< The Psychology of the Buddhists (continued from page 4-96) >
Aryas, practised yoge for suppressing bodily vitality, subjugating the external senses, bringing on abstraction, tranquillity and intense contemplation.
The numerous forms of mysticism and the different stages of somnambulism and clairvoyance clearly show the innumerable states between the brain and soul and the state receiving the impress of the soul or partaking of its essentiality, is the state in which we have clear knowledge. “Samadhi is the ideal identification with the object of meditation devoid of individual nature.” The soul rises from the personal to the impersonal; from the sensuous to the supersensuous; from the finite to the infinite, in the attainment of the void or nothingness of the mundane and the arrival at the “other shore,” or the state of the Nirvana or Jeebun Saneti—the spiritual state of the Aryas. Mrs. F. W. R. Davids observes that “the attainment of Samadhi is looked upon by Dr. Carpenter as not only possible, but as having actually taken place in certain instances given.”
Lapen affirms that the early Buddhists acknowledged the supreme mind. Bastian finds that the Buddhists of Central Asia worshipped Abida as the highest and most perfect god. A well-known prayer of the Buddhists is, Om! Mani Padmi!—“Oh, the jewel of creation is in the lotus—heart or soul of the universe, the all-pervading self, or the all in all.”
The following used to be sung on hearing the convent bell:—
“Produce in all a perfect rest and quiet from every care, |
Again, it is said that the true idea of God is in the “inner self.” “The Amiterbha is eternal, omnipresent, Adhi Buddha; and one form of existence, the supreme nature of the first cause; beyond that we can ascertain nothing.” Again, “There is a supreme power; but not a supreme being.” The theistic Buddhas of Nepaul think that the self-existent God is the sum of perfection, infinite, eternal; without members or passions; “one with all things (in priverti) and separable from all things (in nevrite), as form, formed, and formless—the essence of priverti and nevrite.” Gotama, arriving at Nirvana, assured his disciples that there is a divinity in man that for ever works for universal and remedial ends. It appears from several of the above passages that the Buddhas were largely importing Vedantic ideas. In Hodgson’s Literature and Religion of the Buddhists, we find that the soul, or pran and jiva, is a particle of the essence of the Adi Buddha. Soul is unchangeable. In Beale’s Catena, we find further proof of the Buddhists being saturated with Vedantic doctrines. “The contemplative soul views God by a light which is the divine essence, and even the soul is that divine light.” With regard to Vedantism, Vans Kennedy says, “It cannot but excite surprise that man at that remote period should have been capable of entering into such abstruse speculation and forming conceptions to the sublimity of which no philosopher of Europe has ever attained.” Sir William Jones adds his testimony that it is “a system wholly built on the purest devotion.”
The Buddhists, like the Aryas, valued soul as the best source of knowledge. They say “the various kinds of knowledge: ear knowledge, eye knowledge, taste knowledge, and all things that exist in the phenomenal world are as unreal as a phantom.” Again, “All lust removed, all wicked acts uprooted, all within calm and pure, without any blemish. Who is acquainted with all things that have not yet transpired. Who knows and sees and hears all things?” Such universal wisdom is rightly called “illumination.” The soul has “divine eye or divine vision.”
The word Nirvana has been variously interpreted. The author of the article on Buddhism in the Encyclopedia Britannica, 9th edition, gives the following definition:—“Happy seat, the excellent external. Place of bliss where there is no death or decay, the end of suffering, the home of peace, the other side of the ocean of existence, the shore of salvation, the harbour of refuge, the medicine of all evil, the transcendent, the tranquil state, the truth, the infinite, the inseparable, the everlasting.” “The fruits of Nirvana are supreme wisdom, complete deliverance and essential body;” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, Vol. XX. Various terms have been used to denote this state. Amrita (immortality), apavarga (conclusion, completion, or abandonment), sreyas (excellence), nih-neyasa (assured assurance), caiwalya (singleness), nihsarava (exit, departure), mueti or moesha (emancipation, deliverance from evil, liberation from worldly bonds, relief from further transmigration), ananda (unmixed tranquil happiness, or ecstasy). There are many other terms. The word Nirvana or Jeebun mueti was also used by the Aryas and meant the spiritual state, which it is clear the Buddhist also meant. Nirvana literally means the extinguishment of the brain or natural life. The spiritual state or the linga sarira (subtile body) of the Aryas.
The Buddhists describe this state as void.
Schlaginteveit, in his Buddhism in Thibet, observes:—“ Perfection in abstract meditation is indispensable for final salvation; the perfection guarantees an energy not to be derived from the mere practice of simple virtues. Yoidness alone is self-evident and perfect.”
Burnouf says:—“The expression ‘void,’ which occurs in what are indirectly the oldest monuments, has led me to the supposition that Sankhya saw the highest good in the complete annihilation of the thinking principle. He represented it to himself according to an oft-repeated simile like the extinction of the flame of a dying lamp.”
D’Alwis defines void as a state above all desire and fear.
In Samuel Beal’s Catena of Buddhistic Scriptures, it is said that in this mysterious state of Sathagata, the state of wisdom is the same as the substantial void, and the state of emptiness is the same as the substantial wisdom, ever pure and unconditioned, universally diffused.”
Void means the absorption of the brain in the soul. When this is done, the spiritual life is attained. This is not only the teaching of the Aryas and Buddhists, but Christian Mystics have said “In nothingness is all.” Charles Kingsley says, “Empty thyself and God will fill thee.”
The Arya and Buddhist teaching is:—“The more the self, the I, the me, the mine—that is self-seeking and selfishness—abate in a man the more does God’s I, that is God Himself, increase in him.”
Buddhism was originally atheistic, because the predominant idea was the extinction of pain. Intense contemplation vivified the conviction of the existence of the soul or the immortal and divine principle in the human being and through the soul, the Soul of Souls was made vivid. Buddhism although originally atheistic, was eventually Vedantic in the conception of God, of the soul and the means of attaining Nirvana or soul life.
Calcutta.
The British National Association of Spiritualists
Last Monday night, at the ordinary fortnightly meeting of the British National Association of Spiritualists, Mr. Desmond Fitz-Gerald, M.S.Tel.E., presided. There was a large attendance.
The Rev. W. Stainton-Moses, M.A., then read the following paper:—“It is now nearly a year* since Miss Kislingbury read a paper in this place on the subject of “Form Manifestations,” in which she pointed out that the term covered a wide area, and might apply to very diverse kinds of phenomena. The choice of that term (erroneously attributed in her recent book by Madame Blavatsky to myself) seemed to me very felicitous, as did the paper in which Miss Kislingbury developed her views with regard to the various phenomena embraced under it.
Nearly six months afterwards† I submitted to this society a paper on the same subject, in which I endeavoured to particularise what had been done in the way of accumulating exact knowledge, and to point out what still remained to be desired. Exact knowledge, when accounts were thoroughly sifted, there was very little. Some fortunate experimenters had, indeed, been in a position to give positive testimony as to the production of a human form which they had seen, and of the existence of which they had assured themselves while the medium was in their sight. But these were conspicuously the exceptions which only served to prove the rule.
“In most cases—practically in all save a tiny percentage—the scientific result was nil. A medium was secluded from view, and certain forms were more or less visibly perceived to issue from the cabinet in which he <... continues on page 4-98 >
* Spiritualist, Dec. 22, 1876.
† Spiritualist, May 18, 1877.
Editor's notes
- ↑ The British National Association of Spiritualists by unknown author, London Spiritualist, No. 275, November 30, 1877, pp. 254-5
London Spiritualist, No. 275, November 30, 1877, pp. 254-5