André van der Braak

Reimagining Zen in a Secular Age
Charles Taylor and Zen Buddhism in the West

André van der Braak

In Reimagining Zen in a Secular Age André van der Braak offers an account of the exciting but also problematic encounter between enchanted Japanese Zen Buddhism and secular Western modernity over the past century, using Charles Taylor’s magnum opus A Secular Age as an interpretative lens.

Religion and Social Cohesion
Western, Chinese and Intercultural Perspectives

André van der Braak (ed.), Dedong Wei (ed.), Caifang Zhu (ed.)

Both in the West and in China, it is increasingly recognized that religion is not merely an individual matter, but a social force that has an important impact on society. And whereas the focus in the media today is often on the potential negative social impact of religion (the threats of fundamentalism, violence and terrorism), religion has also often been an important factor in the arising of social capital and social cohesion.

Nietzsche and Zen
Self-overcoming without a Self

André van der Braak

Andre Van der Braak's Nietzsche and Zen: Self-overcoming Without a Self is a thoughtful meditation on doing intercultural philosophy in a Nietzschean way. Nietzsche ultimately seeks a 'way-knowing' more similar to Buddhism and Daoism than the truth-seeking of his own philosophical tradition. This book situates Nietzsche in an intercultural context

Enlightenment Blues
My Years with an American Guru

André van der Braak

Enlightenment Blues is Andre van der Braak’s compelling first hand account of his relationship with a prominent spiritual teacher. It chronicles both the author’s spiritual journey and disenchantment as well the development of a missionary and controversial community around the teacher. It powerfully exposes the problems and necessities of disentanglement from a spiritual path.