Books on Eastern Spirituality?

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I’m looking for the best books that explain Eastern spirituality and mysticism. They don’t necessarily have to be Catholic. They can be Orthodox as well.

I’m looking for a differant perspective on Christian spirituality, and I think studying the Eastern Churches is a great way to go.

Does Thomas Merton’s spirituality fit into this? I know he was big into the East; even Budda !

Thanks for the replies !
 
Search for Catholic mystics, like St. John of the Cross, who is also a Doctor of the church. Actually any and all Doctors of the church would be bonafide!

You don’t have to go Eastern, as the topic would be pretty much the same, to read about it. Thomas Merton, of blessed memory, God rest his soul, was searching for that Catholic aesthetic but never found it in the modern age, under Catholicism. If you wish to find modern mystics it is best to go East.

His books are difficult reading. But so is St. John of the Cross. Must clear everything to concentrate, and take in small doses. Kind of like St. Faustina’s Diary.
 
A well known famous Orthodox book is: The Way of a Pilgrim: And the Pilgrim Continues His Way (Image Classics)Aug 5, 2009
by Walter J. Ciszek and Helen Bacovcin
 
Thomas Merton didn’t write on Orthodox Christianity as far as I know, and he only wrote one book Zen and the Birds of Appetite. The book had more to do with how Zen philosophy fits into Christian beliefs. In fact, it’s probably a good read for Christians to believe what is real and revealed in Christianity instead of running out to find miracles.

Other than that, The Way of the Pilgrim, is a good book and will open you to the Philokalia.

FYI, the Philokalia is five volumes and is an important part of Orthodox Christianity.

Beware that volume four, takes on an anti-Roman Catholic spin, but the first three volumes are excellent, especially the first volume on Jesus Temptation in the Desert.

Jim
 
?
Thomas Merton wrote more than one book:

The Seven Story Mountain
The Sign of Jonas
Day of the Stranger
Bread in the Wilderness
The Living Bread
Praying the Psalms
He is Risen
Exile Ends in Glory: The Life of a Trappistine, Mother M. Berchmans, O.C.S.O.
What are these wounds?: The Life of a Cistercian Mystic, Saint Lutgarde of Aywières.
The Last of the Fathers: Saint Bernard of Clairvaux and the Encyclical Letter, Doctor Mellifluus.

Seeds of Contemplation
The Ascent to Truth
Disputed Questions
New Seeds of Contemplation
Raids on the Unspeakable
Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander
Contemplative Prayer
What is Contemplation
The Secular Journal of Thomas Merton
The Asian Journal of Thomas Merton
Woods, Shore and Desert: A Notebook, May 1968
Cassian and the Fathers: Notes for Conferences Given in the Choir Novitiate, Abbey of Gethsemani.
The Other Side of the Mountain: The End of the Journey; the Journals of Thomas Merton
The Cold War Letters of Thomas Merton
Thomas Merton: A Life In Letters
The Waters of Siloe
No Man Is an Island
Silence in Heaven
The Silent Life
Thoughts in Solitude
The Wisdom of the Desert: Sayings From the Desert Fathers of the Fourth Century
Spiritual Direction and Meditation
The New Man
Life and Holiness
Seasons of Celebration
Gethsemani: A Life of Praise
Contemplation in a World of Action
Cistercian Life
The Monastic Journey
Love and Living
Introductions East and West: The Foreign Prefaces of Thomas Merton
My Argument with the Gestapo: A Macaronic Journal
The Behavior of Titans
Ishi means man
The Literary Essays of Thomas Merton
Thomas Merton: Spiritual Master
Thirty Poems
A Man in the Divided Sea
The Tears of the Blind Lions
The Strange Islands: Poems
Selected Poems
Emblems of a Season of Fury
Monks Pond: No. 1, 1968
Cables to the Ace
The Geography of Lograire
The Collected Poems of Thomas Merton
In The Dark Before Dawn: New Selected Poems of Thomas Merton
Seeds of Destruction
Gandhi on Non-Violence
Faith and Violence
The Non-Violent Alternative
The Hidden Ground of Love: Letters on Religious Experience and Social Concerns (Letters, 1). 1985.
Opening the Bible
A Vow of Conversation: Journals 1964-1965
Thomas Merton in Alaska: The Alaskan Conferences, Journals and Letters
The Road to Joy: Letter to New and Old Friends (Letters, II)
The School of Charity: Letters on Religious Renewal and Spiritual Direction (Letters, III)
The Courage for Truth: Letters to Writers (Letters, IV)
Witness to Freedom: Letters in Times of Crisis (Letters, V)
Run to the Mountain: The Story of a Vocation (Journals, I: 1939-1941)
Entering the Silence: Becoming a Monk and Writer (Journals, II: 1941-1952)
A Search for Solitude: Pursuing the Monk’s True Life (Journals, III: 1952-1960)
Turning Toward the World: The Pivotal Years (Journals, IV: 1960-1963)
Dancing in the Water of Life: Seeking Peace in the Hermitage (Journals, V: 1963- 1965)
Learning to Love: Exploring Solitude and Freedom (Journals VI: 1966-1967)
The Other Side of the Mountain: The End of the Journey (Journals VII: 1967-1968
The Intimate Merton: His Life from His Journals
Dialogues with Silence
Love and Living
The Inner Experience
Seeking Paradise: The Spirit of the Shakers
Peace in a Post-Christian
 
Casilda said:
?
Thomas Merton wrote more than one book:

The Seven Story Mountain
The Sign of Jonas
Day of the Stranger
Bread in the Wilderness
The Living Bread
Praying the Psalms
He is Risen
Exile Ends in Glory: The Life of a Trappistine, Mother M. Berchmans, O.C.S.O.
What are these wounds?: The Life of a Cistercian Mystic, Saint Lutgarde of Aywières.
The Last of the Fathers: Saint Bernard of Clairvaux and the Encyclical Letter, Doctor Mellifluus.

Seeds of Contemplation
The Ascent to Truth
Disputed Questions
New Seeds of Contemplation
Raids on the Unspeakable
Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander
Contemplative Prayer
What is Contemplation
The Secular Journal of Thomas Merton
The Asian Journal of Thomas Merton
Woods, Shore and Desert: A Notebook, May 1968
Cassian and the Fathers: Notes for Conferences Given in the Choir Novitiate, Abbey of Gethsemani.
The Other Side of the Mountain: The End of the Journey; the Journals of Thomas Merton
The Cold War Letters of Thomas Merton
Thomas Merton: A Life In Letters
The Waters of Siloe
No Man Is an Island
Silence in Heaven
The Silent Life
Thoughts in Solitude
The Wisdom of the Desert: Sayings From the Desert Fathers of the Fourth Century
Spiritual Direction and Meditation
The New Man
Life and Holiness
Seasons of Celebration
Gethsemani: A Life of Praise
Contemplation in a World of Action
Cistercian Life
The Monastic Journey
Love and Living
Introductions East and West: The Foreign Prefaces of Thomas Merton
My Argument with the Gestapo: A Macaronic Journal
The Behavior of Titans
Ishi means man
The Literary Essays of Thomas Merton
Thomas Merton: Spiritual Master
Thirty Poems
A Man in the Divided Sea
The Tears of the Blind Lions
The Strange Islands: Poems
Selected Poems
Emblems of a Season of Fury
Monks Pond: No. 1, 1968
Cables to the Ace
The Geography of Lograire
The Collected Poems of Thomas Merton
In The Dark Before Dawn: New Selected Poems of Thomas Merton
Seeds of Destruction
Gandhi on Non-Violence
Faith and Violence
The Non-Violent Alternative
The Hidden Ground of Love: Letters on Religious Experience and Social Concerns (Letters, 1). 1985.
Opening the Bible
A Vow of Conversation: Journals 1964-1965
Thomas Merton in Alaska: The Alaskan Conferences, Journals and Letters
The Road to Joy: Letter to New and Old Friends (Letters, II)
The School of Charity: Letters on Religious Renewal and Spiritual Direction (Letters, III)
The Courage for Truth: Letters to Writers (Letters, IV)
Witness to Freedom: Letters in Times of Crisis (Letters, V)
Run to the Mountain: The Story of a Vocation (Journals, I: 1939-1941)
Entering the Silence: Becoming a Monk and Writer (Journals, II: 1941-1952)
A Search for Solitude: Pursuing the Monk’s True Life (Journals, III: 1952-1960)
Turning Toward the World: The Pivotal Years (Journals, IV: 1960-1963)
Dancing in the Water of Life: Seeking Peace in the Hermitage (Journals, V: 1963- 1965)
Learning to Love: Exploring Solitude and Freedom (Journals VI: 1966-1967)
The Other Side of the Mountain: The End of the Journey (Journals VII: 1967-1968
The Intimate Merton: His Life from His Journals
Dialogues with Silence
Love and Living
The Inner Experience
Seeking Paradise: The Spirit of the Shakers
Peace in a Post-Christian
Click to expand...
Correct, but he did not write on Orthodox Christianity, which is the point of my statement.

Jim
 
“The Mountain of Silence”, by Kyriacos C. Markides

Others have mentioned “The Way of The Pilgrim”…I will also highly recommend this book.
 
The closest that Thomas Merton may have come to writing on Orthodoxy may have been his book on the Desert Fathers, “The Wisdom of the Desert”, published by New Directions and currently available at this link: amazon.com/Wisdom-Desert-New-Directions/dp/0811201023.

You might want to check this link for free Christian Mystical books: christianmystics.com/Ebooks/Christian_Mystics.html

One excellent but difficult resource specifically for Eastern Spirituality isthe classic “The Philokalia,” originally in Greek and Old Slavonic but available in English translation as a free download if you search a bit. Here is a link holybooks.com/philokalia/.

One of my personal favorites is “Zen Catholicism” by Dom Aelred Graham, published in the 1960s and excellent on showing the similarities between the Christian apophatic tradition(eg. the 14th century book, “The Cloud of Unknowing”, still available both as free download in middle English or in more contemporary adaptation christianmystics.com/Ebooks/The_Cloud_Unknowing/Cloud_of_U_Annotated.pdf
hard copies: amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=the+cloud+of+unknowing ) and Zen Buddhism. Contrary to the horror expressed by some in these fora at the suggestion that Zen and Catholicism might be compatible, they seem to have much in common. Not in doctrine so much as in terms of experience of the prayer of quiet. Thomas Merton’s old home, Gethsemani Abbey in KY, hosted The Gethsemani Encounter, bringing together Buddhist and Christian monastics. The resulting book is here: amazon.com/Gethsemani-Encounter-Spiritual-Christian-Monastics/dp/0826411657

I hope this helps you. Ora pro nobis…
 
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