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Contents of Part 1
Abstract
Part 1. Mysticism
1.1. History, Antiquity, and the Weight of Authority
1.2. The 'Proximity Text'
1.3. Types of Mystic
1.3.1. Devotional and Non-Devotional
1.3.2. Other Types of Mystic
1.3.3. The Two Practices
1.3.4. The Fully Evolved Bhakti
and Jnani
1.3.5. Via Positiva and Via
Negativa
1.3.6. Theistic and non-Theistic
Spirituality
1.3.7. The Occult
References for part 1
Abstract
This dissertation sets out to examine the evidence
for Socrates as a mystic of a certain type. In Part 1 a view of mysticism
is put forward proposing a crucial distinction between devotional and non-devotional
mysticism (bhakti and jnani), and stressing the importance
of the 'proximity text.' The jnani type of mysticism is then elaborated
on in detail, using three well-known mystics to arrive at a composite portrait.
In Part 2 this portrait of a jnani is used as model against which
evidence for the status of Socrates as mystic is assessed. Part 2 starts
out with an overview of evidence for the historical person of Socrates,
examines the Platonic canon (firstly in a broad-brush manner, and then in
detail with four dialogues), and finally weighs this picture of Socrates
against that portrayed by Xenophon. It is then concluded that the evidence
for Socrates as mystic is substantial, though the weak status of Plato's
Socratic dialogues as 'proximity texts' means that the evidence is not conclusive.
Part 1. Mysticism
1.1. History,
Antiquity, and the Weight of Authority
As this investigation spans many eras and cultures it is important to be
explicit about some of the premises used. One premise that I shall employ
is that human nature is essentially similar across these eras and cultures,
and that we can compare speech and actions between individuals from differing
eras and cultures in a meaningful way. There may be many reasons for disagreeing
with this premise, one of which is the evolutionary/devolutionary standpoint.
Those who believe in the evolution (over the two and a half thousand years
spanning the texts discussed here) of culture would say that we cannot 'return'
to the simplicity of mind of the Athenian or of the 5th century BC setting
for the Buddha's life; those who believe in devolution (such as the Hindus
with their 'Kali Yuga', or the Traditionalists) would say that we are so
'fallen' as to make it almost impossible to understand the lofty heights
of the ancients. Rudolf Steiner argues for a different kind of change over
this time-scale: we have become progressively more 'materialised' and less
aware of our spirit-natures [1]. Cultural theorists place less emphasis on the passage
of time as on ethnic, national and cultural identities, all of which make
relatively inaccessible the minds of those designated as 'other'.
I believe that mysticism involves the study of the deepest and most essential
of human experiences, and hence the cultural argument is invalid in this
context. The evolution/devolution argument is more difficult to reason about,
probably arising from the optimism or pessimism of the individuals holding
the view. The only evidence on this matter from mysticism itself is the
weight given by so many mystics to the present, the eternal now,
to suchness (Hinduism), or to dasein (Eckhart), all of which
point to the insignificance of time, history, epoch.
My premise (that we should in essence ignore differences in time and culture)
has implications concerning the kind of authority that we give to texts
from different eras and cultures. In the introduction to his Sword of
Gnosis Jacob Needleman is inclined to agree with Frithjof Schuon "that
the appearance of a new and complete sacred teaching is an impossibility":
It is quite out of the question that a "revelation,"
in the full sense of the word, should arrive in our time, one comparable,
that is to say, to the imparting of one of the great sutras or any other
primary scripture; the day of revelation is past on this globe and was
so already long ago [2].
Schuon believes in a "Divine Epoch"
when revelation was possible, and finds support for this in all the major
traditions; the current epoch is seen according to the Buddhist tradition,
for example as "the latter times", the most corrupt [3]. While much
of Schuon's writings are insightful into mysticism, this premise that underlies
his work and of the Traditionalist group of thinkers means that iconoclast
and contemporary mystics are ruled out of consideration. He says:
If things were otherwise or if spiritual values
were to be found outside the sacred traditions, the functions of the saints
would have been, not to enliven their religion, but rather to abolish it,
and there would no longer be any religion left on earth, ... [4]
Yet the Buddha, Christ, Kabir, Nanak, Eckhart, and countless others can
be seen as iconoclasts, and either founded new religions or 'enlivened'
their own. The Traditionalists seem to wish that 'revelation' ended with
Mohammed, but this reduces the status for example of two almost universally
accepted 19th and 29th century saints, Ramakrishana and Ramana Maharshi.
The manner of their 'revelation' suggests in both cases that while they
illuminated their tradition, they were not dependent on it. The 'revelations'
of other 20th century luminaries like Gurdjieff and Krishnamurti or mystics
alive at the time of writing (Douglas Harding, Andrew Cohen, and Mother
Meera, to name just a few) are also ignored. Schuon argues that "only
traditional metaphysics does justice both to the rigour of objectivity and
to the rights of subjectivity; it alone is able to explain the unanimity
of the sacred doctrines as well as the meaning of their formal divergences
[5].
" But the works of our contemporary Douglas Harding [6] do exactly
this, locating themselves in all the traditions, and yet providing a revelation
that is genuinely new and appropriate to a democratic era.
In opposition to the Traditionalist view is the Perennialist (which is closer
to the one I wish to adopt), but to argue between them is too difficult
in a short space. The problem that I encounter with the Traditionalist view
is that it leads to a form of authoritarianism: the scriptures and sutras
from the sixth century backwards are 'frozen' both in their form and their
interpretation, whereas if we accept that revelation is continuous we have
a much larger pool of texts to draw on in reaching an understanding of the
mystical and sacred. Also, recent mystics are well-documented, and we can
be much surer, or even certain as to what they said. What, for example,
if Jesus never said that the only path to God was through him? So many assumptions
rest on a text whose origin is doubtful, whose transcription and translation
are open to error, and to centuries of stultifying scholarly and theological
activity. The argument that the 'traditions' are sanctioned by God, and
therefore nothing more recent has authority, is a circular one. On what
basis do we give authority to a revelation just because it is ancient?
In connection, then, with our inquiry into Socrates, I shall draw on mystics
of all eras and cultures for comparison, and, unlike the Traditionalists,
I will, where appropriate, draw on more recent (and hence better-documented)
mystics to illuminate the more ancient.
1.2. The 'Proximity
Text'
In considering texts in mysticism I would like
to argue for a new category of text, called the 'proximity text', which
is a category probably not relevant to other areas of scholarship. If we
can consider a text written or dictated by the mystic as a primary
text, then it would be a common scholarly idea to call texts by non-mystics
such as William James and Evelyn Underhill as secondary texts, where
they draw on primary texts as just defined. A tertiary text would
then be one written by a scholar concerning secondary texts, probably in
order to pursue the methodology and epistemology of studies in mysticism.
The boundaries between primary, secondary, and tertiary texts is always
blurred; for example both James and Underhill have mystical sensitivities
which come from personal experience (though James denied any explicitly
religious experiences); tertiary texts might cite primary texts in their
arguments; and secondary texts may pursue methodological and epistemological
themes.
My category of proximity text is needed in addition to these other
categories to describe a mystical text written by a non-mystic who was a
close associate of the mystic, and with the deliberate intention of conveying
the ideas of the mystic. It is not the same as a secondary text because
it is drawn from direct contact, rather than the writings of the mystic,
though we need to change the definition of secondary texts to include scholarly
writings on primary and proximity texts.
Clearly, a primary text normally carries more weight than a proximity text
as evidence regarding a particular mystic, and for the understanding of
mysticism in general. By definition, the writer of the proximity text is
not a mystic, otherwise it would be a primary text. In the rare case that
a mystic wrote about another mystic one would have the difficult job of
deciding whether the evidence found in it was to be used in constructing
a picture of the writer or the subject (in fact we might find ourselves
in this position with Plato), where there was no other reliable evidence.
However, the proximity text suffers from two major problems: firstly it
may be unduly sycophantic or apologetic, or secondly it may be deliberately
distorted to serve the interests of its author. A third problem, implicit
in its nature, is that it somehow adumbrates the original. At its best however
a proximity text gives us a clear picture of the mystic's teaching and manner,
and can add valuable supporting and biographical detail. Very often the
'proximity' here will be the closeness of a disciple to his or her Master,
and this closeness can tell us a lot about transmission, putting in proportion
the twin phenomena of darshan and dharma (presence and teachings).
In fact our knowledge about many of the mystics comes almost entirely from
proximity texts.
In connection with our enquiry into Socrates, we will be asking if either
or both of Plato's and Xenophon's Socratic Dialogues are proximity texts
as defined here. The oral traditions that preceded writing in both the West
and East are another factor in considering texts, and are a form of proximity
text at some remove.
1.3. Types of
Mystic
In the study of mysticism since William James' seminal work The Varieties
of Religious Experience the emphasis has been on mystical experience,
rather than on the teachings of the mystic, or the person of the mystic,
though the latter are also important. The emphasis on mystical experience
probably has two origins; firstly in the widespread feeling that it is the
'core data' of mysticism (as dreams might be for psychoanalysis) and secondly
because it counters the Church tradition of placing the weight on authority
rather than personal experience. The Variety of Religious Experience
followed Richard Maurice Bucke's Cosmic Consciousness and was undoubtedly
influenced by it, but Bucke placed the emphasis on transformation rather
than experience. He gives the following criteria for the 'cosmic sense'
of the mystic which is a state or continuum, rather than an experience:
The subjective light
The moral elevation
The intellectual illumination
The sense of immortality
The loss of the fear of death
The loss of the sense of sin
The suddenness, instantaneousness of the awakening
The previous character of the man intellectual, moral and physical
The age of illumination
The added charm to the personality so that men and women are always (?)
(sic) strongly attracted to the person.
The transfiguration of the subject of change as seen by others when the
cosmic sense is actually present [7].
Later scholars, from Underhill to Happold, have followed James' emphasis
rather than Bucke's, but in this investigation of Socrates I will revert
to Bucke's priorities. In fact I prefer to place transmission first,
teachings second, and mystical experience third, where the term 'transmission'
is intended to convey something of the Eastern term darshan sitting
with the Master. However this is not mean to be a radical departure from
current scholarship on mysticism, but just a slight changing of priorities.
It means for example placing slightly more weight on a proximity text written
by an author in direct contact with the mystic than on texts coming out
of an oral tradition, however reliable we believe that tradition to be.
The late Oxford scholar R.C.Zaehner used three terms to distinguish different
types of mysticism: panenhenic, monistic, and theistic
[8]. Zaehner as
a Catholic prioritised these terms, so that theistic mysticism (a God-oriented
mysticism) was 'sacred', and the other two 'profane'. Panenhenic mysticism
is, broadly speaking, nature mysticism, while monistic mysticism is the
form in which the mystic finds union, but no 'other', i.e. no God. In this
dissertation I will use, instead of Zaehner's terms, two Indian words bhakti
and jnani, which correspond roughly to theistic and monistic respectively.
I am proposing that this binary divide, while recognising that other forms
of mysticism exist, will be the most useful in examining Socrates. They
will be given equal weight, unlike in Zaehner's system, and shown to be
mutually interdependent.
1.3.1. Devotional
and Non-Devotional
The best English translations of the terms bhakti and jnani
are probably 'devotional' and 'non-devotional', and in suggesting this I
am highlighting early on the difficulty for understanding jnani in
the West. The devotional is well-understood, and the word 'piety' (important
in Plato and the trial of Socrates) generally has a devotional implication.
Through the history of the dominant religion in the West, Christianity,
we are presented with saints and mystics as examples of the devotional:
Teresa of Avila, Richard Rolle, Mother Julian of Norwich are just a few.
It appears to the Western mind to make little sense to have a complementary
list of saints and mystics who are categorised as non-devotional, because
what else is there? In the East, jnani is well-understood, and to
the list of devotional (bhakti) mystics and saints such as Ramakrishna,
Chaitanya, Rumi, and Kabir, one can run a complementary list of jnani
mystics and saints such as Vivekananda, Ramana Maharshi, Patanjali, and
of course, the Buddha. While Buddhism is essentially a jnani religion,
as Christianity is essentially a bhakti religion, Hinduism seems,
remarkably, to embrace both polarities. Ramakrishna, as one of the great
Hindus of more recent times used this invocation:
"Greeting to the feet of the Jnani [seeker
on the path of awareness (knowledge)]! Greeting to the feet of the Bhakta
[seeker on the path of devotion]! Greeting to the devout who believe in
the formless God! Greeting to those who believe in God with form! Greeting
to the men of old who knew Brahman! Greeting to the modern knowers of Truth.
" [9]
Ramakrishna, in discussion with disciples, continuously probed the question
of 'God with or without form'; a recognition that the religious seeker could
equally express their search and conclusions in theistic or non-theistic
terms. This is not widely understood in the West. His great disciple, Vivekananda,
said this of Ramakrishna: "Outwardly he was all Bhakta, but inwardly
all Jnani. I am the exact opposite." [10] Hinduism had evolved a language
that could deal with the polarities of bhakti and jnani, while
recognising at the same time that the two are inseparably linked.
In psychology a distinction is drawn between the heart-oriented and the
head-oriented person, though this is often used rather crassly. Despite
this I think that the distinction is tremendously useful if we see it as
a disposition rather than a complete description: the heart-oriented person
tends to initially react to situations through feeling, while the
head-oriented person tends to initially react to situations through
thinking. The crass view that the thinking person does not feel and vice
versa is not sustainable or useful, and in bhakti and jnani
similar assumptions also do not work. However the distinction, and its parallel
in psychology, is too important to lose just because it has been caricatured.
1.3.2. Other Types
of Mystic
We have seen that Zaehner proposed a third type
of mystic, the panenhenic or nature mystic (and he included drug-induced
experiences in this category), while the tradition in India is that in addition
to jnani and bhakti there is a third path, karma yoga,
the path of action or good works. Gurdjieff proposed that a third path was
in fact the path of the fakir, "the way of the struggle with
the body ... physical will over the body." [11]
While recognising these possibilities, they
are not particularly relevant to what we know of Socrates.
1.3.3. The Two
Practices
Practice and teachings in jnani mysticism can be said to centre around
meditation, while practice and teachings in bhakti mysticism
centre around prayer. I have chosen the terms meditation and prayer
as a shorthand for the practices within the two paths, and, because of the
widely differing uses of these terms, they need careful definition for the
purposes of this dissertation. The term meditation is often used synonymously
with contemplation, and there is no generally accepted definition across
academicians, religious traditions and cultures. Hence I will give a precise
definition in the recognition that the reader may disagree with it, but
I would ask that the reader either accept it for now, or translate it mentally
into their preferred equivalent.
meditation: an inward-oriented stilling of the mind with no object
contemplation: an inward- or outward-oriented stilling of the mind
focusing on an object.
The Chambers dictionary reflects the general confusion between these terms,
defining them in terms of each other, and also in terms of 'deep thought'.
However, I have followed etymology as far as possible: the root of meditation
is (probably) the Latin mederi to heal, so meditation has connotations
of healing and wholeness, consonant with the absence of the fragmenting
and splintering effect of discursive thought. The etymology of contemplation
indicates both completeness and the marking out of a temple or place of
worship, indicating perhaps that the activity has more of an object
than meditation. Clearly, however, the distinction made here between meditation
and contemplation is not widely supported, but its temporary adoption will
make subsequent debate more clear.
I want to define another term, cogitation, in clear distinction to the other
two:
cogitation: deep or profound thinking in a discursive manner, involving
language
The root of cogitation is the Latin cogitare to think deeply, and
is quite distinct from the Latin root cognitum from which comes cognition,
cognitive etc. The definition of cogitation is not as problematic as the
other two, and is usefully associated for most people with Descartes famous
'cogito ergo sum'. All three terms, with the specialised meaning given here,
are associated with jnani, though the confusion between meditation
and cogitation is prevalent in the West and makes for difficulty in understanding
jnani. The term 'ratiocination' is also used as an alternative to
cogitation, and has an implication of logic or rationality.
In the same way that I have made a distinction in the practice of jnani
between meditation and contemplation, based on whether or not there is an
object, I would like to do the same for the practice of bhakti. The
bhakti's whole orientation and meaning is to love the divine, rather
than to know it; to be penetrated by it, rather than to penetrate it; to
be passive rather than active. Yet within this intense love there are clearly
those who insist on an object, either God or one of His prophets (in Otto
the 'wholly other'), and those who (having merged with this object) have
remaining only an objectless love. I will use the terms worship and prayer
to distinguish these two states or activities, in the full awareness that
the definitions used here have little or no wider currency:
prayer: the state or action of divine love without an object
worship: the state or action of divine love with an object
It is implicit in the definitions here that meditation is a more advanced
form than contemplation, and prayer a more advanced form than worship. This
is a contentious point, but as later arguments do not hinge on any prioritisation
of the terms, we can leave the question open. For now I wish to use meditation
to stand for the practice of the jnani and prayer to stand
for the practice of the bhakti, asking merely that the reader accept
this as just a form of shorthand.
1.3.4. The Fully
Evolved Bhakti and Jnani
There is some evidence that the fully evolved mystic, while having travelled
either of our two major paths, is then equally conversant with both, thought
it is probably fair to suppose that the initial predilection which predisposed
the individual to one or other major path is still intact (Ramakrishna is
a good example of this). If we accept Patanjali as a mystic for the sake
of argument (his identity is not, in keeping with Indian tradition, well-documented),
then he merely makes a nod at the devotional: a single statement: Ihwarapranidhanatwa,
meaning "Success is also attained by those who surrender to God [12] ," is
included in his Yoga Sutras for the sake of completeness, otherwise
they comprise a classic Indian treatise on the jnani path of awareness
and will.
1.3.5. Via Positiva
and Via Negativa
It is worth introducing at this point another distinction, widely held to
be useful, between via positiva and via negativa. Via negativa
is the more easily defined of the two: it is the path to mystical union
via the denying of all manifest things. The work of Dyonisius the Areopagite
is perhaps the best example in a Western context, but the same principles
are found as far afield as in branches of Hinduism ('neti, neti' meaning
'not this, not that' is its Indian formulation); in Buddhism (in the very
concept of nirvana or nothingness); and in modern sages like Krishnamurti
and Douglas Harding. Via negativa carries with it associations of
withdrawal, solitude, contemplation, silence, simplicity, and renunciation,
though these are often caricatured, as in the supposed Christian 'heresy'
of quietism.
Via positiva is the path of expansion, a growing capacity to lose
boundaries and temporality until one becomes the Whole. Perhaps the best
exponent of this path is Walt Whitman (though this may be an unfamiliar
proposition). One might more readily recognise via positiva in an
ecstatic like Rumi or Kabir. Because of the expansiveness of love,
and of spiritual love in particular, one tends to associate bhakti
with via positiva and jnani with via negativa, but
I believe that one should be wary of an automatic link.
1.3.6. Theistic
and non-Theistic Spirituality
The West has some difficulty with the concept of a non-theistic spirituality
in the same way that it has difficulty with a non-devotional spirituality.
'Religion without God isn't that a contradiction in terms?' asks Gail Vines
in a recent article in the Times Higher Education Supplement. The
article discusses the Sea of Faith Christian movement sparked recently
by the Cambridge priest Don Cupitt in connection with a MORI poll that showed
that while only 43% of Britons believe in God 67% believe themselves to
be religious [13]. In the East the idea of a non-theistic religiousness
is more widespread, and is at the heart of Buddhism, for example.
It might seem that a bhakti would automatically speak in terms of
God, or gods, while a jnani would not, but it may not always be so.
The Sea of Faith group, including the Church of England vicar Anthony Freeman,
has a parallel in the Jewish faith: Reconstructionist Judaism, which also
does not believe in God. These groups probably represent the jnani
instinct within Christianity and Judaism, and are groping towards a non-theistic
language that their tradition does not readily provide. Eckhart, as far
back as the thirteenth century, was a jnani who had to bend the devotional
language of Christianity to his purposes, as we shall see.
1.3.7. The Occult
Before looking in more detail at the jnani type of mystic, I would
like to delineate the territories of the occult from that of the mystical.
Again we find little agreement on the precise meaning of these terms, but
for the purposes of this dissertation it will be useful to make a temporary
distinction at least. I would like to use the term occult for to cover the
world of disembodied beings such as the spirits of the departed, angels
and ghosts, and for the paranormal. It also includes astrology, alchemy,
and all cosmologies and cosmogenies that lie outside of conventional science.
By this definition Rudolf Steiner, for example, is an occultist par excellence,
though he is not a mystic, for his concern is not with union, or transcendence.
However, the territories overlap considerably, as some occultists are
concerned with union or transcendence, and many mystics show an interest
in occult matters. I believe however that most genuine mystics are wary
of the occult, and advise against an involvement with it. Reincarnation
is a subject that is essentially an occult one, but some mystics make it
part of their teachings or cosmogenies. It is not essential to mysticism,
but, as it occurs widely in Plato, it will be discussed.
References for Part
1
[1]
See, for example: Steiner. R. The Evolution of Consciousness, Rudolf
Steiner Press, 1966, pp. 49-50
[2]
Needleman, Jacob, The Sword of Gnosis, London, Boston and Henley:
Arkana, 1986, p. 17
[3]
Schuon, Frithjof, "No Activity without Truth" in Needleman, Jacob,
The Sword of Gnosis, London, Boston and Henley: Arkana, 1986, p.
29 and p. 33
[4]
Schuon, Frithjof, "No Activity without Truth" in Needleman, Jacob,
The Sword of Gnosis, London, Boston and Henley: Arkana, 1986, p.
34
[5]
Schuon, Frithjof, "No Activity without Truth" in Needleman, Jacob,
The Sword of Gnosis, London, Boston and Henley: Arkana, 1986, p.
32
[6]
See for example Harding, D.E. Head Off Stress - Beyond the Bottom Line,
London: Arkana, 1990, and Harding, D.E. On Having No Head - Zen and
the Rediscovery of the Obvious, London: Arkana, 1986
[7]
Bucke, R.M. Cosmic Consciousness - A Study in the Evolution of the Human
Mind, Olympia Press, London, 1972, p.71
[8]
Zaehner, R.C. Mysticism Sacred and Profane: an Inquiry into some Varieties
of Praeternatural Experience, Oxford 1957
[9]
Rolland, Romain, The Life of Ramakrishna, Calcutta: Advaita Ashrama
(Publication Department), 1992, p.1
[10]
Rolland, Romain, The Life of Ramakrishna, Calcutta: Advaita Ashrama
(Publication Department), 1992, p. 236
[11]
Ouspensky, P.D. In Search of the Miraculous - Fragments of an Unknown
Teaching, Arkana, p. 44
[12]
This translation from Rajneesh, Yoga, the Science of the Soul, Volume
II, Oregon: Rashneesh Foundation, International, 1984, p.69; see also
Feuerstein, Georg, The Yoga Sutras - A New Translation and Commentary,
Rochester, Vermont: Inner Traditions International, 1989, p. 42
[13]
Vines, Gail A Godless Creed, Times Higher Educational Supplement,
July 19th 1996.
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