Idealism: The Philosophy of The Matrix (Nonfiction)

Author: Harun Yahya
Category: Nonfiction
Publisher: Global Publishing
Format: Paperback
Pub Date: 2003
Price: $22.99
ISBN: 9756426322

Idealism: The Philosophy of the Matrix and the True Nature of Matter

I was asked to review this book because of my fondness of the Matrix trilogy, and my basic knowledge of Islam. The book is written by a Muslim scholar, and Hollywood Jesus felt that it would be interesting to get another perspective on the movie itself. After all, the majority of what is written on this site is done by Christians.

To be perfectly honest, I found this book to be one of the weirdest I have ever read. First of all, I have rarely seen a book of its nature to be so illustrated with full color pictures, and ornate borders on every page. I have to suppose that this the modern equivalent of “illuminated” texts, a basic attempt at contextualization since ancient holy scriptures are written in the same ornate fashion.

Secondly, even though the book is 285 pages long, it only has approximately 150 pages of content—all of which appears to be saying the same thing. It was almost as arduous to read through as the Quran or Leviticus since it was so redundant, and didn’t appear to make any point except that matter is ultimately an illusion of the mind. Yahya spills an untold amount of ink trying to explain away matter scientifically, and then uses the last few chapters to decry the modern scientific theories of evolution.

How could he use highly theoretical ideas found in such disciplines as virtual reality and neurobiology, and then trash the same said science as fallacious in the end?

The author makes his case that the Matrix reflects the philosophy of “idealism,” an “approach to philosophical enquiry. As a basis for cosmology, or an approach to understanding existence, idealism is often contrasted with materialism, both belonging to the class of monist as opposed to dualist or pluralist ontologies.” The idea of the philosophy is that ultimately there is no “real reality.” Matter is an emanation of consciousness, or of an ultimate consciousness in the case of eastern monism. Yahya argues through his entire book that all of our senses are being fooled into believing that material things exist outside of our perceptions of them in our brain. The following quote underscores his main point:

“Everything a person thinks he possesses—house, car, family, job and friends—are all composed of images and sensations that occur in the brain. Anyone who understands this will also understand that the one who has created these images in his brain is God, to whom all things belong. For that reason, those who are emotionally attached to the life of this world greatly fear this reality.

Now, I do agree with him that The Matrix reflected an idealist philosophy (not to mention enough philosophical worldview for everyone from Christians to Buddhists to claim the movie as their own); but I would also point out the problems that the movie ultimately ran into because of it.

First, our author believes that the images God created aren’t real. Therefore there is really nothing that really belongs to Him. He is ultimately just part of His creation, which is surprising given the ostensibly monotheistic leanings of Islam.

Second, since nothing was really real in the matrix, except for the possibility of a hyped-up computer sending light impulses to the brain, nothing ultimately mattered in the movie; this became the movie's own bane. This is the problem I do believe with monistic religions and philosophies. If everything is an emanation from the one, then there really is no transgression against anything real. From this standpoint, sin ultimately is non-existent.

This is the problem Augustine runs into, too, when he accepts a Platonic view of evil as a privation rather than real transgression—the view of the Greeks who believed that matter was evil and the spirit was good. This is why Greek gods like Dionysius, who is allegedly the precursor for the “divine-man, savior God” we see in Christian mythology (Jesus’ story of God becoming man, and dying and resurrecting) is spurious. First of all, it is hard to determine which myth borrowed off the other since the mystery religions never wrote down or canonized their “doctrine,” and secondly Dionysius could never have been seen as flesh and as a sacrifice for anything, since the gods could never truly become human and remain gods at the same time.

Subsequently, since matter was evil, it was seen as illusory or immaterial, didn’t ultimately matter, and had no real need for a savior. This is why I do believe that monistic religions view “salvation” as merely some form of enlightenment (an awareness of the pathway towards healing, holiness, nirvana, etc.) rather than atonement for real sins against a real God.

Islam therefore doesn’t believe in the cross, or have a need for the cross, because all that man needs is to be properly pointed back to the law so that they can live their lives in ways that are pleasing to Allah.

Finally, Yahya, sets up his idealism against scientific materialism, without allowing the possibility that God could create real material, and might be the sovereign agent behind that matter. This is the difference between the Quran’s creation out of existing matter, and the Bible’s creation out of nothing. Biblically, creation isn’t the result of something that took human consciousness and “reprogrammed” it to think that reality and matter exist— it is in fact a “substance” that is distinct, yet originating from a creator.

All in all, I found this book too pedantic and redundant, failing to deal with the plot and the myriad of metaphors that the movie allows, choosing instead to preach religion without opening up the possibility of other themes.

In spite of the fact that much of this book is redundant, and might reflect a flawed philosophy, Yahya makes a decent point that not everything we see is everything that there is. We both disagree with the materialist viewpoint that the material world is all that matters. But without a reality connect to the material, there really is no foundation for otherness—and without otherness, there is no real foundation for virtues like love or compassion.