SHUKLAS : Spirituality & Universal consciousness, Wellcome to the world of within Options

[shuklas]

Dear Pradipjee & Admn

Thanks for opening a new platform for the discussion about sprituality-Meditation-religion issues and our indian philosophy. While we are not very learned people who can write something with authority....but everyone of us has felt the touch of universal consciousness,power and love from upper level and from within. In a way every person born on this planet is having spiritual experience .

We will be looking forward to the contribution on core issues of spirituality/Religion and applicability in day to day life. We request the participating members to stay away from being judgemental and critical.

Spirituality is belief and deep convictions in ideas about superpower consciouness and the very existence of human being. We all are searching for answers from every where.

The goal to start this kind of platform is to learn and apply in our present stress full life. Remember that everyone is coming from different level ....yet everyone of us is a student of philosophy.We are thankful to John chacha to forward the idea.

We shall begin uploading exciting material very shortly.We do not claim that these forthcoming uploads are original.They are compilation from various study material.

Astu,

Rashmi Shukla

[shuklas]

Important Influences in the History of Philosophy
Ancient Philosophy of India
The Vedas
The Upanishads
The Mahabharata
The Ramayana
The Puranas
The Darshanas (Six Systems of Indian Philosophy) - Nyaya School, Vaisheshika School, Sankhya School, Yoga School (Patañjali - 2rd century C.E.), Mimamsa School, Vedanta School (Shankara c.788-822, Ramanuja c.1056-1137, Madhva c.1197-1276)



The Katha Upanishad

The Upanishads are ancient scriptures which form the final part of the Vedas. They number more than one hundred, contain both verse and prose texts, and vary in length. They were written in Sanskrit, from c.800-300 B.C.

The Vedas include collections of hymns, chants, and instructions for rituals, dating from c.1500-800 B.C. There are four Vedas: the Rig Veda, Sama Veda, Yajur Veda, and Atharva Veda.

Each of the Vedas consists of four parts: the Mantras (sacred formulas), Brahmanas (instructions for rituals), Aranyakas (‘forest texts’), and Upanishads (philosophical scriptures). The term “Veda” (meaning “knowledge”) usually refers mainly to the Mantras and Brahmanas.

The Rig Veda is the oldest Veda, and consists of hymns to the gods. The hymns are collected in ten books (or mandalas). The Sama Veda consists of songs and chants. The Yajur Veda includes instructions for rituals. The Atharva Veda includes magical spells and incantations.

The Upanishads are philosophical scriptures which are known as the Vedanta, meaning "the end of the Vedas.”

The Upanishads belonging to the Rig Veda include: the Aitareya, and the Kaushitaki. The Upanishads belonging to the Sama Veda include: the Chandogya, and the Kena. The Upanishads belonging to the Yajur Veda include: the Brihadaranyaka, the Isha, the Taittiriya, the Shvetashvatara, and the Katha. The Upanishads belonging to the Atharva Veda include: the Mundaka, the Mandukya, and the Prasna.1

The Katha Upanishad derives its name from the Sanskrit term katha, which means ‘narration,’ referring to a narrative tale, fable, or parable. The term Upanishad is derived from the Sanskrit words ‘upa’ (near), ‘ni’ (down), and ‘sad’ (to sit), meaning ‘to sit down near to’ e.g. a teacher or guru to learn an important teaching.

The Katha Upanishad is written in verse, divided into two chapters, each of which has three sections. The text describes the spiritual journey of a young boy to discover the nature of ultimate reality.

In the Katha Upanishad, Vajashrava is the father of Nachiketas. Vajashrava has performed a ceremony in which his cows have been sacrificed, but Nachiketas says that a sacrificial offering must be truly difficult and demanding if it is to be a worthy gift to the gods. Vajashrava considers this observation by Nachiketas to be a reflection on the sincerity of Vajashrava's devotion to the gods, and he therefore decides to offer his young son to Yama, the God of Death.

When Nachiketas arrives at the Realm of Death, Yama is absent for three days and three nights. When Yama returns, the God of Death decides that, because he has been absent, and because this has been a breach of hospitality, he will make amends by offering to grant the boy three wishes.

Nachiketas’ first wish is to return to his father, and to be accepted and welcomed by him. Yama grants this wish.

Nachiketas’ second wish is to learn the secret of the sacred fire which leads to heaven. Yama also grants this wish.

Nachiketas’ third wish is to know whether or not the Spirit continues to exist after death. Yama tells him that there are two paths, a path of wisdom and a path of ignorance. The path of wisdom leads to the Self, to Atman. The path of ignorance leads to the pursuit of only worldly pleasures.

Yama says that the Self, Atman, is the inner being of all beings. Atman is the individual Self, Brahman is the universal Self.

Yama tells Nachiketas that the Self is indescribable and indefinable. The pure consciousness which is the Self is eternal and all-knowing. The Self dwells in the mind and the body, but does not begin with birth or end with death. The Self is beginningless and endless. The Self is changeless, and omnipresent.

The syllable Om is the symbol of the Self, of Brahman, of ultimate reality. Brahman is present in all being. It is the One in the many.

Knowledge of the world is not to be confused with knowledge of ultimate reality. Knowledge of the plurality of phenomena in the world is not to be confused with knowledge of the unity of Brahman.

Yama likens Atman to the Lord of a chariot. According to this metaphor, Atman rides in the back of the chariot, Awareness or Intellect (buddhi) is the driver of the chariot, the Mind is the reins which the driver holds, the Body is the chariot itself, the Senses are the horses of the chariot, and the World is the road along which the chariot is traveling. If Awareness grasps the Mind firmly, the Mind can guide the Senses along the road to the end of the journey.

Yama likens Brahman to a Tree of Eternity. The tree’s roots are in heaven, and its branches are reaching to the earth. The tree, and its roots and branches, represent Brahman as it is manifested in the world. Brahman is pure Spirit from which the universe has emerged. The World Tree is rooted in Brahman.

The path of yoga is the path to the Self, to Atman. This is the path that leads beyond life and death.

Atman is the eternal in the midst of the temporary, the invisible within the visible, the light concealed in all beings.

Through Yama’s teaching, Nachiketas is able to know the Self, and reaches immortality. The final verse concludes that this is possible for anyone who follows the path to the Self.

The Katha Upanishad is a work of mystical beauty and radiant imagination. It is an inspiring and meaningful document of faith that provides spiritual wisdom as well as psychological insight. It is a timeless story of a journey to the inner Self and to the meaning of spiritual reality.


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1Kurt Friedrichs, The Encyclopedia of Eastern Philosophy and Religion, (Boston: Shambala, 1989), p. 392.


BIBLIOGRAPHY

Katha Upanishad. Translated by Swami Ambikananda Saraswati. New York: Viking Studio, 2001.

The Upanishads. Translated by Juan Mascaró. London: Penguin Books, 1965.

The Principal Upanisads. Edited by S. Radhakrishnan. New York: Harper & Brown, (1953), pp. 593-648.

The Encyclopedia of Eastern Philosophy and Religion. Kurt Friedrichs. Boston: Shambala, (1989), p. 392.

The Hindu World. Volume II. Benjamin Walker. New York: Frederick






Patañjali’s Yoga Sutras

Patañjali (of whom little is known, but who is believed to have lived sometime between 200 B.C.E. and 300 C.E.) was the author of the Yoga Sutras, one of the most important treatises of Yoga philosophy. The Yoga Sutras are a collection of sutras (or aphorisms) on how to attain mental concentration. The sutras are divided into four padas (or parts): I) Samadhi (Concentration); II) Sadhana (Method or Practice); III) Vibhuti (Supernormal Powers); and IV) Kaivalya (Isolation or Liberation).

The Yoga Sutras contain 195 sutras. The Samadhi-pada contains 51 sutras, the Sadhana-pada contains 55 sutras, the Vibhuti-pada contains 55 sutras, and the Kaivalya-pada contains 34 sutras. Each sutra (which in Sanskrit means "thread") conveys an important truth, but is further explained by commentary from writers such as Vyasa (whose Yoga-Bhasya, or "Commentary on the Yoga Sutras," was written c.650-850 C.E.), Vacaspati Mishra (whose Tattva-Vaisharadi, or "Commentary on the Yoga-Bhasya," was written c.850 C.E.), Bhoja Raja (whose Yoga-sutra-vritti, "Modes of the Yoga Sutras," was written sometime during the eleventh century C.E.), and Vijnana Bhikshu (whose Yoga-sara-samgraha, "Summary of the Essence of Yoga," was written sometime during the sixteenth century C.E.).

The Samadhi-pada discusses the methods of restricting mental fluctuations, the goal of concentration, the attainment of stability of mind; and the quality of the highest Self. The Sadhana-pada discusses the five hindrances to concentration, the methods which may be used to weaken hindrances, the means of escape from hindrances, and the five indirect aids to yoga (i.e. the path to cessation of mental fluctuations). The Vibhuti-pada discusses the three direct aids to yoga, the stages of concentration, the practical means of concentration, and the nature of insight. The Kaivalya-pada describes how freedom from hindrances to concentration leads to the full realization of the Self.

Patañjali defines yoga (in Yoga-Sutra I.2) as chitta-vritti-nirodha (the cessation of mental fluctuations). Vyasa’s commentary on the first sutra in the Samadhi-pada explains that chitta (the thinking substance or principle) has five stages: 1) the restless (ksipta), 2) the torpid (mudha), 3) the distracted (viksipta), 4) the focused (ekagra), and 5) the restricted (niruddha). The first three stages (ksipta, mudha, and viksipta) are not classified as yoga, but the next two stages (ekagra and niruddha) are classified as yoga.

Vyasa's commentary also explains that chitta (the mind-stuff or thinking-substance) includes buddhi (intellect), ahamkara (ego-sense), and manas (mind). Chitta evolves from prakriti (primary matter), but may reflect purusha (spirit). Purusha is pure conscioussness and absolute awareness. Purusha transcends the world of prakriti. Purusha is an unchanging principle of reality, but prakriti may be changed by interactions of gunas (qualities) which include: 1) sattva (clarity, radiance), 2) rajas (energy, passion), and 3) tamas (darkness, lethargy).

Mental fluctuations may be caused by latent or subliminal impressions (samskaras), and subliminal impressions may be caused by mental fluctuations. Mental fluctuations may be restricted by practice (abhyasa) and by detachment (vairagya). Practice can lead to calmness and stability (sthiti). Detachment is a loss of desire for worldly objects (I.15). Supreme detachment (paravairagya) is a state of absolute indifference to the gunas of prakriti (I.16).

Patañjali explains that there are nine distractions (vikshepas) or obstacles to calming mental fluctuations (I.30), including: 1) sickness (vyadhi), 2) listlessness (alasya), 3) doubt (samsaya), 4) carelessless (pramada), 5) lethargy (styana), 6) worldliness (avirati), 7) erroneous perceptions (bhrantidarshana), 8) failure to attain any stage of concentration (alabdhabhumikatva), and 9) instability of any stage of concentration (anavasthitatva). These distractions may cause pain, dejection, restlessness of the body, and unsteadiness of breathing (I.31). These distractions may be overcome by focusing the mind on a single principle of reality, and by practicing concentration.

According to Patañjali, mental fluctuations are modifications (vritti) of chitta (the mind-stuff or thinking-substance ). These modifications include: 1) valid cognition (pramana), 2) invalid cognition (viparayaya), 3) concepts which do not refer to any corresponding reality (vikalpa), 4) dreamless sleep, or absent cognition (nidra), and 5) memory (smriti). These mental fluctuations may be hindered or unhindered.1

Pramana (valid cognition) may arise from: 1) perception (pratyaksa), 2) inference (anumana), and 3) verbal testimony (shabda). Thus, Patañjali maintains that there are three valid sources of knowledge. However, viparayaya (invalid cognition) is wrong knowledge which can create an illusion or misconception about something (such as when darkness is misperceived as light, or when obscurity is misperceived as clarity).

Viparayaya (wrong knowledge) may be caused by the five hindrances or afflictions (II.3, kleshas): 1) ignorance (avidya), 2) egoism (asmita), 3) attachment (raga), 4) aversion (dvesha), and 5) fear of death (abhinivesha). Avidya (II.4) is the field upon which the other hindrances may be dormant (prasupta), attentuated (tanu), interrupted (vicchinna), or sustained (udara). Avidya is a cause of the mistaken tendency to identify the impermanent as permanent, and the not-self as the self (II.5). Asmita is a cause of the mistaken tendency to identify the intellect (buddhi) as pure consciousness (purusha). Raga is a cause of the failure to perceive the spiritual reality of the Self as being different from the material reality of prakriti. Dvesha is the tendency to dwell upon pain.2 Abhinivesha is an instinctive fear of death or a sense of threatened annihilation.

Karmas (actions) may be caused by hindrances to concentration. Kriya-Yoga (the Yoga of action) may weaken hindrances, and may thus diminish mental fluctuations (II.2). Kriya-Yoga includes: 1) tapas (self-discipline), 2) svadhyaya (repetition of mantras and study of scriptures), and 3) Ishvara-pranidhana (devotion to God).

Patañjali notes that the sacred word designating God (or Ishvara) is the mystic syllable OM (I.27). Repetition of the mystic syllable OM and reflection upon its meaning may be an aid to concentration.

Patañjali also says that the means of escape from hindrances may be provided by discriminative discernment (viveka-khyati). Liberation (kaivalya) is attained by means of discriminative discernment, which reveals how purusha is different from prakriti. Discriminative discernment leads to the concentration which Patañjali calls the Cloud of Knowable Things (Dharmamegha). The attainment of this Cloud of Knowable Things leads to the cessation of hindrances and of fluctuations.

When all hindrances to concentration have been overcome, the Self can act freely and authentically. The highest Self is unhindered by fluctuations or by karmas. The Self which is liberated from prakriti has an absolute consciousness established in its own Self (IV.34) The eight aids to yoga enable the thinking-principle (chitta) to attain discriminative discernment and thus to reflect purusha (spirit).

Patañjali says that the eight aids to yoga (II.29) include: 1) restraint (yama), 2) observances (niyama), 3) bodily postures (asana), 4) regulation of breath (pranayama), 5) withdrawal of the senses (pratyahara), 6), fixed attention (dharana), 7) meditation (dhyana), and 8) perfect concentration (samadhi). The first five aids are indirect aids, while the next three aids are direct aids. The indirect aids are also referred to as outer or external aids (bahiranga sadhana), while the direct aids are also referred to as inner or internal aids (antaranga sadhana).

The eight aids or means to yoga are called the eight limbs (angas) of yoga. Thus, Patañjali’s yoga (ashtanga yoga, or eight-limbed yoga) is an eightfold path toward perfect concentration.

Restraint (yama) includes the five abstentions: 1) abstention from injuring any other beings (ahimsa), 2) abstention from falsehood (i.e. adhering to truth, satya), 3) abstention from stealing (asteya), 4) abstention from lustful sensuality (brahmacharya), and 5) abstention from covetousness (aprarigraha).

The five observances (niyamas) include: 1) purification (shaucha), 2) contentment (santosa), 3) austerity or self-discipline (tapas), 4) study of scriptures (svadhyaya), and 5) devotion to God (Ishvara-pranidhana).

Steady and restful postures (asanas) can promote relaxation of the body. Regulation of breathing (pranayama) can transcend external and internal operations, and can help the mind to focus on discriminative thinking. Withdrawal of sensory awareness (pratyahara) can promote separation from external objects, so that attention can be focused on an inner object.

The three direct aids to yoga (dharana-dhyana-samadhi) are called samyama (perfect restraint) when they are together applied to the same object. Mastery of this perfect restraint is a means to insight (prajña), whereby knowledge is attained of the Self and of the tattvas (principles of reality).

The mind which has attained stability is balanced between the knower, the process of knowing, and the object to be known (I.41). This state of balance produces calming of mental fluctuations. The latent or subliminal impression (samskara) produced by this balanced state of concentration restricts other subliminal impressions (I.50). When the subliminal impression produced by this balanced state of concentration is also restricted, the yogin may attain seedless or objectless concentration (nirbija-samadhi).3

Concentration (samadhi) may have a seed (bija) or object (as sabija-samadhi), or may not have a seed or object (nirbija-samadhi). Objects of concentration include: 1) gross objects (vitarka), 2) subtle objects (vichara), 3) the sense of bliss (ananda), and 4) the ego-sense (asmita). Samprajnata-samadhi is concentration which is reached with the help of vitarka, vichara, ananda, and asmita (I.17).

Vyasa’s commentary explains that samprajnata-samadhi has varying levels or stages (bhumis), including 1) savitarka-samadhi (with gross elements as objects), 2) savichara-samadhi (with subtle elements as objects), 3) sananda-samadhi (with bliss as an object), and 4) sasmita-samadhi (with the ego-sense as an object).4

Savitarka-samadhi is a lower level of concentration, which includes all four types of objects (vitarka, vichara, ananda, and asmita). Savitarka-samadhi (which determines gross elements as objects) may progress to nirvitarka-samadhi (which does not determine gross elements as objects).5 Nirvitarka-samadhi may progress to the next level of concentration, savichara-samadhi. Savichara-samadhi is free from vitarka.6 Savichara-samadhi (which reflects upon subtle objects) may progress to nirvichara-samadhi (which does not reflect upon subtle objects). Nirvichara-samadhi may progress to the next level of concentration, sananda-samadhi. Sananda-samadhi is free from vitarka and vichara. Sananda-samadhi (which has bliss as an object) may progress to nirananda-samadhi (which does not have bliss as an object). Nirananda-samadhi may progress to the next level of concentration, sasmita-samadhi. Sasmita-samadhi is free from vitarka, vichara, and ananda. Sasmita-samadhi (which determines the ego-sense as an object) may progress to nirasmita-samadhi (which does not determine the ego-sense as an object).

Savitarka-samadhi, savichara-samadhi, sananda-samadhi, and sasmita-samadhi are all stages of samprajnata-samadhi. Samprajnata-samadhi is a state of concentration in which the meditator becomes fused with the object of meditation. Asamprajnata-samadhi is a higher state of concentration in which the object of meditation has disappeared.

Asamprajnata-samadhi leads to kaivalya (isolation or liberation). Kaivalya is attained when purusha is isolated from prakriti. Kaivalya is also attained when spiritual reality transcends material reality.

Yoga is thus a practical means of control over the body and mind. Patañjali affirms that through disciplined activity the Self can attain release and liberation. When the Self is liberated from constraint by mental fluctuations, the Self becomes aware of itself as a spiritual reality. Thus, the practice of yoga can lead to the full realization of the Self and to authentic Selfhood.


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[shuklas]

Commentary on the Vedanta Sutras

Ramanuja (c.1056-1137) was the founder of Visishtadvaita Vedanta (qualified non-dualism). Vedanta philosophy is based on the teachings of the Upanishads. Visishtadvaita Vedanta teaches that Atman (the individual Self) is part of the unity of Brahman (the universal Self), but that Brahman has other differentiating qualities. This viewpoint is in contrast to Advaita Vedanta (non-dualism), which teaches that Atman is the same as Brahman, and that Brahman is undifferentiated.

Ramanuja’s most important writings include his commentary on the Vedanta Sutras (the Sri Bhasya, or "True Commentary"), and his commentary on the Bhagavad-Gita (the Gitabhasya, or "Commentary on the Gita"). His other writings include the Vedartha Samgraha ("Summary of the Meaning of the Veda"), the Vedantasara ("Essence of Vedanta"), and Vedantadipa ("Lamp of Vedanta").

The Vedanta Sutras (or Brahma Sutras) are aphorisms concerning the nature of Brahman, based on teachings of the Upanishads. They were written in Sanskrit by Badarayana or Vyasa, sometime between 400 B.C.E. and 200 C.E. They are fragmentary in nature, and thus many authors have written commentaries about them.

The Sri Bhasya of Ramanuja is divided into four adhyayas (or chapters). Each adhyaya is divided into four padas (or parts). Ramanuja interprets Badarayana’s Aphorisms of the Brahman, making extensive references to the Upanishads, the Vedas, the Bhagavad-Gita, the Vishnu Purana, and other scriptures. The first two adhyayas discuss how the term "Brahman" is to be defined, while the second two adhyayas discuss how knowledge of Brahman is attained.

According to Ramanuja, Brahman is ultimate reality. Brahman is infinite and eternal. Brahman is pure Being (sat), pure Consciousness (chit), and pure Bliss (ananda). Brahman is the essence of Selfhood. Brahman is the inner Self of the world and of all individual souls. Brahman has a divine form as the highest Self or supreme Person. Thus, Brahman is the highest aim of humankind.

Ramanuja says that Brahman is qualified by its attributes, which include intelligence, knowledge, and blessedness. Brahman is the source of all reality, and is knowable by means of its attributes. Brahman is the source of the individual Self, and is qualified by Atman. Atman can attain Self-knowledge by attaining knowledge of Brahman. The appearance of any essential difference between Atman and Brahman is a result of nescience (i.e. ignorance, avidya). Atman is not essentially different from Brahman. Nescience (or false knowledge) regarding Atman can be sublated or corrected by true knowledge of Brahman. The released Atman is a Self which has freed itself from the false perception that it is essentially different from Brahman.

Ramanuja maintains that Brahman is the supreme Person who is free of any imperfection, who is free of any evil, who has created the world, who governs and sustains the world, who is all-knowing, whose will is perfect, and who is the source of all truths. Thus, Brahman is the same as God.

For Ramanuja, Brahman is also the highest Self, which is the inner being of the world and of all individual souls. The material world and all individual souls are the embodiment of Brahman. All conscious and non-conscious beings constitute the body of the highest Self. Brahman is the highest principle of being, and is both the material and operative cause of the universe.

Ramanuja rejects the doctrine that moksha (i.e. release, the cessation of avidya) can only arise from knowledge of a non-qualified Brahman. A non-qualified Brahman is a Brahman without any qualities or attributes. Ramanuja argues that Brahman can only be known by means of its attributes.

According to Ramanuja, knowledge may come from three sources: 1) perception (pratyaksa), 2) inference (anumana), and 3) scripture (sruti). Scripture is a document of verbal testimony (shabda). Brahman cannot be known by perception or by inference, but only through the teachings of the scriptures. The cessation of avidya does not depend merely upon an act by which the individual Self recognizes Brahman as the universal Self. The cessation of avidya also depends on the grace which is given to the individual Self by Brahman.

Ramanuja says that in pure knowledge there is no distinction between the knowing subject and the known object. For the universal Self, there is no distinction between the knower and the known. For the individual Self, however, the "I" or ego cannot be obliterated without obliterating the essential nature of the Self. The individual Self must have an I-consciousness which persists even in the state of ultimate release. The "I" or ego is not merely an attribute of the individual Self, but constitutes the nature of the individual Self. Thus, the I-consciousness is not obliterated by knowledge of Brahman.

The knowing subject is the "I" or ego, which is a consciousness of the inward Self. The "I" or ego is a form of knowledge, constituting the essential nature of the Self. Thus, the released Self knows the essential nature of the inward Self.

Atman may take three forms: 1) it may be bound to the material world, 2) it may be released from the material world, and 3) it may be eternal in its unity with Brahman. The bound Self identifies itself with the material world. The released Self is freed from attachment to the material world, and is aware of itself as a spiritual reality. Release from samsara (cyclic, worldly existence) is a state of non-difference from the highest Self. The released Self is aware of the unity of Brahman.

Ramanuja rejects the doctrine that the phenomenal world is illusory and unreal. According to Ramanuja, the phenomenal world is not unreal unless it is viewed as distinct from Brahman. The phenomenal world is not simply a realm of false and illusory appearances. The phenomenal world includes primordial matter (prakriti), which is part of the body of Brahman.

Prakriti has three qualities (or gunas): 1) clarity (sattva), 2) activity (passion, rajas), and 3) inactivity (darkness, tamas). The interaction of these changing qualities may be reflected by changes in the nature of the material world. Brahman is the inner Self or spirit (purusha) which may determine the gunas of prakriti. Thus, reality is both material and spiritual. Purusha is an unchanging spiritual reality, while prakriti is a changing material reality. Plurality is not unreal unless it is seen as replacing the unity of Brahman.

Ramanuja’s Visishtadvaita Vedanta (or philosophy of qualified non-dualism) has some important differences from Shankara’s Advaita Vedanta (or philosophy of non-dualism). For Shankara, undifferentiated Brahman is ultimate realty. For Ramanuja, differentiated Brahman is ultimate reality. For Shankara, undifferentiated Brahman can be known and experienced intuitively. For Ramanuja, Brahman can only be known through its attributes, and since Brahman has attributes which can be known and experienced intuitively, it must be differentiated.

For Shankara, maya is an illusory appearance of reality, occurring when the plurality of the phenomenal world is superimposed on the unity of Brahman. For Ramanuja, however, maya is real and is the plurality of attributes which are manifested by Brahman. Maya is the way in which Brahman is manifested in the phenomenal world.

According to Shankara, there are two kinds of knowledge: lower knowledge (aparavidya) which is knowledge of the empirical world, and higher knowledge (paravidya) which is intuitive knowledge of Brahman. Lower knowledge implies the duality of the knower and the known, while higher knowledge transcends the duality of the knower and the known. According to Ramanuja, however, there can be no knowledge without a knowing subject, and thus knowledge implies that there is always a duality of the knower and the known. The released Self is not dissolved into an undifferentiated unity, but is aware of itself as part of a differentiated unity.

According to Shankara, the individual soul (jiva) or ego is only real insofar as it is an appearance of Atman. The ego-sense (ahamkara) of the individual soul is the same as its I-consciousness (ahambdi). Both the ego-sense and the I-consciousness are different from the pure consciousness of Atman. However, Ramanuja says that the ego-sense is different from the I-consciousness. The ego-sense is the product of prakriti, but the pure I-consciousness is the same as Atman.1

According to Shankara, God is Saguna-Brahman (Brahman with attributes) as distinguished from Nirguna-Brahman (Brahman without attributes). According to Ramanuja, however, there is no distinction between God and Brahman. In Ramanuja's view, Brahman is differentiated, and is the same as God.

According to Shankara, the phenomenal world is real only insofar as it is an appearance of Brahman. According to Ramanuja, however, the phenomenal world is as real as Brahman, and constitutes part of the reality of Brahman.

Ramanuja also differs from Shankara in emphasizing bhakti (devotion to God) as more important than jnana (knowledge) in defining the path to spiritual reality. According to Ramanuja, spiritual release is obtained by bhakti yoga (the path of loving devotion). Ramanuja also emphasizes the personal relationship between the individual soul and God.


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[shuklas]

Brahma Sutras

Shankara (c.788-820) was one of the most influential thinkers in Vedanta philosophy. He wrote commentaries on the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita, and the Brahma Sutras. He was an exponent of non-dualistic (Advaita) Vedanta, maintaining that Brahman (the universal Self) is the same as Atman (the individual Self). This viewpoint was later opposed by dualistic (Dvaita) Vedanta, which taught that there is a fundamental difference between Atman and Brahman.

Vedanta is a school of Hindu philosophy that elaborated the teachings of the Upanishads. The Upanishads are ancient Hindu scriptures, regarded as the final section of the Vedas. Thus, the Upanishads have also been called the Vedanta. Vedanta literally means “the end of the Vedas.” Vedanta philosophy interprets and develops the teachings of the Upanishads.


The three main schools of Vedanta philosophy are: Advaita (non-dualism), represented by the philosophy of Shankara; Visishtadvaita (qualified non-dualism), in the teachings of Ramanuja (c.1056-1137); and Dvaita (dualism), in the teachings of Madhva (c.1197-1276).1 Shankara argued that Brahman is undifferentiated being, and that Brahman and Atman are a unity. Ramanuja argued that Brahman is a unity, but that it has two forms, the self and matter. Madhva argued that Brahman is differentiated being, and that Brahman is different from both the self and matter.

Basic principles of Advaita Vedanta include: that reality (Brahman) is non-dual; that Brahman and Atman are a unity; that the appearance of plurality in the phenomenal world is illusory; and that illusion (maya) is the misinterpretation of appearance as reality.

For Shankara, Brahman is ultimate reality. Brahman is Being, Consciousness, and Bliss. It is eternal and all-knowing. It is infinite, formless, and perfect. Brahman is the unchanging Self.

Brahman is imperceptible and indefinable. It transcends time and space. It cannot be expressed or described. It is beyond names, classifications, or characterizations. It is the one and only reality.

The existence of Brahman is known, on the ground of its being the Self (I,1,1). The non-existent is devoid of Selfhood. When the Self is known, Brahman is known. Perfect knowledge reveals to us the unity of the individual Self (Atman) and the universal Self (Brahman).

Atman is the spirit of the Self, the spirit of the individual being. Atman is not simply the ego, or the individual personality. The ego is a form of the individual soul. The individual soul (jiva) is an appearance of Atman. But the appearance should not be confused with reality. Atman is the reality of the individual Self.

Atman is universal, and is present in all individual beings. Both Atman and Brahman are uncreated and eternal. According to Shankara, the Self is independent of the body, and is unchanged by the existence of the body. Wrong knowledge, or false outlook, can occur by confusing the Self with the body. Shankara affirms that the Self exists, even if the body does not exist. The Self is not subject to the endless cycle of birth-death-and-rebirth.

According to Shankara, the mind or body is not the Self. The mind or body is only a changing appearance of the Self, which is unchanging. To believe that the mind or body is the Self is to try to superimpose the Non-Self upon the Self. This superimposition of the Non-Self (Anatman) upon the Self (Atman) is caused by lack of knowledge (avidya).

Avidya is not only nescience (lack of knowledge), but is also a false outlook, or wrong knowledge. Avidya superimposes plurality on the unity of Atman and Brahman.

Shankara asserts that the existence of the individual soul (jiva) is only apparent, and is the product of nescience. The individual soul is actually an appearance of the universal Self. The appearance is the effect of nescience, but actually the soul is nothing but Brahman (II,3,50).

To know the Self is to know Brahman. In Brahman, there is no duality between the knower and the known. In Brahman, there is no duality between the subject and the object. Shankara argues that the duality between subject and object is an illusion of the empirical world.

Brahman cannot become an object of perception. But everything that is perceived in the empirical world is dependent on Brahman. Brahman is not perceived, but it is the ultimate reality underlying all empirical phenomena. Thus, the plurality of phenomena in the empirical world is illusory. The illusory appearance of phenomena in the empirical world is due to lack of knowledge of Brahman.

To say that phenomena in the empirical world are illusory is not to say that they do not exist. What Shankara is saying is that the empirical world depends for its existence upon Brahman. Therefore, the empirical world does not have an independent reality.2

Shankara says that the empirical world is an illusory appearance of Brahman, in the same way that a rope may appear to be a snake. The empirical world can be mistaken for Brahman, just as a rope can be mistaken for a snake (II,1,14).

Knowledge of the empirical world should not be confused with knowledge of ultimate reality. According to Shankara, knowledge of the empirical world has the same relation to knowledge of Brahman as the phantoms of a dream have to the apprehension of reality when the sleeper wakes up (II,1,14). Shankara argues that ignorance (avidya) consists in not knowing the difference between the empirical world and ultimate reality.

Maya is the mistaken tendency to regard appearance as reality. The unconscious tendency to perceive appearances as the ultimate reality provides an illusory form of knowledge. This illusory knowledge of the phenomenal world can be ‘sublated’ or corrected by perfect knowledge of Brahman.

Maya conceals Brahman, and creates the forms of the empirical world. Maya enables us to know the world, and sustains the world as an appearance of Brahman. But knowledge of the world can be replaced by direct, intuitive knowledge of Brahman.

Thus, there are two types of knowledge: lower knowledge, by which the phenomenal world is apprehended, and higher knowledge, by which Brahman is apprehended.

Time, space, and causality are attributes of the empirical world, but not of Brahman. Brahman transcends time, space, and causality. Brahman is without cause or effect.

For Shankara, God is Brahman, insofar as Brahman refers to the world. Brahman is independent of causality, but God (Ishvara) is the material cause, and the operative cause, of the empirical world.

For Shankara, God is the creator of the world, and the creative principle of the universe. The universe is an appearance of Brahman. Thus, God is Brahman, appearing in the world.

Shankara also asserts that God (Saguna-Brahman) has attributes, while Brahman (Nirguna-Brahman) is without attributes.

Being and non-being, life and death, existence and non-existence are the unfolding of Brahman. The plurality of conditions manifested by the Self is, in reality, only the unity of Brahman.

Liberation (moksha) is attained when we have Self-knowledge. Moksha is attained by being able to recognize the difference between appearance and reality. Moksha is release from the eternal cycle of birth-death-and-rebirth. Moksha helps us to understand that Atman, the individual Self, does not begin with birth, or end with death, but is eternal.

Moksha is attained when a correct outlook replaces a false outlook, i.e. when knowledge (vidya) replaces lack of knowledge (avidya). Moksha is attained by knowing the unity of Brahman and Atman.

According to Shankara, moksha is not dependent on action. Moksha comes from Self-knowledge. Moksha is freedom from lack of knowledge of the Self. Moksha is freedom from maya, which is the tendency to superimpose the Non-Self upon the Self.

For Shankara, knowledge (jnana) is more important than action as a means to spiritual release. Love and devotion (bhakti), ethical conduct, and good karma (action) are also important, but the discipline of knowledge (jnana yoga) is what enables us to realize the unity of Atman and Brahman.

[shuklas]

the Brahma Sutras

Madhva (c.1197-1276) is regarded as the founder of the dualistic (Dvaita) branch of Vedanta philosophy. His most important writings include his commentaries on the Brahma Sutras (the Madhva-bhashya), on the Bhagavad-Gita (the Gita-bhashya), on the Upanishads (the Upanishad-Bhashyas), on the Mahabharata (the Mahabharata-tatparya-nirnaya), and on the Bhagavata-Purana (the Bhagavata-tatparya-nirnaya).

According to Madhva, Brahman is ultimate reality. Brahman is infinite and eternal. Brahman is an absolute reality which transcends any attempts to explain or comprehend it. Brahman is indescribable and indefinable. Brahman is perfect being, perfect wisdom, and perfect bliss. Brahman is the inner being of all things, and is the source of all reality.

For Madhva, Vishnu is God or the Highest Ruler. Vishnu is the Lord who sustains the universe, the Supreme Being upon whom the universe depends for its existence. Brahman (which Madhva refers to as Hari, Vishnu, or Narayana) is all-powerful and all-pervading. Brahman is the Supreme Deity, the Almighty (Bhagavan), the Perfect Self (Paramatman). Brahman is not the individual soul (jiva), which is an imperfect reflection of Brahman. Brahman is a universal reality, which may manifest itself in both the non-Self (Anatman) and the Self (Atman).

Madhva asserts that Brahman is different from the individual soul, and that Brahman is also different from the material world. Brahman is an independent reality, while the soul and the material world depend for their reality on Brahman. Both the soul and the material world are real, but the differences between them are also real, as are their differences from Brahman. Thus, Madhva’s doctrine of the fivefold nature of difference asserts that there are five real kinds of differences: 1) between Brahman and the individual soul, 2) between Brahman and the material world, 3) between the soul and the material world, 4) between individual souls, and 5) between individual material things.1

Madhva teaches that the embodied soul is characterized by the qualities of a material substance, but that Brahman is not characterized by the qualities of a material substance. Madhva also teaches that the soul is eternal, but that the physical body to which a soul may be bound is non-eternal. The released soul is a spiritual entity which has been freed from bondage to the physical body, and which is no longer characterized by the physical qualities of matter. Thus, the released soul may reflect a spiritual reality (purusha) which is no longer bound by the properties of material reality (prakriti). The soul may attain release from the endless cycle of worldly existence by means of devotion to the Lord, who may enable the soul to understand that Brahman is the only unconditional and independent reality. Thus, the means to salvation is bhakti yoga (the path of devotion).

While the embodied soul may experience both bliss and misery, the released soul may experience eternal and perfect bliss. The bliss which is experienced by the released soul may be similar but not identical to the bliss of Brahman. The individual soul is different from Brahman, even in the state of perfect wisdom and perfect bliss.

Madhva explains that release from cyclic, worldly existence (samsara) depends on the grace of God and cannot be attained solely by the efforts of the individual soul. For the soul to know Brahman, the soul must receive the grace of God. The study of scriptures may also be necessary to gain knowledge, but knowledge of Brahman is ultimately attained by being devoted to the Lord (Vishnu) and by receiving the grace of God.

Madhva disagrees with Shankara’s view that the existence of the soul is only apparent, and that the soul is only an illusory appearance of Brahman. In Madhva’s view, the soul is real and is in fact different from Brahman. Madhva also disagrees with Shankara’s view that the material world is only an illusory appearance of Brahman, and that the appearance of difference between the material world and Brahman is caused by a misperception or ignorance (avidya) of the transcendent reality of Brahman. In Madhva’s view, the material world is real and not illusory, and the appearance of difference between the material world and Brahman is caused by a true perception of Brahman as an eternal and unchanging reality.

Madhva also disagrees with Shankara’s view that the individual Self (Atman) is the same as the universal Self (Brahman). For Madhva, the individual Self is always different from the universal Self, even after the individual Self has been released from samsara. Madhva asserts that Brahman may be manifested in Atman (the Self), but that Brahman may also be manifested in Anatman (the non-Self). While Shankara teaches that jnana yoga (the path of knowledge) is the means to release from samsara, Madhva teaches that bhakti yoga (the path of devotion) is the means to salvation.

Madhva agrees with Ramanuja that Brahman must be differentiated if it is to be known by the Self. Madhva also agrees with Ramanuja that the material world is real and that it is not merely an illusory appearance of Brahman. However, Ramanuja asserts that the material world constitutes the body of Brahman, and that the reality of the material world is not distinct from the reality of Brahman. Madhva rejects this view, arguing that there is a real difference between the material world and Brahman, and that the changing reality of the material world is distinct from, but dependent on, the unchanging reality of Brahman.

Madhva’s philosophy is dualistic in that it distinguishes between two types of reality: 1) independent (svatantra), and 2) dependent (paratantra). Independent reality is an attribute of Brahman, while dependent reality is an attribute of individual souls and of material things. Dependent reality is divided into two types: 1) the reality of conscious being, and 2) the reality of unconscious being. The reality of conscious being is also divided into two types: 1) the reality of conscious beings who have been released from samsara, and 2) the reality of conscious beings who remain in bondage to samsara. The reality of conscious beings who remain in bondage to samsara is also divided into two types: 1) the reality of those who are eligible for release, and 2) the reality of those who are not eligible for release.2

Madhva agrees with Ramanuja’s concept of Atman, in that Ramanuja views Atman as a pure consciousness of Self rather than as an ego or mind which is under the influence of prakriti. However, Madhva disagrees with Ramanuja’s view that the released Atman is not essentially different from Brahman. Madhva asserts that the released Atman retains its own Selfhood, and that the released individual Self is different from Brahman.


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[shuklas]

J.Krishanmurty :

An interesting Dialogue : Audio File



From the Book, "Life Ahead" by Krishnamurti

For the total development of the human being, solitude as a means of cultivating sensitivity becomes a necessity. One has to know what it means to be alone, what it is to meditate, what it is to die; and the implications of solitude, of meditation, of death, can be known only by seeking them out. These implications cannot be taught, they must be learnt. One can indicate, but learning by what is indicated is not the experiencing of solitude or meditation. To experience what is solitude and what is meditation, one must be in in a state of inquiry; only a mind that is in a state of inquiry is capable of learning. But when inquiry is suppressed by previous knowledge, or by the authority and experience of another, then learning becomes mere imitation, and imitation causes a human being to repeat what is learnt without experiencing

[shuklas]

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Emile Durkheim: His Life and Work (1858-1917)
[Excerpt from Robert Alun Jones. Emile Durkheim: An Introduction to Four Major Works. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications, Inc., 1986. Pp. 12-23.]

David Emile Durkheim was born on April 15, 1858 in Epinal, capital town of the department of Vosges, in Lorraine. His mother, Mélanie, was a merchant's daughter, and his father, Moïse, had been rabbi of Epinal since the 1830s, and was also Chief Rabbi of the Vosges and Haute-Marne. Emile, whose grandfather and great-grandfather had also been rabbis, thus appeared destined for the rabbinate, and a part of his early education was spent in a rabbinical school. This early ambition was dismissed while he was still a schoolboy, and soon after his arrival in Paris, Durkheim would break with Judaism altogether. But he always remained the product of close-knit, orthodox Jewish family, as well as that long-established Jewish community of Alsace-Lorraine that had been occupied by Prussian troops in 1870, and suffered the consequent anti-Semitism of the French citizenry.


Metaphysics (Lectures 69-80)
Metaphysics -- the science that studies the conditions of states of consciousness -- raises three questions: First, is there one condition common to all states of consciousness, taken collectively, that we might call the soul? Second, are there conditions relative to the material world that we might call the body? And third, is there a condition relative to rational principles that we might call God? In addition to discovering whether or not these conditions exist, metaphysics also tried to determine their nature. In Lectures 13-14, Durkheim had already dealt with the question of the existence of the external world -- including the body -- as well as its nature. So his remaining lectures were primarily concerned with the soul and with God, using the same method he had followed throughout, and consistently defending a spiritualist, anti-materialist point of view. Briefly, Durkheim asked if the states of consciousness are sufficient to themselves or, on the contrary, need to be explained by some external condition. This method is not purely a priori, Durkheim reminded his students, because it begins with facts (i.e., the states of consciousness themselves); but neither is it purely inductive, for it deduces the conditions of facts previously assumed, rather than merely generalizing from facts themselves.

When we say there is a soul, Durkheim began his 70th lecture, we mean only that, within us, related to our states of consciousness, there is a principle distinct from the matter we perceive through the senses. But is there really a principle within us other than matter? It was here that the significance of Durkheim's Leibnizian -- by contrast with Cartesian -- realism became clear. In Lecture #14, Durkheim reminded his students, he had demonstrated that the idea of extension is contradictory, that the notion of extended matter is thus only an appearance, and the substratum of this appearance must be conceived as forces analogous to ourselves. Durkheim now turned this argument around, suggesting that the principle that we call matter, when it is perceived by the senses, is identical to the principle we call the mind, when perceived by the consciousness.

This is what we mean, Durkheim insisted, when we say that the soul is "spiritual" -- i.e., it is "matter" different from sensible, extended matter. Durkheim thus advanced four "special proofs" of the spirituality of the soul, the first three of which demonstrate a contradiction between the nature of mind and that of matter.43 First, Durkheim observed, the mind is one, while matter is multiple and indefinitely divisible: second, the mind is identical, while matter is constantly changing; and third, mind is endowed with activity and spontaneity, while matter is inert. These three arguments are analogous to those used by Descartes for the same purpose -- i.e., to demonstrate the difference between mind and matter. But Durkheim emphasized that his method is not the same as Descartes -- i.e., the Cartesian arguments depend upon the notion that two concepts which can be conceived separately belong to different species, while Durkheim's arguments are based on the principle that two orders of phenomena presenting contradictory characteristics are not related to the same substance. Durkheim thus argued that his own, Leibnizian position escapes the most common objection made to spiritualism -- i.e., that it accepts the existence of two different kinds of reality. "Our spiritualism," he emphasized, "admits, on the contrary, that the soul is not a reality of a separate nature, arising suddenly in the scale of beings. The mind finds itself in all degrees, only more or less rudimentary: everything lives," Durkheim concluded, "everything is animated, everything thinks."44

The doctrine opposed to spiritualism, Durkheim continued, is materialism, for which three arguments are commonly advanced. First, the scientific method constantly enjoins us not to multiply causes and/or principles, and spiritualism admits two realities, two irreducible principles, provoking an immediate presumption against it. But spiritualism only does this, Durkheim objected, because most spiritualists believe that sensible matter cannot have the property of thought. Recognizing that the essence of things escapes us, Durkheim asked rhetorically, is it conceivable that someday it will be "proved experimentally" that matter is endowed with spontaneity and thought? Durkheim's initial response to this rhetorical question was to remind his students that his own, Leibnizian form of spiritualism avoids dualism altogether -- i.e., reality is always the same; but seen from the outside, it is material, while seen from the inside, it is spirit. But the spiritualist hope that sensible matter will one day be shown to think is purely illusory -- i.e., as Durkheim had just explained in his previous lecture, the constitutive qualities of the mind (e.g., unity, identity, etc.) don't belong to matter, and the absence of these qualities implies the absence of thought.

The second materialist argument points to the dependence of the psychological on the physiological life; but Durkheim immediately countered by emphasizing the influence of the moral life on our physical health. The reciprocal influence of these two lives on one another is thus incontestable, Durkheim observed, and this indicates that they have the same principle; but we still have no reason to believe that this principle is material rather than spiritual. And the third materialist argument, based on the study of the brain and thought by the method of concomitant variations, insists that thought varies with the brain's volume, weight, form, quality, quantity of phosphorous, circulation of blood, etc. But these facts, Durkheim argued, are explained just as well if we consider the brain as the condition -- and not the cause -- of thought; and the condition, Durkheim reminded his students, is simply that without which the cause cannot produce its effect, not the cause itself.

All of its arguments being insufficient, Durkheim concluded, materialism cannot be scientifically established. Most decisively, the materialists want to reduce everything to extended, sensible matter; but the idea of extension, Durkheim repeated, is contradictory, and a world in which extended matter were the sole principle would be utterly unintelligible to us. What we call "matter," Durkheim insisted, is only a collection of appearances, and the existing substance that underlies and supports these appearances cannot be reached through the senses.

If the soul is distinct from the body, Durkheim then asked, how do we explain the continuous relations between the physiological and the psychological life? How can the physical act upon the moral, and vice versa? The hypotheses that have been advanced, Durkheim observed, include some that are metaphysical, and others that are physiological. The metaphysical hypothesis of Cudworth, for example, imagines a "plastic mediator" -- i.e., half-body, half-spirit -- between the body and the soul. Descartes, by contrast, treats the relations of thinking substance and extended substance as an irreducible fact, despite the abyss between them. Malebranche tried to explain these relations between two different substances through his theory of "occasional causes" -- i.e., the notion that we are not the causes of our own actions, but the occasions by means of which God exercises his causality. Finally, the metaphysical theory of Leibniz -- like that of Descartes -- insisted that the soul and the body (like all monads) could not act directly on one another. What makes them appear to act on each other, therefore, is that they are governed by God from eternity, and thus possess a "pre-established harmony."

Some hypotheses, by contrast, have a more physiological character. Since Descartes considered life to be a purely mechanical phenomenon -- e.g., human bodies are only machines -- it initially seems difficult to explain the relationship between things as different as the soul and the body; but there are "Cartesian" theories that accept a special principle for some properties of life. Organicism, for example, represents these properties as disseminated in the organs, the life of the body then being the result of all the local lives of the anatomical elements. But this explanation, Durkheim objected, fails to account for the harmony and unity of the vital functions. There must be a principle, a law, an idea -- i.e., something that directs and organizes the body's elementary organs and their movements. Members of the Montpellier school call this the "vital principle" (hence "vitalists"), adding that the soul is governed by an analogous, "spiritual" principle, and that these two principles -- "forces of the same nature" -- can act upon and communicate with one another. But Durkheim confessed that he still found it difficult to see how two substances like the mind and the body -- however analogous their "principles" -- might act on one another. This is why one last doctrine -- i.e., the animistic doctrine -- has insisted upon identifying the two principles. In The Vital Principle and the Thinking Soul, for example, Francisque Bouillier (1813-99) has argued that the "common sense" unhesitatingly affirms the unity of the self, suggesting that the body and the soul must emanate from the same source. Careful to avoid the more extreme position of Georg Ernst Stahl (1660-1734), who insisted that the soul acts on the body consciously, Bouillier thus emphasized that the influence of emotion and passion on the circulatory or immune systems indicates that the soul does act directly on the body. After reviewing all these metaphysical and physiological hypotheses concerning the relationship between the body and the soul, Durkheim concluded that it was simply impossible to find a satisfactory solution.

Within us, Durkheim continued, we have established the existence of a spiritual principle called the soul. During life -- in so far as experience reveals it to us -- the soul seems to be entirely bound to the body. Is this union necessary? When the body dies, does the soul perish with it? Of all beliefs, Durkheim emphasized, the most popular is that in the immortality of the soul. What are we to think of this belief? Three kinds of arguments have been offered in its support. The psychological arguments for the immortality of the soul, for example, point to a contradiction between the nature of our faculties and the hypothesis of a finite mortality -- e.g., our sensibility includes passions that no existing object can satisfy; our intelligence stimulates us to pursue an ideal truth that is unreachable; and our activity strives to attain a perfect good that can not be realized. But why would there be no contradiction, Durkheim asked, between our aspirations and our destiny? This argument becomes plausible only if we already assume the existence of a benevolent, intelligent, omnipotent God, who would not have given us tendencies that had to remain unsatisfied. Still, all of these hypotheses concerning the ends God has assigned us remain uncertain, for what appear to us as "contradictions" might simply be the consequence of our limited intelligence. Perhaps if we knew the system of ends toward which the world progresses, things that now appear contradictory would no longer seem so.

Durkheim described two metaphysical arguments for immortality: first, the view that death consists in dissolution -- i.e., a division of parts -- while the soul is one and simple, and thus cannot die; and second, the principle of the conservation of force and matter -- which extends to the psychological and physical world -- suggests that the "force" that we are (i.e., our soul) can be transformed, but not lost. When we die, Durkheim agreed, something of us survives, so both of these arguments are "more probing" than the psychological arguments already discussed. But the immortality we hope for is personal immortality -- i.e., an immortality in which the self remains the same, retains its memory, and affirms its existence after the decomposition of the body. But the immortality promised by the two arguments above is purely metaphysical and impersonal -- i.e., our souls might subsist after death, but only at the cost of being transformed into something not ourselves.

Moral arguments for immortality, Durkheim concluded, rest on the idea that the moral law must have a sanction -- i.e., a system of punishments and rewards must be attached to the observation or violation of the law. The laws of nature, Durkheim noted, need no sanction, because we cannot remove ourselves from their authority; but we can avoid the moral law, he added, and thus a sanction is always necessary to impose it on our consciousness. There are four kinds of sanction to which we are subjected during our lives: the material sanctions applied by society; the moral sanction applied by our peers; the material sanctions resulting from our actions themselves; and finally, the moral sanctions that we apply to ourselves. The first -- i.e., civil punishments and rewards -- are subject to numerous errors, leaving criminals unpunished and virtuous acts unrewarded; and while these are sometimes augmented by the moral rewards and punishments applied by our peers, these too are extremely fallible. The material sanctions resulting from the actions themselves are more reliable; but here again, the debauched person is sometimes able to preserve his good health, while the most sober individual is occasionally struck down by illness. Finally, where we impose moral sanctions on ourselves, we find that the most conscientious person often suffers more guilt, while the wicked are able to silence their consciences and escape any feelings of remorse altogether. In sum, the sanctions attached to the moral law in this life are insufficient, an observation that brings us to Kant's argument for immortality. Reason, Kant had emphasized, cries out for an absolute harmony between happiness and virtue -- something clearly lacking here on earth. Isn't this to say, Durkheim asked his students, that this harmony should be encountered later, in another life? But in fact Durkheim found Kant's argument defective. Admittedly, each of the four kinds of sanction -- taken in isolation -- is insufficient; but for Kant's argument to be complete, it would have to be shown that one type does not make up for the deficiencies of another, and that -- taken in their ensemble -- they remain insufficient.

From his discussion of arguments for the immortality of the soul, Durkheim then turned to arguments for the existence of God or the absolute -- i.e., a being that exists in itself and by itself, unconditioned, unlimited, undetermined, and thus perfectly self-sufficient. To ask if God exists, Durkheim explained to his students, is to ask if we have good reasons -- either metaphysical or moral -- for admitting the existence of such an absolute being. If God is the absolute, for example, our metaphysical proofs for its existence should show that the relative is insufficient to explain it -- i.e., that the phenomena demand to be explained by something other than themselves. But the world can be considered under as many different perspectives as there are rational principles, Durkheim observed, so each metaphysical proof must show that phenomena are insufficient to one of these perspectives; and the most general rational principles are those of perfection, causality, and finality.

The first metaphysical effort to prove God's existence by the principle of perfection, Durkheim began, was that introduced St. Thomas Aquinas, and later adopted by Descartes. Briefly, we observe that there are beings that are more or less good, more or less perfect, which assumes that there is an ideal perfection by which we measure everything that is only "relatively" perfect. Within us, therefore, there is an idea of absolute perfection, and Descartes -- reasoning that there must always be at least as much reality in the cause as there is in the effect -- argued that this idea could only come to us from a perfect being, or God. But the idea of perfection, Durkheim objected, is not among the conditions of experience; and the Cartesian notion that there is as much reality in the cause as in the effect assumes that the effect is only an "adequate part" of the cause (albeit detached from it). This is a mathematical conception, Durkheim complained, that bears no relationship to reality, where each effect is a new reality -- one qualitatively different from the cause. Finally, by assuming that our ideas are the products of external objects -- whether material or transcendent -- it denies our minds the active role that Durkheim had repeatedly insisted they possess.

The second proof of God's existence by the principle of perfection was the ontological argument, advanced in various forms by St. Anselm, Descartes, and Leibniz. Briefly, God is such that we can conceive of no being greater than he. If God doesn't exist, we could conceive of being that would be superior -- i.e., one that, in addition to God's other traits, would add the property of "existence." Therefore, God must exist. But even before Kant, Durkheim observed, Leibniz had noted a deficiency in this argument. In the manner of a mathematical proof, he observed, we first pose a definition (e.g., God is perfect), and then draw a consequence from it (e.g., existence is a perfection and thus God exists). But when we define a geometric figure (e.g., an isosceles triangle), Leibniz reminds us, we know that the figure is logically possible -- something we cannot know in the case of a perfect being. But even ignoring Leibniz's objection, Durkheim clearly found Kant's objections decisive. First, "existence" can hardly be a "perfection," for when I say an object "exists," I add nothing to my notion of the object -- only declaring that the attributes that comprise it are real. Second, a syllogism is an instrument of analysis that, by deriving an object's "existence" from its definition, is attempting a synthetic judgment -- something a syllogism cannot provide. "From the fact that I affirm that all perfections can belong to the subject God," Durkheim explained, "it follows only that God might exist, not that he really does exist."45

The second metaphysical effort to prove God's existence, which has its origin in Aristotle's Metaphysics, appeals to the principle of causality. Briefly, everything that is in movement is moved by something, while this something must itself be moved by something else. Outside of what we know, therefore, there must be a first mover -- itself unmoved, and thus deriving its own movement from itself -- from which all the other things derive their movement. Durkheim noted the similarity of Aristotle's argument to the proof a contingentia mundi of Samuel Clarke (1675-1729), which insisted that the existence of contingent effects requires prior causes, which themselves requires still prior causes, leading us into an infinite regress. This regression from cause to cause must have some end, for otherwise the world would be inexplicable. So we must stop at some first cause, which is itself without a cause -- i.e., God. Durkheim considered this proof superior to that by the idea of perfection; but a first cause, he objected, contradicts the principle of causality itself, for it does no more than to give the name "cause" to a term distinct from another term called the "effect." Indeed, a self-creating object contradicts any rational principle, and is thus beyond the limits of reason itself. What we should really learn from the principle of causality, applied to this sequence of causes and effects, is that there must exist something outside of the world of phenomena altogether.

The third metaphysical proof of God's existence -- i.e., by the principle of finality -- may be explained either abstractly or empirically. In the more abstract form of the proof, we begin by noting that reason obliges us to conceive the series of causes and effects as converging toward some kind of end; but for the unity called for by our minds to be realized in the world, these ends must be subordinated to one another. So we conceive each end as a means, in relation to some other end, and so on, until we arrive at a unique end -- i.e., God. God thus appears to us as the absolute end toward which the world of things is moving. Because this abstract version of the proof by the principle of finality does not require an indefinite regression of means and ends, Durkheim considered it superior to the proof by the principle of causality; but again, Durkheim saw no reason why these series of causes and effects would have to form just one system with a single end. Why not several distinct systems, for example, each with its own, special end? And if there are several systems, Durkheim reminded his students, we would be far from the absolute, and thus from God. And even if the end of the world were not multiple, Durkheim added, there remains the possibility that the end of the world is the realization of a free, rational being (i.e., man) and thus not an absolute, transcendent being (i.e., God) at all. The argument that attempts to prove the existence of God as the end of the world, Durkheim thus concluded, is not valid.

But there is still another metaphysical proof of God's existence, Durkheim observed, that combines the principles of finality and causality. This argument -- which Kant called the physico-theological proof, and for which he professed a particular respect -- considers God the designer of the world. It begins with the empirical observation that nature presents with evidence of order, plan, or design. This order, Kant observed, is not inherent in things, but rather belongs to them in a contingent manner, suggesting that there is a cause that has produced the world, not as a force "fatally engendering" its effect, but as an intelligence which acts freely. This in turn implies the existence of a designer -- i.e., an intelligence coordinating things harmoniously in view of some end. This intelligence is God. To this last argument, Durkheim then added Leibniz's principle of sufficient reason. At the origin of things, according to Leibniz, there was an infinity of logically possible worlds. Who, then, made the choice among all these possibilities? Why was one world chosen from these possibilities, and existence denied to all the others? Such a choice, Leibniz reasoned, implies the existence of an intelligence combined with a will, a supreme person -- i.e., God. It was God, therefore, who chose the present world because it is the best; and without God, this choice no longer has "sufficient reason."

All philosophers, Durkheim observed, agree with the first step of the proof -- i.e., the universe does reveal a certain order or harmony; but the same is not true for the second step, which attempts to explain this order as the result of an intelligent design. In the Greek atomists Democritus and Epicurus, for example, the order and harmony of the universe are explained contingently, as the consequence of chance collisions, combinations, and recombinations of atoms falling freely through infinite space. Cicero, of course, objected strongly to the Epicureans, insisting that so well-ordered a universe could never be explained as the consequence of mere chance. But Durkheim argued that Cicero had missed the point. In what appears again to be an appeal to Leibniz, he noted that the atoms might be grouped in an infinity of different ways, yielding an infinity of different worlds. Yet the present combination finished -- and had necessarily to finish -- by succeeding over all the others. Why? Because this combination was the only stable one -- i.e., the only one that allowed a state of equilibrium in the world. So we should be astonished, Durkheim concluded, neither by the fact that this orderly world has been formed, nor by the fact that it has endured.

How, then, are we to explain this peculiar state of equilibrium? The atomistic philosophy, which rejected finality only to replace it with sheer chance, is no longer acceptable. Instead, both chance and finality have been replaced by the mechanistic philosophy, whose most recent and perfected form Durkheim found in the evolutionism of Herbert Spencer (1820-1903). Earlier philosophers, Durkheim explained, had been impressed by the "marvelous proportion" between organisms and their environments, as well as the extraordinary coordination of the constituent elements within the organism itself; and they concluded that these two facts could be explained only on the hypothesis of an intelligent cause. But the mechanists, Durkheim observed, explain both as the deterministic consequence of efficient -- rather than final -- causes. The harmony between an organism and its environment, Spencer thus argues, can be explained by "adaptation" and the "instability of the homogeneous" -- i.e., a homogeneous mass is inherently unstable, so that an organism must differentiate in order to adapt to its environment; and the internal coordination of parts is explained by "segregation" -- i.e., the joining together of similar things into distinct systems. But Durkheim insisted that Spencer's argument doesn't really avoid the need for finality or for chance. If an organism is placed in a hostile environment, for example, it may or may not develop the organs necessary to its adaptation. But if it does develop these adaptive organs, can this development be explained simply as a consequence of the fact that the organs were necessary? If so, isn't this proof by the principle of finality? If not, isn't this development the consequence of mere chance? Moreover, where Spencer's theory might account for the physical coordination of the parts of an organism (i.e., the reunion of similar elements), it cannot explain their organic coordination -- i.e., their systematization or subordination to a dominant unity. In an organism, Durkheim reminded his students, all the parts cooperate in the whole, and this subordination is repeated in each individual organ. Again, Durkheim insisted, Spencer's evolutionism doesn't permit us to escape the need for the principle of finality. On the contrary, the harmony between organisms and their environments and the coordination of the constituent elements within an organism make our appeal to final causes all the more necessary.

In sum, Durkheim observed, we've established the existence of an end. But how is this end to be represented? The physico-theological argument, Durkheim reminded his students, conceives of the world as a work of art, and attributes its finality to the intelligence of an artist; in short, it conceives of the world as the product of a transcendent mind. But some philosophers have objected that this is unjustifiably anthropomorphic. Why can't finality be imminent -- i.e., thing going spontaneously to their end, as if guided by instinct rather than a transcendent mind? Versions of such an argument appear in Aristotle and also in Hegel; but it was immediately clear that here Durkheim was referring to Hartmann and Schopenhauer, whose theory of imminent finality was designed to replace transcendent finality and avoid anthropomorphism altogether. The "great failure" of their argument, according to Durkheim, was that it is irrepresentible. Briefly, all finality assumes the concept of an end; and such a concept is a psychological phenomenon, and is thus inconceivable without consciousness. Because he embraced the doctrine of unconscious psychological phenomena, Hartmann was undisturbed by this objection; but Durkheim had already rejected the notion of the unconscious, and was thus forced to accept a transcendent finality.

Does the physico-theological argument prove the existence of God? Kant thought not, addressing two objections to the argument, and Durkheim agreed with him completely. First, while the physico-theological argument demonstrates clearly that there is an architect of the universe, and that its form is contingent, it does not demonstrate that there is a creator, and that the material is contingent. For this, we require the cosmological argument, which Kant also rejected. Second, while the physico-theological argument begins with experience, it is not limited to experience alone. For if the order and harmony of the world are imperfect, we cannot conclude with the existence of a perfect cause. But everything given to us in experience, Kant argues, is more or less imperfect, and thus yields at most a cause which is very wise and very powerful in relation to ourselves -- but a not perfect cause.

What, then, are the moral argument for the existence of God? The first moral proof, Durkheim observed, is that from common consent -- i.e., the notion, first advanced by Cicero. that because all men believe in God, God must exist. But as Durkheim immediately pointed out, it isn't clear that all men believe in God; and even if they did, this would provide only a presumption -- not a proof -- in favor of God's existence. Turning to the second moral argument, Durkheim reminded his students of the two elements of morality that seem to assume a foundation outside of morality itself. The first element is obligation -- i.e., the moral law must bind us in some way, and it can do so only if we consider it as something living -- i.e., as God himself; and the second element is the sanction -- i.e., reason cries out for the harmony of virtue and happiness, and this is possible only assuming a transcendent God who puts nature into conformity with morality. According to this second moral argument, therefore, God appears to us both as the living moral law and as the sole condition on which the harmony of happiness and virtue might be realized.

From the metaphysical arguments, therefore, Durkheim was able to conclude that God exists as an absolute end, and also that he is the architect -- but not necessarily creator -- of the world; and from the moral arguments, Durkheim was able to conclude that God is the living moral law, as well as the condition of moral sanctions. What, then, is God's nature -- i.e., what are his qualities and attributes? To answer this question, Durkheim observed, there are two methods. The first is analogical -- i.e., it begins from the characteristics of imperfect beings, elevating them to perfection, and in this way arrives at the attributes of God. But this method, Durkheim complained, follows the principle that there should be as much reality in the cause as in the effect -- a principle that Durkheim had already refuted. The alternative method, which Durkheim favored, was to start from the definition of God, and to examine the conditions of the attributes -- both metaphysical and moral -- implied by this definition. Following this method, for example, the metaphysical attributes of God are: infinity -- i.e., being absolute, God cannot be finite; unity -- i.e., being absolute, God is necessarily one; perfection -- i.e., being absolute, God must be perfect; immortality -- i.e., being absolute, God cannot be subject to change; immensity -- i.e., being absolute, God cannot be limited in space; and eternity -- i.e., being absolute, God is outside of time. Following the same method, the moral attributes of God are: omniscience -- i.e., as the cause of harmony between happiness and virtue, God must be a perfect judge of the causes of men's actions; omnipotence -- i.e., God must be able to execute these same judgments; justice -- i.e., both the judgments and their execution must be absolutely impartial; and freedom -- i.e., to be perfectly just in both judgment and execution, God must be removed from the influence of any external cause.

Some philosophers, Durkheim observed, have argued that there is a contradiction between the metaphysical and the moral attributes of God -- i.e., the latter encourage us to see God as a person, while the former suggest that God is impersonal. This objection would be justified, Durkheim responded, if we understood God's "infinity" as infinite in extension; but we understand God as infinite, not in extension, but in comprehension -- i.e., as another form of his divine character. Similarly, the complaint would be justified if we understood God's "perfection" as simply the bringing together of all real and possible qualities to their maximum intensity; but for us, Durkheim insisted, the "perfect" is almost a synonym for the "absolute," and there can be no contradiction between the idea of God as the absolute and the idea of God as a person. On the contrary, the "perfect person" has for his ideal the "absolute."

What is the relation of God to the world? People typically consider God as the "cause" of the world. But how does this cause (God) produce its effect (the world)? The dualist answer, Durkheim observed, is that God merely gave order and harmony to matter, which itself had existed from eternity. But this matter, Durkheim objected, would then have been an absolute limiting the power of God -- something contradictory to those attributes of God described above. Moreover, however inchoate and indeterminate this matter might originally have been, it would still have had to possess certain properties, so that God could not organize it "absolutely as it pleased him." Responding to these objections, the pantheists ask why we should conceive of God as "outside" the world at all. Why isn't the universe "God developing himself"? Such a view, Durkheim observed, deprives any existence to individuals, which are now conceived as merely the diverse phenomena of an underlying, common substance -- whether material (Stoicism), spiritual (Hegel), or Spinoza's res extensa et cogitans -- called "God." But whatever its form, Durkheim argued, pantheism is vulnerable to three objections. First, its conception of God is impossible -- i.e., one thing cannot simultaneously have both extension and thought. Second, pantheism is inconsistent with our individuality or our freedom -- i.e., things that would be impossible if we were simply moments in the divine self-realization. And third, pantheism doesn't account for sensible multiplicity -- i.e., it reduces all movement and change to an eternally immobile God. Durkheim thus concluded that neither the dualist nor the pantheist account of God's relation to the world is acceptable. God is distinct from the world, Durkheim affirmed, and he is its creator, not just its architect; but we must not try to represent to ourselves what this means, for it is beyond our powers.

But some philosophers, Durkheim began his last lecture, simply cannot believe that God -- having created the world -- could have abandoned and lost interest in it. Descartes, for example, insisted that the world must be perpetually connected to the source from which it takes its existence -- his primary metaphysical argument for the existence of providence. Here, Durkheim observed, it is common to distinguish between particular and general providence. The first, as described by Bossuet, is an effective intervention of God in the human events of the world. But this doctrine of a particular providence, Durkheim complained, both contradicts the idea of human freedom and exalts the power of God at the expense of his dignity. Providence is therefore general -- i.e., it is the perfect wisdom and goodness of God, exercised at the beginning of time when it established the laws that govern the world, and continuing into the present through the maintenance of these laws and the conservation of the world.

A serious objection to this notion of a general providence, however, had been made by Pierre Bayle (1647-1706), who had revived the Manichaean doctrine of evil as a principle independent of God. Evil, Bayle had observed, may be of three kinds: metaphysical -- i.e., the physical and intellectual imperfection of all beings, including ourselves; moral -- i.e., the weakness of our will, which leads to sin; and physical -- i.e., suffering, illness, and death. How can such evil, Bayle asked, be reconciled with our notion of a general providence? But in his Theodicy (1710), Leibniz responded to Bayle that none of these evils proves anything against providence, for each is but the condition of inestimable goods, which would be impossible without them. Metaphysical evil, for example, simply shows that, as created beings, we cannot be perfect -- something that belongs to the absolute alone. Far from being an independent entity, therefore, this kind of evil is only the negation -- and thus a condition -- of the good. Similarly, moral evil a necessary condition of moral good, for we can do good (or evil) only if we are free to choose. Finally, physical evil is the consequence of the operations of natural laws; but these laws were not created for that reason, but because without them, the world would not exist. The suffering of some individuals is thus a condition of the existence of the world. Moreover, pain and suffering are "the best school of morality," raising individuals to a kind of dignity that the perpetually happy person could never achieve. At the moment of creation, Leibniz argued, God imagined the infinity of possible universes, and chose -- not the absolutely best -- but the best possible world. So to judge the perfection of the creation -- and thus the goodness of its author -- we must resist the tendency to judge each of the parts in detail, and instead judge the totality of things that exist. Evil can be considered bad only by minds that systematically limit their analysis to a part rather than the whole; and while the whole world is not perfect, neither is it bad. It is, according the Leibniz, the best of all possible worlds.

Durkheim apparently agreed with Leibniz's response to Bayle's pessimism; but the theological pessimism of Bayle, he continued, has been recently been replaced by the psychological and moral pessimism of Schopenhauer and Hartmann, becoming "almost popular over large parts of Europe." Schopenhauer's pessimism, for example, insists that pleasure is only the negation of pain, making pain the positive, normal fact of our sensibility; and while Hartmann at least granted pleasure a positive value, he also insisted that the quantity of pleasure that one can experience in life is vastly inferior to the amount of pain we are assured. Whether a pleasure is psychological or physical, Hartmann argued, both its duration and intensity are very brief, while the duration and intensity of pain is far greater; and even where pleasures and pains are of the same duration, no one would purchase an hour of pleasure with an hour of pain. In sum, for Hartmann, pain is the law of life, the almost constant state of the sensibility.

If Hartmann is right, Durkheim acknowledged, then the being that created us does not merit the name of "providence"; and in fact, Hartmann insisted that the Unconscious -- i.e., the mysterious principle of all nature -- created us only to realize its own, personal ends. While we think we are seeking our own ends, and even experiencing pleasure, this illusion vanishes with philosophical reflection, and we discover that we've been fooled, that we are the docile means for the ends of the Unconscious, and that our fate is pain rather than pleasure. But Durkheim argued that Schopenhauer and Hartmann had made two fundamental errors. First, the pessimists treat pleasure as an objective, impersonal phenomenon; but pleasure, Durkheim insisted, is clearly an individual matter -- i.e., what is "pleasurable" for one person might not be pleasurable for the next -- and thus they can hardly be submitted to quantitative measurement. In fact, some people would purchase an hour of pleasure with an hour of pain, as a matter of individual preference. Second, the pessimists assume that pain obsesses the mind for long periods, while pleasure is fleeting; but memory and hope, Durkheim argued, allow us to make pleasures endure no less than pains.

Happiness is an art, Aristotle's Ethics tells us, and one can learn any art.



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[shuklas]

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Durkheim :

Psychology: The Description and Enumeration of States of Consciousness (Lectures 5-37)



Because states of consciousness have frequent relations with other phenomena, Durkheim began his fifth lecture with an effort to distinguish the things studied by psychology from those studied by physiology. A physiological phenomenon (e.g., a wound) occurs in space, occupies a certain extension, can be reduced to movements, and its spatial extension and movement can be measured. While we are conscious of its result (e.g., pain and suffering), the physiological phenomenon itself can be unconscious. Finally, while I might say "I am in pain," my sensation of pain is only the psychological consequence of the physiological wound. The physiological phenomenon is experienced as belonging, not to my self, but rather to my body. By contrast, every psychological phenomena (e.g., pain and suffering) is attributed to the self (my pain, my suffering), is fully conscious, is not in space, has no extension, and can be measured only in its temporal duration. Physiology and psychology, Durkheim thus concluded, are distinct sciences, each with its own object very different from the other.

Durkheim then turned to a discussion of the different methods that have been applied to the study of psychological phenomena, beginning with the psycho-physical school of E.H. Weber (1795-1878) and Gustave Fechner (1801-1887). In his Elemente der Psychophysik (1860), Fechner had introduced a mathematical formulation that he called the "law of intensity" -- i.e., that the intensity of a sensation increases as the logarithm of the stimulus (that is, by diminishing increments) -- which would become known as the "Weber-Fechner law," considered by some to be the beginning of quantitative experimental psychology.3 The law is important because Durkheim would refer to it again in De la division du travail social (1893), in support of his argument that the human capacity for happiness is limited, and that the desire for happiness must thus be dismissed as a possible cause for the division of labor.4 But in this fifth Sens lecture, Durkheim dismissed the Weber-Fechner law categorically. Fechner's calculations, Durkheim suspected, contain mathematical errors. The principle of his method is the measurability of the sensations, and sensations -- which are outside of space -- cannot be measured. Most important, by attempting to establish relations only between sensations and their physical stimuli, Durkheim insisted, Fechner had ignored the physiological phenomena that intervene between them, immediately preceding the psychological fact. "If the body were a passive context," Durkheim observed, "which transmits the excitation produced in the soul without alteration, we could disregard it as a psycho-physical fact. But the body is far from being such a passive thing, and while transmitting physical facts to the soul, [the body] modifies them significantly, and differently according to the individual and the circumstances."5 Because it thus fails to establish relations, first between physical and physiological phenomena, and then between physiological and psychological phenomena, Durkheim concluded, the psycho-physical method must be dismissed.

It was to overcome this last difficulty, Durkheim continued, that Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920) established the psycho-physiological school, which no longer relates states of consciousness directly to physical phenomena, but rather to physiological phenomena. For Wundt, in short, the conscious life of the soul has its roots in the unconscious life of the body. But whatever interest Wundt's work might hold, Durkheim objected, it cannot replace a science that studies conscious psychological facts in themselves; in short, the soul cannot be reduced to the body. Again, this negative assessment is extremely interesting in the light of Durkheim's visit to Wundt's laboratory in Leipzig just two years later, and his subsequent praise for Wundt's willingness "to reduce the higher forms of intelligence to experience," and subject "the life of reason" to "psychological scrutiny."6

The positive lesson to be learned from this discussion of psycho-physics and psycho-physiology, Durkheim thus emphasized, is that we must study the states of consciousness in themselves and for themselves; and the only method consistent with this emphasis is observation by means of the consciousness. This method, Durkheim admits, has been subject to at least three criticisms. First, states of consciousness are ephemeral, fleeting, "remaining only an instant in the field of the interior vision," and this interior vision of consciousness itself is regarded as crude and imprecise. Second, the notion that the mind both observes and is observed -- simultaneously -- is rejected as an impossibility. And third, because the "observer" in this case is the individual consciousness, these observations would lack all objectivity and generality, and thus would not provide scientific evidence. Responding to the first objection, however, Durkheim insisted that we observe our states of consciousness every day, with incontestable results; and if psychological phenomena are ephemeral, they can also be resuscitated through memory, allowing us to study them at leisure. Second, it is simply not true that we cannot be observers and observed simultaneously -- e.g., if we see ourselves in a mirror or we hear ourselves speak, we can certainly observe our states of consciousness as well. And third, while the observer is an individual consciousness, the states of consciousness observed are those common to all, something of which we can be assured by comparing our results with those of others.

Turning to the states of consciousness themselves, Durkheim grouped them into three "faculties of the soul" -- i.e., activity, sensibility, and intelligence.7 Just as we act on the exterior world through the intermediary of our bodies, for example, we act on the interior world by our wills -- i.e., directing our intelligence, exercising our thought, etc. If our willful actions are unimpeded, we experience pleasure; and if they encounter obstacles, we feel pain. But pleasure and pain are not actions, for they are produced in us without our willing them -- a group of passive states of consciousness to which Durkheim gave the name sensibility. Finally, when we act, we know that we are acting; when we experience pain, we know that we are experiencing pain; but this is not to act or sense itself, but to have knowledge of our action or sensation. So there are states of consciousness called ideas, some of which refer to the external, and others to the internal world; and these form the faculty of the intelligence.

Do these faculties have a real existence in the soul? Or are they just labels for groups of states of consciousness? Durkheim's response to this version of the realist-nominalist distinction is interesting, because it is analogous to the way he sometimes dealt with the relationship between the individual and society. Without their constituent states of consciousness, Durkheim admits, the faculties would have no concrete reality; but if their states of consciousness were suppressed, the faculties would still be powers of the soul. For the power to act, sense, and/or think both precedes and survives the states of consciousness themselves. Might two of the faculties be reduced to the third? Spinoza tried to reduce the soul to intelligence, Durkheim reminded his students, just as Condillac attempted to reduce it to sensibility, and Maine de Biran to activity. But Durkheim insisted that the three groups differ too much to be joined together in this way. Are the faculties then distinct entities, in the manner suggested by Plato? On the contrary, Durkheim replied, they are merely the distinct powers of a single, identical being -- i.e., the self -- acting in concert with one another. Durkheim thus embraced the Aristotelian principle that we live not by one faculty, but with the entire soul.



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Sensibility (Lectures 7-9)

His introduction to the science of psychology thus completed, Durkheim took up each of the three faculties in greater detail, beginning with the sensibility -- i.e., the faculty of feeling pleasure and pain.8 These states of consciousness, Durkheim observed, have three essential characteristics. First, they are affective phenomena -- i.e., when we experience them, we are passive. Second, these states of consciousness are produced within us necessarily, as the consequence of some prior cause, and these states can be altered only by modifying the cause that produced them. Durkheim admitted that pleasure and pain might be temporarily suppressed or intensified through acts of the will; but the notion that we might be "absolute masters" of such affective phenomena, he insisted, was an illusion of the Stoics and Epicureans. Third, everything sensible is also relative -- i.e., what is pleasure for one person is pain for another.