Fruit of the Contemplative Life
Fruit of the contemplative life: => Unpacking Religion => : joelibrahim March 28, 2015, 12:49:01 PM
-
Hi Jeffrey .Enjoying the forum and hoping to read more of the case histories soon as they are very valuable data.There is a point of contention I feel I need to raise. I have seen this problem on many spiritual paths and call it "reification" i.e. taking something abstract and treating it like something concrete.I am referring specifically to the model of the different jhanas.We have the same problem in psychiatry where doctors treat the diagnostic entities as actual realities when they are at best general descriptions and approximations.Interestingly enough the genome project is now showing clearly that the genetics is more about characteristics like hyperemotionality or poor impulse control then about any specific diagnosis.
Spiritually speaking I think we have to realize that all our models are only that-models.this is as true of the seven stages of the ego or the seven stages of the soul in Sufism as it is of the four material jhanas and the 4 or 5 immaterial stages of jhana.None of these are precise or sequential in any rigorous manner.I myself have had experiences of cessation without experiencing charismatic phenomena prior to that and my eldest daughter regularly has experiences of ecstasy without any understanding of emptiness or enlightenment.So I think we have to take all classifications and models with a grain of symbolic salt.Hope that is clarifying.Feel free to share this or any part of it with your followers on the forum.Salaams,Ibrahim
Joel Ibrahim Kreps
-
I am glad, Dr. Kreps, that you are enjoying the forum. Thank-you, for bringing up a very interesting, and salient, topic for us to discuss here. I moved it to Unpacking Religion, because one of the many problems of religion is it too often tends to Reify its doctrine, philosophy, its progenitors and prophets, etc.
Reification (fallacy) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reification_%28fallacy%29)
Reification (also known as concretism, hypostatization, or the fallacy of misplaced concreteness) is a fallacy of ambiguity, when an abstraction (abstract belief or hypothetical construct) is treated as if it were a concrete, real event, or physical entity. [1][2] In other words, it is the error of treating as a concrete thing something which is not concrete, but merely an idea. A common case of reification is the confusion of a model with reality. Mathematical or simulation models may help understand a system or situation, but they model an abstract and simple mental image, not real life (which will also differ from the model): "the map is not the territory".
Reification is part of normal usage of natural language (just like metonymy for instance), as well as of literature, where a reified abstraction is intended as a figure of speech, and actually understood as such. But the use of reification in logical reasoning or rhetoric is misleading and usually regarded as a fallacy.
Spiritually speaking I think we have to realize that all our models are only that-models.this is as true of the seven stages of the ego or the seven stages of the soul in Sufism as it is of the four material jhanas and the 4 or 5 immaterial stages of jhana.None of these are precise or sequential in any rigorous manner.I myself have had experiences of cessation without experiencing charismatic phenomena prior to that and my eldest daughter regularly has experiences of ecstasy without any understanding of emptiness or enlightenment.So I think we have to take all classifications and models with a grain of symbolic salt.Hope that is clarifying.Feel free to share this or any part of it with your followers on the forum.Salaams,Ibrahim
Joel Ibrahim Kreps
Yes, I agree that there might be a tendency to reify the 8 stages of deep meditation (samadhi); however, I do not believe that I am erring in that direction when I reduce the the 8 stages of deep meditation down to their salient qualities. However, I do believe that the religious literature of the world most definitely does tend to reify the religious experience in ways that make it impossible for anyone in the future to have the experience.
Since you used the term 'cessation,' then I will start there. What the case histories here show is the 8 stages of deep meditation tend to be relative stages of non-dual experience that is the product of deep meditation. When I present this I do not see how I am erring in reifying the experience of he 8 stages of deep meditation. Instead I am quantifying, an otherwise abstract subjective experience.
I also define the 8 stages of deep meditation in salient qualities, which are in deed common, such as: the first stage is simply an enjoyable experience of meditation that the subject recognizes as a deeper stage than normality; the 2nd stage is cessation of thought; the 3rd stage is equanimity; 4th stage is typified by a profound sense of well-being which feels to the subject as if it would go on forever.; the upper 4 stages of deep meditation are typically out-of-body experiences.
So, since my model takes into account my case histories, then I am going to argue that I am not guilty of reifying the experience of the stages of deep meditation. If so please point out where I am doing so. Otherwise, if we do not define the 8 stages of deep meditation, then we can not determine where one is in deep meditation. If we do not determine where one is in deep meditation, then there is no point in giving anyone guidance through the 8 stages of deep meditation. We could then say that psychiatry errs in the same way, therefore there is no point of offering psychiatric care.
In fact I often find the subjects have reified their experience of deep meditation so much so that when they find out that their experience was just level 1 or 2, they are turned off and go away and launch themselves into a messianic mission. For instance: Eckhart Tolle has made a career out of the 2nd stage of the religious experience; he thinks he is "full-on enlightened;" Rajnish had a single experience of the 3rd stage of the religious experience and made a huge career out of it.
-
I think Jeffrey uses the phrase "shades of grey" when he explains each stage of samadhi. We can't always separate one from the other. The map is not perfect, but it's still good to have a map if you have to go into the wilderness.
-
Last night I found myself reflecting upon this topic. It occurred to me that the miracle stories in every religion are a classic example of reification. People tend to take the miracle stories in every religion literally, and even emphasize them over the: doctrine, philosophy, ethics, and lifestyle that the religious literature is attempting to instill in its followers through the metaphor of miracle stories.
-
Hi Jeffrey .Enjoying the forum and hoping to read more of the case histories soon as they are very valuable data.There is a point of contention I feel I need to raise. I have seen this problem on many spiritual paths and call it "reification" i.e. taking something abstract and treating it like something concrete.I am referring specifically to the model of the different jhanas.We have the same problem in psychiatry where doctors treat the diagnostic entities as actual realities when they are at best general descriptions and approximations.Interestingly enough the genome project is now showing clearly that the genetics is more about characteristics like hyperemotionality or poor impulse control then about any specific diagnosis.
Spiritually speaking I think we have to realize that all our models are only that-models.
Yet to subscribe to this, one would also have to subscribe to the belief that the "spirit" is a faculty of the body.
When you say "...We have the same problem in psychiatry where doctors treat the diagnostic entities as actual realities when they are at best general descriptions and approximations..." you speak of perception? I agree with you 110% that it is indeed "general descriptions and approximations". More-so that perception is a faculty of ones identity, and the identity is abstract.
So what then of the spirit? Is it something that the mind conjured up? Is it an inherent need as humans to believe in something greater than oneself? I personally subscribe to the belief that the =mind is indeed a model, abstract, impermanent. But what about the spirit?
-
So what then of the spirit? Is it something that the mind conjured up? Is it an inherent need as humans to believe in something greater than oneself? I personally subscribe to the belief that the =mind is indeed a model, abstract, impermanent. But what about the spirit?
Your comment goes to the same problem as mentioned under the runner's high (http://fruitofthecontemplativelife.org/forum/index.php/topic,1079.msg7087.html#new). The physical sciences, which medicine comes from, has an inherent problem with acknowledging that any perceivable phenomena can exist that a scientific instrument cannot measure. However, case histories are the "instrument" of the social sciences.
This is why I collect case histories, as well as the reports of mystics as recorded in ancient literature, and what we see is a remarkable parallel in religious experiences from people coming from many different cultures, periods, religions and languages; which provides ample proof for those who can think critically that cultural baggage, such as a belief system, has little to do with the religious experience. However, it is understandable that the devout will never accept this fact, because they are too bound up in their cultural baggage, ie. belief systems, to think critically.