[KALKI]

The Hindu Vedantists say that one may stumble into super-consciousness sporadically, without the previous discipline, but it is then impure. Their test of its purity, like our test of religion’s value, is empirical: its fruits must be good for life. When a man comes out of Samadhi, he remains enlightened, a sage, a prophet, a saint; his whole life is changed, illumined.

The Buddhists, James explains, used the word “samadhi” as well as the Hindus; but “dhyana” is their special word for higher states of contemplation. There seems to be four stages recognized in dhyana [in Buddhism]. The first stage comes through concentration of the mind upon one Phra_Ajan_Jerapunyo-Abbot_of_Watkungtaphao[1]point. It excludes desire, but not discernment or judgment; it is still intellectual. In the second stage, the intellectual functions drop off, and the satisfied sense of unity is felt. In the third stage, the satisfaction departs and indifference begins along with memory and self-consciousness. In the fourth stage, the indifference, memory and self-consciousness are perfected. James here states that just what memory and self-consciousness mean in this connection cannot be the same faculties familiar to us in the lower life. Higher stages still of contemplation are mentioned – a region where nothing exists and where the meditator says: “There exists absolutely nothing” and stops. He then reaches another region where he says: “There are neither ideas nor absence of ideas,” and again stops. Then another region where, “having reached the end of both idea and perception, he stops finally.” This would seem to be, not Nirvana, but as close an approach to it as this life affords.

thY0214M7DIn The Mohammedan world, the Sufi sect and various dervish [see image of whirling dervishes] bodies are the possessors of the mystical tradition. The Sufis have existed in Persia since the earliest times. And, as their pantheism is so at variance with the hot and rigid monotheism of the Arab mind, it has been suggested that Sufism must have been introduced into Islam by Hindu influences. James tells us that we Christians know little of Sufism for, its secrets are disclosed only to those initiated. But, to give its existence a certain liveliness in our minds James quotes a Moslem philosopher and theologian, Al-Ghazzali, a Persian from the eleventh century who ranks as one of the greatest theologians of the Moslem church [much abridged]:

“The science of the Sufis aims at detaching the heart from all that is not God and giving it up to for the sole occupation of the divine being.” “… my heart no longer felt any difficulty in renouncing glory, wealth, and my children” says Al-Ghazzali, “so I quitted Bagdad and, reserving from my fortune only what was indispensable for my subsistence, I distributed the rest. I went to Syria, where I remained about two years with no other occupation than living in retreat and solitude conquering my desires, combating my passions, training myself to purify my soul, to make my character perfect, to prepare my heart for meditating on God – all according to the methods of the Sufis, as I had read of them.”

“I recognized, for certain, that the Sufis are assuredly walking in the path of God. Both in their acts and in their inaction, whether internal or external, they are illumined by the light which proceeds from the prophetic source. The first condition for a Sufi is to purge his heart entirely of all that is not God. The next key to the contemplative life consists in the humble prayers which escape from the fervent soul and, in the meditation of God in which the heart is swallowed up entirely. But, in reality this is only the beginning of the Sufi life; the end of Sufism being total absorption in God.” “… revelations take place in so flagrant a shape that the Sufis see before them, whilst wide awake, the angels and the souls of the prophets. They hear their voices and obtain their favors.”

Al-Ghazzali goes on to describe the prophetic faculty as being analogous to such: “… sleep. If you were to tell a man who has never had the [sleep] experience that there are people who at times swoon away so as to resemble dead men, and who [in dreams] perceive things that are hidden [from the outside observer], he would deny it. Nevertheless, his arguments would be refuted by actual experience. Just so, in the prophetic, the sight is illumined by a light which uncovers hidden things and objects which the intellect fails to reach. The chief properties of prophetism are perceptible only during the transport, and by those who embrace the Sufi life.”