Pramāṇa · Search · About · API

A Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy c9.s4: Types of mystical experience

A Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy c9.s4

Language
English

Contents

Types of mystical experience

c9.s4.1.1

to be found scattered in the Upanishads, which bear respectively on the forms, the colours, the sounds, and the lights which are experienced by the mystic in the process of contemplation. These we shall indicate from the various Upanishads, without trying to sever the different experiences from one another. In the second chapter of the Śvetāśvataropanishad, there is a classic reference to the different forms and lights that are experienced by the mystic on the threshold of his spiritual pilgrimage. We are told that he experiences forms such as those of " mist and smoke, the sun, the fire and the wind, the fire-fly and the lightning, the crystal and the moon " (S. 19. a). An early passage from the Bṛihadāraṇyakopanishad tells us almost in the same strain that to the vision of the advancing mystic appear such forms as those of the saffron-coloured raiment, of the red-coloured beetle, of a flame of fire, of a lotus-flower, and of a sudden flash of lightning : these constitute the glory of the advancing mystic " (S. 19. b). It seems, however, on the whole, that the Upanishadic mystics are either morphists, or photists, rather than audiles. There are only few references to the experience of audition in the Upanishads, and these also are not well accounted for.

c9.s4.1.2

In the Bṛihadāraṇyaka, as in the Maitri Upanishad, we are told that the mystic hears certain sounds within himself which are attributed by the authors of those Upanishads to the process of digestion that is going on within the system. We are told that " the sound is a result of the processes of digestion and assimilation, that a man is able to hear it merely by shutting his ears, and finally that when a man is dying he is not able to hear the sound " (S. 20. a). The Chhāndogya Upanishad in a similar strain tells us that the indication of the presence of Reality within us can be obtained merely by shutting our ears, and by being able to hear sounds like those of the roaring of an ox, or the peal of a thunder, or the crackling of fire (S. 20.b). Mystic expereince has shown that it is not merely by shutting our ears that we are able to hear the mystic sound, that we can hear it even with our ears quite open, and that finally even a deaf man who cannot hear anything else is yet able to hear this sound. Then, again, we cannot call the mystic sound a result of the processes of digestion and assimilation within us. It is true that the mystic sound is to a certain extent dependent upon physiological circumstances. But to call the sound a result of those circumstances is like putting the cart before the horse.

c9.s4.1.3

We thus see that even though a reference is unmistakably made to the auditions experienced by a mystic, the Upanishadic seers are not correct in giving their *raison dêtre*, nor even in defining their exact nature. On the other hand, when they come to deal with the photic experiences, the Upanishadic mystics are evidently at their best. "On a supreme disc set with gold," says the Muṇḍakopanishad, "is the spotless and immaculate Brahman, which is the light of all lights which the seekers after Ātman experience" (S. 21. a). The Chhāndogya Upanishad tells us that "after having crossed the bund of phenomenal existence, even though a man may be blind, he ceases to be blind; even though he may be pierced, he is as good as unpierced; after having crossed this bund, the very night becomes like day, for before the vision of the aspiring mystic the spiritual world is suddenly and once for all illumined" (S. 21. b). Another passage from the Chhāndogya Upanishad tells us that before such a mystic, there is neither ever any sun-set nor any sun-rise. "Only if this be true," says the author of the Upanishad, "may I not break my peace with God. When there is neither any sun-rise nor any sun-set, there is eternal day before the aspiring soul" (S. 21. c).

c9.s4.1.4

Finally, this same idea is reiterated once more in the Śvetāśvataropanishad, where we are told that "when there is neither day nor night before the mystic, when there is neither being nor not-being, God alone is", thus testifying to the transcendence of God beyond both night and day, beyond both being and not-being, as the result of an utter cancelment of these in divine omnipresence (S. 21. d).

c9.s4.2

14. The photic or auditive experiences which we have referred to above, though they may be called the harbingers of a full-fledged realisation to come, do not yet constitute the acme of Self-realisation. One very celebrated passage of the Muṇḍakopanishad tells us that the Ātman cannot be realised except by one whom the Ātman himself chooses : before such a one does the Ātman reveal his proper form (S. 22. a). This is verily the doctrine of Grace. It implies that man's endeavours after a full-fledged realisation of God may always fall short of the ideal, unless Grace comes from above. It is only when the Ātman chooses the saint for the manifestation of his supreme glory that the mystic will be able to perceive Him. It is only then that the golden-coloured Being of the Chhāndogya Upanishad who can be seen on the Sun, "with golden mustaches, and golden hair, and who shines like gold up to his very toes," can come to be identified, as by the sage of the Īśopanishad, with the Being within oneself (S. 22. b). It is only then that the Individual Spirit can become one with the Universal Spirit. The Śvetāśvataropanishad tells us that "just as a mirror which is cleaned of its impurities becomes lustrous and capable of reflecting a lustrous image, even thus does the mystic see Himself at the height of his spiritual experience and reach the goal of his endeavour. Just, again, as with the help of a lamp one is able to see an object, similarly by the help of the Individual Self he sees the lustrous Universal Self, who is unborn, who is the highest reality, and who is beyond all existences" (S. 22. c). The mystic imagery implied in the above quotations from the Śvetāśvatara is made absolutely clear in the teaching of the great sage Maitri who imparted to his disciple "the highest secret of the Upanishads" when he said that at the acme of spiritual expreience the mystic sees his own form in a flood of supreme light arising from within himself, which indeed constitutes the realisation of the immortal and fearless Ātman (S. 22. d).

c9.s4.3

15. The Upanishads abound in passages which try to reconcile opposite qualities in the Ātman as realised. The Śvetāśvatarapanishad tells us that "the Ātman is neither male nor female, nor is the Ātman of an intermediate sex : what body He takes, in that body does He lie ensconced" (S. 23. a). The Īśopanishad tells us that "the Ātman may be said to move and yet not to move. He is far as well as near. He is inside all things as well as outside all things." A daring mystic of the Kaṭhopanishad asks—Who except himself has been able to realise the Ātman who rejoices and rejoices not, who can walk in a sitting posture and move about everywhere in a lying one? In the Muṇḍakopanishad an attempt is made to reconcile the infinite greatness of the Ātman with his infinite subtlety: "Great and lustrous is that incontemplatable Being, and yet he is subtler than the subtle. He is farther than any far-off end, and yet quite near to us, being shut up in the cave of our heart." In like manner does the Kaṭhopanishad tell us in an oft-quoted passage that the Ātman is subtler than the subtle and greater than the great, and is pent up within the recesses of our heart. On the other hand, passages are not wanting, as in the Śvetāśvataropanishad and the Kaṭhopanishad, where the Ātman is described as being of the size of a thumb and glorious like the sun; or even again as being as small as the tip of a needle, or a hundredth part of the end of a hair divided into a hundred infinitesimal portions (S. 23. b). What is meant exactly by saying that the Ātman is neither male nor female, that He moves and yet does not move, that He is both far and near, that He is greater than the great and smaller than the small, or that He is of the size of a thumb, only the mystics can know. We, who judge from the outside, can have no idea of how the seeming contradictions may be reconciled in the infinite variety and greatness of the Ātman.

c9.s4.4

16. The Upanishads discuss in many places the psychological and other effects which the realisation of God produces upon the perfected Mystic. "One who knows his identity with the Self and comes to realise that he is the Ātman—for what reason should such a man enter into any feverish bodily activity, for his desires are fulfilled and his end is gained?" (S. 24. a). This is as much to say that when the identification with Ātman comes to take the place of the identification with body in a perfected Mystic, all his desires for bodily accommodation vanish immediately. Then, secondly, "the knots of his heart are broken, all his doubts are solved, and the effects of his actions are annihilated, when once he has seen God who is higher than the highest" (S. 24. b). The doubts which had so long

Cites (4)