Bhakti and Embodiment Read online

  Many of the debates among theorists of the body in feminist and gender studies center on the gendered body and its relation to the sexed body, with the validity of the sex/gender distinction itself a topic of contention. On the one hand, feminist advocates of social constructionism tend to distinguish between sex and gender, in which sex (male or female) is identified with the biological body as a “natural” datum and gender (masculine or feminine) is a second-order sociocultural construction that is superimposed as an ideological superstructure on this “natural” base. On the other hand, feminist advocates of sexual difference call into question the sex/gender distinction and insist that the sexually marked biological body, like gender, is socially constructed. Butler, for example, in Bodies That Matter argues that the binary sex/gender system arises not from nature but from a system of sociocultural norms grounded in the “heterosexual imperative,” and thus sex must be construed not “as a bodily given on which the construct of gender is artificially imposed, but as a cultural norm that governs the materialization of bodies.”33

  The Body in Religion

  A number of scholars of religion have contributed in recent years to scholarship on the body in the social sciences and humanities. This burgeoning interest is evidenced by the increasing number of scholarly forums and publications since the 1990s dedicated to sustained reflections on the body in religion, including international conferences and seminars, special issues of religious studies journals, edited collections, review essays, and book series.34 The emerging corpus of scholarship on the body in religion is a multidisciplinary enterprise, involving the collaborative efforts of scholars of religion, philosophers, anthropologists, sociologists, historians, feminist theorists, and other scholars in the human sciences. The majority of studies have focused on body discourses and practices in particular religious traditions.35

  Although a number of scholars of religion have made important contributions to our understanding of the body, the dominant trends of analysis are problematic in two ways. First, many scholars of religion have tended to simply adopt the categories of the body that have been theorized by scholars in philosophy, history, the social sciences, or feminist and gender studies: the lived body, the mindful body,36 the social body, the body politic,37 the sexual body,38 the alimentary body,39 the medical body,40 the gendered body,41 and so on. I would suggest that using such Western constructions of the body as the default cultural templates against which to compare and evaluate categories of embodiment from “the Rest of the World” serves to perpetuate the legacy of “European epistemological hegemony”42 in the academy. In order to establish “theory parity”43 in our investigations as part of the post-colonial turn, we also need to consider the potential contributions of “the Rest of the World” to theories of embodiment, and it is therefore important for scholars of religion to excavate the resources of particular religious traditions and to generate analytical categories and models of the body that are grounded in the distinctive idioms of these traditions. For example, in addition to categories such as the medical body and the gendered body, other forms of embodiment that are of particular significance to religious traditions—such as the divine body,44 the ritual body,45 and the devotional body46—need to be more fully explored from the methodological perspective of the history of religions. Second, as a result of the tendency to appropriate categories from other disciplines, we are left with a bewildering profusion of scholarly constructions of the body. Such an approach is not adequate to account for the complex integrative frameworks and taxonomies that are constructed by religious traditions to delineate the interconnections among various forms of embodiment.

  Hindu Discourses of the Body

  A number of studies in recent years have focused on select aspects of embodiment in Hindu,47 Buddhist,48 and other South Asian religious traditions.49 Hindu traditions in particular provide extensive, elaborate, and multiform discourses of the body, and I have sought to demonstrate in my own work that a sustained investigation of these discourses can contribute in significant ways to scholarship on the body in the history of religions and in the human sciences generally.50 The body has been represented, disciplined, regulated, and cultivated from a variety of perspectives in the discursive representations and practices of Hindu traditions, including ritual traditions, ascetic movements, medical traditions, legal codes, philosophical systems, bhakti movements, yoga traditions, tantric traditions, the science of erotics, martial arts, drama, dance, music, and the visual arts.

  Although Hindu discourses of the body have assumed highly diverse forms, it is nevertheless possible to isolate a number of fundamental postulates that are shared by most of these discourses and that need to be taken into consideration in our investigations.

  The Body as a Psychophysical Continuum

  The human body is represented as an integrated psychophysical organism that has both gross and subtle dimensions.

  In contrast to Western philosophy’s emphasis on the mind/body polarity, Hindu discourses generally represent the human body as a psychophysical continuum encompassing both gross physical constituents and subtle psychic faculties.51 This notion is elaborated in two types of conceptions: the doctrine of the five sheaths (pañca-kośa) of the embodied self, and the distinction between the gross body (sthūla-śarīra) and the subtle body (sūkṣma-śarīra or liṅga-śarīra). The doctrine of the five sheaths, which is first formulated in the Taittirīya Upaniṣad,52 maintains that the embodied self (śarīra ātman) is composed of multiple layers, from the gross, outermost sheath constituted by food (anna-maya-kośa) to the increasingly subtle sheaths made of breath (prāṇa-maya-kośa), mind (mano-maya-kośa), and consciousness (vijñāna-maya-kośa) to the subtlest, innermost sheath consisting of bliss (ānanda-maya-kośa). The distinction between the gross body and the subtle body also has its roots in the Upaniṣads and is elaborated in Sāṃkhya, one of the six Darśanas, or orthodox Hindu philosophical schools, within the framework of the twenty-three tattvas (elementary principles) that constitute prakṛti, primordial matter: the gross body is constituted by the five gross elements (mahā-bhūtas), while the subtle body is made up of the intellect (buddhi or mahat), ego (ahaṃkāra), mind (manas), five sense capacities (buddhīndriyas), five action capacities (karmendriyas), and five subtle elements (tanmātras).53

  An alternative formulation is proposed in one of the contending philosophical schools, Advaita Vedānta, which distinguishes three bodies: the gross body (sthūla-śarīra), which is composed of the five gross elements; the subtle body (sūkṣma-śarīra), which is made up of the intellect, mind, five sense capacities, five action capacities, and five vital breaths (prāṇas); and the causal body (kāraṇa-śarīra), which is ignorance (avidyā or ajñāna) and is the cause of the gross and subtle bodies. The Advaita school, moreover, correlates the three bodies with the five sheaths of the embodied self, identifying the sheath constituted by food with the gross body; the sheaths made of breath, mind, and consciousness with the subtle body; and the sheath consisting of bliss with the causal body.54

  In these various formulations the mind, along with other psychic faculties, is represented as a subtle form of embodiment—a subtle sheath or an aspect of the subtle body—while the physical body is represented as a gross form of embodiment. The mind, like the physical body, is a type of matter, although it is a more subtle form of materiality than the physical body. The mind/body problem that has preoccupied Western philosophy is thus not a central concern in Hindu philosophical traditions. The principal problem is rather the relationship between the material psychophysical organism and the eternal Self—variously termed Ātman, Brahman, or puruṣa—which is represented as the ultimate reality that in its essential nature transcends all forms of embodiment. In Sāṃkhya and Pātañjala Yoga, as we shall see, this problem is formulated in terms of the relationship between prakṛti, primordial matter, and puruṣa, pure consciousness. In Advaita Vedānta the problem is reformulated in terms of the relationship between the ph
enomenal world of embodied forms—which is ultimately deemed to be māyā, an illusory appearance—and Brahman, the encompassing totality that in its essential nature is beyond all form.55

  Hindu conceptions of the subtle body and subtle materiality find elaborate expression in tantric traditions, which, drawing on the ontological and psychophysiological categories of Sāṃkhya, Pātañjala Yoga, and Advaita Vedānta, re-figure the subtle body as a subtle physiology constituted by a complex network of channels (nāḍīs) and energy centers (cakras) and the serpentine power of the kuṇḍalinī.

  Transmigratory History of the Body

  The human body is represented as having a transmigratory history in which the subtle body reincarnates in a succession of gross bodies.

  From the Upaniṣadic period on, the distinction between gross and subtle bodies assumes soteriological import as an integral part of the doctrine of karma and rebirth. The subtle body is represented in this context as the transmigratory body that reincarnates in a series of gross bodies. The character and destiny of an embodied self in any given lifetime is determined by the combined influence of the two bodies: the karmic heritage from the subtle body, which is the repository of the karmic residues accumulated from previous births, and the genetic heritage from the gross body, which is the repository of the genetic contributions of the current father and mother. In the Upaniṣads and later ascetic traditions, as well as in philosophical schools such as Sāṃkhya, Pātañjala Yoga, and Advaita Vedānta, all forms of embodiment—gross and subtle—are represented as a source of bondage because they bind the soul to saṃsāra, the endless cycle of birth and death. Mokṣa, liberation from saṃsāra, is construed in this context as freedom from the fetters of embodiment and realization of the essential nature of the eternal Self beyond the material psychophysical complex.

  The Person, the Self, and the Body

  Constructions of embodiment in different Hindu traditions are embedded in distinctive ontologies and notions of the person and the self.

  Many Hindu traditions distinguish between the empirical self in bondage, which mistakenly identifies with the psychophysical complex in the material realm of prakṛti, and the eternal Self, which is beyond the realm of prakṛti. In such traditions embodiment is generally represented as a fundamental problem of the human condition that is inextricably implicated in the bondage of materiality.

  Constructions of embodiment in classical Sāṃkhya, as expounded in the Sāṃkhya-Kārikā of Īśvarakṛṣṇa (c. 350–450 CE), are based on a dualistic ontology that posits a plurality of puruṣas that are eternally distinct from prakṛti, primordial matter. Puruṣa is pure consciousness, which is the eternal, nonchanging Self that is the silent, uninvolved witness of the ever-changing transformations of prakṛti. Bondage is caused by ignorance (avidyā) of puruṣa as distinct from prakṛti. The jīva, empirical self, mistakenly identifies with the activities of the ego, intellect, and mind, which are subtle forms of materiality, and is thereby subject to the binding influence of prakṛti and its continuum of pleasure and pain that is perpetuated through the cycle of birth and death. Liberation from bondage is attained through the discriminative knowledge (jñāna) that distinguishes between puruṣa and prakṛti. The enlightened sage, having realized the luminous reality of puruṣa, the nonchanging Self, attains kaivalya, a state of absolute isolation and freedom in which identification with the dance of prakṛti, the ever-changing realm of embodiment, ceases.

  The classical Yoga system, which is first articulated in the Yoga-Sūtras of Patañjali (c. 400–500 CE), builds upon the ontology and epistemology of Sāṃkhya in its discussions of the nature of embodiment, bondage, and liberation. However, in contrast to Sāṃkhya’s emphasis on discriminative knowledge, Pātañjala Yoga gives primary emphasis to practical methods of purification and meditation as means to liberation. It outlines an eight-limbed program termed aṣṭāṅga-yoga, which comprises physical and mental disciplines aimed at purifying the material psychophysical complex (śarīra) and attenuating the afflictions (kleśas) and the residual karmic impressions (saṃskāras) that perpetuate the cycle of rebirth. The first four limbs involve external practices, including a series of vows of abstinence (yama), psychophysical disciplines (niyama), bodily postures (āsana), and breathing exercises (prāṇāyāma). The fifth limb involves withdrawal of the mind from external sense objects (pratyāhāra) in preparation for the internal practice of saṃyama, a threefold meditation technique that encompasses the final three limbs, comprising two phases of meditation (dhāraṇā and dhyāna) and culminating in samādhi, an enstatic experience of absorption in the Self, puruṣa, which is pure consciousness. Through sustained practice of aṣṭāṅga-yoga the yogin ceases to identify with the fluctuations of ordinary empirical awareness (citta-vṛtti) and attains direct experiential knowledge (viveka-khyāti) of the true nature of puruṣa as separate from the realm of prakṛti and from other puruṣas. The liberated yogin, having become permanently established in the nonchanging Self, puruṣa, enjoys eternal freedom in kaivalya, a state of absolute isolation, and attains a perfected body (kāya-sampad) that manifests siddhis, psychophysical powers, as an externalized expression of the yogin’s enlightened consciousness.56

  In classical Advaita Vedānta, as expounded by Śaṃkara (c. 788–820 CE), constructions of embodiment are based on a monistic ontology in which the duality of puruṣa and prakṛti is subsumed within the totality of Brahman, the universal wholeness of existence, which alone is declared to be real. Brahman is described as an impersonal totality consisting of being (sat), consciousness (cit), and bliss (ānanda), which in its essential nature is nirguṇa (without attributes) and completely formless, distinctionless, nonactive, nonchanging, and unbounded. As saguṇa (with attributes), Brahman assumes the form of Īśvara, the personal God who manifests the phenomenal world of forms as māyā, an illusory appearance. Deluded by ignorance (avidyā), the jīva, empirical self, becomes enchanted by the cosmic play and mistakenly identifies with the material psychophysical complex (śarīra), becoming bound in saṃsāra. The goal of human existence is mokṣa or mukti, liberation from the bondage of saṃsāra and the fetters of embodiment, which is attained through knowledge (jñāna or vidyā) alone. When knowledge dawns the jīva awakens to its true nature as Ātman, the eternal, universal Self, and realizes its identity with Brahman. In this embodied state of liberation, jīvanmukti, the liberated sage enjoys a unitary vision of the all-pervasive effulgence of Brahman in which he sees the Self in all beings and all beings in the Self.57

  The discourse of embodiment developed by the sixteenth-century exponents of the Gauḍīya Sampradāya, which will be a major focus of the present study, rejects both the dualistic ontology of Sāṃkhya and Pātañjala Yoga and the monistic ontology of Advaita Vedānta. The Gauḍīyas promulgate instead the ideal of acintya-bhedābheda, inconceivable difference-in-nondifference, which re-visions prevailing notions of the relationship between embodiment, personhood, and materiality on both the divine and human planes. On the one hand, they assert the deity Kṛṣṇa’s supreme status as pūrṇa Bhagavān, the full and complete Godhead, who is beyond the impersonal, formless Brahman and is supremely personal and possessed of an absolute body (vigraha) that is nonmaterial. On the other hand, they maintain that the goal of human existence is for the jīva, individual living being, to awaken to its svarūpa, its unique inherent nature, as a part (aṃśa) of Bhagavān and to realize the particular form of its siddha-rūpa, its eternal, nonmaterial body made of bliss. The highest state of realization is thus represented as an eternal relationship between two persons—Kṛṣṇa, the supreme Bhagavān, and the individual jīva—each of whom possesses a body that is eternal and nonmaterial. In the Gauḍīya perspective, as we shall see, the body is not a problem to be overcome but, on the contrary, is ascribed a pivotal role on multiple levels—divine and human, material and nonmaterial—as the very key to realization.58

  Integral Bodies

  Construction
s of embodiment are not limited to the human body but rather include a hierarchy of structurally correlated bodies corresponding to different planes of existence: the human body, the social body, the cosmos body, and the divine body.

  Vedic taxonomies posit a system of inherent connections (bandhus) among the different orders of reality: the divine order (adhidaiva), the natural order (adhibhūta), and the human order (adhyātma), which includes the psychophysical organism as well as the social order. These orders of reality are at times represented as a hierarchy of structurally correlated bodies, nested one within the other: the human body, the social body, the cosmos body, and the divine body. I term these bodies “integral bodies” in that each is represented as a complex whole that is inherent in the structure of reality. The earliest formulation of this fourfold hierarchy of bodies is found in the famous Puruṣa-Sūkta, Ṛg-Veda 10.90, which is the locus classicus that is frequently invoked in later Vedic and post-Vedic discourses of the body. In this formulation the divine body is the encompassing primordial totality, which transcends and at the same time replicates itself in the structures of the cosmos body, the social body, and the human body; the cosmos body is the body of the universe, which is the differentiated manifestation of the divine body; the social body is the system of social classes (varṇas), which is inherent in the structure of the divine body; and the human body is the microcosmic manifestation of the divine body, which is ranked according to class and gender in the social body. A system of homologies is thus established between the transcosmic divine body, the macrocosmic cosmos body, the microcosmic human body, and the social body, which is the intermediate structure between the microcosm and the macrocosm.