Jednom - i nikad više
Ostaci

Kad se arheolozi bave ostacima velikih gradova i starih civilizacija, povremeno ih snimaju iz visine, da bi dobili celovit pregled, generalni plan. Katkad se osećam kao da sa velike visine vidim sebe razbacanog, poput ostataka neke građevine. Ali, veći deo vremena kao da provodim uz neki zid i samo čeprkam tu i tamo, tražeći slučajno izgubljenu stvar, možda neku naušnicu, ili narukvicu, ili neku namerno skrivenu (a zaboravljenu) dragocenost, ostavljenu za mirnija i bolja vremena koja nikad nisu došla.

Kao mali, gledajući iznošeni kaput svog dede i rasklimatane stvari njegovog domaćinstva, pomišljao sam: mora biti da je jednom, u nekom vremenu pre mene, sve to bilo novo, celo. Pokušavao sam da zamislim to vreme, nekakav početak, kad su njegovo domaćinstvo — pa i njih dvoje, baka i on — bili novi, mladi, lepi.

Tako sada nastojim da zamislim, da sebi predstavim tog velikog čoveka u jednom komadu, čije ostatke nalazim u sebi (i oko sebe, u knjigama, ili slikama koje sam stvorio). Ako ostaci postoje, mora da je nekad postojala i celina koju su oni činili. Kada je to moglo biti i kako je on stvarno izgledao — potpuno mi izmiče.

Čini mi se da je Đakometi pred kraj života imao slično osećanje, ali u gorem vidu, kad je rekao: "Čak i kad ne bi bilo ništa ono što sam do sada uradio (u poređenju sa onim što želim da uradim) i uprkos mojoj izvesnosti da sam do sada omašio i da mi sve, čega se poduhvatim, izmiče između prstiju, imam više želje da radim nego ikad. Razumete li vi to? Ja to ne razumem, ali tako je. Vidim sve svoje skulpture ispred sebe: svaku, čak i one koje sam prividno dovršio, a svaka je fragment, svaka je neuspeh. Tačno tako — neuspeh! Ali, u svakoj je nešto od onoga što bih želeo da stvorim jednog dana. U jednoj je nešto od toga, u drugoj nešto drugo, a u trećoj nešto što nedostaje u one dve. Ali, skulptura o kojoj ja mislim, sadrži sve ono što se javlja rasuto i fragmentarno u drugim skulpturama. To mi daje želju, sveobuhvatnu želju, da nastavim svoj rad — tako da ću jednog dana možda dostići svoj cilj."

Epifanija

U junu 1996., jedne večeri ispratio sam ženu na železničku stanicu. Dok sam stajao ispred vagona, pojavila se jedna prosjakinja — išla je od vagona do vagona i mimikom se obraćala putnicima na prozorima, tražeći da joj nešto udele. Na svoje zaprepašćenje, u jednom trenutku sam je prepoznao. Zar je moguće da je to ona — prosjakinja koju poznajem od pre četrdeset godina, kad sam u tom kraju (u Karađorđevoj ulici) stanovao? Poslednji put sam je video 1956, pre nego smo se odselili iz tog kraja na Dorćol.

U to vreme ona je mogla imati oko dvadesetak godina. Mi smo se skupljali da igramo fudbal u malom parkiću prekoputa sadašnje autobuske stanice, a ona se tu muvala, uvek se mimikom obraćajući namernicima. Najviše me je začudilo da se tako malo promenila, ali možda je tako samo izgledalo — zbog slabog osvetljenja. Pošto je bila Ciganka i imala crnu kosu, jedina upadljiva promena je bila njena proseda kosa.

U međuvremenu, voz je krenuo, žagor se pojačao i ja sam se pozdravio sa ženom, poželevši joj srećan put. Kad se voz izgubio u tami, ostao sam stojeći na peronu, zagledan u daljinu, sa sledom misli koji sam jedva uspevao da pratim.

Prosjakinja mi je sada izgledala kao neki stožer u vremenu. Sa čuđenjem sam pomislio: pa ona i sada živi kao pre 40 godina. Izgledalo mi je to kao neka nepravda — zašto da Bog osudi nekoga da bude 40 godina prosjak? Bez napretka, bez nazadovanja — ali, šta ja, uostalom, znam o napredovanju, ili nazadovanju u prosjačkom svetu, pa i svetu uopšte?

Da sam mogao tada da s njom progovorim, možda bih je pitao: "Kako ste podnosili svoju sudbinu svo ovo vreme, kakvog smisla za vas ima ovaj život? Da li ste istrajavali, govoreći sebi: jednog dana kad se izgradi socijalizam, društvo će preuzeti brigu o prosjacima i ubogima. Ili, možda: jednog dana kad se izgradi kapitalizam, ja ću imati kiosk sa kokicama, ili, čak, kobasicama. Ili: živeću kako bude, a Bog sve gleda i daće mi platu nebesku. Ili, kao neki egzistencijalista: istrajavam u svojoj egzistenciji, koja je prava, takva kakva je — ko živ, ko mrtav."

Sartr je govorio o "suvišnim postojanjima" u jednom parku, a sada mi je izgledalo da smo, ona i ja — u ovim godinama posle III balkanskog rata, na ovoj stanici — suvišna postojanja. S druge strane, ona mi je izgledala kao neka karika, koja je za mene povezivala 40 godina — vreme između prvih pitanja i poslednjih odgovora.

Kad je učenik spreman, učitelj je tu, kaže indijska poslovica. Ona je bila (ponovo) tu — posle 40 godina — jer sam ja bio spreman (za odgovore). Njeno prisustvo mi je govorilo kao ona stabla Prustu: "Ono što od mene ne saznaš večeras, nećeš saznati nikada. Ako dopustiš da padnem u zaborav iz koga sam se uzdigla do tebe, čitav jedan deo tebe, koji sam pokušala da ti donesem, pašće zauvek u bezdan".

Onda sam shvatio — u njoj nije bilo nedoumice, jer nije bilo ni pitanja — ona mi je dala odgovor, iako nije mogla ništa da mi kaže.

Gluvonema prosjakinja je bila epifanija. Sad sam mogao mirno da umrem, ili mirno da živim — svejedno. Shvatio sam — da nema šta da se shvati. Nije to bila obeshrabrujuća misao. Naprotiv.

Ona nije mogla reći u čemu je smisao života, ne zato što joj je on postao jasan, ali neizreciv — nego zato što joj se nije ni postavljao. Osim toga — bila je gluvonema.

Jezički osvešćeni filozofi su važno isticali: granice mog sveta su granice mog jezika (diskursa). A gluvonema prosjakinja mi je sad rekla: granice mog sveta su granice moje nemosti. Vi zanemite kad stignete do granica jezika — ja sam nema sve vreme.

Njeno postojanje mi je izgledalo kao kontrast u odnosu na sve one promene koje su se odigrale za to vreme, u rasponu od četrdeset godina. U međuvremenu je stvoren i srušen Berlinski zid. Stvarana je i razorena Jugoslavija, uzdizano i rastureno bratstvo i jedinstvo. Živeli su i umrli moji roditelji i pojedini prijatelji.

Pomislio sam: pa ona je bila pošteđena svih onih velikih reči i uverenja koja su tutnjala svih ovih godina — drugovi koji su smenili gospodu i gospoda koja su smenila drugove, za nju su bili samo prolaznici — kojima se može, ili ne može, prići i tražiti milostinja.

Ako je apsolut ono jedno i nepromenljivo — kako su verovali stari metafizičari — onda je ova prosjakinja njegovo ovaploćenje (parousija). Ona je bila otelovljenje nepromenljivosti, u sveopštoj promenljivosti i prolaznosti. Drugi ljudi su menjali zanimanja i karijere, ideološka uverenja, ateizam i pobožnost, političke pripadnosti, državljanstva i zakletve, domovine i azile, bogatili se i siromašili, pljačkali, ili bili opljačkani. Ona je bila uvek na istom. Nije mogla da se obogati, nije mogla da osiromaši. Nije postala ateista, niti vernik, nije menjala ideologiju, ni stranku, ni zanimanje - nije napredovala niti nazadovala. Nije stigla do penzije i nije se plašila (ako ode u penziju), da je neće ceniti, da će joj penzija biti mala.

Ona je bila ironično, poetsko otkrovenje suštine univerzuma. Bila je to ironija univerzuma, suština sveta u kome se ukupnost mase i energije ne menja, iako neprekidno menja oblike.

Vitgenštajn je zaključio da smo svi gluvonemi kad je reč o poslednjim istinama — da se one ne mogu izreći, nego samo pokazati. Meni je bubnjalo u ušima, kao da mi je prosjakinja vikala u uvo: "Ja sam put i istina — niko ne može shvatiti smisao života, osim kroz mene."

Da li su na to mislili kada su govorili o poučavanju bez reči? Nisam mogao reći šta sam to saznao, ali to je bilo ispred mene, takoreći opipljivo. Setio sam se indijske priče o slepcima koji su opipavali slona (tj. istinu), ali je svaki mogao samo delimično da ga opipa i svakome je izmicala celina. Za mene je istina ovde, sada, bila opipljiva i cela — zacelo.

Gluvonema prosjakinja je prekoračila granicu svoje nemosti i mog jezika. Ona mi je rekla ono što je nisam mogao pitati i ono što (ona) nije mogla da mi saopšti — čak ni jezikom gluvonemih. Iako nije mogla da čuje pitanje, niti da izrekne odgovor, svojim prisustvom, svojim javljanjem, ona mi je dala odgovor na ono što se i nije moglo postaviti kao pitanje — u čemu je smisao života, kakvo je značenje vremena?

Bio je to apsolutni, nadilazeći paradoks — onaj koji je Ale (Alphonse Allais, 1855—1905) hteo da izrazi kad je "komponovao" posmrtni marš za gluvog čoveka, ili Kejdž (John Cage, 1912—1992), kad je "komponovao" i "izveo" svoju kompoziciju "Tišina" (ili 4'33") — muzika namenjena gluvonemoj prosjakiniji i njenim učenicima — tišina posle odlaska voza, na peronu beogradske železničke stanice, u kasno junsko veče.

Pogledao sam sat na staničnoj zgradi — bilo je skoro 11. Izgledalo mi je da sam već dugo tu, a ja sam stajao zanet manje od pet minuta. Ljudi koji su — kao i ja — došli na ispraćaj, već su se razišli.

Potražio sam pogledom prosjakinju. Misleći da je sigurno još uvek tu negde, želeo sam da joj zahvalim. Išao sam duž perona, ali nje nije nigde bilo.

LIFE AND LONGING

- With examples from Chinese poetry

When I was young I was longing for the life experiences I thought were awaiting me in the future. Now, being over fifty, I know that experiences awaited me - but not the ones I expected. Some of them are better, some are worse than I expected. So, I cannot say that life fulfilled my longing, but it relieved me of a great burden. My burden was a feeling that I was cheated and treated unjustly by life.

Best years of our life

Until ten years ago I was somehow feeling that I was preparing myself for the great days in life to come, for the bright future that was still to come. Then one day, all of a sudden, I felt that the best days of my life were not in front of me, awaiting me in the future, but behind, already in the past. I read about the same experience, described by the French writer Marcel Proust, who died in 1922. Somehow, we both have shared this feeling of being cheated by life -it has put something before us as a bait, and then, before we could reach the bait, it disappeared. I felt that this was not fair - as if life "promised" me something, but did not keep the promise.

Winner or loser?

I seem to have passed the prime of life empty-handed, with a feeling of a loser. I was feeling that life has treated me unjustly -that I did my best, but was not rewarded for the effort.
Then, I remembered a quotation from K'uran , the holy Muslim book, which says:
I swear by time
And by the unreliable destiny
That man is always at loss
And so it is until the end of time. (sura 103)
After several years I considered another way of reasoning. Maybe life is not to blame. I thought that life promised me something in exchange for my promise to work hard, and be "a good boy." Perhaps my longing projected some hopes for the future that could not be fulfilled. When time forced me to see that these shall not be fulfilled, I felt cheated, and I had to give up my hopes. Now, my hopes were not any more part of future expectation, but part of a remembered past, my hopes became my memories.
Later, I changed the perspective, following my own advice, that I gave to a young man, several years ago. This is what he said: "I always thought that my life would have meaning if I could go toward a single goal, like an arrow shot toward its target. But somehow I cannot see what should be that target, and when I catch a glimpse of a possible goal, myriad of difficulties arise in front. Therefore, I fell confused and without direction."
I gave him an answer by example. Being an archer, one shiny day I took him to a beautiful field where I never practiced archery. I brought the target and said: "See, no matter how good an archer, he can shoot more or less close to the center. In many cases he will miss it. Now, consider a different practice -and I took an arrow, pulled the bow and shot the arrow aimlessly up in the air. After a big free flight it fell down and struck between the grass blades. I said: ''See, if you shoot like this - just for the love of flying -you always hit the center, because the center is on the spot where the arrow falls. So, maybe you should consider giving your life a more free course, instead of compulsively searching for the target, sticking to one option, and a straight trajectory."
I am not sure was this, in his case, a good advice, because I know that some people need an opposite advice -they lead a completely aimless life, and would really benefit from searching and finding the target that would give them direction, and stediness. Anyway, this proved to be a good advice for me. I do not feel any more cheated by life, nor do I feel that life did me wrong. For someone maybe this is ''nothing special", but I feel much better than I felt before.

Burden and ease

During life-time our longing takes different courses and turns.
When we are young, we long to separate, to get away from the supervision of parents, and start a life of our own. However, in many cases this may be contrary to our parents' wish, who long to keep us more close to them. Sometimes these contrary longings clash, sometimes they find a happy compromise. But in many cases there is much suffering involved on both sides. Later, when you have your own children, you change sides - now you wish to keep them more close to your supervision, but they oppose, and develope lives contrary to your expectations and wishes. Also, you can, sometimes, be caught in-between your parents, and your children, especially when -both sides at the same time - are expecting support from you. That is why many people go through life (as if) carrying a burden, or a "cross".
In Christianity there is a famous dictum of Jesus Christ: "And whoever does not accept his cross and follow after me, is not worthy of me" (Bible, Matthew, 10: 38).
In Ch'an Buddhism there is a story related with Pu-tai (whose biography appears in Ch'uan-teng Lu, fasc. 27), and who lived during the T'ang Dynasty (died in 916). He is popularly known now as Laughing Buddha, or Happy Chinaman. It is said that he always went around carrying a huge bag -a bottomless source of benevolence, full of gifts for children.
Once a Ch'an master stopped him and asked him :
- What is the meaning (the essence) of Ch'an?
Pu-tai immediately stoped and plopped his sack down on the ground. Master understood this as his answer ("The essence of Ch'an is to give you relief ffrom your burden"), and asked further:
- What is the actualization (the function) of Ch'an.
At once Pu-tai swung the sack over his shoulder and continued on his way.
Ha! - thought the master - this means that once you have the essence you return to daily life again and take over the ussual burden, but with new mind!
Anyway, no matter do we consider our burden - (a) as a cross that we have to carry because of our past sins, and as a ticket for our future salvation, or (b) as a heavy sack of benevolence towards others - it seems to be related with being human. Every person shares a certain lot (burden).
Trying to get rid of all burden, and to turn everyone and everything into a support for oneself, turns a man into a monster. However, such monsters are not rare in human kind, although they have various success and careers -some manage to manipulate nations, or corporations, while some have power only over several persons.
For virtuous people relationship with such men is a particular problem, and the subject is dealt with beautifully in Chuang Tzu, ch. IV (''In the World of Men"): "You may go and play in his bird cage... If he listens, then sing; if not, keep still."

Longing for relationship and intimacy

In young age, persons also feel a general longing (without a definite goal, or object), longing for experiences, and relationships. Perhaps this longing comes from the same source as the longing of the chick to get out of the egg, or of the butterfly to free itself of the cocoon.
This longing is found in a poem recorded by Meng Ch'i, in his Pen-shih shih /Original Incidents of the Poems/, written during the T'ang dynasty. The lonely Palace maiden was longing for a close relationship. So, she inscribed a poem on a tree leaf, letting it down a flowing stream, to drift outside the palace walls. The poem was as follows:
Once I entered the palace depths.
The spring of life was closed for me forever.
Now, I entrust my poem to a strip of leaf,
Hoping it will reach a man of feeling.
However, a person may long for a relationship even if not closed inside a palace. Sometimes persons have a feeling that life itself is like a palace with high walls, and they feel that they are closed in life -closed within existing relationships, that are without warmth and tenderness, empty and cold.
The French painter Van Gogh /19th cent./, wrote to his brother: "Some people have a big fire-place in their souls, but no one ever approaches it to warm up; passers-by just notice some smoke above the chimney and go their way without stopping." He was fighting bravely against loneliness and feeling of abandonment. At the end, he was overwhelmed by loneliness, and committed suicide, unable to keep his sanity.
It does not matter does one feel like a maiden closed in a palace, like a butterfly in a silk cocoon, or like a isolated fire-place. Basically, it is the same longing -to reach out for a fruitfull relationship.
The initial longing is a valuable energy in human beings and whole life. By itself, it is only a general potential -thirst for life, wish to experience and go through life. It can be invested in evil -those who destroy and kill give us examples for that. It can be invested in virtue, and inspire humans to find out things, to undertake arduous enterprises and hardships in order to reach lofty goals.
It can remain in its crude form -as will for power, property, or fame -or it can be sublimed for higher aspirations. It can take various courses even in the same person, in which case the person is contradictory - with opposite traits.
However, most people manage to compromise, developing a dominant guiding line in their life. In modern times, it usually centers round their profession. For most people profession is a strong identification center, and when they have to give it up and retire, this seems hard, or impossible.

Mask and face

In various traditions there is a story of a man who wanted to hide his identity behind a mask. He wore a mask for many years, Finally, one day he decided to get rid of it and to appear again with his original face, but it was impossible -the mask has become his face.
Most often, we identify with a certain profession. After many years, when we should retire, we are not willing to do that, because we feel we do not have any other identity. Our personality has been spent up in our profession. However, for most people, usually in late age, but sometimes before /if they change the profession/, it is necessary to find a new center of identity.
"From Three Dynasties on down, everyone in the world has altered his inborn nature because of some thing. The petty man? -he will risk death for the sake of profit. The knight? -he will risk it for the sake of fame. The high official? -he will risk it for family; the sage' -he will risk it for the world. All these various men go about the business in a different way, and are tagged differently when it comes to fame and reputation; but in blighting their inborn nature, and risking their lives for something, they are the same" /Chuang Tzu, ch. 8/

Longing for reunion

We can see that longing undergoes some change during life. When one is young, his longing is directed towards the future, towards the expected experiences and things of life: love, offspring, material, or spiritual attainments. In old age one may have /or may not have/ a feeling that he has attained or realized the goals of his youthful longing. In most cases his longing makes a turn in the deep seat of consciousness. It no longer faces the future, but mostly the past -he remembers his past experiences and attainments, with a longing for the "good old times'!
The most rare kind are those who always seem "to be young at heart" (a refrain in a tune, sung long time ago by Frank Sinatra). They -even in old age -seem to have a childlike enthusiasm, readiness to forget the old pain, and injustice, to start anew every day without resentment, as if nothing bad ever happened. They always seem to consider the world afresh, as a vast screen for new expectations, a great store of opportunities.
One type of longing is most common -to fulfill some particular desire related with a definite object, or situation. This longing has two principal forms. It can be a longing for a particular relationship, that is either expected to happen, or to continue. Or it can be a longing for something lost, actually, a wish for reunion. When we search through poetry, it seem that we find more examples for the second type of longing - wish for reunion.
The Chinese poet Li Shang-yin /812 -858/, from T'ang dynasty, left in his poems fine examples of longing:
Coming was an empty promise, you have gone and left no footprint.
The moonlight slants above the roof, already the fifth watch sounds.
Dreams of remote partings, cries which cannot summon.
Hurrying to finish the letter, ink which will not thicken.
The light of the candle half encloses kingfishers threaded in gold,
The smell of musk comes faintly through embroidered water lilies.
Young Liu complained that Fairy Hill is far.
Past Fairy Hill, range above range, ten thousand mountains rise.
/"Seven love poems", poem 5/

With Li Po /or Li Bai, 691 -762/, from T'ang dynasty. we find examples of longing for reunion, in his poem "To someone far away".
When she was here
pretty darling
flowers filled the hall.
Now she's gone
pretty darling
left her bed behind.
On her bed
the embroidered coverlet
rolled up
never slept in again.
Three years to the day
still keeps
the scent of her.

Fragrance never lost
pretty darling
never came back.

Longing and patience

In ancient Greece the poetess Sappho wrote: "I know that in this world man cannot have the best, yet to pray for a part of what was once shared, is better than to forget it."
In myth related with Orpheus we find a beautiful story how longing -being always more or less impatient -can wreck an opportunity for reunion.
-Orpheus was in love with Eurydice, but one day she died of a snake bite. With his lamenting songs Orpheus touched Pluto, the terrible Lord of the Underworld. He permitted him to lead Eurydice back to the world of living, but under one condition. It was stipulated that Orpheus must not look back to see whether Eurydice really follows him (on the upward journey), until he is completely beyond the confines of the Underworld. But the impatience and longing were too strong for Orpheus. He looked back too soon, only to see Eurydice, with a desperate glance, being drawn back again - and thus he lost her forever.
After that he was longing for Eurydice, but this was longing for something with no hope of retrieving.
Longing for something that will never be again, that is definitely out of reach, is a particular subject of poetry; it causes hopelessness, which is hard to bear.
In an old Chinese tune from Sung dynasty it is said:
When will the last flower fall, the last moon fade?
So many sorrows lie behind.
Again last night the east wind filled my room.
O gaze not on the lost kingdom under this bright moon.

Still in her light, my palace gleams as jade
Only from bright cheeks beauty dies.
To-know the sum of human suffering
Look at this river rolling eastward in the spring.
/''The Beautiful Lady Yu"/

In many cases longing for the irretrievable is related with the death of the beloved. We find this in a tune by Su Shih /1037 -1101/, from Sung dynasty:
For ten years the living and the dead have been severed;
Though not thinking of you,
Naturally I cannot forget.
Your lonely grave is a thousand miles away,
Nowhere to tell my grief.
Even if we could meet, you would not recognize me;
My face is all covered with dust,
The hair at my temples shows frosty.
/"The Charms of Nien-nu"/

Longing for youth

But longing for something (usually) irretrievable is not the last mode of longing. Among irretrievable objects, most irretrievable is one's youth.
In certain periods of life longing seems to tire of itself, and one is not capable to feel with previous freshness and intensity. There is lack of enthusiasm, versatility, readiness to feel and run after experience. Sometimes this is related with aging, but not necessarily.
When that happens one may feel a longing for previous freshness and intensity; usually this is "longing for youth" The Serbian writer Bora Stankovic /1876-1928/ was fascinated by this sentiment. In his play Koshtana, the main character, an aged man laments:
"Nothing is wrong with me, I am healthy, but I suffer. I suffer of myself, because I am alive. /.../ Why has my heart withered, my strength dispersed, and I am aged... Do you know what is the black-sorrow-of-the-hearth (Turkish: kara-sevdah)? That is my sickness. Being of old age, but still feeling the lust for life... still craving for beauty and tenderness..."
This is a particular twist of longing -a person feels weary, but part of the impulse is still present, and there is a longing for former days and ways, when craving seemed related with something possible.

Being tired of life

When the French writer Jean-Paul Sartre /1905-1980/ wrote his novel Nausea he was thirty, but it was the voice of a tired man.
Bloomings, blossomings everywhere, my ears were buzzing with existence...'But why' I thought, 'why so many existences, since they all resemble one another?' /.../ They did not want to exist, only they could not help it; that was the point. /.../ Tired and old, they went on existing... simply because they were too weak to die... Every existent is born without reason, prolongs itself out of weakness, and dies by chance. /.../ But no necessary being can explain existence: contingency is not an illusion... it is absolute, and consequently perfect gratuitousness /Nausea, ch. "Six o'clock. in the evening"/.
"Man is a useless passion" - concludes Sartre at the end of ch. 4 in Being and Nothingness.
This tiredness sometimes arises even in hearts of young men and women. It may be a pre-sentiment of weariness, and despondency that people feel with more justification when they are hit by some personal or collective catastrophy, or when they are tired of life in old age. We can also find this mood in Indian Buddhism:
There is no fire like passion, no capturer like hartred,
There is no net like delusion, no torrent like craving.
/Dhammapada, 2:3/

The value of the useless

Is it the same thought, as in Sartre -is it useless to flourish? Are our passion and our longing useless, and absurd? Have we been cheated by life and becoming? Is our longing just a cunning invention of nature to make us take over and carry our crosses, and sacks for decades, before we tire up, or realize the uselessness? And the Gods join to persuade us that it is our holy duty to do so?
Taoism and Buddhism go beyond the point where Sartre stops. Lao Tzu said:
See, all things howsoever they flourish
Return from the root from which they grew.
But he adds: This return to the root is called Quietness;
Quietness is called submission to Fate;
What has submitted to Fate has become part of the always-so
To know the always-so is to be Illumined;
Not to know it, means to go blindly to disaster /Ch. 16/.
At the very end of ch. 4 in Chuang Tzu we find a famous remark: "All men know the use of the useful, but nobody knows the use of the useless." Perhaps old Rome -beside silk and china-ware -imported from old China some wisdom as well, and Publius Ovidius Naso /43 B.C.-18 A.D./, says in his Ex Ponto /II,7.47/: "Nothing is so usefull as arts that are of no use" /Magis utile nil est artibus bisque nil utilitatis habent/.
So far, three answers seem possible, and I think that all are legitimate; neither can be prescribed as exclusive and valid for everyone. It is possible to affirm the will to flourish, again and again, as Nietzsche would say: "Let it be -once again" Or to say with Sartre: "No more -I find it useless and absurd" Or to agree with Buddhism and look for release from the wheel of becoming and longing.

Longing for release

With the third, longing seems to come to its final goal and form -longing for release /from longing/. Is it possible for longing to go beyond itself, and reach that peace of mind that liberates from longing? This is -at the same time -most simple, and most complex.
In Hsin-hsin Ming, a Ch'an text from the eight century, we find the following lines with a possible answer.
The best way is not difficult
It only excludes picking and choosing
Once you stop loving and hating
It will enlighten itself.

To set longing against loathing
Makes the mind sick.
Not knowing the deep meaning /of the Way/
It is useless to quiet thoughts.

If the mind does not discriminate
All things are of one suchness.
In the deep essence of one suchness
Resolutely neglect conditions.

When all things are held as even
You return again to spontaneity.
Put an end to the cause
And nothing can be compared.

One is all
All is one -
Merely with such ability
Worry not for finality.
/Stanzas 1,3,24,25,35/
What is the real difficulty? If you want to go beyond longing - and not only give it up in despair and/or unsatisfied thirst, which will lead you to a new birth, repeating the story all over - release should not be an object of your longing.

Bibliography

- Anthology of Chinese literature /1965/, ed.by C. Birch, Penguin
- Auden, W.H. /1976/: The Portable Greek Reader, New York, Viking
- The Complete Yorks of Chuang Tzu, /1968/, trans. by B. Watson, New York.
Columbia Un. Press
- Evans, B. /1972/: Dictionary of Mythology, New York, Laurel
- Levy, H.S. /1968/: "The Original Incidents of the Poems", Sinologica,
Vol. X, No 1, Basel, Switzerland,/pp 1-51/
- Pajin, D. /1985/: "On Faith in Mind -Translation and Analysis of the Hsin-hsin Ming", Journal of Oriental Studies, Vol. XXVI, No.2, Univer. of Hong Kong /pp.-776-288/
- Sartre, J-P. /1965/: Nausea, Penguin
- Sartre, J-P. /1969/: Being and Nothingness, London, Methuen
- Waley, A. /1968/: The Way and its Power -Study of the Tao Te Ching, London,
Allen & Unwin.

Remembrance And Recognition In The Transpersonal Perspective Of The Aesthetic Way

Dusan Pajin, Ph.D. Belgrade University



It is said that transpersonal psychology "proceeds on the assumption that human beings possess potentialities that surpass the limits of the normally: developed ego" (Washburn, 1988: V). Based on examples from philosophy, religion, and aesthetics, this essay proceeds to prove an assumption that human beings possess potentialities that surpass the limits of normally developed cognitive functions, like remembrance and recognition.

In cognitive psychology remembrance and recognition are functions or mental abilities useful in coping with life, and getting what one wants in life (biological values: adapting, survival, reproduction). Therefore, in egoic perspective remembrance and recognition help in dealing with the world at large.

In existential or psycho-therapeutic perspective one can remember traumatic conditioning, double binds, recognize unconscious drives and feelings, the life plan Or script etc. On existential level remembrance and recognition are factors of a reflective recollection on the meaning and aim of life. One superposes various stages and parts of his/her past, making a balance sheet of life.

Remembrance and recognition in a meditative and therapeutic context can serve in resolving the experiences possibly related to past incarnation(s) - if such an option is involved - i. e. in breaking "the spell of past karma".

On the transpersonal levels remembrance and recognition serve not to make up life-history and to maintain the egoic identity of "my family, my life, my personality", but rather to disentangle one from the partiality of "my-ness", considering the interplay of individual and generic. In this way one can recognize the comon exemplified (or denominator) in his/her existence - how individual life situations articulate anew the main stages in the life of man (or woman) in general. With the inner reflective freedom one can recognize the "other" (transpersonal) self, or the "eternal witness" of Vedic seers. In a transpersonal setting remembrance and recognition can also be related with the aesthetic experience, and the "aesthetic way" appears to be a specific path to the transegoic stage.

As egoic functions remembrance and recognition help to strenghten ego-boundaries. In a transpersonal perspective they are functions of transcendence. The egoic and personal bring the feeling of isolation, contingency, and finally a tragic sense of life (I against the world, destiny, gods...).

Transpersonal perspective opens the mind for the realization that one exists as a web of mutually conditioned relationships - that man is related to the totality of existence (experience of the Boundless), and that (after all) this relation is positive. While developing the ego, such conditioning and connection are constricted, or repressed, in order that the personality can deve1op (as a subject with integrity, and self-will), and survive (as a self-reliable entity).But once the ego is developed and is strong enough, one can move to transpersonal levels, which seem like (or resemble) regression, or pre-egoic structures (possible confusion is related to the "pre/trans fallacy" as explained by Wilber).

Mann said that if transpersonal psychology "can develop analytic categories that permit us to see the commonalities as well as the divergencies among the many ways of approaching the absolute, it will have greatly enriched the human community" (Mann, 1984: 119). In this line we proceed to analyse different contexts in which we find elaborations of remembrance and recognition that speak in favour of the transpersona1 perspective. Analysis that follows should be labeled as "transpersonal" - i. e., "commited to the possibility of unifying spiritual and psychological perspectives" (Washburn, 1988: 1).

Remembrance in Plato

Myth can be understood as a solid memory of metaphorical occurences, and situations from illo tempore (primordial time - therefore it begins: "long, long time ago..."). Myth-telling and later, recital and drama, help man to recollect and remember these occurences, and to recognize the same pattern repeating in his life, in actual time (Oedipus killed his father on the road - in public trafic people kill each other in accidents, or anger, daily).

It is a process of double recognition: in myth and drama man recognizes the patterns of happenings which he remembers from his, or other peoples lives, and in his, or other people's lives, one recognizes the pattern exemplified in myth or drama.

With Plato's theory of anamnesis (remembrance, recollection) we leave aesthetics and approach epistemology, we part with poetry and drama, and enter philosophy. In the former case, remembering meant keeping in memory what has been told and retold in tradition. With Plato, remembrance and recollection refer to a special faculty and protohistory of the soul, "recollection of the things (i.e. ideas:— D.P.) formerly seen by our soul when it traveled in the divine company" (Phaedrus, 249 b.). This means that the soul (phyche) has seen and known something before birth, and after birth it has forgotten this knowledge. But, why?

There are two reasons: one is prenatal, the other postnatal. In The Republic (620) Plato explains, in the myth of Er, that before the souls are reborn (incarnated) each has to drink from the River of Forgetfulness (Lethe). As they drink they forget everything they have seen and known in the world beyond.1) New oblivion or forgetfulness adds to this after birth. "Because every pleasure and pain has a sort of rivet with which it fastens the soul to the body and pins it down and makes it corporeal, accepting as true whatever the body certifies" (Phaedo, 83).

However, under the guidance and help from philosophy, the willing soul can remember its knowledge (noesis, episteme), and recognize its true identity, and independence from the body.

The main point is that this knowledge is actualy nothing new for the soul - it is potentially there all the time, but obscured by ignorance which is oblivion. The same goes for the independance and identity of the soul. It is pure and free from becoming and decay. But, obscured by emotions, it accepts "as true whatever the body certifies", and is excluded from the "fellowship with the pure and uniform and divine". The main task of philosophy is, therefore, not to impart some new knowledge, really unfamiliar to the soul, but to help it to remember. Ignorance is oblivion, knowledge is recollection, "learning is just recollection (anamnesis)" (Phaedo, 72—76).

Without help the "pregnancy" of the soul (holding this memory) is only a potential, because, under oblivion, the soul is the willing prisoner of the body.

"Every seeker after wisdom knows that up to the time when philosophy takes it over, his soul is a helpless prisoner... and wallowing in utter ignorance. And philosophy can see that the imprisonment is ingeniously effected by prisoners own active desire, which makes him first accessory to his own confinement" (Phaedo, 82).

The possibility of liberation from this confinement rests upon three factors. The one is anamnesis,the other is philosophy, or guidance by a philosopher, and the third are sensible objects. The third factor (sensible objects) is important, because (in the dualism of his idealism) Plato ascribes a double role to the sensible world. On the one hand it deludes the soul, keeps it in ignorance and bondage, as a source of pain and pleasure of the body, on the other hand it serves (as help) in recovering knowledge.

"... We acquired our knowledge before our birth, and lost it at the moment of birth - but afterwards, by the exercise of our senses upon sensible objects, recover the knowledge which we had once before . . ." (Phaedo, 75).

However, only few people retain an adequate rememberance of that, and "when they behold here any image of that other world, (they) are rapt in amazement, but they are ignorant of what this rapture means, because they do not clearly perceive. For there is no radiance in our earthly copies of justice or temperance or those other things which are precious to souls... But of beauty. I repeat that we saw her there shining in company with the celestial forms: and coming to earth we find her here too, shining in clearness through the clearest aperture of sense" (Phaedrus, 250).

So, the easiest and most accessible way to anamnesis is: by way of sight and love for beauty. Giving this special credit to beauty, Plato is not willing to single out art as a primary source in remembering the idea of beauty. In Symposion, Diotima explains that ascending course to beauty starts with the perception of beauty in forms, and then in souls and deeds, institutions and sciences. "He who has been instructed thus far in the things of love... when he comes toward the end will suddenly perceive a nature of wondrous beauty... a nature which in the first place is everlasting, knowing no birth or death, growth or decay (Symposium, 210—211).

For Plato, aesthetic experience is, therefore, not exclusively related to art. Beauty is first perceived (aisthesis) by the sense of sight, and later only by noesis. Love (eros), on the other hand, is not exclusively an emotional relation between the sexes (actually, Plato speaks about love in a homosexual context), but an instinct or drive which - through cultivation and contemplation - finally, leads to the recollection of the idea of beauty.

These rich metaphors and imagery will inspire Platonism and Gnosticism.

Recognition and gnosis

Being born, man "falls" or is "thrown" into the world and the body. The soul forgets her original habitation and identity. She is overwhelmed with desires and worldly cares, being engaged and involved, more and more. Gnosticism speakes of "sleep", "drunkness" and "oblivion". Man is dispersed, and divided, by cravings and cares. He is engulfed by the noise of the world, by the fear, hope and disapointment. This is the "world of darkness, utterly full of evil... full of falsehood and deciet... A world of turbulence without steadfastness, . . . a world in which the good things perish and plans come to naught" (Jonas, 1963: 57).

In Gnostic dualism the opposition between "this world" and "the other world" is, perhaps, greater than in the philosophy of Plato. The duality of light and darkness, of good and evil, coresponding to the duality of the two worlds, is greater than the Platonic duality of ideas and "shadows", since darkness is the essence and power of kosmos. There is no mediation and resemblance which one can find between the ideas and the "shadows".

Even the light in this world is really darkness - "black light" (Jonas, p. 58). In such a world there is no beauty; and, if there is, it is not there to remind of the idea of beauty (to help remembrance - anamnesis), but to keep man in oblivion and ignorance, to show its ugly back and outcome, at the end. In order to regain and remember knowledge, gnosis, man needs help and a "call from without". "The call is uttered by one who has been sent into the world for this purpose and in whose person the transcendent Life once more takes upon itself the stranger's fate: he is the Messenger or Envoy - in relation to the world - The Alien Man" (Jonas, 75-63). This redeemer was in Christian Gnosticism identified as Jesus Christ.

Gnosis is insight, immediate vision of truth. Man who has gnosis knows from where he comes and where he goes; he can remember his true identity and understand his present condition. Jonas summarized contents of the call (or gnosis) as follows: "the reminder of the heavenly origin and the transcendent history of man; the promise of redemption,... and finally the practical instruction as to how to live henceforth in the world..." (1963, p. 81).

This call has to help man,or initiate his self-recognition as (or through) remembering. This knowledge (gnosis) is effective in the sense that it is sufficient for salvation and the ascent of the self (pneuma), back to its origin (Divine light).

To be reminded means to be reawakened for the knowledge of oneself, to regain, through remembering, the forgotten knowledge of One's true identity, to recognize that man in the world is not at home, because he is "not of this world." He is an alien, a stranger, unprotected, who does not understand the ways of the world, nor the world understands him.

"The stranger who does not know the ways of the foreign land wanders about lost; if he learns its ways to well... the distress has gone, but this very fact is the culmination of the strangers tragedy. The recollection of his own alienness, the recognition of his place of exile for what it is, is the first step back; the awakened homesickness is the beginning of the return" (Jonas, p. 49-50).

For Gnosticism, suffering in the world is not an expiation for sins, but a reminder2) - that the man has been thrown into the world. Suffering gives a thrust toward recognizing his pneuma (self), and his otherworldly origin. There is some basic agreement between Plato, Gnosticism, Abhi- navagupta and Proust - that forgetfulness is inborn, and due to the relation with the body, to the cares, anxietes, and the hustle of life. For Plato, remembrance and recognition enable us to regain the perceptions from the world of ideas, and for Gnostics, to aknowledge otherworldliness.

Among modern writers, Marcel Proust had the feeling that man is either reincarnated, or that he is other-worldly. He sees that the obligations of moral life, or strivings toward perfection, are hard to explain if we consider only this one life. Contemplating after the death of Bergotte, he says — it seems that we enter life under a burden of obligations already fixed in some previous life. There is no reason, he says, that we should be kind and good-hearted, and there is no reason for the artist to be obliged to start or polish his work for the twentieth time, since - once he is dead - the admiring his work would arouse will mean nothing to his dead body (in many cases the public will not even notice its perfection, nor admire it). All these obligations - he adds - are not sanctioned in this life, and seem to belong to a different order, to some other world, completely different from this one. And we have these laws in ourselves, without knowing who has inspired our being with them (Proust, La Prisonniere, I. 246).

However, in Gnosticism we find extreme dualism. There are not only two worlds, but two gods and two selves, as well. One God is the creator God, responsible for this world, the other is the unknown God, yet to be recovered at the end of the time. One self is the self of the world (psyche), the other self (pneuma) is not from here, and it is not of this world. The transcendence of the other world, and the unknown God, do not stand in any (positive) relation to the sensible world, and the pneumatic self has no relation to the psychic self. Therefore, Jonas calls this teaching "acosmism" - the main values being beyond cosmic origin and significance.

Every culture must confront itself with the principal relation of man with the world, and with the relation of past, present and future - in individual existence, and cosmo-historical time. These are basical questions which also determine the possible answer to the question: what is the meaning of life, how is man supposed to use his time and power available in this life. Gnosticism proudly announces - "the knowledge of who we are, what we become, where we were, where into we have been thrown, where to we hurry, where from we are redeemed, what birth is, and what rebirth" (Clement of Alexandria: Excerpta ex Theodoto, 78. 2,in Jonas, 1963: 334).

Throwness, forlornness, and homelesness, can be found as subjects in Existentialism, especially in Heidegger's Sein und Zeit.3) Also, the theme of the alien, stranger and emigrant can be found in the writings of the 20-th century authors, like Camus (The Stranger) and M. Crnjanski (Migrations, The Novel on London). The best description of the world (as if) made and governed by the bad god Demiourgos, can be found in Kafka's novels and novels of disident writers from Eastern Europe (Solzenyitsin, Shalamov, Kundera). While in Gnosticism the man is thrown into a kosmos as nature (physis), here man is thrown into a kosmos of social and political relations (state, polis). Both are governed solely by power.

However, in Gnosticism there is still gnosis, the other world, and an asumption that man can save himself and return to real, eternal light and life. In modern literature there is no Call (save to the trial or prison), no open doors, no meaning, no promise, no faith, no knowledge - only absolute contingency.

"This makes modern nihilism infinitely more radical and more desperate than gnostic nihilism could ever be... That only man cares, in his finitude facing nothing but death, alone with his contingency and the objective meaninglessness of his projected meanings, is a truly unprecedented situation" (Jonas, 1963: 339).

For the modern man, there is neither Gnostic knowledge (gnosis), or Christian faith (pistis), neither possibility of ascent,4) or salvation; only will to power and class~struggle.

Among the modern writers, Nietzsche5) and Proust proclaimed that only aesthetically world and life can be justified. For them, art and aesthetic experience were important as gnosis was in time of Gnosticism, or faith in Christian times. To be saved by, or through art, was a life credo of some modern artists. Since aesthetic values do not need any transcendental support, it seemed that art can survive the downfall of the "inteligible world" of philosophy, and the "death of the God" of religion.6)

The 'aesthetic way'

Art was not calling upon knowledge (gnosis), or faith (pistis) - aesthetic wonder was sufficient - its message was valid even when philosophy and religion were corrupted. Even when man lost faith in ideas and gods, he still could wonder - being in front of a work of art, in a meadow full of flowers, meeting a creature, or being in love, could perhaps, be a sufficient reason to live (even if one is without hope, faith, or meaning of a trandscendent kind).

"I pay my homage to Shiva the omniscient-poet, who created all the three worlds, and thanks to whom people are able to attain aesthetic bliss by watching the spectacle of the play that is our life in this world", says Bhattanayaka, Indian aesthetician. In Trika Shaivism we find an original contribution — the "aesthetic way", a possibility to attain liberation not only through purification and perfection in ethic, noetic, ascetic or devotional values, but through aesthetic contemplation - in peace (santarasa) and wonder (camatkara) attained in aesthetic contemplation.

However, this was not a result of nihilism, a reaction to a downfall of religious or philosophical order, but introduced beside them - it was introduced out of plenty, not because of want.

With Proust we see that art and aesthetic experience were a last refuge in the wasteland — for Abbinavagupta and his predecessors it was a matter of choice. For Gauguin and Van Gogh art was the last resort - something to hang on after everything else has failed.

Abhinavagupta often quotes Vijñanabhairava, a work which can be considered as one of the best expositions of the aesthetic (or should we say "ecstatic") way of Trika Shaivism. In Vijñanabhairava there is no principal difference between aesthetic experience related to work of art and experience of relish, joy, or expansion in front of a beautiful landscape. The same principle is present in Chinese and Japanese "aesthetic way", exemplified in the tea ceremony,7) in the contemplation of plum and cherry blossoms (contemplation in front of the tree, or contemplation of a picture, with a poem on the margin), or in garden contemplation - of a garden which is "not real", (but abstract - sometimes even without flora), and is, therefore, a work of art, and, at the same time, an object of natura naturata.

In India, this principle was present in performing arts. Cosmic play (lila) in Kasmir tradition includes the drama of life and drama as a stage performance; therefore, aesthetic bliss is possible while watching play in life and play on stage.

However, to look upon life as (a part of the cosmic) play, for most people is possible only after meditative training. It is easier to obtain this experience through poetry or drama. Abhinavagupta - and other aestheticians from Kasmir - explain this factor (in modern parlance known as "aesthetic distance") in a similar way: as generality (sadharanya) of art presentation. This presentation creates beyond the space of personal interest and concern, and - at the same time - gives the recipient an opportunity to remember his personal experiences and moods, to recognize them in events of drama, and to identify with main personalities. "Generality is thus a state of self-identification with the imagined situation, devoid of any practical interest... of any relation whatsoever with the limited self, and as it were impersonal (Gnoli, 1969: XXIII1).

The aesthetic experience is, therefore an invitation to the recognition (pratyabbijña) of the higher impersonal self (atman), it points to the same goal as meditative experience,9) which can also be realised in an aesthetic setting beyond art.

However, this happens under certain conditions, which, also, explain why people, generally, do not attain liberation during, or after aesthetic experiences. Plato said that the aesthetic experience governed by eros (love for beautiful bodies) should gradually lead to the recogni- tion of the idea of beauty. To this, Gnoli (1968: XLVII) adds citations from Theologia Platonica of Proclus, where the wonder10) that appears in aesthetic and mystic experience, and the astonishment of the soul in front of beautiful and sacred, are compared. The cessation of ordinary world, of the limitations of everyday experience, and practicaly oriented functional consciousness, is related with wonder and amazement. We cannot say what is the cause and what the effect - non-ordinary or non-worldly (alaukika), and wonder (camatkara) are in a synchronic relation: without wonder everything is just ordinary, worldly (laukika), and in ordinary we cannot recognize the non-ordinary (alaukika) without wonder (camatkara, or vismaya). According to Abhinavagupta, camatkara is consciousness without obstacles (vighna). It is the consciousness of a subject "who is finessed in the vibration (spanda) of a marvellous enjoyment (adbhutabhoga)" - Abbinavabharati, (trans. by Gnoli, 1968: 60). This consciousness cannot be intentional and it is the result of tuning (turning on), or rezonance with a certain vibration. This is possible for the sahrdaya, ("one with a heart"), who is sensible and possesses the consent of his own heart.

These traits we also find in blissful moments (moments bienheureux) of Marcel Proust: bliss and wonder, cessation of obstacles, non-intentionality fine tuning of the personality to the ecstatic, extemporal vibration. For Marcel Proust, these blissful moments were not related (for the most part) to the works of art, but to the superposing of remembered and actual impressions. Of the eleven principal moments, listed by Shattuck (1964: 70-74), one is related with work of art (septet by Vinteuil). This puts them close to dharanas from Vijñanabhairava. For example, with dharana 49 we are reminded of the first blissful moment (madeleine sequence, Proust, 1934: I, 34-36), related to the taste of tea and cake, and the exquisite pleasure: "When one experiences the expansion of joy of savour arising from the pleasure of eating and drinking one should meditate on the perfect condition of this joy; then there will be supreme delight" (Vijñanabhairava, verse 72).

Recognition of the extemporal self

For Proust, blissful moments are generally a blending of past and present. However, there is one exception - moment related with "the steeples of Martinville" (Proust, 1934: I, 138—140) does not include any memory. The sequence begins with the enigmatic "call" from various impressions to decifer the meaning of happiness related with them. While riding to Martinville, on one of the turns the two steeples appear glowing in the sunset. Full of joy, Marcel feels that this glow seems to contain and conceal some meaning.

This reminds us of dharana 51: "Wherever the mind of the individual finds satisfaction, let it be concentrated on that. In every such case the true nature of the highest bliss will manifest itself" (Vijnanabhairava, verse 74).

However, the prevalent pattern of Proust's blissful moments is the super- posing of past and present, while dharanas are mostly related with the present. But the difference is superficial - the means are different, the goal same: to tune in with pure time (eternal now, paradox of time without transiency), and recognize one's extemporal being.

In Time Regained Proust says that he could not contemplate solely on actual experience, since he could not apply his imagination - his only faculty for enjoying beauty - in actual situation. In order to apply imagination, he needed the superposing of present with past experience. Thus, connecting past experience (remembered and imagined), with present time, he could "immobilize" and "isolate" pure time - he could recognize "this being" (cet etre) that feeds upon the "essence of things".

Blissful moments are based on non-intentional, involuntary remembering11), while voluntary remembering is governed by sound (practical) aim12). The common feature of blissful moments and camatkara is - overcoming time and obstacles. This brings bliss.

"The so-called supreme bliss, the lysis, the wonder, is therefore nothing but tasting... of our own liberty", says Abbinavagupta (Abbinavabharati, in Gnoli, 1968: XLIV).

Through lengthy volumes Marcel is repeatedly challenged to solve the enigma of happiness related with blissful moments. In the last volume (Time Regained) he understands that these moments are blissful because he is free from the anxiety and doubts concerning his future (will he be a writer, is he "losing" time). He gains time (free from transiency), and certainty, which make him indifferent to death. Finally, he recognizes in himself "this being" (cet etre), which belongs to the extempore order, he recognizes the common source of the past and thepresent. That being is also beyond the anxiety related with future, represented by transiency and death. Beside wonder, recognition of this "other self" is the second precondition for attaining liberation through aesthetic experience.

Colpe (1980: 40-1) related Proust's idea of liberation from time, with the Gnostic notion of immortality, and the recognition of everyday self and the extemporal "this being" (cet etre), with the recognition of the psychic and the pneumatic self in Gnosticism. However, Proust has greater affinity and affection for this world than any Gnostic. He accepts as genuine its call to confront the mystery of beauty and destruction, love and pain, wonder and despair, being and death. For him, these are not distractions, or a negative hint for a "call from without". Mostly, the call to solve the enigma is received from the beauty of the world: the steeples of Martinville, the three trees in Hudimesnil, the azure sky of Venice, or the sound of a spoon striking against the plate.

But, how should we understand the concluding part of Time Regained, the matinee at Guermantes which follows the last blissful moment? After a long intermission Marcel meets his aged friends, and recognises them only with considerable effort, realising the destructivness of time. Beckett (1978: 57), and Shattuck (1964: 38, 111) consider this as proof that blissful moments have failed, that death is not indifferent ("because it sets limit to one's human capacity to create"), that time was not regained, or recovered, but only obliterated (for a while), and now strikes back with the load of years, and the "powder" of old age, covering hair, and faces of his acquaintances with ashes of time.

Confronted with this dance macabre Beckett and Shattuck gave up the meaning and importance of blissful moments, and were willing to surrender to oblivion (oubli) the hardly won recognition (reconnaisance) of the extemporal self (after all, we have to wait for the second coming of Christ, who will bring apokatastasis).

Perhaps Abhinavagupta would have understood Proust better. For Abhinavagupta the essential nature of the self (atman) is hidden owing to the innate forgetfulness (moha). The purpose of pratyabhijña13) (recognition, reconaissance) is to remove this forgetfulness concerning atman.14) In Isvarapratyabhijña-vimarsini he says that recognition (pratyabhijña) is the unification of the two experiences: remembrance (samarana) and perception (anubhava) - quoted by Kaw (1967: 145). For Abhinavagupta and Proust the power of remembrance (smarana-sakti) supports the view that atman (cet etre) is permanent and extemporal.15)

Did Proust understand the "dolorous synthesis of survival and anihilation", or his bliss failed him at the end? Perhaps he would have found familiar the following lines:

"In this way, if the aspirant imagines that the entire world (or at least Guermantes world - D.P.) is being burnt by the fire of Kala-agni and does not allow his mind to wonder away to anything else, then in such a person the highest state of man appears" (Vijñanabhairava, verse 53).

Perhaps Kala-agni - the personification of total conflagration at the end of time - presided at Guermantes matinee, even though Lilian Silburn translated this verse some sixty years after this matinee.

The "Aesthetic way" and the transpersonal connection

If moral perfection, or purification in terms of ethics, may be considered as the "way of ethics", and higher insight, or purification of understanding as the "cognitive way", then the "aesthetic way" appears as partially independant approach to the same goal of transpersonal realization. Striving toward beauty and perfection as intrinsic values that lead one beyond worldliness (Plato), the aesthetic wonder which transports consciousness beyond obstacles, and brings recognition of the self tuned with the eternal vibration (Abhinavagupta), the blissful moments which bring to the fore atemporal self (Proust), all these constitute the orchestration of the main theme - that the lustre and tragedy of life, the self-affirmation, resigning and self-transcendence, are consumated in the tremendous ecstasy that opens the transpersonal horizon for the individual.

Aesthetic contemplation is possible only when the personal and egoic involvement are cast aside, whereas, at the same tune, identification and empathy have the cathexis of the transformed eros, resulting in wonder and exitement, free from transiency, death, or sorrow. If related with a transpersonal perspective (and Abbinavagupta, Proust and others give directions and examples for that) the aesthetic experience opens one for the trans-egoic horizons, which seemed remote, and even non-existent, from the egoic, and personal perspective.

The "aesthetic way" stands as a "middle way" - between the complete alienation of the world of Gnosticism, and the craving, never satisfied thirst, of the egoic level. However, a permanent passage from egoic to the transpersonal level is not a matter of one-time aesthetic contemplation. It can be a matter of a lifetime, and more than often it includes a difficult passage varioussly named (encounter with the shadow and the archetypes, differentiation from anima/animus, the dark night, regression in the service of transcendence etc).

Under certain conditions remembrance and recognition can instantly - as in camera obscura - change the perspective, and switch the egoic to transpersonal. But, as we see with Proust - and in some other cases - this may not be a permanent change of level. Therefore, we have to discriminate between aesthetic contemplation (as a kind of peak-experience), and the "aesthetic way" as a component of an overall process of self-transformation. In the first case it is a preview, or foretasting of the juice (rasa) of the transpersonal integration. One could say that tea in the tea ceremony (chanoyu) has the 'taste' of the transpersonal, as do madeleine cakes for Proust.

NOTES

l) This differs from the later interpretation, by Vergillius (Aeneis), who says that the souls forget the suffering beared in former lives, and then are willing to live again under the sky (i.e. to be reborn).

2) Therefore, Gnosticism could explain the suffering of the innocent (and the good life of the vile - who are not reminded). If Dostoyevski were a Gnostic - and not an Orthodox Christian - perhaps he would have found an answer for his question (why the suffering of an innocent child?), since suffering is not an expiation for sin, but a reminder (and even innocent have to be reminded). However, "reminding" seems to be more painful (or tragic) for some prsons.

3) Jonas (1963: 320-340) gives an extensive comparative analysis of Gnosticism, Existentialism and Nihilism in the concluding section or his book. Taubes (1954): 155—172) has written a comparative study of Gnostic and Heidegger's notions from Sein and Zeit.

4) Metaphors of ascent have been changing: for Plato "wings of the soul"; in Gnosticism, ascending through the spheres of the seven planets; with John Climacus, climbing the 1adder (spiritual growth). Now ascent means becoming rich and/or powerful, or having a successful career (climbing the ladder of social strata).

5) In The Birth of Tragedy Nietzsche says that only art can overcome the terror and absurdity of life; only with the help of art man can endure the absurdity of existence; life and world are justifiable only as aesthetic phenomena.

6) Even if art cannot survive, we can be sure that soap-operas will survive.

7) Tea ceremony is a sophisticated aesthetisation of an ordinary event, blending ordinary (preparing and drinking tea) and non-ordinary (highly stylized manners and conversation), integration of life with ritual, slowing down and becoming attentive to details, leaving aside the hustle, cares and anxieties of everyday life, in order to open the mind and heart to the mystery of eternal now, and to the ineffable meaning that "lies beneath the surface" (yugen). For further analysis of yugen, see Deutsch (1975).

However, this does not mean that the autonomy of art is obscured. "Abhinava likes to insist on the autonomy of a work of art, on the fact that it is sui generis and need have no object corresponding to it in the real world" (Masson and Patwardhan, 1969: 51).

9) Masson and Patwardhan (1969: 2l) state that Bhattanayaka was perhaps "the first person to make the famous comparison of yogic ecstasy and aesthetic experience". He comments the opening verse of Natya-shastra (a classic on art of drama, ca. VI cent. A.D.) and states that drama should help people to understand the insubstantiality of wordly objects. The idea was also later developed in the aesthetics of Japanese Noh theatre (although in a Buddhist context).

10) The notion of wonder (ekplekseos) - in writings of Plato and Proclus - seems to be different from the wonder (thauma) which is for Aristotle the beginning of philosophy (Metaphysica, 982 b), and both are (somewhat) different from aesthetic wonder (camatkara), as developed in Kashmiri tradition.

11) It is strange that Shattuck (1963: 69-75) - who made a careful analysis of these moments - underestimated the importance of involuntary remembering in blissful moments. He makes a summary of their pattern as follows. First, "Marcel is always in a dispirited state of mind, bared, even tired at the time of their occurrence". Second, "he experiences a physical sensation, which comes unexpectedly..." Third "the sensation is accompanied by a clear feeling of pleasure and happiness which far surpasses anything explained by the sensation alone". Fourth, all these "lift Marcel steeply out of the present", and the past event is "remembered, recognized and asimilated into the same binocular field of vision with the present event". Fifth, "the first three components reach out to form a link not only with the past, but also with an event, or development in the future". The sixth element is a variable response to the experience that follows it. Shattuck (1964: 40) mentions the distinction between involuntary memory and conscious recognition, but in a different sense. He puts this involuntary memory of the blissful moments in opposition to the conscious recognition of Marcel's vocation as a writer, and his task of writing. This recognition is - for Shattuck - not the recognition of the extemporal self (which makes death indifferent), but recognition of the vocation and task awaiting him (in time left) before death.

12) Free association in psychoanalysis combines involuntary remembering with a practical aim. The patient has to remember some past experiences (emotional conflicts) in order to recognize their conversion into present symptoms; this frees him from past (conflicts) and from present (repetition of symptoms). The same pattern can be found in Indian meditative traditions. One has to remember previous lives in order to recognize the relationship between unresolved tendencies and his present life. With that he is liberated from karma, or the necessity of (further) repeating incarnations.

13) Separate schools in Kashmir Shaivism developed around the notion of pratyabbhijña (recognition), whose main representative was Utpaladeva (10th cent.), and around the notion of vibration (spanda), whose main representatives were Vasugupta and Kallatabhatta 9th cent.). "According to Utpaladeva, the soul is bound because he has forgotten his authentic identity and can only achieve liberation, the ultimate goal of life, by recognizing his true universal nature" (Dyczkowski, 1987: 17).

14) A note for those familiar with Vedanta. Atman in Pratyabhijña school slightly differs from atman as understood in Vedanta. In Pratyabhijña atman is a synonym for Maheshvara (Great Lord, ultimate reality), and an individual self, while in Vedanta atman is an individual self, identical with brahman.

15) We leave aside the "status" of Proust's mysticism, defined by R. C. Zaechner as "nature mysticism" (in Mysticism, Sacred and Profane, and Drugs, Mysticism and Make-believe). Besides, for Zaechner, intentions of Proust seem to be - basically - religious: to transcend death and mortality, although in non-theistic terms of "nature mysticism". For us, Proust is one of the major modern contributors in articulating the transpersonal perspective in terms of the "aesthetic way."

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Beckett, S. (1978): Proust, New York: Grove Press.
Colpe, C. (l9:80): "The Challenge of Gnostic Thought for Philosophy, Alchemy and Literature", The Rediscovery of Gnosticism, ed. by B. Layton, Leiden (p.32-56).
Deutsch, E. (1975): Studies in Comparative Aesthetics, Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.
Dyczkowski, M.S.G. (1987): The Doctrine of Vibration, New York: SUNY.
Foerster, W. (1974): Gnosis, A Selection of Gnostic Texts, Oxford: Clarendon.
Gnoli, R. (1968): The Aesthetic Experience According to Abbinavagupta, Varanasi: Chowkhamba.
Jonas, H. (1963): The Gnostic Religion, Boston: Beacon
Kaw., R. K. (1967): The Doctrine of Recognition, Hoshiarpur: Vishveshvaranand
Koepping, K-P. (1987): "Anamnesis", in The Encyclopedia of Religions, ed. by Mircea Eliade, New York: Macmillan
Mann, R.D. (1984): The Light of Consciousness, Albany: SUNY.
Masson, J.M. and Patwardhan, M.V. (1969): Santarasa and Abbinavagupta's Philosophy of Aesthetics, Poona: Bhandarkar Or. Inst.
Proust, M. (1934): Remembrance of Things Past (I—II), New York: Random
Shattuck, R. (1864): Proust's Binoculars, London: Chatto/Windus.
Taubes, S.A. (1954): "Gnostic Foundations of Heideggers's Nihilism", The Journal of Religion, XXXIV, No 3: p. 155—172.
Vijnanabhairava Tantra, trans. by L. Silburn (1976), Paris: E. de Boccard, trans. by J. Singh (1979), Delhi: Banarsidass.
Washburn, M. (lD38): The Ego and the Dynamic Ground, Albany: SUNY

The Fourth Turn of the Wheel of the Dharma

Dusan Pajin, Ph.D.



Since ancient times Buddhism has been a cultural mediator in Asia. In this century in the West it moved from the exclusivity of academic study, to becoming a source of inspiration for many people wanting to live worthwhile lives

Ernest Cassirer wrote in 1961, "The truly great works of culture never confront as things absolutely fixed and unchanging, shackling and stifling the free motion of the spirit in their fixity. Their contact has being for us only by virtue of the fact that they must be continually possessed anew and hence continually recreated.


PAN-CULTURAL MEDIATOR

Buddhism is rarely seen in its role of a pan-cultural mediator, not only in Asia but also in disseminating the cultural influence of Asia in Europe, or the West in general, during the last two centuries. Whereas in Asia Buddhism spread as a living religion and philosophy, in the West it spread mostly as a part of the cultural heritage of Asia in a way that was somewhat similar to the spreading of the Hellenistic cultural heritage during the Renaissance. That is, in the West its reception was mostly considered as part of the "living past," even though it was presented by the living proponents of Buddhism or "Eastern missionaries."

Nevertheless, it offered abundant inspiration and presented a challenge in many fields of cultural interest--in philosophy, religion, the arts and literature, psychology, and psychotherapy. Apart from any academic divisions, its influence was mostly felt in ethics ( understood as a "way of life" ) with special emphasis on broadening ethics ( as a value system governing interhuman relations ) to a value system encompassing the relation of man to nature, or to life in general. It was a discovery to find that something that seemed only a matter of quite recent developments in the West ( an evaluation of man's relation to nature connected with new ecology-consciousness ) had its precursor in Buddhist ethics.

On the other hand, pacifism, as a general rejection of war, especially of aggressive war, was recognized as an outline of a more general principle of nonviolence (ahimsa), whose historical validity in modern times was so magnificently demonstrated by Gandhi.

From a historical perspective we can recognize two general phases in the role of Buddhism as a cultural mediator.

The first falls between the third century B.C. ( when Buddhism was transmitted to Sri Lanka ) and the fourteenth or fifteenth century ( when Buddhist cultural influence in Tibet and Japan was consolidated ). During the classical age the relations between Asia and Europe ( i.e., Greek and Roman culture ) were manifold, but not distinctly related to Buddhism ( exceptions are found in philosophy - cf. the Greek philosopher Pyrrho).

The second phase took place at the beginning of the nineteenth century and extends into our time. In this period Buddhism emerged as one of the important cultural mediators in East-West communications, while its role as an inter-Asian cultural mediator seemed to be a matter of the past.

Partly, this was the outcome of developments in world affairs, since in the meantime East-West relations gained in importance and the West became more susceptible to cultural exchange. However, we cannot understand the present and also the possible roles of Buddhism in our time and the future, unless we understand its interAsian history. Excellent studies have been written on this topic, but perhaps the reception and transmission of Buddhism into China have been most extensively investigated.

ASIAN HISTORY OF BUDDHISM

There are some important general conclusions that can be derived from the Asian history of Buddhism. First of all we see some of the general characteristics of Buddhism as a religion that spread from India to other Asian countries--north, east, and southeast. In some of these countries Buddhism pushed into the background the popular cults of shamanistic origin, including in its practices and rituals some of the functions of these cults, transforming their indigenous animistic godlings into personages of the Buddhist pantheon and connecting local festivities to Buddhist holidays. In countries that already had established religious traditions (like China), it was founded as a parallel, second (or third) religion, sometimes in peaceful coexistence, at other times in conflict with the domestic religion. After several centuries, during which time it was treated mostly as an intruding foreign factor, it was assimilated and became as native as the forerunning tradition.

Buddhism has accepted the vernacular languages and elaborated new textual traditions that were added to the corpus of translated texts of Indian origin. The ethics and discipline of the monks were partly adapted to local customs. Nevertheless, up to the time of the Muslim invasion (between A.D. 1000 and 1200), when Buddhism declined in India, India was considered as the holy land of Buddhism, where pilgrims would come to seek inspiration and "study at the source", especially at the great universities like Nalanda.

Some of those pilgrims, like the Chinese Buddhists Hsuan-tsang and I Tsing (during the eighth century), have left valuable accounts of their travels, and of Buddhist practices and teachings, ranging from India, and China, to Java and Sumatra.

These events had fostered the role of Buddhism as an inter-Asian cultural mediator, that transcended state borders, political interests, and conflicts, spreading the Dharma from the plains of Central Asia to the jungles of Java, and from the Himalayan peaks to the coasts of the Land of the Rising Sun. Buddhism as a religious community (Sangha) was quite different from the Christian churches (both Orthodox and Catholic), with their centralized organizations and hierarchical structures. Sanghas in other countries were never subordinated to the Sangha in India, a fact equally valid and applicable to the offshoots of the Theravada tradition and to the communities that were inspired by the Mahayanist and Tantric traditions. The trans-national character of the Buddhist teachings was harmoniously intermingled with the national character of the Buddhist Sanghas, a fact that enabled local traditions to find their full expression in the realm of the Dharma. This should be stressed as one of the most important traits of Buddhism in its relation to national cultures. It did not act as a suppressor of national cultural values, but rather fostered the national character that inspired the talents in each given national milieu to express themselves.

Unity in diversity and diversity in unity--that was the feature that gave Buddhism its validity and enabled those various national talents to express themselves while maintaining the essence of the Dharma. This feature was responsible for the fact that Buddhism in various countries had its own schools and sects, besides those it developed during its history in India. These sects were sometimes in conflict with each other, over prevalence, power, or the favor of a particular ruler, but there was no explicit violence concerning heresy, no anathemas, or religious wars and exterminations such as we find in the history of Western Christianity (e.g., the conflict between Protestantism and Catholicism). In contrast to Christianity--whose dissemination and the baptizing of the people were usually a precursor of political or military subordination, or colonization, in later times--Buddhism spread beyond the Indian states quite independently of these factors and interests.

On the other hand, even when Buddhism was the prevalent religion or even a state religion, as in India at the time of Ashoka, other religions were not banished or persecuted, nor had they the status of heresies. In only two countries, Tibet and Japan, Buddhism strongly intermingled with political power or military ethics. In the first case (Tibet) this was due to the fact that no separate administration developed, so that the lamas had to fulfill the role of state bureaucrats; in the second case (Japan) it was due to the need of the samurai to find compensation in religion for the uncertainties of their existence.

Whether in its religious or philosophical guises, certain forms of Buddhism had strongly unworldly or even a cosmic leanings. On the other hand, many of its schools were never confined within monastery or library walls and thus shaped and influenced the everyday life of the laity or the career of many an artiüt, as much as the life of the monks. The influence of Buddhism on the arts was manifold, so that we find the finest examples of this influence in art that was not limited to religious themes, or in art that based its values beyond the immediate religious purpose. Vast indeed is the range of these remnants: the sculptures of the Gupta period in India, the Ajanta cave paintings, Tibetan mandalas and thangkas, Chinese Ch'an and Japanese Zen paintings, Japanese sculpture and Zen gardens, architectural masterpieces in Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Burma, Thailand, Cambodia, all the way down to Java. If we were to compare, for example, three sculptural masterpieces--the standing Buddha from the Gupta period (fifth century ), the seated image of Miroku ( Maitreya ) from the Chugu-ji temple in Japan (seventh century), and the head of Jayavarman VII from Cambodia (twelfth century) -- we would find the same expression of serene purity and compassion, despite the fact that these sculptures bear the distinct features of their time, place, and nationality.

THE FOURTH TURN - EAST AND WEST

The second phase of Buddhism as a cultural mediator-or should we say, the fourth turn of the Wheel of the Dharma--took place at the beginning of the nineteenth century and embraces our own time. Reviews of the reception of Buddhism in the West, as a religion and a philosophy, have been written, but until now (note: this paper was written in 1984), to my knowledge, there has been no attempt to review the considerable influence that Indian philosophies and religions, particularly Buddhism, had on contemporary developments in psychology and psychotherapy, although the reception of Buddhism in America was presented by Fields (1981). From the time of Carl Jung--before World War II--onward, there have been some attempts to evaluate the complex encounter of psychology with Buddhism, and other influences originating in the East.

The reception of Buddhism in the West was from the beginning an international affair. Buddhology emerged not only as a result of personal efforts (of investigators of various nationalities), but also as a result of their permanent communication and criticism. Certain centers (in Russia, G. Britain, Frnace, Germany) were for a time gathering places for investigators of various nationalities dedicated to a common task: Buddhist studies. This is also the case today in various places in Europe, India, Japan, Hawaii, and North America.

During the last 150 years we can trace a considerable shift of interests and attitudes toward Buddhism. Up to World War II, the prevailing interest in Buddhism was expressed in terms of ethics, religion, mysticism, and philosophy. This coincided with the tendency to import and convey the spiritual traditions of the East on the grounds of mysticism and religion which, after a time (particularly at the turn of the century) it was hoped that Buddhism would serve, either as a moral corrective for the West, or as a source for creating a universal religion that could transcend particular churches, and beliefs. This formed a barrier in terms of history of philosophy, and historians of philosophy and culture had difficulty in proving that Asia had philosophies that were not at the same time mystical or religious, and that the "Asian mind" cannot be reduced to mystical inclinations.

BUDDHISM AS WAY OF LIFE

After World War II the interest in the general Buddhist attitude to life and meditation came to the forefront. This was connected with the fact that far more people shared a non-academic interest in Buddhism; they were not professional historians of religion and philosophy, nor philologists, and for them Buddhism was not primary an object of study, but an inspiration that presumed personal involvement (and Buddhist studies were means in developing this goal). Perhaps in connection with this was also the shift of interest from the Pali Theravada tradition, to Mahayana and Tantrayana traditions, particularly Tibetan, after the exile and dispersion of the lamas to the West, from the 1950’s onward. The previous reception of Buddhism in terms of religion or philosophy was followed by a new perspective. Generations of Buddhologists tried to interpret and understand nirvana from various standpoints, but the "psychology of nirvana" has become a recent item in bibliograplüy (Johansson, 1970), and early Buddhist psychology has been included in one of the standard presentations of the theories of personality (Hall and Lindzey, 1978), under a somewhat ambiguous title "Eastern Psychology."

In this still growing field of interest we can see the same oscillations in interpretations from one extreme to the other.

Previously, the interpretation of, let us say, Early Buddhism, or the Pali Canon, swung between categories of mysticism/religion, and philosophy (cf. Chatalian, 1983). On the other hand, in the reception of Buddhism in the field of psychology before the war, psychological, particularly psychoanalytical interpretations of Buddhist meditation, were given in negative terms: it was considered as a regression leading to catatonia (Alexander, 1961). Jung was less negativistic, but concluded that Buddhist (or Eastern in general) types of meditation were definitely not for Westerners (Jung, 1971).

New generations of investigators changed this opinion by considering meditation as one of the possible ways to self-realization, selfactüialization, or personality-growth beyond mere "normality" or healthy-mindedness, which were the traditional goals of psychotherapy.

This reception was a part of a general widening of interest in Buddhist and non-Buddhist "ways of selfrealization" or "transpersonal psychologies," presented in textbooks that gathered similar material from various Eastern traditions (Murphy, G. and L. B., 1968; Tart, C., 1976; Welwood, J., 1979 ).

During the last fourty years, there has been an outpouring of literature presenting various aspects of Eastern traditions from the viewpoint of Western psychology and psychotherapy, as well as their possible application on new grounds. With meticulous analysis it would be possible to reconstruct in detail the process which in reversal gave birth to some new concepts and standpoints in psychology itself, but it is more important to give the main outline.

The psychological approach to Buddhism has been manifested through various modalities.

First, through attempts to present the contents of Buddhist teachings that have psychological relevance.

Second, through presentations that interpreted various Buddhist concepts from a psychological standpoint (Kasamatsu and Hirai, 1963 ; Ornstein and Naranjo, 1971 ; Hirai, 1974 ; Sekida, 1975 ; Brown, 1977).

Third, in striving to deduce, or adapt--from the conceptual framework or from the meditational practices of Buddhism--new concepts of personality-growth and techniques of psychotherapy, or those reaching beyond therapy strictu senso (Watts, 1961; Goleman, 1971; Casper, 1974; Deatherage, 1975; Goleman, 1977; Washburn and Stark, 1977; Welwood, 1977). With the fourth group of authors (Ornstein, 1972; Maslow, 1962; Walsh and Shapiro, 1979) we actually leave the specific reception of Buddhism in psychology and have to deal with concepts and methods that (in this field) represent what Robinson (1976, p. 14) has named as the final stage of assimilation, when the system (in his subject-matter, Madhyamaka in China, in our case, Buddhist psychology in the West) has been critically assessed and transcended.

We can now describe the full turn in the reception of Buddhism in this context: understanding certain Buddhist contexts from the psychological viewpoint, applying them in modified form, being inspired by them and assimilating them by defining concepts and methods appropriate to our time and cultural milieu. When we say this we should bear in mind that meditation cannot be equated with psychotherapy even in its widest sense, leading beyond therapy strictu senso, that nirvana cannot be equated with self-actualization or normality beyond healthy-mindedness, and that Buddhist concepts and practices cannot be reduced to psychological ones without a remainder. Anyhow, such equation is not necessary to a true encounter and if made it would be a misunderstanding.

The encounter between Buddhism and Western psychology has taken place mostly in the Anglo-Saxon milieu, but is of importance for the overall reception of Buddhism in Europe and America, because it probes deeply into questions concerning the fundamental premises of every culture: What is the purpose of being in the world? What ultimate goal can fulfill the life of man? Much of the energy of man is lost in support of the economic, political, and military interests that divide mankind. We should give more of our attention to those strivings and cultural values that drive us to the common enigma of man--how to lead a life that should not be a waste of the small amount of time and energy that is our lot. Or to quote a Buddhist dictum: Having obtained the difficult-to-obtain, free and endowed human body, it would be a cause of regret to fritter life away (Gampopa, The Rosary of Precious Gems).


References

- Alexander, F. "Buddhistic Training as an Artificial Catatonia,"The Scope of Psychoanalysis, New York: Basic Books, 1931.
- Brown, D. "A Model for the Levels of Concentrative Meditation," The International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, XXV, 4. Philadelphia; 1977.
- Casper, H. "Space Therapy and the Maitri Project," Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, VI. Stanford: 1974.
- Cassirer, E. The Logic of the Humanities. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1961.
- Chatalian, G. "Early Indian Buddhism and the Nature of Philosophy: A Philosophical Investigation," Journal of Indian Philosophy, 11, 2. Dordrecht:
- Deatherage, G. "The Clinical Use of Mindfulness Meditation in Short-term Psychotherapy," Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, VII, 1975.
- Fields, R. How the Swans Came to the Lake: A Narrative History of Buddhism in America, Boulder:Shambhala
- Goleman, D. The Varieties of the Meditative Experience. New York: Dutton, 1977.
-"Meditation as Meta-Therapy", Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, III,.1971.
- Hall, C. S., and Lindzey, G. Theories of Personality. New York: Wiley, 1978.
- Johansson, R. E. A. The Psychology of Nirvana. Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1970.
- Jung, C. G. "Psychological Commentary on the Tibetan Book of the Great Liberation," The Tibetan Book of the Great Liberation, ed. W. Y. Evans-Wentz, London: Oxford University Press, 1971.
- Kasamatsu, A., and Hirai, T. "Science of Zazen," Psychologia, no. 6. Kyoto: 1963.
- Maslow, A. Towards a Psychology of Being. New York : Van Nostrand, 1962.
- Murphy, G. and L. B. Asian Psychology. New York : Basic Books, 1968.
- Ornstein, R., and Naranjo, C.,On the Psychology of Meditation, New York: Viking, 1971.
- Robinson, R. H., Early Madhyamika in India and China. Delhi : Motilal Banarsidass, 1976.
- Sekida, K., Zen Training, New York: Weatherhill, 1975.
- Tart. C., Altered States of Consciousness. NewYork : Wiley, 1969.
- Tart. C.,Transpersonal Psychologies, New York: Harper and Row, 1976.
- Walsh R., and Shapiro, D. Beyond Health and Normality: An Exploration of Extreme Psychological Wellbeing. New York: Van Nostrand, 1979.
- Watts, A. Psychology East and West. New York : Pantheon, 1961.
- Welwood, J. "Meditation and the Unconscious: A New Perspective," Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, IX, 1977.
- Welwood, J.The Meeting of the Ways. New York : Shocken, 1979.

The Fourth Turn of the Wheel of the Dharma

Dusan Pajin, Ph.D.



Since ancient times Buddhism has been a cultural mediator in Asia. In this century in the West it moved from the exclusivity of academic study, to becoming a source of inspiration for many people wanting to live worthwhile lives

Ernest Cassirer wrote in 1961, "The truly great works of culture never confront as things absolutely fixed and unchanging, shackling and stifling the free motion of the spirit in their fixity. Their contact has being for us only by virtue of the fact that they must be continually possessed anew and hence continually recreated.


PAN-CULTURAL MEDIATOR

Buddhism is rarely seen in its role of a pan-cultural mediator, not only in Asia but also in disseminating the cultural influence of Asia in Europe, or the West in general, during the last two centuries. Whereas in Asia Buddhism spread as a living religion and philosophy, in the West it spread mostly as a part of the cultural heritage of Asia in a way that was somewhat similar to the spreading of the Hellenistic cultural heritage during the Renaissance. That is, in the West its reception was mostly considered as part of the "living past," even though it was presented by the living proponents of Buddhism or "Eastern missionaries."

Nevertheless, it offered abundant inspiration and presented a challenge in many fields of cultural interest--in philosophy, religion, the arts and literature, psychology, and psychotherapy. Apart from any academic divisions, its influence was mostly felt in ethics ( understood as a "way of life" ) with special emphasis on broadening ethics ( as a value system governing interhuman relations ) to a value system encompassing the relation of man to nature, or to life in general. It was a discovery to find that something that seemed only a matter of quite recent developments in the West ( an evaluation of man's relation to nature connected with new ecology-consciousness ) had its precursor in Buddhist ethics.

On the other hand, pacifism, as a general rejection of war, especially of aggressive war, was recognized as an outline of a more general principle of nonviolence (ahimsa), whose historical validity in modern times was so magnificently demonstrated by Gandhi.

From a historical perspective we can recognize two general phases in the role of Buddhism as a cultural mediator.

The first falls between the third century B.C. ( when Buddhism was transmitted to Sri Lanka ) and the fourteenth or fifteenth century ( when Buddhist cultural influence in Tibet and Japan was consolidated ). During the classical age the relations between Asia and Europe ( i.e., Greek and Roman culture ) were manifold, but not distinctly related to Buddhism ( exceptions are found in philosophy - cf. the Greek philosopher Pyrrho).

The second phase took place at the beginning of the nineteenth century and extends into our time. In this period Buddhism emerged as one of the important cultural mediators in East-West communications, while its role as an inter-Asian cultural mediator seemed to be a matter of the past.

Partly, this was the outcome of developments in world affairs, since in the meantime East-West relations gained in importance and the West became more susceptible to cultural exchange. However, we cannot understand the present and also the possible roles of Buddhism in our time and the future, unless we understand its interAsian history. Excellent studies have been written on this topic, but perhaps the reception and transmission of Buddhism into China have been most extensively investigated.

ASIAN HISTORY OF BUDDHISM

There are some important general conclusions that can be derived from the Asian history of Buddhism. First of all we see some of the general characteristics of Buddhism as a religion that spread from India to other Asian countries--north, east, and southeast. In some of these countries Buddhism pushed into the background the popular cults of shamanistic origin, including in its practices and rituals some of the functions of these cults, transforming their indigenous animistic godlings into personages of the Buddhist pantheon and connecting local festivities to Buddhist holidays. In countries that already had established religious traditions (like China), it was founded as a parallel, second (or third) religion, sometimes in peaceful coexistence, at other times in conflict with the domestic religion. After several centuries, during which time it was treated mostly as an intruding foreign factor, it was assimilated and became as native as the forerunning tradition.

Buddhism has accepted the vernacular languages and elaborated new textual traditions that were added to the corpus of translated texts of Indian origin. The ethics and discipline of the monks were partly adapted to local customs. Nevertheless, up to the time of the Muslim invasion (between A.D. 1000 and 1200), when Buddhism declined in India, India was considered as the holy land of Buddhism, where pilgrims would come to seek inspiration and "study at the source", especially at the great universities like Nalanda.

Some of those pilgrims, like the Chinese Buddhists Hsuan-tsang and I Tsing (during the eighth century), have left valuable accounts of their travels, and of Buddhist practices and teachings, ranging from India, and China, to Java and Sumatra.

These events had fostered the role of Buddhism as an inter-Asian cultural mediator, that transcended state borders, political interests, and conflicts, spreading the Dharma from the plains of Central Asia to the jungles of Java, and from the Himalayan peaks to the coasts of the Land of the Rising Sun. Buddhism as a religious community (Sangha) was quite different from the Christian churches (both Orthodox and Catholic), with their centralized organizations and hierarchical structures. Sanghas in other countries were never subordinated to the Sangha in India, a fact equally valid and applicable to the offshoots of the Theravada tradition and to the communities that were inspired by the Mahayanist and Tantric traditions. The trans-national character of the Buddhist teachings was harmoniously intermingled with the national character of the Buddhist Sanghas, a fact that enabled local traditions to find their full expression in the realm of the Dharma. This should be stressed as one of the most important traits of Buddhism in its relation to national cultures. It did not act as a suppressor of national cultural values, but rather fostered the national character that inspired the talents in each given national milieu to express themselves.

Unity in diversity and diversity in unity--that was the feature that gave Buddhism its validity and enabled those various national talents to express themselves while maintaining the essence of the Dharma. This feature was responsible for the fact that Buddhism in various countries had its own schools and sects, besides those it developed during its history in India. These sects were sometimes in conflict with each other, over prevalence, power, or the favor of a particular ruler, but there was no explicit violence concerning heresy, no anathemas, or religious wars and exterminations such as we find in the history of Western Christianity (e.g., the conflict between Protestantism and Catholicism). In contrast to Christianity--whose dissemination and the baptizing of the people were usually a precursor of political or military subordination, or colonization, in later times--Buddhism spread beyond the Indian states quite independently of these factors and interests.

On the other hand, even when Buddhism was the prevalent religion or even a state religion, as in India at the time of Ashoka, other religions were not banished or persecuted, nor had they the status of heresies. In only two countries, Tibet and Japan, Buddhism strongly intermingled with political power or military ethics. In the first case (Tibet) this was due to the fact that no separate administration developed, so that the lamas had to fulfill the role of state bureaucrats; in the second case (Japan) it was due to the need of the samurai to find compensation in religion for the uncertainties of their existence.

Whether in its religious or philosophical guises, certain forms of Buddhism had strongly unworldly or even a cosmic leanings. On the other hand, many of its schools were never confined within monastery or library walls and thus shaped and influenced the everyday life of the laity or the career of many an artiüt, as much as the life of the monks. The influence of Buddhism on the arts was manifold, so that we find the finest examples of this influence in art that was not limited to religious themes, or in art that based its values beyond the immediate religious purpose. Vast indeed is the range of these remnants: the sculptures of the Gupta period in India, the Ajanta cave paintings, Tibetan mandalas and thangkas, Chinese Ch'an and Japanese Zen paintings, Japanese sculpture and Zen gardens, architectural masterpieces in Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Burma, Thailand, Cambodia, all the way down to Java. If we were to compare, for example, three sculptural masterpieces--the standing Buddha from the Gupta period (fifth century ), the seated image of Miroku ( Maitreya ) from the Chugu-ji temple in Japan (seventh century), and the head of Jayavarman VII from Cambodia (twelfth century) -- we would find the same expression of serene purity and compassion, despite the fact that these sculptures bear the distinct features of their time, place, and nationality.

THE FOURTH TURN - EAST AND WEST

The second phase of Buddhism as a cultural mediator-or should we say, the fourth turn of the Wheel of the Dharma--took place at the beginning of the nineteenth century and embraces our own time. Reviews of the reception of Buddhism in the West, as a religion and a philosophy, have been written, but until now (note: this paper was written in 1984), to my knowledge, there has been no attempt to review the considerable influence that Indian philosophies and religions, particularly Buddhism, had on contemporary developments in psychology and psychotherapy, although the reception of Buddhism in America was presented by Fields (1981). From the time of Carl Jung--before World War II--onward, there have been some attempts to evaluate the complex encounter of psychology with Buddhism, and other influences originating in the East.

The reception of Buddhism in the West was from the beginning an international affair. Buddhology emerged not only as a result of personal efforts (of investigators of various nationalities), but also as a result of their permanent communication and criticism. Certain centers (in Russia, G. Britain, Frnace, Germany) were for a time gathering places for investigators of various nationalities dedicated to a common task: Buddhist studies. This is also the case today in various places in Europe, India, Japan, Hawaii, and North America.

During the last 150 years we can trace a considerable shift of interests and attitudes toward Buddhism. Up to World War II, the prevailing interest in Buddhism was expressed in terms of ethics, religion, mysticism, and philosophy. This coincided with the tendency to import and convey the spiritual traditions of the East on the grounds of mysticism and religion which, after a time (particularly at the turn of the century) it was hoped that Buddhism would serve, either as a moral corrective for the West, or as a source for creating a universal religion that could transcend particular churches, and beliefs. This formed a barrier in terms of history of philosophy, and historians of philosophy and culture had difficulty in proving that Asia had philosophies that were not at the same time mystical or religious, and that the "Asian mind" cannot be reduced to mystical inclinations.

BUDDHISM AS WAY OF LIFE

After World War II the interest in the general Buddhist attitude to life and meditation came to the forefront. This was connected with the fact that far more people shared a non-academic interest in Buddhism; they were not professional historians of religion and philosophy, nor philologists, and for them Buddhism was not primary an object of study, but an inspiration that presumed personal involvement (and Buddhist studies were means in developing this goal). Perhaps in connection with this was also the shift of interest from the Pali Theravada tradition, to Mahayana and Tantrayana traditions, particularly Tibetan, after the exile and dispersion of the lamas to the West, from the 1950’s onward. The previous reception of Buddhism in terms of religion or philosophy was followed by a new perspective. Generations of Buddhologists tried to interpret and understand nirvana from various standpoints, but the "psychology of nirvana" has become a recent item in bibliograplüy (Johansson, 1970), and early Buddhist psychology has been included in one of the standard presentations of the theories of personality (Hall and Lindzey, 1978), under a somewhat ambiguous title "Eastern Psychology."

In this still growing field of interest we can see the same oscillations in interpretations from one extreme to the other.

Previously, the interpretation of, let us say, Early Buddhism, or the Pali Canon, swung between categories of mysticism/religion, and philosophy (cf. Chatalian, 1983). On the other hand, in the reception of Buddhism in the field of psychology before the war, psychological, particularly psychoanalytical interpretations of Buddhist meditation, were given in negative terms: it was considered as a regression leading to catatonia (Alexander, 1961). Jung was less negativistic, but concluded that Buddhist (or Eastern in general) types of meditation were definitely not for Westerners (Jung, 1971).

New generations of investigators changed this opinion by considering meditation as one of the possible ways to self-realization, selfactüialization, or personality-growth beyond mere "normality" or healthy-mindedness, which were the traditional goals of psychotherapy.

This reception was a part of a general widening of interest in Buddhist and non-Buddhist "ways of selfrealization" or "transpersonal psychologies," presented in textbooks that gathered similar material from various Eastern traditions (Murphy, G. and L. B., 1968; Tart, C., 1976; Welwood, J., 1979 ).

During the last fourty years, there has been an outpouring of literature presenting various aspects of Eastern traditions from the viewpoint of Western psychology and psychotherapy, as well as their possible application on new grounds. With meticulous analysis it would be possible to reconstruct in detail the process which in reversal gave birth to some new concepts and standpoints in psychology itself, but it is more important to give the main outline.

The psychological approach to Buddhism has been manifested through various modalities.

First, through attempts to present the contents of Buddhist teachings that have psychological relevance.

Second, through presentations that interpreted various Buddhist concepts from a psychological standpoint (Kasamatsu and Hirai, 1963 ; Ornstein and Naranjo, 1971 ; Hirai, 1974 ; Sekida, 1975 ; Brown, 1977).

Third, in striving to deduce, or adapt--from the conceptual framework or from the meditational practices of Buddhism--new concepts of personality-growth and techniques of psychotherapy, or those reaching beyond therapy strictu senso (Watts, 1961; Goleman, 1971; Casper, 1974; Deatherage, 1975; Goleman, 1977; Washburn and Stark, 1977; Welwood, 1977). With the fourth group of authors (Ornstein, 1972; Maslow, 1962; Walsh and Shapiro, 1979) we actually leave the specific reception of Buddhism in psychology and have to deal with concepts and methods that (in this field) represent what Robinson (1976, p. 14) has named as the final stage of assimilation, when the system (in his subject-matter, Madhyamaka in China, in our case, Buddhist psychology in the West) has been critically assessed and transcended.

We can now describe the full turn in the reception of Buddhism in this context: understanding certain Buddhist contexts from the psychological viewpoint, applying them in modified form, being inspired by them and assimilating them by defining concepts and methods appropriate to our time and cultural milieu. When we say this we should bear in mind that meditation cannot be equated with psychotherapy even in its widest sense, leading beyond therapy strictu senso, that nirvana cannot be equated with self-actualization or normality beyond healthy-mindedness, and that Buddhist concepts and practices cannot be reduced to psychological ones without a remainder. Anyhow, such equation is not necessary to a true encounter and if made it would be a misunderstanding.

The encounter between Buddhism and Western psychology has taken place mostly in the Anglo-Saxon milieu, but is of importance for the overall reception of Buddhism in Europe and America, because it probes deeply into questions concerning the fundamental premises of every culture: What is the purpose of being in the world? What ultimate goal can fulfill the life of man? Much of the energy of man is lost in support of the economic, political, and military interests that divide mankind. We should give more of our attention to those strivings and cultural values that drive us to the common enigma of man--how to lead a life that should not be a waste of the small amount of time and energy that is our lot. Or to quote a Buddhist dictum: Having obtained the difficult-to-obtain, free and endowed human body, it would be a cause of regret to fritter life away (Gampopa, The Rosary of Precious Gems).


References

- Alexander, F. "Buddhistic Training as an Artificial Catatonia,"The Scope of Psychoanalysis, New York: Basic Books, 1931.
- Brown, D. "A Model for the Levels of Concentrative Meditation," The International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, XXV, 4. Philadelphia; 1977.
- Casper, H. "Space Therapy and the Maitri Project," Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, VI. Stanford: 1974.
- Cassirer, E. The Logic of the Humanities. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1961.
- Chatalian, G. "Early Indian Buddhism and the Nature of Philosophy: A Philosophical Investigation," Journal of Indian Philosophy, 11, 2. Dordrecht:
- Deatherage, G. "The Clinical Use of Mindfulness Meditation in Short-term Psychotherapy," Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, VII, 1975.
- Fields, R. How the Swans Came to the Lake: A Narrative History of Buddhism in America, Boulder:Shambhala
- Goleman, D. The Varieties of the Meditative Experience. New York: Dutton, 1977.
-"Meditation as Meta-Therapy", Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, III,.1971.
- Hall, C. S., and Lindzey, G. Theories of Personality. New York: Wiley, 1978.
- Johansson, R. E. A. The Psychology of Nirvana. Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1970.
- Jung, C. G. "Psychological Commentary on the Tibetan Book of the Great Liberation," The Tibetan Book of the Great Liberation, ed. W. Y. Evans-Wentz, London: Oxford University Press, 1971.
- Kasamatsu, A., and Hirai, T. "Science of Zazen," Psychologia, no. 6. Kyoto: 1963.
- Maslow, A. Towards a Psychology of Being. New York : Van Nostrand, 1962.
- Murphy, G. and L. B. Asian Psychology. New York : Basic Books, 1968.
- Ornstein, R., and Naranjo, C.,On the Psychology of Meditation, New York: Viking, 1971.
- Robinson, R. H., Early Madhyamika in India and China. Delhi : Motilal Banarsidass, 1976.
- Sekida, K., Zen Training, New York: Weatherhill, 1975.
- Tart. C., Altered States of Consciousness. NewYork : Wiley, 1969.
- Tart. C.,Transpersonal Psychologies, New York: Harper and Row, 1976.
- Walsh R., and Shapiro, D. Beyond Health and Normality: An Exploration of Extreme Psychological Wellbeing. New York: Van Nostrand, 1979.
- Watts, A. Psychology East and West. New York : Pantheon, 1961.
- Welwood, J. "Meditation and the Unconscious: A New Perspective," Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, IX, 1977.
- Welwood, J.The Meeting of the Ways. New York : Shocken, 1979.

Women’s Poetry In Ancient Times


Dusan Pajin, Ph.D.




Anthologies of poetry (or literature) existed since ancient times. But later came professors of literature, who defined the literary canon, and made scholarly anthologies.

To appear in the Norton or Oxford anthology is to belong to the literary cannon, to have literary (social, aesthetic etc.) status, and accessibility to a reading public. Anyone who has studied literature in a secondary school or university in the western world knows what that means. It means that the works in the canon get read, read by neophyte students and supposedly expert teachers. It also means that to read these privileged works is a privilege and a sign of privilege. It is also a sign that one has been canonized oneself -- beatified by the experience of being introduced to beauty, admitted to the ranks of those of the inner circle who are acquainted with the canon and can judge what belongs and does not. (...) And that is why, of course, it matters that so few women writers have managed to gain entrance to such anthologies, says George P. Landow

Solutions to this more or less systematic dis-appearance of women's works include (1) expanding the canon to include more great women's works recently discovered; (2) changing standards or definitions of the canon, so that forms practiced by women, such as letters and diaries, appear as literature; (3) creating an alternate tradition or canon.

However, involvement with this questions can create a false impression that introduction of women’s poetry is a modern issue (19-20th, century) and that in ancient times women’s poetry (or literary works), neither has been created, or preserved. Let’s have a look.

Few glimpses show us that, in those bygone times, some women were literate, had time and passion to write down their thoughts and feelings (a rare privilege even in much later times), and their writings were included and saved in ancient anthologies.



EGYPT

From the New Kingdom (we would rather say “old kingdom” since it existed in 16-15th c. BC), The Harris Papyrus has been preserved, with some love songs, written by women. One is impressed by frankness and immediacy of feeling of those (anonymous) women writers in ancient Egypt (most writers from ancient Egypt are anonymous). And also, with the discovery that man and woman (almost) have not changed since those times.


If I am (not) with you, where will you set your heart?
If you do (not) embrace (me), (where will you go?)
If good fortune comes your way, (you still cannot find) happiness.
But if you try to touch my thighs and breasts,
(Then you’ll be satisfied). 
(...)
Take then my breast:
for you its gift overflows.
Better indeed is one day in your arms...
than a hundred thousand (anywhere) on earth.
 
My love for you is mixed throughout my body
like (salt) dipped in water,
like a medicine to which gum is added,
like milk shot through water...

So hurry to see your lady,
like a stallion on the track,
or like a falcon (swooping down) to its papyri marsh.

Heaven sends down the love of her
as a flame falls in the hay...

(transl. by William Kelly Simpson)



ISRAEL

Song of Songs is in the Hebrew, the Greek, the Christian Canon of the Scriptures (Bible). It belongs to the times of Solomon (Hebrew: Shlomo - fl. mid-10th c. BC). It describes, in reciprocal voices, the love for each other of Solomon and the Sulamit who, as bride and bridegroom, or as lovers, talk with, or of, each other. One part (2:6 to 5:1) describes two chief personages, who approach each other in stately procession, and the day is expressly called the wedding-day. But, the lyrical character of the song is unmistakable, and the development of an external action is not in focus so much as the unfolding of the lyrical expression of feelings.

However, one can ask: who wrote it - God, a woman, or a man? Do we have here a gender problem - one gender trying to describe the feelings of the other. Or the anonymous writer noted down a dialogue of lovers, or of a wedding pair, addressing each other in a poetic love praise. So far, the woman’s voice in this poem seems authentic, and above all: human and poetic. Let us quote just one passage of this women’s poetry.


My beloved is mine, and I am his;
    he delights in the lilies.
While the day is cool and the shadows are dispersing,
    turn, my beloved, and show yourself
     a gazelle or a young wild goat
on the hills where cinnamon grows.

Night after night on my bed
    I have sought my true love;
    I have sought him but not found him,
    I have called him but he has not answered.
I said, “I will rise and go to the rounds of the city,
through the streets and the squares,
    seeking my true love?
   I sought him but I did not find him,
   I called him but he did not answer.
The watchmen, going the rounds of the city, met me,
and I asked, “Have you seen my true love?”
    Scarcely had I left them behind me
   when I met my true love.
   I seized him and would no let him go
   until I had brought him to my mother’s house,
       to the room of her who conceived me.

(Song of Songs, 2:16-17; 3:1-4)



GREECE

Sappho (fl. c. 610-c. 580 BC) belongs to a rich poetic tradition that developed in her native city Mitylene (on island Lesbos, in Aegean sea), but also spent part of her life (twice) in ostracism (expulsion, for political reasons), on Sicily, at that time a Greek colony. Her poetry was greatly admired in all ages, and she exceeded most lyric poets (except Archilochus and Alcaeus), in the history of Greek literature. At that time in Lesbos women of good family would assemble in informal societies and spend their days in graceful pleasures, in composition, recitation, and singing poetry. Sappho was the leading spirit of one of these associations. Her possible lesbian affections are to be set aside in considering her poetry, as we do (ignoring homosexuality) when we consider works of Greek philosophers.

In the era of Alexandrian scholarship realated to the library of Alexandria (3-2nd c. BC), what remained of her work was collected and republished in a standard edition of nine books (The Ennead) of lyrical verse and one of elegiac. They survived into Byzantine times, but in 380 A.D. Gregory of Nazianzus ordered burning of her books, deemed obscene by the Church. Afterwards, Sappho was known only through quotations in other ancient writers, until 1900, when considerable fragments of her work began to be found on papyrus in Egypt, and so only a few hundred lines of her poetry remain. In her lifetime, she invented a 21-string lyre, to accompany herself when she sang her poems. As with other ancient texts and writings (hieroglyphic, Hebrew, Chinese, Japanese) it makes sense - for those who are not fluent in ancient Greek - to read multiple translations to obtain several viewpoints. Her poetry includes a wide gamut of subjects and poetic forms (wedding songs, songs of praise, funeral songs etc.). She wrote with equal skill about delights of love and youth, and sorrows of departure, old age and death. Fragment 58


Age seizes my skin and turns my hair
From black to white:
My knees no longer bear me
And I am unable to dance again
Like a fawn.

What could I do? I am not ageless:
My youth is gone.
Red-robed Dawn, immortal goddess,
Carried (Tithonus) to earth's end
Yet age seized him
Despite the gift from his immortal lover ....

I love delicate softness:
For me, love has brought the brightness
And the beauty of the sun ...   
(transl. by D. W. Myatt)



CHINA

The Book of Songs (Shih ching) was compiled some time after 600 BC. It also includes a rich variety of poetic forms, and also love songs written by women. Most authors are anonymous. Some of these songs are among the most original love songs ever written in world literature (like the first one in our selection). The way to express feelings relating them to parts of outfit in this poem, should not be confused with fetishism. Fetishism is fondness for certain parts of clothes etc. of the opposite gender (not related to a particular person). However, this poem expresses a particular fondness for the loved person, where parts of his clothes are associated with intensive feelings.


That the mere glimpse of a plain cap
Could harry me with such longing,
Cause pain so dire!

That the mere glimpse of a plain coat
Could stab my heart with grief!
Enough! Take me with you to your home.

That a mere glimpse of plain leggings
Cold tie my heart in tangles!
Enough! Let us two be one.

(trans. by Arthur Waley)

The second song is a frank description of a love night in the open.


Mid the bind-grass on the plain
That the dew makes wet as rain
I met by chance my clear-eyed man,
then my
joy began.

Mid the wild grass dank with dew
lay we the full night thru,
that clear-eyed man and I
in mutual felicity.

(trans. by Ezra Pound)



INDIA

Ambapali was a wealthy and beautiful courtesan during the time of Buddha (circa 560-480 BC), and she lived in the city-state Wesali. Wesali was similar to city-states that in those times existed in Greece, and the position of courtesan in India was similar to the position of hetaera in Greece (Gr. hetaira). These professional independent courtesans, besides developing physical beauty, cultivated their minds and talents to a degree far beyond that allowed to the average woman. Usually living fashionably alone, or sometimes two or three together, they enjoyed an enviable and respected position of wealth and were protected and taxed by the city-state. They were often hired as entertainers for parties and other occasions, and they themselves were sometimes hosts for distinguished guests. Therefore, Ambapali was on occasion a host to Buddha and his followers.

However, after a while, beauty, as anything else, ends - and in the face of the inevitability of aging, and the loss of her beauty, Ambapali left some unforgettable lines, describing with same poetic passion the glow of youth, and wearing down of body forms in old age. In her late age she joined the Buddhist order. Her verses were included in the collection known as Theri-gatha (Verses of nuns - part of the Buddhist Pali canon). Perhaps the original verses by Ambapali were slightly different. Here, we find a form fiting with the Theri-gatha religious point (The truth of the Truth-speaker's words doesn't change), and with the important Buddhist concept (aging), which - together with illness, and death - is the starting point for the Buddhist teaching of release.


 Black was my hair
     -- the color of bees --
     & curled at the tips;
         with age, it looked like coarse hemp.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Fragrant, like a perfumed basket
     filled with flowers: my coiffure.
         With age it smelled musty,
         like animal fur.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Thick & lush, like a well-tended grove,
     made splendid, the tips elaborate
     with comb & pin.
         With age, it grew thin
         & bare here & there.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Adorned with gold & delicate pins,
     it was splendid, ornamented with braids.
         Now, with age,
         that head has gone bald.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Curved, as if well-drawn by an artist,
     my brows were once splendid.
         With age, they droop down in folds.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Radiant, brilliant like jewels,
     my eyes: elongated, black -- deep black.
         With age, they're no longer splendid.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Like a delicate peak, my nose
     was splendid in the prime of my youth.
         With age, it's like a long pepper.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Like bracelets -- well-fashioned, well-finished --
     my ears were once splendid.
         With age, they droop down in folds.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Like plantain buds in their color,
     my teeth were once splendid.
         With age, they're broken & yellowed.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Like that of a cuckoo in the dense jungle,
     flitting through deep forest thickets:
     sweet was the tone of my voice.
         With age, it cracks here & there.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Smooth -- like a conch shell well-polished --
     my neck was once splendid.
         With age, it's broken down, bent.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Like rounded door-bars -- both of them --
     my arms were once splendid.
         With age, they're like dried up patali trees.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Adorned with gold & delicate rings,
     my hands were once splendid.
         With age, they're like onions & tubers.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Swelling, round, firm, & high,
     both my breasts were once splendid.
         In the drought of old age, they dangle
         like empty old water bags.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Like a sheet of gold, well-burnished,
     my body was splendid.
         Now it's covered with very fine wrinkles.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Smooth in their lines, like an elephant's trunk,
     both my thighs were once splendid.
         With age, they're like knotted bamboo.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Adorned with gold & delicate anklets,
     my calves were once splendid.
         With age, they're like sesame sticks.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     As if they were stuffed with soft cotton,
     both my feet were once splendid.
         With age, they're shriveled & cracked.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.

     Such was this physical heap,
     now: decrepit, the home of pains, many pains.
         A house with its plaster all fallen off.
     The truth of the Truth-speaker's words
             doesn't change.
(Theri-gatha, 252-270, transl. by C. A. R. Rhys Davids)



JAPAN

Manyoshu is the oldest and greatest anthology of Japanese poetry (compiled in the 8th c., and containing 4.500 poems, sometimes of much earlier date). Among these are many poems written by women of different rank, and we know their names. In some cases the poems express a particular feeling for nature, like this poem by lady Sagami.


The under leaves of the lespedeza
When the dew is gathering
Must be cold:
In the autumn moor
The young deer are crying.

(trans. by A. Waley)

In some cases the poem is related brotherly love, as this one by the princess Oku (661-701).


To speed my brother
Parting for Yamato,
In the deep of night I stood
Till the wet with the dew of dawn.

The lonely autumn mountains
Are hard to pass over
Even when two go together -
How does my brother cross them all alone!


Some poems express passion that we can find much later in Romanticism. (http://home.fuse.net/wiederhold/romantic.htm) Lady Kasa (in the 8th c.) wrote a set of 29 poems expressing her love (toward O. Yakamochi). We quote two of them.


Oh how steadily I love you -
You who awe me
Like the thunderous waves
That lash the seacoast of Ise!

More thoughts crowd into my mind
When evening comes; for then,
Appears your phantom shape -
Speaking as I have known you speak.


Manyoushu is also famous for its collection of (63) love poems (written and exchanged, mutually) by two lovers - a man (N. Yakamori), and a women (S. Otokami).

From a later collection (10th. century) is this impressive poem by a anonymous women poet, with its spectacular and painful self-awareness!


Dreams, listen, my dreams!
Do not bring me together
With the man I love -
When once I have awakened
It makes me feel so lonely.




BIBLIOGRAPHY

The Literature of Ancient Egypt, ed. by W. K. Simpson, Yale Univ. Press, 1973
Anthology of Chinese Literature, ed. by C. Birch, Penguin 1967
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Dusan Pajin, Belgrade

BAUHAUS - DESIGN FOR THE CENTURY
- 80th anniversary of Bauhaus (1919-1999)

In 1919 Walter Gropius (1883-1969) was appointed to head a new institution - the Bauhaus in Weimar (Germany). Bauhaus was founded combining the Weimar Art Academy, and the Weimar Arts and Crafts School.

New school of design

Bauhaus gathered people who believed that a rebirth of society and humanity is possible through the union of artistic media and potentials.
Both an artist and a master craftsman trained students, to make future artists familiar with science and economics, to unite creative imagination with a practical knowledge of craftsmanship, and to develop a new sense of functional design. Bauhaus taught the coexistence of modernity, machine, work, building, simplicity, complexity, and economy to form a new "functional" aesthetics of clear facades, and lines, dicarding any ornament.
Bauhaus "building" covered all levels - from building houses, to creating the new look of the cities, and 'building future', changing the environment, and designing the future.
The school had three aims at its inception:
1) to rescue arts from the isolation, create a synthesis of arts, and encourage the individual artisans and craftsmen to work cooperatively (team-work) combining their skills;
2) to elevate the status of crafts (designing and producing chairs, lamps, teapots, etc.), to the level enjoyed by fine arts;
3) to maintain contact with the leaders of industry and eventually gain independence from government support (funds), by selling designs to industry, or even having its own (limited) production.
These aims were basically the same throughout the life of the Bauhaus (1919-1932), even though the direction (conditions, and places) of the school changed significantly during these 13 years.
Bauhaus fitted with the social and culture plans of the Weimar Republic: to build homes which bring art to the people through their design. The Bauhaus program developed into real housing, and by 1924 mass housing was the great social issue of Weimar Germany; by 1932 no other country had built more houses for its workers. Most of the buildings for workers were built with tax money.
Instead of elaborate, classic buildings, the new architects opted for more simple, functional designs. Buildings were soon constructed in the form of concrete, steel, wood, stucco, and glass. A building must have a flat roof and a sheer façade, with neither cornices nor eaves. The result was rational social housing, with open floor plans, white walls, no drapes, and functional furniture.

Overall design

Bauhaus proved to be a focus of immense creative potential, that created the new, urban aesthetics, dominant worldwide for the next sixty years. It shaped everything - from teapots and chairs, to cars, sky-scrapers, and highway junctions.
"Everyone sitting on a chair with a tubular steel frame, using an adjustable reading lamp, or living in a house partly or entirely constructed from prefabricated elements is benefiting from a revolution in design largely brought about by the Bauhaus" (Whitford, F.: Bauhaus, London, Thames & Hudson, 1988, p. 10).
The entire "modern" style of aesthetics (boxy, functional, and plain) began with Bauhaus. We are still surrounded by the architecture that this philosophy produced. Bauhaus managed to develop and produce new ideas and programs, and to spread them in its own time, and the time to come - not only outside Thuringia and Germany, but also beyond the confines of Europe, becoming the global aesthetics, or the dominant style of our century. Its ambition to create and design the future was not an empty talk of mystics or utopians.
Among the people who contributed to Bauhaus creativity, were (beside Gropius) some leading artists of our century (some of them from neighbor countries): Oskar Schlemmer, Johaness Itten, Mies van der Rohe, Paul Klee, Wassily Kandinsky, Gerhard Marcks, Lyonel Feininger, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Georg Muche, Theo van Doesburg, Joost Schmidt, Josef Albers, Gerta Stölzl...
The core of Bauhaus ideas that will have world-wide impact, can be found in "Dessau Bauhaus - principles of Bauhaus production" (written by Gropius, 1926).
The Bauhaus seeks... to derive the form of an object from its natural functions and limitations. (...)The nature of an object is determined by what it does... it must function practically, must be cheap, durable, and 'beautiful'. (...)
Forms emerge from a determined consideration of all the modern methods of production and construction and of modern materials. (...)
For most people the necessities of life are the same. (...) Design is more a matter of reason than of passion.
(The goals are):
- Determined acceptance of the living environment of machines and vehicles.
- Exclusive use of primary forms and colors comprehensible to everyone.
- Simplicity in multiplicity, economical use of space, material, time and money.
- Prototypes suitable for mass production and typical of their time are developed with care and constantly improved.

World-wide influence

During thirteen years Bauhaus developed enough potential to influence architecture, design and art round the world, especially when the professors and (former) students dispersed. Many of them left Germany (during Nazi times), and spread (personally - and through the new generation that they educated) their knowledge, creativity and ideas, West and East. Bauhaus influenced our lives immensely, in ways that most people take for granted, because they were born in this environment.
"The 'New Bauhaus' founded by Moholy-Nagy in Chicago in 1937, the activities of Gropius at Harvard, Albers at both Black Mountain College and Yale, the establishment in 1950 of a 'Hochschule für Gestaltung' ...in Ulm... are merely the most visible results of that influence. Less easy to demonstrate but not less important is the continuing influence of Bauhaus ideas in countless art schools from London to Tokyo" (Whitford, 1988: p. 197).
Postmodern architecture and design, during the last decade, reduced this dominance, and Bauhaus aesthetic is now seen as separate, as any other style - nowadays, in postmodernism, individualism and even whimsy is increasingly prized.