Highly Recommended Article on Pure Consciousness

[Guest guest]

This is what Gita has to say on this:

 

According to Astavakra Gita: Burn the forest of ignorance with the fire of

conviction that God is the ONE with pure consciousness -- It will free you from

sorrow and make you blissful.

Body and Self are tools in the hands of Soul which is pure consciousness –

the body is inert while Self is blind energy.

Dave Anand

On this and related matters, please visit:

http://www.PeopleSuperHighway.com

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

Namaste,

 

Earlier, in a message to Ananda, I mentioned an article on 'Pure

Consciousness' by Robert Forman:

 

http://www.zynet.co.uk/imprint/Forman.html

 

This was buried in a long message of mine which you may not have

read. I do recommend reading this interesting though lengthy

article. It directly relates to our discussion of the 'contentless

consciousness' of deep sleep. The article is scholarly and draws on

many mystical experiences from around the world. Not all of it may

agree with Advaita but much of it does, and the comparison is highly

illuminating.

 

Also, by Robert Forman is a book called 'Mysticism, Mind

Consciousness'. The following is an informative review that I

clipped, but unfortunately I no longer have the link, so I will just

post the review, since it is really worth reading. It may be

copyrighted, so I apologize and please don't reproduce this. Also,

consider buying the book, which I have. It's a good book and not

expensive.

 

Benjamin

 

 

 

A PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNSAYABLE

 

In this ambitious study, Professor Forman attempts to provide a

philosophical basis for mysticism. He tries to show that mystical

experience is not simply a product of the time, place, and background

of the individuals claiming such experience. Those holding that

mystical experiences are the product of such considerations are

called 'constructivists'. Their philosophical ancestor, for Professor

Forman, is Kant. In opposition to constructivism, Professor Forman

argues that mysticism in its most basic form is a 'pure consciousness

event' (PCE) - the mind knowing itself in a nonlinguistic manner

involving pure awareness of mind as such.

 

Professor Forman relies in large part on reports of the mystical

experience from people far removed from each other in terms of time

and culture. He discusses his own experiences, those of contemporary

Christian, Hindu, and Buddhist mystics,and ancient texts by Buddhist

and Hindu contemplatives reporting on the mystical experience. He

states that he has been greatly influenced by the transcendental

meditation of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, Ram Dass, and Meister Eckhart;

and the first and third of these are discussed in the book. In

addition to Eckhart, Professor Forman's book is also heavily

influenced, I find, by William James's 'Varieties of Religious

Experience' and by Jean Paul Sartre.

 

In addition to discussing and attempting to describe the nature of

the mystical experience (no small task in itself), Professor Forman

takes issue with philosophers such as Kant, Husserl and a

contemporary writer on mysticism, Steven Katz, who see the mystical

experience as conditioned by language. (The constructivists are

juxtaposed against the 'perennialists' who, we learn, have no

sensitivity to the nuances of language, time, and place.)

 

The philosophic argument of the book is found in a dense discussion

in chapter 4 'Non-Linguistic Mediation' which is a critique of the

philosophy of Kant. Although Professor Forman allows the

nonphilosophically inclined to skip this chapter it is pivotal to his

philosophical argument. I was unable, at any rate, to agree with

Professor Forman's description of the Kantian philosophy or with its

critique. It turns on an argument that Kant's Transcendental

Aesthetic was not intended to apply to mystical experience and that

the restrictions it would place on human knowledge do not apply to

the mystical experience. Unfortunately, I found that this argument

does not meet Kant's argument which was squarely directed against

unmediated experience as well as unmediated philosophizing.

 

Professor Forman also is critical of the arguments of Edmund Husserl

on the intentional nature of consciousness, finding in Husserl a

restatement of the constructivist claim of Kant. I am not sure if

Professor Forman is correct in considering Husserl a constuctivist.

Much of Husserl's phenomenology, which focuses as I understand it on

a description of experience (bracketed to avoid causual questions

such as those Professor Forman addresses) is useful in an attempt to

understand the nature of the mystical experience - recognized by

Professor Forman in a backhanded way, I think.

 

As a philosophical critique, the book is less than successful. As a

description of the mystical experience and as a statement of why such

experiences may be valuable and important it does much better. The

subject richly deserves attention, as does the nature of the

spiritual life and Professor Forman has much to say.

 

I think the problem at bottom as the mysticism is not by its nature

susceptible to philosophical analysis or justification. As the Buddha

for one insisted it is experiential in character and can't be reached

by philosophical argument. Again, Husserl and William James are

helpful here. One must look and see for oneself If one engages in a

contemplative practice and looks and sees, the nature of the path

becomes opened by the process and practice. The issue of

'constuctivism' is irrelevant one way or the other to the nature of

the experience. Both the 'constructivist' approach and Professor

Forman's critique are off the mark in that they both attempt to put

in words what is undescribable and experiential.

 

 

 

A Seminal Work That Takes The Mystery Out Of Mysticism

 

The word 'mysticism' means different things to different people. To

many it connotes heightened sensory or cognitive experiences such as

visions, voices or revelations. To others, mystical experiences are

silent fusings of the conscious self with eternity, infinity,

oneness, unbounded awareness. In this book Dr. Forman, a professor of

religion at Hunter College, carefully restricts his use to the latter

type of mysticism - consciousness events not describable in terms of

the senses. Of these he distinguishes two stages: the short-lasting

'pure consciousness event' and the longer-lasting or permanent

'dualistic mystical state'.

 

The two opening chapters define the 'pure consciousness event' (PCE)

in detail. The author describes his own PCE experiences (strictly

speaking they are not subject-object experiences at all but simple

periods of awareness without thought) and cites accounts of similar

experiences by contemporary, medieval and ancient writers. The thesis

he will develop is that the PCE is universal and the same for

everyone, an innate ability analogous to the experience of hot or

cold, light or dark and not the product of a person's previous

experience, culture, or expectations - a model called

'constructivism' that pervades today's academic world.

 

Chapters 3-5 explore the philosophical basis of constructivism and

show convincingly that constructivist models, no matter how valuable

in explaining ordinary subject-object experience, cannot account for

pure consciousness events. Although the arguments are rigorous,

Forman's style is lively and readable. Chapter 4 deals with the

epistemology of Kant, Brentano and Husserl. Here the going is

somewhat tough and the author gives the less philosophically inclined

reader permission to skip ahead. Chapter 5 examines the writings of

Paramartha, a 9th century Buddhist thinker who invoked constructivist

models similar to those of contemporary writers to explain ordinary

experiences, but rejected them as unsuitable for mystical (pure

consciousness) phenomena.

 

Having dealt with the constructivists, Forman explains in Chapters

6-7 that mystical phenomena are actually products of

'de-construction' - of letting go, forgetting, 'unknowing', and

introduces the principle of 'knowledge by identity' whereby the

mystic knows his state not through concepts, words or transitory

acquaintance but by direct unmediated experience.

 

Now comes the most interesting part. Moving beyond simple 'pure

consciousness events' Forman discusses the more significant

'dualistic mystical state' (DMS). Unlike the short-lived PCE, the DMS

is a long-lasting or permanent state in which pure consciousness

persists along with ordinary relative consciousness. Some have

described it as a great silence within, a void, a cosmic vastness

that persists in the midst of ordinary day-to-day life. Others feel

it as loss of ego or personal self that is sometimes distressing.

This paradoxical state has been experienced and lived by mystics

throughout the ages, but no western writers (although Bernadette

Roberts, Franklin Merrell-Wolff, and Suzanne Segal come close) have

analyzed it as formally and clearly as the present author.

 

He knows whereof he speaks; in Chapter 8 Dr. Forman quietly tells us

that he has lived the dualistic mystical state since his twenties

when it came upon him during an extended meditation retreat. It has

never left. Deep conscious inner silence, he writes, persists during

daily activity and even during sleep. This book, then, is the result

of his attempts over the years to make philosophical sense of the

mystical (some would say 'contemplative') state that is now his

everyday reality.

 

In his final chapters Forman examines the nature of consciousness

itself in light of the PCE and DMS, drawing on Sartre and the Zen

philosopher Hui Neng to buttress his conclusions that pure

consciousness is non-linguistic, non-intentional and 'utterly

translucent,' a 'pure watching presence' that 'can tie things--and

itself--together through time.' 'One knows it only because one is

it,' he writes. The book ends with the suggestion that 'this

nonverbal presence has a great deal to teach about the nature of

human life and intelligence.'

 

Mysticism, Mind, Consciousness is a groundbreaking book that could

well become a classic in the field - vital reading for anyone

interested in the twin phenomena of consciousness and mysticism.

Those looking for warm New Age fuzzies however, might be

disappointed; Forman is a scholar writing primarily for other

scholars (although he keeps lay readers in mind throughout). His

thoughts and carefully reasoned arguments, drawing on a wide variety

of thinkers both ancient and modern, take the mystery out of mysticsm

and establish the PCE and DMS as valid subjects for further inquiry

and research.

 

This short book (214 pages, 36 of which are notes and bibliography)

raises many questions. Why do mystical experiences come easily to a

few people and not to most others? Is there a physiological basis to

these states? (Forman details some interesting physical sensations

associated with his transition.) Could pure consciousness phenomena

perhaps be verified by brain wave patterns? What is 'enlightenment'?

(Forman suggests that the DMS represents a beginning stage to it.)

Many mystics claim that pure consciousness phenomena are 'salvific';

why does Forman disagree? What type of meditation did he practice

that brought him to the dualistic mystical state? ('Neo-Advaitan' is

all he will say.) What did he learn from spiritual teachers Maharishi

Mahesh Yogi and Ram Dass (both briefly acknowledged in the Preface

but scarcely mentioned thereafter)? What is the relationship between

religion and mysticism? Hopefully we will hear more from Dr. Forman

on these questions in the near future.

 

Meanwhile, if you are at all interested in the topics of mysticism,

mind or consciousness, pick up a copy of this book. You will probably

want to read it several times.

 

 

Forman's Book Is A Landmark Study.

 

Rober K. C Forman is the foremost philosopher of mysticism

(mysticist) of our time. In Mysticism, Mind and Consciousness, Forman

discusses the pure consciousness event (PCE), a new model of pure

consciousness, and what Forman calls the 'dualistic mystical state'

(DMS). The pure consciousness event is a state of awareness wherein

the mystic experiences nothing. There is no thinking, no willing, no

sensing, no remembering. The mystic has no sense of the self or the

world. There is no sense of place or of time passing. But the mystic

is not asleep or unconscious. The mystic is aware that they are aware

throughout the event. Accounts of pure consciousness events are found

in all religious traditions. The PCE is a frequent concomitant of

meditative practices. But it needn't be. Sometimes non-religious

people experience pure consciousness events. I am aware of one

person, for example. who experienced a PCE as a result of

concentrating on her breathing. To account for how the mystic is

aware of the PCE, Forman proposes a new model of pure consciousness.

Foreman says that the mind of the mystic is reflexively aware of

itself, even when there is no content to the consciousness. Although

this may sound strange, it is what mystics report. Mystics know that

they have been aware throughout the pure consciousness event, even

though there has been no sense of self or the world. After a PCE, a

mystic is often at a loss in how to understand the event and express

it to others. A PCE doesn't link well to language, as it has no

content. So what does one say about it? An experience of nothing is

ineffable. All the same, mystics often place interpretative

categories on what they have experienced. They may say that they have

experienced the presence of God, or the ground of being (the Tao) or

a silence within or their self-nature. A mystic might say that they

have experienced a level of themselves wherein they are most real.

Irregardless of how a mystic interprets a PCE, the language used to

talk about it should be taken as figurative at best. The language is

not the experience and can only point to it. Some mystics go on from

the experience of the PCE, to have a continuing sense of the

experience during ordinary, wakeful consciouness. Forman calls this

the dualistic mystical state (DMS). A person might have a sense of

the 'silence within', for example, at the same time that they are

going about their ordinary daily routines. A person might have a

sense of the 'self-nature ' that they experienced during the PCE, at

the same time that they see themselves as a person having roles,

responsibilities, activities and so on. As a result of this, mystics

often feel less attached to themselves and the things of the world.

They are enlightened. As a philosopher of mysticism, Forman describes

the dualistic mystical state (DMS) as one where two distinct

epistemiological modalities are operating at the same time. In this

state, the mystic has a sense of the experience of the PCE -

awareness per se (awareness without content) and, at the same time,

the mystic is aware of themselves and the world. Forman refers to

this as a new modus operandi of human living. Mysticism, Mind and

Consciousness is essential reading for all students of mysticism.