The Oceanic Feeling. The Origins of Religious Sentiment in Ancient India

Transcription

1 The Oceanic Feeling The Origins of Religious Sentiment in Ancient India

2 Volume 3 Editors: Bimal K. Matilal Spalding Professor of Eastern Religions and Ethics, Oxford University, England J. Moussaieff Masson Professor of Sanskrit, University of Toronto, Ontario, Canada Editorial Board: Etienne Lamotte University of Louvain, Louvain, Belgium Daniel H. H. Ingalls Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass., U.S.A. John Brough St. John's College, University of Cambridge, England

3 The Oceanic Feeling The Origins of Religious Sentiment in Ancient India by J. Moussaieff Masson D. Reidel Publishing Company Dordrecht; Holland! Boston; U.S.A.! London; England

4 Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Masson, Jeffrey Moussaieff, The oceanic feeling. (Studies of classical India; v. 3) Bibliography: p. Includes index. 1. Mysticism-India-Collected works. 2. Mysticism-Hinduism-Collected works. 3. Psychoanalysis and religion-collected works. 4. Psychology, Religious -Collected works. 5. Mysticism-Psychology-Collected works. I. Title. II. Series. BL2015.M9M '01' ISBN-13: DOl: / e-isbn-13: Published by D. Reidel Publishing Company, P.O. Box 17, 3300 AA Dordrecht, Holland Sold and distributed in the U.S.A. and Canada by Kluwer Boston Inc., Lincoln Building, 160 Old Derby Street, Hingham, MA 02043, U.S.A. In all other countries, sold and distributed by Kluwer Academic Publishers Group, P.O. Box 322, 3300 AH Dordrecht, Holland D. Reidel Publishing Company is a member of the Kluwer Group All Rights Reserved Copyright 1980 by D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht, Holland No Part of the material protected by this copyright notice may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any informational storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the copyright owner

5 Like everything else, for Terri and Simone

6 TABLE OF CONTENTS FOREWORD IX PREFACE by George Devereux I: Introductory Essay on the Application of Psychoanalysis to the Indian Tradition 1 II: The Oceanic Feeling: Origin of the Term 33 III: The Oceanic Feeling: The Surrounding Imagery in the Earliest Sanskrit Texts and its Psychological Implications 51 IV: The Oceanic Feeling: The Image of the Sea 68 V: Monkeys, Children's Literature and Screen-Memories: A Psychological Approach to Enchanted Forests in the Rdmdyw;a 80 VI: Notes on Kubja the Hunchback and Kr~l).a, with some Observations on Perversions 110 VII: Yogic Powers and Symptom-Formation 125 A Personal Epilogue 142 BIBLIOGRAPHY 143 INDEX 208 xiii

7 FOREWORD By way of a personal note, I can reveal to the reader that I was led to Sanskrit by an exposure to Indian philosophy while still a child. These early mystical interests gave way in the university to scholarly pursuits and, through reading the works of Franklin Edgerton, Louis Renou and Etienne Lamotte, I was introduced to the scientific study of the past, to philology and the academic study of an ancient literature. In this period I wrote a number of books on Sanskrit aesthetics, concentrating on the sophisticated Indian notions of suggestion. This work has culminated in a three-volume study of the Dhvanyaloka and the Dhvanyalokalocana, for the Harvard Oriental Series. Eventually I found that I wanted to broaden my concern with India, to learn what was at the universal core of my studies and what could be of interest to everyone. In reading Indian literature, I came across so many bizarre tales and ideas that seemed incomprehensible and removed from the concerns of everyday life that I became troubled. Vedantic ideas of the world as a dream, for example, to which I had been particularly partial, seemed grandiose and megalomanic. I turned away with increasing scepticism from what I felt to be the hysterical outpourings of mystical and religious fanaticism. In order to get as far away as possible from the unintelligible, and impressed by the insights manifested in the works of Freud, Glover, Bernfeld, F enichel and Fliess, I turned to the study of psychoanalysis. I did a full clinical training, a course of study that lasted eight years and included a personal analysis, three years of seminars on the psychoanalytic literature, and supervised control-analyses of three patients seen five days a week. After my training, I gradually became disillusioned with the parochialism and narrow interests of many analysts and, once again, I understood the value of learning a new language, a distant culture and a distant past. I now returned to Indian studies, my enthusiasm rekindled by a new perspective: my scepticism, fed by the absurdity of many of the unworldly assumptions upon which so much of Indian philosophy is based, had eroded my enthusiasm. Now, a new means of approach reawakened my interest and curiosity. Could these writings, these tales and legends, be understood as IX

8 x FOREWORD distorted expressions of ordinary human needs? Disguised pleas for love, affection and attention which we all need and seek in different, often bizarre ways? Was not a classical hysterical psychoneurosis, or an obsessional illness, at root a different expression for the same cravings? Perhaps the word I had used to dismiss what repelled me ('fanaticism') was simply a description in need of further explanation and having its own psychology. What, after all, lies behind the claim to omniscience and to omnipotence? Where do the claims of being able to fly and to walk on water and to speak with spirits stem from? Why would some people claim such powers for themselves, and still other people believe them? Asking these questions and attempting to answer them in a rigorous scientific manner produced the essays which make up this volume. The essays which are the chapters of this book have not been published elsewhere. Written for a variety of occasions, they are tied together by a concern with the application to ancient India of psychoanalytic insights derived from a thorough study of the literature and gained from my clinical practice. The introductory essay was written as a means of reviewing the literature on psychoanalysis and India and introducing the reader to those areas of ancient India that seem amenable to psychoanalytic scrutiny. Chapters Two and Three, given as lectures at the University of California at Berkeley, and Oxford University contain my views on mysticism. I consider the states of feeling manifest in the practice of mysticism to be basically defenses against depression. Chapter Four was delivered before the annual meeting of the American Psychoanalytic Association in Quebec City in Chapter Five was given at the Annual RdmdyalJa Conference held in Berkeley in Chapter Six was a lecture to the annual meeting of the Canadian Society for Asian Studies. As far as I know, nothing had been written on this curious encounter between Kf~l)a and a hunchback. I have gathered together the Sanskrit material, some of it little known, and I have brought out some of the psychological implications by reviewing the literature on sexual perversions. But a satisfying thesis uniting these two areas has yet to emerge. Chapter Seven was first delivered as a lecture at Columbia University, then to the University of California at Berkeley, at the annual meeting of the American Oriental Society in Toronto in 1977, to the University of Vienna,

9 FOREWORD xi and finally to Oxford University. Widely unpopular with audiences, it is nevertheless my favorite essay. Dr. R. Lefeber, Mrs. M. Loring, Professor S. Sandahl-Forgue, Professor B.K. Matilal and Professor Phyllis Granoff offered many helpful suggestions. Professor Robert Goldman read through the manuscript and improved it noticeably. Ms. Pamela MacFarland read the final draft with great care and used her skill with the English language and her considerable knowledge of Sanskrit and psychoanalysis to improve the book. I am grateful to Dr. George Devereux, both for the inspiration I derived from reading his scholarly work and for writing a preface to this volume. My wife Terri---improved my writing, my thinking and the whole book. J. MOUSSAIEFF MASSON Munchen, 1980 Spring