The Silence of the Mystics

BY RAM MURTI LOOMBA, M. A.

(Lecturer, The Durbar College, Rewa)

The mystics claim to have received a certain immediate and intimate knowledge of ultimate reality or ultimate truth in a unique type of experience, sharply distinguished from sense-perception as well as from rational intelligence, which is not commonly testified to but is nevertheless, they assert, a fact. However, they say, this knowledge cannot be told. The secret of spiritual life, Ramadasa tells us, has been ineffable.¹ "What Brahman is," says Ramakrishna, "no tongue can express. One who realises it cannot give information about it to others."² The mystic thus refuses to tell us what he knows. He would invite you to follow his path and, if you may, attain the state of ultimate, perfect knowledge, of communion with the absolute principle of reality. As the Buddha said to the five monks in his first sermon at Sarnath,

"If ye walk according to my teaching, ye shall be par-takers in a short time of that for which noble youths leave their homes and go into homelessness, the highest end of religious effort. Ye shall even in this present life apprehend the truth itself and see it face to face." ³

But to all questions as to the exact character of that truth his answer is always that he cannot really tell. Often in the Buddhist Suttas do we find this principle of ineffability very forcefully expressed. The Mahayana Suttas are never tired of the adjectives, ‘unspeakable,’ ‘indefinable.’ Insistently does the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad repeat, "Neti, Neti."Whatever attempt you make to know, to learn from me the nature of the Spirit, whatever description you offer to elicit from me some assertion about it, I always say "Neti, Neti."It is not so. It is not that. It does not correspond to this description.

In a milder form this refusal to communicate consists of statements that what the mystic has ever preached or taught is only a barest fraction of what he knows. The Buddha, thus, we are told, once took a few ‘simsapa’ leaves and urged that as these did not exhaust the leaves of the forest, even so, the truths he had announced were not all the truths that he had learnt. ⁴ Ibnul Farid, the Muslim mystic poet, sang in his Odes:

"That whereof I declare unto thee a part is only the frontispiece of my state: ’tis beyond my power to express what lies underneath.

And being unable, I refrain from speaking of many matters; they shall not be recounted by my speech." ⁵

Similar words come from the Greek, Plotinus:

"Remember that there are parts of what it most concerns you to know which I cannot describe to you."

Our living mystic poet, Rabindranath Tagore, sounds the same warning to his readers:

"Who are you, reader, reading my poems an hundred years hence?

I cannot send you one single flower from this wreath of the spring, one single streak of gold from yonder clouds,"

Like the Buddha, he tells his reader to go and obtain first-hand knowledge for himself:

"Open your clouds and look abroad.

From your blossoming garden gather fragrant memories of the vanished flowers of an hundred years before.

In the joy of your heart may you feel the living joy that sang one spring morning sending its glad voice across an hundred years hence." ⁶

Plotinus too undertakes only to guide the seeker on the path.

"You must come with me and see for yourselves. The vision is for him who will see it."

For this refusal to describe and communicate the intuitive knowledge upon which the mystics take their stand, two very important sociological grounds have been given. Firstly, that preaching of intuitive truth is not calculated to spiritual progress, being liable to excessive authoritarianism, to professionalism in mystic preaching and, consequently, to a dulling of intuitive capacities. And, secondly, that it is likely not to be understood, and to be misunderstood and abused by the vulgar and the uninitiated.

Thus when the Buddha said he had not announced all the truths that he had learnt, he assigned, as the reason for withholding description of certain ultimate knowledge, the fact that the announcement of that knowledge was not calculated to further progress in spiritual development.⁷ It did not, he said, conduce to "aversion or absence of passion, cessation, quiescence, insight, enlightenment and Nirvana." ⁸ It would, on the other hand, lead to dogmatic acceptance of what was imparted and continued dogmatic preaching of the same, however imperfectly grasped or distorted by the understanding, dulling all the while the capacities of intuitive realization in personal experience. Preaching would become a profession and culminate in quite the reverse of the qualities sought to be cultivated for the attainment of Nirvana.

Secondly, said the Buddha, there was every possibility of his description of ultimate truth, if given, not being understood or being misunderstood by the enquirer. Thus, at the time of his preaching the first sermon, he was unwilling to expound the truth that he had realized under the Bodhi tree, knowing that it was so subtle that men would not be able to grasp it. The Lankavatara states that the people could not possibly understand the truth, and so, in order not to frighten them, the Tathagatha did not elucidate the question.⁹ The teachings of the Greek mysteries, likewise, were hidden from the general public, and were things about which the lips were to be kept closed, because it was considered that they were beyond their immediate comprehension. Danger of misunderstanding or misinterpretation has been voiced, for instance, by Clement when he decided that

"since to write down everything in a book is as bad as putting a sword into the hands of a child, the safest thing isnot to write at all, but to learn and teach orally, for what is written remains." ¹⁰

Dhu’l-Nun had the same fear in mind when he wrote:

"Divine love is a mystery that must not be spoken of, lest it come to the ears of the vulgar."¹¹

Abu Said too sang:

"Adorable One! I endeavour to hide thy name from all,

In order that thy name may not come into folk’s mouths."

St. Paul said he had seen things "unlawful to utter." Even Plato wrote:

"To find the Father and the Maker of this Universe is a hard task, and when you have found Him, it is impossible to speak of Him before all people." ¹²

And all people are believed to be capable of mal-apprehension or misinterpretation of the mystic’s utterances who are not initiated into the mystic fold. All the uninitiated are for this purpose ‘vulgar’ and ‘folk’ before whom it is undesirable and also unlawful to attempt to elucidate truths of mystic intuition. The uninitiated is a child in the matter of mystic knowledge, and to entrust to him expressions of ultimate truth is as dangerous as to entrust the child with a sword and a sharp edge.

At the of this fear of misunderstanding and misinterpretation, and the consequent abstention from communication to the uninitiated, is a philosophical principle–that mystic intuition cannot possibly be adequately expressed in language. The medium of understanding for the uninitiated consists only in language, without any chance of modification, verification or correction by positive personal experience. The initiate is free from this disadvantage; he can always re-orient his understanding and comprehension of received expressions of mystic truth by reference to his own personal experience. To him the slightest, the most inadequate expression is of the greatest help as a symbol which leads him on automatically to the whole truth of mystic realization.

The uninitiated has to rely solely on expression and utterances in language. Mystic intuition, however, can possibly find no such adequate expression. Teresa reports that being one day in prayer, it was for an instant represented to her in a vision how and in what manner all things are contained in the Deity; but to attempt to describe it, she says, would be impossible. The Buddha’s refusal to elucidate ultimate truths is explained by Nagasena by pointing out that there are four kinds of questions, ‘akamsavyakaraniya,’ ‘vibhajyavyakaraniya,’ ‘pratiprechavyakaraniya’ and ‘sthapaniya,’ and that the last are those which are to be set aside because their answers cannot be explained by mere words, but can only be realized by a man by his own experience. Again and again in Buddhist scriptures are we told that the truth realized by the Buddha cannot be expressed by mere ‘aksharas’ or words, "The ‘paramartha’ (absolute knowledge) has no words for its expression." ¹³ The Buddha himself is reported to have said:

"How is it that the truth which has no letter for its expression should be taught and heard?" ¹⁴

Love, the Bhaktas tell us, cannot be described or expressed but can only be felt or immediately experienced; just as the dumb man can taste but cannot express the enjoyment therein involved, ¹⁵ In the ‘yoga-Vashishta,’ likewise, we read,

"The taste of sugar can never be made known to one who has not himself tasted it. In the same manner, the nature of the Self cannot be known without direct intuition of it." ¹⁶

Plotinus has in clear words stated that the vision is impossible to adequately describe; he accounts by this for the implicit injunction attested to, as we have seen above, by St. Paul that mystic intuition was "unlawful to utter." He says:

"This is clearly the intent of that injunction of the mysteries which forbids communication of their secret to the uninitiated; since it was not communicable, it was forbidden to explain the divine secret to anyone to whom it had not been vouchsafed to see of it himself." ¹⁷

Rama Tirtha in his Diary writes of his intuitive realization:

"The wild wood, the bank of the river, the blossoming flowers of the forest, solitude, a few verses from the Upanishads, that is all, and……Language, hast thou capacity or power to describe that blessed happiness? I am blessed. I am."¹⁸

Plato says on the idea of the ultimate Good:

"There is no writing of mine on this subject, nor shall ever be. It is not capable of expression like other branches of study……If I thought that they could be adequately written down and stated to the world, what finer occupation could I have had in life than to write what would be of great service to mankind, and to reveal Nature in the light of day to all men?"

That he has positive knowledge he leaves us in no doubt:

"I know this at any rate, that if these things were to be written down at all, they would be better stated by myself than by others."

But he also adds:

"and I know too that I should be the person to suffer most by their being badly set down in writing."

And he concludes by saying:

"I do not even think the effort to attain this a good thing for man, except for the very few who can be enabled to discover these things by means of a brief indication. The rest it would either fill with contempt in a manner by no means pleasing, or with a lofty and vain presumption as though they had learnt something grand." ¹⁹

For this inadequacy of language to express mystic truth, four principal reasons have been pointed out: firstly, that the truth is infinite; secondly, that it is too sweet and enrapturing to be told; thirdly, that it cannot be described in terms of the categories of the intellect which are necessarily also the categories of language; and, lastly, that the subject-object identity, which is the essential mark of mystic experience, makes description impossible.

The Absolute, it is firstly claimed, is infinite and cannot hence be described by the finite capacities of human language and expression.

"The infinite splendour of His glory admits of no narration. Even though the tongue expend itself like the lamp continuously to extinction."

All predicates, said Plotinus, serve only to limit their subject. He, the Divine Reality, is absolutely infinite and therefore absolutely indetermined. How then can anything be said and predicated of Him? ‘Ananta’ or ‘The Infinite’ was also a favourite name of the Divine Being for Kabir, the weaver-saint. That is why he called discourse about divine truth an ‘akatha kahani’or ‘a story that cannot be told.’ The Buddha’s silence on ultimate questions was also interpreted by King Pasenadi to the nun Khema as an indication of the immensity of the task and the inadequacy of our resources. Even as we cannot count the sands of the river, he said, we cannot describe the state of the Perfect One, for His being is "deep, unmeasurable, unfathomable, as the great ocean." The thirteenth century Jewish cabalists, again, called God the Mystery of Mysteries and admitted of one name only being applied to Him, ‘The Infinite.’

Secondly, the mystic argues, the truth of his realization is too sweet and enrapturing to be communicated:

"Love’s gift is shy, it never tells its name, it flits across the shade spreading a shiver of joy along the dust." ²⁰

It is like the sweet taste of sugar that can be enjoyed but cannot be described. The unique quality of enjoyment that constitutes sweetness cannot be communicated by way of language. When the individual grasps reality in intuitive communion, the melody of enjoyment, in Shelley’s words,

"Becomes too sweet for utterance and it dies

In words, to live again in looks, which dart

With thrilling tone into the voiceless heart

Harmonising silence without a sound." ²¹

Ramakrishna used to illustrate this rapturous ineffability by a parable:

"Four friends, in course of their travels, once came to a plot of land surrounded by a very high wall. All felt a great curiosity to know what was within. One scaled the wall and peeped in. He was wonderstruck at what he saw, and bursting into a fit of laughter fell within the enclosure. He could bring no news. Similarly whoever climbed up fell within with a loud laughter. Who will then bring the news!" ²²

Mystic knowledge, thirdly, is claimed to be beyond and to transcend the categories of the intellect. The Ding an sich, the ultimate reality, we know, was for the German philosopher Kant unknowable in terms of any of the categories of pure reason. The mystic agrees with him so far; but he proceeds further still. Rejecting the intellect which is proved incapable of ultimate knowledge, he proceeds by intuition, wherein he finds the fulfillment of his quest in immediate apprehension of Reality, the Ding an sich. This intuition is characterized quite, contrarily to the categories of the intellect. It is, therefore, beyond the determination and descriptive power of language, which, so far as it is universal and not merely symbolic, is purely a construction of the intellect and must completely abide by its categories. Buddhistic as well as Vedantic mysticism has pointed this out with great clearness and emphasis. The ‘Neti,’ ‘Neti,’ of the Upanishads is a refusal to accept determination in terms of the categories of the intellect. The Buddha, too, we are told again and again in the Mahayana works, must be perceived directly by intuition. All reserved questions are referred just to the impossibility of any determination whatsoever. It cannot be asserted either that the Buddha is relational or that He is non-relational, or both, or neither. ²³ Such characteristics are all conventional (prajnapati); they are imputed characteristics (aropitovyavaharah).²⁴The Buddha is merged quiescent in nature and beyond every possible determination. ²⁵ Those who proceed to dichotomise Him as eternal or non-eternal, existent or non-existent, relative or non-relative, omniscient or non-omniscient, are all misled by words.²⁶ They have no direct intuition (na pasyanti) of the absolute Buddha.²⁷ Just as a man who is blind from birth cannot see the sun, ²⁸ just so are men in the throes of conventional conceptions. They do not perceive the Buddha directly but wish to detail Him (prapanchayanti) conceptually. Only by them can He not be seen directly (aparokshavartin). ²⁹

Lastly, and this is the most important reason the mystic offers us, the subject-object identity which is the essential mark of mystic experience makes all description impossible and meaningless. For not only are the categories of determination inadequate, but there is nothing besides the self that might be determined and differentiated by it. As Plotinus says,

"The vision is hard to describe. For how could a man report as something different from himself what at the time of his vision he did not see as different but as one with himself?" ³⁰

The Bodhisattva Manjari too is reported in the Vimalakirti Sutta to have said:

"Non-duality is truly above words." ³¹

Shandilya, in his Bhakti Sutra, likewise, has opposed Bhakti to the duality of conceptual knowledge and expression which is always expressive of separation and opposition (dvesha), and has called it rasa or joy. ³²

1 Abhangas XX.

2 Diary of M.

3 S Radhakrishnan: Teaching of Buddha by Speech and Silence (Hibbert Journal, XXXII.)

4 Samyutta Nikaya, L. vi. 31.

5 Ibnul Farid: Odes, 34, 35.

6 Rabindranath Tagore: Gardener.

7 Samyutta Nikaya.

8 Cula-Malumkyaputta Sutta, Majjhima I, 426.

9 Lankavatara, p. 114.

10 Clement: Stromateis.

11 Qushayri.

12 Plato: Timaeus.

13 Lankavatara, p. 294.

14 M. V. p. 264: B. A. P. p. 365.

15 Narada: Bhakti Sutra- "Mukaswadanavat."

16 Yogavashishta, V, 64, 53.

17 Ennead VI, 9, § 10.

18 Rama Tirtha: Diary (Kulyat-i-Ram. Vol. II) p. 97.

19 Plato: Seventh Epistle.

20 Tagore: Lover’s Gift.

21 Shelley: Epipsychidion.

22 Diary of M.

23 Svadhimukti-daridra, 433, 1.

24 Ibid., p. 443, 13.

25 Ibid., p. 448, 1.

26 Ibid., p. XXII, 15.

27 Ibid., p. 448, 10.

28 Ibid., p. 448, 10.

29 Ibid., P. 448. 9.

30 Plotinus: Ennead VI, 9, 10.

31 Suzuki: Mahayana, pp. 167-8.

32 Shandilya: Bhakti Sutra, 6.