine rel.-soziale Bewegung (neue religiöse Bewegungen), die auf dem Hintergrund indischer Ursprünge weltweit agiert und als spirituelle Praxis eine dem mechanistisch-physikalischen Wissenschaftsparadigma angepaßte Geistesschulung propagiert mit dem Ziel einer psycho-sozialen Veränderung der Welt. Methodisch knüpft sie an die tantrische Form (tantra) der indischen Japa-Tradition an, wo semantisch bedeutungslose Kurzformeln…