Kālī's child : the mystical and the erotic in the life and teachings of Ramakrishna
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Bibliographic Information
Kālī's child : the mystical and the erotic in the life and teachings of Ramakrishna
University of Chicago Press, 1995
- : pbk
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Note
Bibliography: p. 363-369
Includes index
Description and Table of Contents
- Volume
-
ISBN 9780226453750
Description
The 19th-century Bengali mystic Ramakrishna played a major role in the development of Hinduism and is regarded as a modern saint. Yet he remains an enigma to followers unable to reconcile his saintly status with his eroticized language and actions. In this work, Jeffrey J. Kripal attempts to untangle the paradox. He demonstrates that Ramakrishna's famous mystical experiences were driven by erotic energies that he neither fully accepted nor understood; the key to understanding him, Kripal argues, lies in Tantra and its ritual, symbolic and doctrinal equation of the mystical and the erotic. Moving through Ramakrishna's world both chronologically and conceptually, this book employs two complementary interpretive strategies: a nuanced phenomenological reinterpretation of original Bengali texts and a non-reductive psychoanalytic reading of Ramakrishna's mystical eroticism. Kripal shows how the heterosexual structure of Tantric symbolism, the abusive way its rituals were often forced upon the saint, and Ramakrishna's own homosexual desires all came together to produce in him profound feelings of shame, disgust and fear.
Kripal establishes that the homosexuality of this great, if unwilling, Tantric mystic is linked inextricably to virtually every aspect of his life and teachings.
Table of Contents
Foreword Preface A Note on Transliteration List of Abbreviations Introduction: Approaching the Secret Defining the Study: Recovering the Text and Revealing the Secret The Mystical and the Erotic Ramakrishna's Tantric World The Study's Symbolic Structure: Kali's Child The Hindu Unconscious Ch. 1: Kali's Sword: Anxious Desire and the First Vision Kali's Sword From the Village to the Temple, 1836-1856 A Textual Study of Ramakrishna's "Anxious Desire": Discerning a Vocabulary of Desire Ramakrishna's "Anxious Desire" in the Eyes of His Contemporaries "Her Sword as His Flute" Ch. 2: Kali as Mother and Lover: Interpreting Ramakrishna's Tantric Practices Kali as Mother and Lover The Secret Years: Textual Considerations The Secret Years: The Practices according to the Puranas, 1856-1861 The Secret Years: The Practices according to the Tantras, 1861-1865 The Hero and the Child Cleaving the Bitch in Two Ch. 3: Kali on Top of Siva: Tantra and Vedanta in Ramakrishna's Teachings and Mystical Experiences Why Is Kali on Top of Siva? The Secret Years: From the Practices according to the Vedas to the Jesus State, 1865-1868 The Mansion of Fun and Its Tantric Form The Love-Body of the Goddess "Ramakrishna Paramahamsa" Ch. 4: Kali's Feet: Ramakrishna's Descent into the Forms of Man Kali's Feet The Coming of the Disciples, 1868-1885 The Change and the Secret of the Dislocated Hand Phallic Love and the Incarnation's Erotic Community Ramakrishna's Foot: The Sinful Touch of God Ramakrishna Viparitarata Ch. 5: Kali's Tongue: Shame, Disgust, and Fear in a Tantric World Kali's Tongue The Last Days, 1885-1886: The Secret Revealed and Concealed Gauri's Question Lover-and-Gold The Secret Door "Bite Your Tongue!" Epilogue: The Fog of Bliss Conclusion: Analyzing the Secret Emerging from the Fog of Bliss: Defining the Secret Sexuality and Mysticism: Realizing the Erotic Appendix: Some Historical and Textual Aspects of Ramakrishna's Secret Talk Notes Works Cited Index
- Volume
-
: pbk ISBN 9780226453767
Description
The 19th-century Bengali mystic Ramakrishna played a major role in the development of Hinduism and is regarded as a modern saint. Yet he remains an enigma to followers unable to reconcile his saintly status with his eroticized language and actions. In this work, Jeffrey J. Kripal attempts to untangle the paradox. He demonstrates that Ramakrishna's famous mystical experiences were driven by erotic energies that he neither fully accepted nor understood; the key to understanding him, Kripal argues, lies in Tantra and its ritual, symbolic and doctrinal equation of the mystical and the erotic. Moving through Ramakrishna's world both chronologically and conceptually, this book employs two complementary interpretive strategies: a nuanced phenomenological reinterpretation of original Bengali texts and a non-reductive psychoanalytic reading of Ramakrishna's mystical eroticism. Kripal shows how the heterosexual structure of Tantric symbolism, the abusive way its rituals were often forced upon the saint, and Ramakrishna's own homosexual desires all came together to produce in him profound feelings of shame, disgust and fear.
Kripal establishes that the homosexuality of this great, if unwilling, Tantric mystic is linked inextricably to virtually every aspect of his life and teachings.
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