passions and emotions in the indian philosophical-religious traditions- some preliminary remarks

8/3/2019 Passions and Emotions in the Indian Philosophical-Religious Traditions- Some Preliminary Remarks

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Anyone enquiring into the status of passions and emotionsin traditional India is surprised to find that the subcontinent, soavid for analysis in every field of knowledge, has never produced

any science similar to western psychology. As a first response,what comes to mind is the gymnosophists answer to Socrateswho was questioning him about mans nature: But how can wedeal with the human before knowing about the divine? Too busycontemplating the fearful symmetries of the supernatural, werethe Indians consequently not particularly interested inuntangling the developments of human behaviour? The absenceof psychology, as an independent discipline at least, appears allthe more surprising if one considers that the Indians have neverlacked a capacity either for introspection or for cataloguing. Withthe former, they have achieved results never surpassed in

research on the two realities which, since they naturally coincidewith the observer-subject, lend themselves the more readily toeluding observation. I refer to breathing, the breath of life,literally dissected by yoga, and language, the subject of the mostdiscerning analysis that mankind has ever devoted to this


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Passions and Emotions in the Indian Philosophical-Religious.. 161

fundamental and pervasive reality. The Indians have never been

in short supply with regard to their cataloguing ability and, onthe contrary, have raised it to even maniacal levels, so that it isrampant in all scientific, aesthetic, philosophical and religiousliterature and is often one of the prime reasons making itsreading so arduous. The first great philosophical system todevelop from Upaniadic and epic speculation was given thename Skhya, meaning connected with enumeration, listing.

It is in fact in philosophical texts, starting precisely fromthose of the Skhya school, that we should look for a thesaurusof human passions and emotions, analysed and classified withobstinate accuracy and an absolutely neutral and scientific grasp,

as in the classical texts of Vaieika, or else with a mixture ofcoldness and preoccupation, as often occurs in Buddhist and Jainatexts that describe them, keeping their gaze fixed on themeditating devotee who might be threatened by them. But theresearcher into Indian passions and emotions will soon discoverwith equal surprise that he must delve into treatises on aestheticsand rhetoric perhaps even more than into philosophical andreligious texts. Risking here, moreover, losing both the readerand himself in labyrinthine systematics, in his investigation ofthe essence of poetry and the theatre, the Indian rhetoricianmust first tackle mans basic passions/emotions (bhva), which

the poet or actor must portray so that the reader or spectator cansavour their essence, finally liberated from the restrictions of theindividual ego.

If, now satiated by descriptions - albeit sometimes of greatprecision - the researcher of passions wishes to discover howthey are assessed in the Indian world, things become even morecomplicated. They are differently assessed according to thesubjects social position, his belonging to one or another of thefour basic states of life (rama), and according to caste. Whileanger and disdain (manyu), as Minoru Hara has demonstrated inone of his seminal lexical analyses, are generally reprehensible inthe man of the street, they are even obligatory for thosebelonging to the katriya class of sovereigns and warriors (Hara2001).


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162 Sanskrit-Vimara

In examining the philosophical-religious texts of Hinduism

on such themes, we must first be aware that by far the greaterpart of them comes from the Brahmanic lite, which thus seeks toenvelop the entire Indian reality in its coils. Our first impressionafter observing the central stream of Brahmanic thought is of aconsiderable integration mostly absent in the West1 - of theindividuals physical, psychic-emotive and intellectualdimensions. A single nature runs through them uninterruptedly:it passes fluidly from one level to another, gradually includingthe animal and vegetal worlds. In the words of Louis Dumont(1975: 30, quoted in Bouillier-Tarabout 2002: Introduction, 18):

Il n'y a pas de coupure entre l'homme et la nature. La

chose est sensible dans le vtement - le corps s'enrouledans une pice d'toffe -, dans la simplicit de viematrielle et la forme des objets d'usage courant. Enmusique, l'heure de la journe prescrit le tonsentimental de la mlodie: impossible d'tre nostalgiquele matin et gai le soir

(There is no hiatus between man and nature. This isappreciable in clothing the body wraps itself in a pieceof cloth or in the simplicity of material life and the formof objects we use every day. In music, the time of dayprescribes the sentimental mode of the melody:impossible to be nostalgic in the morning and gay in theevening...)

Albeit deeply rooted in common opinion, such a view ishowever substantially a blunder: far from being absent, dualismis merely radicalised to the extreme. In Skhya for example and Skhya with its cosmogenesis remains the model for muchof later Brahmanic speculation (cf. Torella 1999) an apparentlyunbridgeable abyss separates the world of nature (prakti) comprising the body, senses, passions and mental functionsforming an integrated whole from the world of the spirit, alone

responsible for striking the spark of consciousness, withoutwhich the continual gross activity of the sensorial faculties, of theinner sense, of the I-notion and the intellect could never finally

1. Among the most conspicuous exceptions is Aristotle.


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shine as knowledge. An integrated monism of body, senses,

emotions and intellectual faculties consequently does exist butleaves out that very principle that alone can give meaning to thewhole. The goal is not the final achieving of greater unity, but therecognition of an irremediable otherness, having reached which,the psyche-body-nature complex progressively withdraws fromthe scene, like a dancer, recounts a famous stanza of theSkhya-krik (v. 59), having presented her performance to heraudience, leaving the spirit to shine in undisturbed solitude. Thematerial, emotional and psychic universe thus comes intoexistence solely so that the soul can recognise itself as beingforeign to it and isolate itself in its own self-identity. Even this

recognition is made possible by the action ofprakti itself, whichthus finds in its own negation its ultimate reason for existence.

Based on such a premise, two alternatives are possible: toaccentuate the integrated and unitary aspect of the body-senses-psyche-intellect complex, or to concentrate on the otherness ofthe knower principle, the spirit. Brahmanic philosophy and,mutatis mutandis, Jaina and even Buddhist philosophy, despite aprogrammatic rejection of any substantiality of the subject decidedly take the second alternative, the option that we might,somewhat roughly, term ascetic. The whole fermenting energypotential of human drives, including the intellectual, which the

West would on the other hand place on the other side, is seen astroublesome ballast from which man must free himself. Solelyover the desert of body and passions can the moon of the spiritrise. An incurable ontological weakness undermines the roots ofwhatever is tinted with pleasure or sorrow, or arouses desire oraversion. The whole human adventure may thus take on a fainteroutline or sometimes a more sombre one, as in the scenariodepicted by the Vedntin Surevara in its sub-commentary onthe Taittirya-Upaniad, which explores mans wretchedness rightfrom his mothers uterus, a place of ineffable delights for theWest.

anubht pursahy may marmacchido sakt |karambhavluks tapt y dahanty aubhayn ||

jharnalasatapt pittkhyarasaviplua |garbhaye nimagna t dahanty atibha tu mm ||


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164 Sanskrit-Vimara

audaryakmivaktri kalmalikaakai |tulyni vitudanty rta prvsthikrakacrditam ||

garbhe durgandhabhyihe jhargnipradpite |dukha maypta yat tasmt kanya kumbhipkajam ||

Having entered this uterus [the foetus is speaking], I amsuffering unbearable, devastating pain. Several times in pastexistences I have fallen into the scorching sands of hell that burnwicked souls, but these drops of bile superheated by the fires ofdigestion make my tender body suffer much more. Stomachworms with mouths as sharp as thorns torture me, alreadytortured enough by the bones of my mothers body that cut intome on all sides. The miseries of the hell of Kumbhipka arenothing compared to the tortures I experience in the uterus, fullof the most disgusting miasmas that burn owing to the stomachsdigestive fire.1

Conception was achieved during a rude nocturnal encounter,all heaviness and no grace:

nijvidymahjlasavtadhiaa pumn |mohotthnalakmkhyavaipahtaya ||

tamas kmargea sakalpkaraena sa |rgkhyavialepena tito viayeun ||

grahvia ivna codito janyakarma |yoidagni pataty u jyotirlobht patagavat ||

The mind enveloped in the suffocating coils of innateignorance, the heart dragged away by the hook of insatiable lustborn of obnubilation, the father of the yet unborn is assailed bydarkness, pierced by the arrows of the objects of the sensespoisoned by passion and shot by the bow of desire drawn by hisresolution. Deprived of all control as though a demon possessedhim, driven by the karma of the creature yet unborn, [the fatherto be] plunges rapidly into the womans fire, like a moth avid forthe flame. 2

1. Taittiryopaniadbhyavrttikam, Brahmavall,prathamakhaa, vv.191-194 (p. 86).

2. ibid. vv. 166-168 (p. 81).


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In a manner no less atrocious than life in the uterus is

presented the moment of birth and infancy and youth as theycome along tormented by sexual desire, blinded alternately byone passion or other, by love and anger -, up to the rabidimpotence of old age. The epilogue that follows is not exactly anapotheosis:

h knte h dhane putra krandamna sudruam |maka iva sarpea gryate mtyun nara ||

[]

virmavkasada khalu jvaloka ||

sya sya vsavka samet

prata pratas tena tena praynti |

tyaktvnyonya ta ca vka vihag

yadvat tadvaj jtayo jtaya ca ||

mtibja bhavej janma janmabja tath mti |ghaiyantravad arnto bambhramty ania nara ||

While weeping bitterly over his beloved, his wealth and theson he has to leave, the man is swallowed up by death, like a toadby a serpent. [] This world of mortals is indeed like a tree usedfor shelter. One evening birds perch on it in search of a haven for

the night and next morning leave it and fly away each whereverhe will. Similarly, men encounter, for a brief time, friends orstrangers in this world and then disperse. Birth leads to deathand death to birth: thus, men ceaselessly circle forever, like thewheel the draws water from the well.1

The element around which the whole body-senses-emotionsconstellation seems to turn is attachment, desire. In any finalanalysis, it is from its grip that man must free himself to risetoward the tman or nirva. Even a text certainly not focusedon asceticism, like the Bhagavadgt, does not fail to launch a

lengthy, venomous attack against desire:arjuna uvca:

atha kena prayukto 'ya ppa carati prua |

1. ibid. vv. 212-221 (pp. 89-90).


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166 Sanskrit-Vimara

anicchann api vreya bald iva niyojita ||

rbhagavn uvca:kma ea krodha ea rajoguasamudbhava |mahno mahppm viddhy enam iha vairiam ||

dhmenvriyate vahnir yathdaro malena ca |yatholbenvto garbhas tath tenedam vtam ||

vta jnam etena jnino nityavairi |kmarpea kaunteya duprenalena ca ||

indriyi mano buddhir asydhihnam ucyate |etair vimohayaty ea jnam vtya dehinm ||

tasmt tvam indriyy dau niyamya bharatarabha |ppmna prajahihy ena jnavijnananam ||

Arjuna said: Moved by what does man do evil? By what is hedriven almost by force, O Ka? The Blessed One replied: It isdesire (kma) that drives him, it is anger, arising from the rajas1component. This is the great devourer, the great Evil One.Recognise in it your enemy. As fire is covered by smoke, as themirror is covered by a spot and the embryo by the womb, so isour knowledge covered by it [desire]. By this reality that takesthe shape of desire, a fire that nothing satiates, eternal enemy ofthe knower subject, knowledge is covered. Of desire, the senses,the mind and the intellect are the substrate. Through themdesire, covering knowledge, beclouds the incarnate soul.Therefore, O Bull among the Bharatas, curb first of all the senses

1. Desire and anger are deemed strictly as a pair, or rather as twoaspects of the same reality. As akara says in his commentary onthis passage, it is frustrated desire that is transformed into anger.Rajas, along with sattva and tamas (a doctrine belonging toSkhya, significantly present in the Bhagavadgt) are at the sametime psychic states and cosmic forces - an ambiguity that isunresolved in classical Skhya, which inherits and unites highly

differentiated ancient doctrines. Sattva is characterized by joy andlight: it is gentle and illuminating: rajas is characterized by anabsence of joy and by dynamism: it is unstable and stimulating:tamas is characterized by inertia and restriction: it is heavy andobstructive. Passions and emotions are, of course, expressions ofthe rajas component.


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and then abandon this Evil One who destroys knowledge and

spiritual science. (III.36-41)The Kashmiri recension of the Bhagavadgt lays it on

thicker, inserting, after the first verses of Kas reply, fivefurther verses:

arjuna uvca:

bhavaty ea katha ka katha caiva vivardhate |kimtmaka kimcra tan mamcakva pcchata ||

rbhagavn uvca:

ea skma para atru dehinm indriyeu ha |

sukhatantra ivsno mohayan prtha tihati ||kmakrodhamayo ghora stambhaharasamudbhava |ahakro bhimntm dustara ppakarmabhi ||

haram asya nivartyaia okam asya dadti ca |bhaya csya karoty ea mohayas tu muhur muhu ||

sa ea kalua kudra cchidraprek dhanajaya |rajapravtto mohtm manuym upadrava ||

Arjuna said: But how is it born, O Ka, and how does itgrow? What is its essence, what its operation? Answer, I pray you,this my question. The Blessed One replied: It is the subtle enemy,

supreme, of bodily beings and the senses. It appears as aninstrument of pleasure, O Prtha, but in reality it obfuscates.Cruel, its essence being desire and rage, source of the evilpleasure of pride, cause of the ego, by nature presumptuous, onlywith difficulty can it be overcome by the wicked. First it takespleasure from man and gives him sorrow and, that done, fills himwith terror, obfuscating him increasingly. It is dark, vile, it spieson the weak points, O Arjuna; it is born of rubedo [rajas] and itsessence is obfuscation: it is the plague of mankind.1

One of the five major vows absolutely required by the

highest Jaina ideal (the other four being non-violence,truthfulness, honesty and absence of greed) is itself continence. Itis defined as follows by Hemacandras : Yogastra

1. III.38-42 (cf. Abhinavaguptas Bhagavadgtrthasagraha pp. 55-56).


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168 Sanskrit-Vimara

divyaudrikakmn ktnumatakritai |manovkkyatas tygo brahmdasadh matam ||

The eighteen kinds of continence, in our tradition, consistof abandoning desires (kma) with regard to heavenly, humanand animal beings, in mind, word and body, whether oneexperiences them oneself, or approves their enjoyment, orensures that others enjoy them. (I.23, p. 200)

Equipped with such readings, the first to filter throughsystematically in the West and to be firmly fixed in communisopinio, how often must the western traveller, landing in India inthe expectancy of an ascetic and disincarnate world, have beenstunned by the untiring proliferation of colours, odours andsounds of life in all its most splendid and ephemeral forms!

Consequently it seems that something is not right, or thatthere is at least a hiatus between the theories and prescriptionsof traditional philosophical-religious texts and what then occursin real life. This, however, is only a part of the truth. Indeed,there exists a highly significant sector of Indian thought andreligious experience Tantrism that became increasinglyimportant until it imbued the whole spiritual life of India startingfrom the Middle Ages, which literally turns the tables. Withregard to Hemacandras passage on desire, what the greatest

master of Tantrism, the aiva Abhinavagupta, says in one of hismost difficult works, the Mlinvijayavrttika, is in totalopposition:

kma svkartum icchaiva tadcchdanayogata |viva sdhayet km kmatattvam ida yata ||

Desire (kma) is the will to take possession [of the other] (to makethe other oneself). Veiling everything with his desire, the desirercan accomplish everything, since everything has as its ultimateprinciple desire itself. (I.281)

And again:

ki nkarati ki naia [read: caia] na bhvayati yogavit |tata evocyate stre nrakto rajayed iti ||


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Whoever knows this path, what may he not draw to himself

or realise mentally? For this very reason, traditional texts say,He who is not impassioned cannot arouse passion [in others].

(I.279)

The energy of desire, according to ivaite Tantrism, is whatis manifest in the fruition and enjoyment of the senses, thatwhich gives life to the ferment of the emotions, which has one ofits peaks in the passion of love. The whole universe is pervadedby this energy, the sole matrix of any form of dynamism and life,whose single thread crosses both the most extreme abstractionsof thought and our modest daily round. The first worship that thedevotee is bound to render is to the goddesses of his ownconsciousness (svasavid-devs), who are none other than thekaraevars, the mistresses of his sensorial faculties.1 Thesacrificial offering is thus made of everything within the boundsof ordinary life which, when all is said and done, is not all thatordinary. Neither clarified butter nor flowers are offered to thegoddesss icon, but increasingly penetrating and intenseenjoyments to those unbridled goddesses that are our senses. Asstated in a verse of the Mlinvijayottara-tantra:

bandhamokv ubhv etv indriy jagur budh |vightni [nightni?] bandhya vimuktni vimuktaye ||

The cause of both bonds and liberation are the senses: thisis what the wise said. Fettered they lead to bonds, freed they leadto liberation. (XV.44)

This is echoed by Abhinavagupta in the Tantrloka:

antarindhanasabhram anapekyaiva nityaa |jjvalty akhilkaughaprastograikha ikh ||

bodhgnau tde bhv viantas tasya sanmaha |udrecayanto gacchanti homakarmanimittatm ||

Perennially, whatever the fuel provided, burns within us the

blazing fire of all our senses. The various knowable things,entering this consciential fire and increasing its radiance,thereby become the cause of oblation. (IV.201-202)

1. See particularly the Dehasthadevatcakra-stotra Hymn to the wheelof deities residing in the body, edited by Pandey 1963: 952-953.


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170 Sanskrit-Vimara

To yoga, which requires firstly detachment (vairgya) and

repetitious and gradual practice (abhysa), the aivaite Tantraresponds by opposing to the former attachment and passion(rga), and to the latter the silent vortex of the moment ( kaa).But why attachment and passion and, first and foremost, what isin this word rga whose semantic area is so evasive? Rgaattachment, affection, but also colour or the fact of beingcoloured by emotions in aivaite theology and psychologyconstitutes one of the individuals three innermost cuirasses,the concept of cuirass being complex and many-faceted,irresistibly recalling Wilhelm Reichs similar motif.1 It is a factaccepted by all, say the aivaite masters, that there is no action in

ordinary life that does not proceed from an idea or expectation ofpleasure. Furthermore, the most disparate philosophical schoolsand prescriptive texts coincide in considering rga as the root ofall feelings, emotions and mental activities. The universe herethe great Abhinavagupta is again speaking (Tantrloka IX.62) was created in order to satisfy souls, in which a frenzy (lolik), afeverish craving for enjoyment had been roused. This subtlefrenzy has neither outline nor horizon: it may be said to be adesiring condition without an object (Jayaratha: nikarmaabhilit), a state of undefined expectation (Jayaratha: lolik

svtmani skkateva). Tantrism is aware that it must take this

into account first of all.In order to act on these profound structures, traditional

yoga seems like a blunted weapon.

vastuto sti na kasypi yoggasybhyupyat |svarpa hy asya nrpam avacchedavivarjant ||

upyo py anupyo syygavttinirodhata |recanpraair e rahit tanuvtanau ||

trayaty evam tmna bhedasgaragocart |nimajamnam apy etan mano vaiayike rase ||

nntarrdratvam abhyeti nicchidra tumbaka yath |svapanthna hayasyeva manaso ye nirundhate ||

1. Reich 1973. On the doctrine of the cuirasses in Tantrism, seeTorella 1998.


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te tatkhaanyogd dhvaty unmrgakoibhi |kisvid etad iti pryo dukhe py utkahate mana ||

sukhd api virjyeta jnd etad ida [tv iti ?] |tathhi gurur dikad bahudh svakasane ||

andraviraktyaiva galantndriyavttaya |yvat tu viniyamyante tvat tvad vikurvate ||

In actual fact, no member of Yoga can really serve as ameans of achieving the condition ofanuttara that which nothingtranscends. The means to it is, in fact, a non-means, since itcomprises neither ritual practices nor suppression of the mentalfunctions. It is a boat designed for a light breeze, without

exhalation or inhalation1

, which thereby carries itself beyond theocean of duality, albeit in the meantime the mind is immersed inthe fluid of the objective world. We must bear in mind that thehusk cannot be separated from the grain unless it is soaked. Weconsider what we are headed for when we decide to place thenatural course of the mind under control, as when we wish to puta bridle on a wild horse. As a result of the violence of theprocedures, the mind like the horse starts running here andthere, taking innumerable wrong directions. Why does thisoccur? We all know well that the mind can take pleasure even inpain and, vice-versa, withdraw disgusted from pleasure and

knowledge. This is what the master demonstrates in variousforms in his treatise:2 the impulses of the senses can only bethrown off thanks to a highly special kind of detachment, adetachment practiced in elegant souplesse. On the contrary, if wetry to subdue them, they end up becoming ungovernable.(Mlinvijayavrttika II.106-112)

Passions and emotions are consequently allowed to flowfreely without attempting to safeguard the mind from theirimpact. Not only: Passion should not be extinguished by reason,but reason converted into passion (except that here it is not a

1. This is a clear allusion to yoga practices focused on breathing.2. Here Abhinavagupta is possibly referring to Vmanadatta and his

Svabodhodayamajar; on this interesting, and very peculiar, text seeTorella 2000.


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172 Sanskrit-Vimara

Tantric master speaking, but the early XIX c. Italian poet and

philosopher Giacomo Leopardi in his Zibaldone).

1

1. It is worth presenting the full passage in which the sentence quotedabove is contained. Ma la ragione non mai efficace come lapassione. Sentite i filosofi. Bisogna fare che l'uomo si muova per laragione come, anzi pi assai che per la passione, anzi si muova perla sola ragione e dovere. Bubbole. La natura degli uomini e dellecose, pu ben esser corrotta, ma non corretta. E se lasciassimo farealla natura, le cose andrebbero benissimo, non ostante la dettasuperiorit della passione sulla ragione. Non bisogna estinguer lapassione colla ragione, ma convertir la ragione in passione; fare cheil dovere la virt l'eroismo ec. diventino passioni. Tali sono per

natura. Tali erano presso gli antichi, e le cose andavano moltomeglio. Ma quando la sola passione del mondo l'egoismo, allora siha ben ragione di gridar contro la passione. Ma come spegnerl'egoismo colla ragione che n' la nutrice, dissipando le illusioni? Esenza ci, l'uomo privo di passioni, non si muoverebbe per loro, maneanche per la ragione, perch le cose son fatte cos, e non sipossono cambiare, ch la ragione non forza viva n motrice, el'uomo non far altro che divenirne indolente, inattivo, immobile,indifferente, infingardo, com' divenuto in grandissima parte. (22ottobre 1820) (G. Leopardi, Zibaldone di pensieri, a cura di F. Flora, vol.I, Milano, Mondadori, 1937, pp. 173-174). [But reason is never aseffective as passion. Listen to the philosophers. Men should be led

to act in accordance with reason as much as, indeed much morethan, out of passion; in fact their actions should be determinedsolely by reason and duty. Nonsense. The nature of human beingsand other things can easily be corrupted but not corrected. And ifwe let nature take its course, things would run very smoothly,despite the said dominance of passion over reason. Rather thanextinguish passion with reason, it would be better to turn reasoninto passion: to make duty, virtue, heroism etc. become passions. Sothey are in nature. So they were among the ancients, and thingswere much better. But when the only passion in the world isegoism then it is right to cry out against passion. But how canselfishness be eliminated by reason, which fosters it by destroying

illusions? And without it, a man deprived of passions would not bemotivated by them, or by reason, either, because things are likethat, and cannot change, reason is neither a living nor a motiveforce, and man will do nothing but become lazy, inactive, immobile,indifferent, uncaring, as in large parte he has become. (22 Oct.1820).] I wish to heartily thank Michael Caesar and Franco D'Intino


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Indeed, Tantrism, especially in its most extreme forms, goes

far beyond any instrumental acceptance of the emotivedimension (for the purpose of neutralising it). If the divine is firstand foremost energy that unites and overwhelms all provisionallevels of being, it is in the tumult of the passions that we bestmeet it face to face. Emotional states, whether sexual excitementor fright, joy or terror, not only should not be obliterated, anymore than they should be merely accepted. They should becultivated, skilfully intensified and then exploded and spread inorder to create subtle rents in the veil of ordinary existence,through which we can contact the magma of universalconsciousness/energy. Liberation does not occur therefore in

spite of human passions, but precisely by virtue of them. By wayof a provisional conclusion, we may use a passage from theKiraa-tantra (IV.29a), which ventures, if possible, even farther:Without the body, there can be no liberation (na dehena vinmukti).

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