Read without ads and support Scribd by becoming a Scribd Premium Reader.
See Premium Plans
 
Kundalini
the evolutionary energy in man
 by Gopi Krishna
with an introduction
 by Frederic Spiegelberg
and a psychological commentary
 by James Hillman
London 1970
Stuart & Watkins
FIRST PUBLISHED BY RAMADHAR & HOPMAN, NEW DELHI 1967REVISED EDITION FIRST PUBLISHED IN GREAT BRITAIN I970BY VINCENT STUART AND JOHN M WATKINS LTD45 LOWER BELGRAVE STREET LONDON SWI© 1967 BY GOPI KRISHNA© 1967, I97O COMMENTARY BY JAMES HILLMANMADE AND PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAINBY ROBERT CUNNINGHAM AND SONS LTDLONGBANK WORKS ALVACLACKMANNANSHIRESCOTLAND
 
SBN 7224 0115 9
Introduction
AUTOBIOGRAPHIES mainly concerned with the description of outer life events aretoday perhaps only written by statesmen, that is in a field where the external historicalconditions are more important for the reader than the man and his character itself. Onlysince Goethe's 'Dichtung und Wahrheit' can we talk about real autobiographies, since onlythe author himself can report adequately, if at all, about the inner process of his maturingand about the ways of his feeling. Therefore, autobiographies have commanded theliterary field in the West during the past century, when men have been apt and able tointrovert in a systematic way and thus to explore the vast field of their inner life. Suchefforts have recently found their highest pitch in the psychologist C. G. Jung's fascinatingaccount of the ups-and-downs of his inner development even to the very depths of hisunconscious.In India we find beginnings of such autobiographical statements as early as theUpanishads and again in our own time, partly influenced by Western trends.Autobiographies by Yogis have been extremely rare, partly because the Yogi is wellaware of the importance of keeping and living with a secret and partly because he properly shares the secret only with God and not with the people in his surroundings whoare less aware of the subtle workings of inner tendencies.Only in a few instances have great men of wisdom in India revealed themselves to us inself-descriptions, like Yogananda, Ramdas and Sivananda. In most cases it has beenWesterners who, because of their search for stimulation from a foreign way of self-introspection, have discovered and published the achievements of the Indian masters of Yoga, so did Paul Brunton reveal Ramana Maharishi to the West and also to India, and soRomain Rolland became fascinated with Ramakrishna, Friedrich Heiler with SadhuSundar Singh, Annie Besant with Krishnamurti, Jean Herbert with Ramdas. Now JamesHillman and F. J. Hopman have discovered Gopi Krishna, whose sensationalautobiography they help to publish and to interpret in the psychological way.It remains for me, as an historian of world religions, to introduce this book by putting itinto the framework of Indian religious history. For Gopi Krishna is of unusual interest,first as an example of a most thorough-going mixture of East and West, and secondly as aself-taught prophet of an original kind. Gopi Krishna's approach appears as a greatsurprise because in his book, except for the last chapter, there is no mention of spirituality, religion and metaphysics. Gopi Krishna's endeavours appear as a historicallaboratory in which he, the author, develops genuinely in himself what others havedeveloped before him. But he re-mains independent of his fore-runners, who frequentlyhave wound up in sterile intellectual formulae. By contrast, this self-taught, Guru-lessauthor remains genuine in all his discoveries.
 
Being exposed to Gopi Krishna's experiences is like meeting a space traveller whoseemingly for no purpose has landed on a strange and unknown star without the standardequipment of the professional astronaut, and who simply reports about the bewilderinglandscape around him, colourfully, truthfully, without really knowing exactly what he hasfound. We have here, in this wholly unintellectual personality, a classical example of asimple man, uneducated in Yoga, who yet through intense labour and persistententhusiasm, succeeds in achieving, if not Samadhi, yet some very high state in Yoga perfection, based entirely on his inner feeling development and not at all on ideas andtraditions. Gopi Krishna is an extremely honest reporter, to the point of humbleness.Since he does not claim great powers and achievements, one is even more willing toaccept his detailed descriptions of inner changes as exact reports. Thus, one of theconsequences of his autonomous training is the aliveness of his account.To understand the amazing unusualness of Gopi Krishna's account one might try toimagine in turn the feelings of an Indian Yogi reading the records of a Westerner, who, asa layman, reports about his strange encounters with God and Christ without the background of theological knowledge and discipline and yet trying to find his own waythrough the labyrinth of his emotions without the guidance of any psychology but with anold-fashioned body of religious concepts—a bewildering picture indeed.Lacking the guiding hand of a master, it is Gopi Krishna's fate to be thrown from onedespair into another, hectic ups-and-downs, the daily bread of this sensational experience.Like Faust, Na Ro Pa and many others, he finds a solution several times in his life only atthe point of death. Even commonplace events take on an enormous character and leadhim into depressions and dangers almost to the point of ruination. His own analysis of that situation is that the awakened Kundalini went up into the Pingala instead of into theSushumna where it rightfully belongs. Where does all this lead him? To constant light-awareness, shimmering halo-consciousness but interrupted repeatedly by years of relapseand illness.The comforting aspect of these often quite negative experiences is however that GopiKrishna is never driven to pride, but remains aware of his own helplessness in front of thestunning events of his inner life. In best Indian tradition he does not ever feel himself to be the maker or creator of his own thoughts and feelings; he does not assume any falseleadership in the course of his development but confesses to be nothing but a victim of  positive and negative forces. He is buffeted by them and feels like a 'dumb and helplesswitness to the show' (p. 151).All this proves that Gopi Krishna's is a typical explorer's mentality. Everywhere we meeta certain detachment, boldness, curiosity, independence and acceptance of everything thathappens inwardly. He is equally interested in positive and negative events. Never do wefind any anticipation of fixed results, but like one of the early alchemists he remainsready to accept the unexpected, even to explode, if this should be the result. He will go onanyway, come what may.
Search
Search History:
Searching...
Result 00 of 00
00 results for result for
  • p.
    • Notes
    Load more