PSYCHOLOGY OF YOGA – XXXV Aesthetics and Yoga – III - 3 RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN AESTHETIC JOY AND SPIRITUAL BLISS – III What Bhatta Nayaka has said about rasa more or less on empirical ground, almost the same has been proposed by Abhinavagupta with a suitable philosophical background. The philosophical system he has taken recourse to in the exposition of his view on rasa, is the non-dualism with Shiva as the Ultimate Being. As this system admits only manifestation of the world from the Ultimate Being, and not creation, so rasa, according to Abhinavagupta, is a pure manifestation of the inmost self. The delight or rasa, in this way, is basically the delight of the self. When the delight of the self is experienced through the medium of poetry or drama, maintains Abhinavagupta, it becomes rasa. What comes as an obstruction in the manifestation of the delight is the psychic residue of the inner being. Utility of poetry or dramatic performance in this respect is to remove this obstruction coming in the way of manifestation of the rasa. As the psychic residue, known as vasana, lies in the human psyche from the very beginning and is not an acquisition made by the individual in his present life, it is common to the entire humanity. When the poet through his power of suggestion strikes on this thread of psychic residue, the images he brings home to the reader or spectator through particulars gets universalised. These images help in removing the obstruction lying in the form of vasana, psychic residue. With the remove of the obstruction, the delight of the self gushes out, though not in its pure form but as partly coloured by the residue (Abhinavabharati, p. 473). Thus, it is the delight of the self itself, as tinged by the psychic residue, activated in the form of various sthayi bhavas, which is experienced as rasa by the reader and the spectator. As the delight of the self is pure and unmixed with pain, the experience of rasa is purely delightful. Now, if it is the pure self lying beyond all the ancillary tools of knowledge and experience which is the real source of the experience of rasa, then it must be the same self in its metaphysical implications which must be the real source of rasa as such. What the vasana vyapara does is simply provide the delight of the self as mixed with the psychic stuff on account of which the delight assumes psychological forms in which it is made available to the common man. Thus, whereas the delight of the self in its pure is the preserve of the seer and the sage, the same, having mixed up with the vasana vyapara, is the aesthetic rapture or rasa made available through the literary and artistic creation. If the former is availed through elimination and transcendence of the vasana vyapara, the latter is made available through its liquefaction and enjoyment. If the former is the way of withdrawal and return to the transcendental Self, the latter is the way of progression and enjoyment of its creation. To be continued… Source of synopses: Yoga From Confusion to Clarity, Psychology of Yoga, Vol. 2 (published in 2010) written by Professor Satya Prakash Singh and Yogi Mukesh (© Authors)
Posted on: Mon, 11 Nov 2013 17:16:24 +0000
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