While aesthetic richness has prevailed in Indian spiritual life form ancient times, there has also been a parallel puritanical aspect among Indian people. This puritanism was prevalent in various traditions of monks, and evolved into the systems of Buddhism and Jainism. Monks of these two religious paths prohibited the use of objects that were pleasing to the senses, and prescribed forcible control of the mind and senses, suppression of the emotions and instincts, and renunciation of worldly enjoyments. Those monks who became experts in this austere type of penance often developed supernatural psychic powers like telepathy and hypnotism. Even though Patanjali denounced the attainment of such powers (siddhis) as being impediments to liberation (Yogasutra, IV.36-37) still they tended to have considerable influence on people from all walks of life. Brahmanic thinkers were inflienced as well, but wisely accommodated the ideals and practices of these monks by placing them into the renunciatory and seclusionary periods of a practitioner’s later lifetime (the third and fourth stages which follow the student and householder stages). Tantric theologians did not accept puritanism. Instead they propagated a spiritual path that focused on the simultaneous attainment of enjoyment (bhukti), and liberation (mukti). They accepted both of them as the goal of human life, and developed philosophies and methods that could be followed equally by both monks and householders. They did not approve of any form of forcible control or repression of the mind, emotions, and senses, but rather emphasized that such practices could create adverse reactions that might simply deepen a practitioner’s bondage. — B. N. Pandit, Specific Principles of Kashmir Shaivism (3rd ed., 2008), p. 118.
Posted on: Sun, 20 Apr 2014 22:11:30 +0000
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