The Fifth Dimension: An Exploration of the Spiritual Realm, 2nd edition [Paperback]

John Hick in The Fifth Dimension explores how religious experience can contribute to a best-fit account of the meaning and purpose of human life. The book is made up of several parts of numerous short chapters, but could be helpfully summarised in two parts.

In the first part, Hick defines and defends a religiously informed approach to collecting data about social-life and the cosmos in contradistinction to methods used in the natural sciences. Naturalism purports that everything is constituted of matter and energy and as such is physical. Hick argues that religious experience, e.g. as seen as the motivating force behind the `great saints and mahatmas', brings us into communion with a spiritual realm (the `fifth dimension') beyond the epistemic reach of natural science. He coins the phrase `cosmic optimism' to summarise the sentiments born from communion with this spiritual realm; essentially the idea that human beings are the recipients of a higher source of benevolent love. Hick argues that cosmic optimism can be found embedded in the various world religions, and has it that its higher source of benevolent love is God or, to use Hick's preferred term, the supra-religious `Ultimate Reality'.

Hick secondly considers the possibility of thinking about religious experience and cosmic optimism in such a way that transcends the culturally religious in search of a truer understanding of the Ultimate Reality. Defining religious experiences as `modifications of consciousness structured by religious concepts', Hick is not here concerned with the validity of religious concepts as truth claims (e.g. that Jesus is unique as `the Way, the Truth and the Life'). Rather he wants to consider the way in which religious concepts express our being alive to a spiritual realm that can be tangibly experienced in moments of spiritual enlightenment or `self-transcendence'. Hick's enterprise, even the language he uses, owes much to 19th century liberal religious thought, particularly the theosophy movement. As such, the conclusion is as we might expect: That the varieties of religious experience experienced in the world religions can serve to assure us that there is a benevolent Ultimate Reality. Furthermore, we should learn to transcend the differences betweens religions and live lovingly in harmony with the Ultimate Reality and humankind. This is the meaning and purpose of life.

Though not very original, The Fifth Dimension is at least a lucid and challenging restatement of a seductive philosophy. The reader will feel awed by the immensity of Hick's vision, and will, if open minded, occasionally be enticed by the possibility of an ecumenical cosmic optimism. In one way, this is a work for our time: a search to transcend the religious differences which divide us - sometimes violently - by way of reflection and love. However, for all his speaking into the particular concerns of today, Hick's theosophical approach is curiously dated, even to the point of being antiquarian. Moreover, new developments in social and religious thought critical of his own are not much dealt with. Hick's effort to rid us of religious concepts nowhere engages with postmodernism's critique of people's essential situatedness in community and the significance of shared practices. (Not to mention the way in which substantive differences between the religions are breezily swept aside in his favour). His faith in cosmic optimism is perhaps naïve given the many forms of violence human beings inflict upon each other.

To sum up, The Fifth Dimension is a brilliant statement of a liberal religious worldview. But ultimately it borrows too much from the ideas of a bygone era to more than superficially engage with the social and religious experience of our time - a critical flaw in a work which purports to offer a best-fit account.

Respected theologian and philosopher Hick explains his theory about spirituality in easily readable way. Book starts with defending faith in god, deals with topics like meaning of life and religious experiences in different religions. The basic claim in book is that there is a bigger picture of reality where god is present. Hick present his lifework where basic idea is that all religions lead to same one God and that everyone can find god if one has open mind. I can recommend this book to all who are interested in religions and especially to those interested in idea about ultimate oneness of religions. This books reminds a bit about Huxley's The Perennial Philosophy.