The Resurrected Emergent Self - An Enactive Lens on the Goals of Classical and Contemporary Abrahamic Contemplative Paths

This paper expands the scope of the cognitive science of meditation by applying an enactive approach to the goals of classical and contemporary Abrahamic contemplative traditions. Drawing on recent enactive accounts of Buddhist contemplative practices and paths, it argues that influential Jewish, Christian, and Islamic accounts conceive of the contemplative path as a transformation of the "emergent self"—a self that can be deconstructed but is ultimately reconstructed in ways that simultaneously enhance attunement with divine reality in creation and ethical action. Rather than advocating for the complete dissolution of selfhood, these traditions describe ultimate contemplative transformation as the realization of a dynamically coupled (resurrected) self and world.