Guru, Shaman and the Crazy Man

Buddhism sprang from the same country the Buddha was born in: India. That which is Buddhism as it has come down to us today, is seeped in the religious ferment and backgrounds that existed in the country at the time of the Buddha. All the Buddhistic Sanskrit and Pali texts refer to and use words and meanings that color the various Sutras with meanings cross-related to any number of other religions and religious sects that abounded on the Indian sub-continent at the time...and around the world even to this day.

Zen or Ch'an Buddhism is a movement within the Buddhist religion that stresses the practice of meditation as the means to Enlightenment. Zen and Ch'an are, respectively, Japanese and Chinese attempts to render the Sanskrit term for meditation: Dhyana. (source)

Zen's roots may be traced to India, but it was in East Asia, that is, China and eventually Japan, that the movement became distinct and flourished. Like other Chinese Buddhist orders, Ch'an first established itself as a Lineage of Masters emphasizing the teachings of a particular text, in this case the Lankavatara Sutra. Bodhidharma, the first Ch'an Patriarch in China, who is said to have arrived there from India c. 470 AD, was a master of this text. He also emphasized the practice of contemplative sitting (that is, Samadhi), and legend has it that he himself spent 9 years in meditation facing a wall.(source)

It can be seen thus then, that Zen in the modern sense, through Buddhism via Japan, China, and eventually back to India, has it's beginnings implanted in aspects of religious tenents that reach back into time to nearly prehistory. Throughout that time spectrum, people, Buddhist, Hindu, or otherwise, have had the need for healers and others of similar ilk in their lives. The following is how healers, known as Shamans in some cultures, and religious figures, called Gurus, by the author, may be related and under what circumstances, not related:

Guru, Shaman and the Crazy Man

ADAPTED FROM A PAPER BY
Jacques Vigne

Generally speaking, people with religious backgrounds either emanating from India such as Buddhism or Zen, or based in India such as Hinduism, make sharp distinctions between the Guru and the traditional healer (Shaman), notwithstanding some overlap from time to time. One may trace the demarcation line as follows: one chooses a Guru for life, while one chooses a healer only for a few sessions. The Guru usually gives the disciple a Mantra and a puja (prayer accompanied by a ritual) to practise daily. The healer, instead, recites some mantras, performs divination, or some pujas on behalf of the patient, who has nothing to do but to believe in them. Both have learned their art by assisting and watching their teachers for years, and often give their treatment free of charge. Typically healers think that if they accept money from their patients, they will also have to take their bad Karma. Because of this belief, it is not rare for the healers who take money to stop practising after some years. They interpret some personal or family problems in which they got involved as a consequence of their breach of the rule of not charging for their services.

We have established some differences between Guru and traditional healer (Shaman). Indian tradition, generally, does not confuse the two activities. However, some spontaneous healings may happen around a Guru, though the latter does not look for them, and does not make a show of them. He will say: "It is your faith that saved you" or "It is God who has healed you." The radiance, the energy, of the Guru awakens in each of his visitors a global faith in life which, in some cases, may manifest itself as a healing power. The dynamic influence of the mass of the faithful and the devotional concentration given out from it may also come into play. All these factors together can increase the healing effect of the Guru.

There IS a relationship between the enstasis (Samadhi) enabling a person to become a Guru and the initiatory travels qualifying a Shaman to practise his art. Both, as well as analysts, have the ability to interpret an inner experience and the language to describe it. Mircea Eliade (1907-1986), sees a historical relation between the practices of an Indian Yogi and Shamanism of the North Himalayas. Tantric tradition also accepts the fact that part of their knowledge arrived from the North as well, from the mystical, lost Himalayan city of Shambala (Gyanganj). In Indian society, a transition may be found between the "force of the antipodes," as Richard Lannoy says, (that is, the magic vitality of tribal populations) and traditional Brahmanism, Hindusim, and Buddhism, integrating such a vitality in the form of a charismatic Guru often of Tantric inspiration.

SADHANA

Sadhana means "spiritual practice." The word "Sadhana" in Sanskrit means "an effort exercised towards the achievement of a purpose." In this sense, every effort is some kind of Sadhana, because it leads to the achievement of some intended goal. Most sages during their Sadhana have had some apparently psychopathological phases. But in Indian traditional psychology, the distinction between craziness in the medical sense of the term (unmada) on one side and mystic intoxication on the other, is clearly made, the former being dealt with by the Ayurvedic practitioner, the latter by an experienced Guru. This distinction is better made in India than in the West, where the two are mixed up because of ignorance of the spiritual field among psychologists. I devoted a part of an essay in psychiatry to studying the psychopathological diagnosis that could have been made of Ma Anandamayi during her youth, when she did what she called the "play of her Sadhana." In fact, symptoms of most mental diseases were present, but, every time, there was some difficulty in regrouping them into coherent syndromes. Furthermore, they did not last and they were followed by other symptoms which did not have any link with the preceding ones, at least according to habitual psychopathology. Once this period of Sadhana had elapsed, Ma Anandamayi displayed a very normal behaviour and showed an uncommon energy. She answered questions for more than half a century, in a manner exactly adjusted to the needs of her visitors, among whom one could see political personalities like Indira Gandhi, for instance; or she could solve the various problems which could not fail to arise in the thirty-odd ashrams she had organized around herself. The quality of her relationship to reality could not be doubted, notwithstanding a period out of the world during her years of Sadhana. Yogis have developed their psyche according to well specified methods unknown to Western psychology. The latter, with its diagnostic instruments based on ordinary psychopathology, cannot say much about the former’s troubles, when and if they see them. The microscope is a good instrument, but if it is used to watch the stars, either nothing at all will be seen, or if something is seen, it honestly can not be interpreted.

Sri Seshadri Swamigal, was called "the Saint with the Golden Hand." He roamed the streets of Tiruvannamalai like a mad man, entering a shop and dumping the cash from cash box on the floor or throwing the flour kept for making dough into the water and so on. However, his strange behavior was known to the town people and they never minded. On the contrary, they eagerly awaited his visit, for his visit meant that their business would flourish. Sri Seshadri Swamigal possessed many Siddhis as well, and openly performed many miracles like curing chronic diseases etc.

As a young teenage boy the Buddhist Shaman, Tserin Zarin Boo, aknowledged as one the most powerful Shamans in north central Asia, fell desperately ill. He suffered a lot: he couldn't stay at home, something dragged him out, away from people.He ran about forests and hills couldn't stay in one place, didn't obey his people's words. This lasted over a year and was a time of great hardships for him.

He was told he had khii-ubshen, the Shaman's illness, the sickness that those who are to become Shamans, those who possess the shamanic root, "udga", have to go through. It was recommended he get initiated as a Shaman.

"Unlike the medicine man, the Shaman's adoption of his profession is in many cases not voluntary. The future Shaman's experience of being called seems frequently to consist in a compulsive state from which he sees no other means of escape than to 'Shamanize'. It is often clear, particularly from reports from Siberia, that the man who is to become a Shaman consciously does not wish to do so at all, but is driven and forced to it by the 'spirits', and finally, in order not to perish, takes the only path open to him and becomes a Shaman. The future Shaman, the young man suited for Shamanizing, cannot escape the demands of the spirits, which drive him deeper and deeper into the illness, although he very often tries to resist. He gets into a situation, into a mental illness, from which he can find no way out except death OR the assumption of the office of Shaman."

LOMMEL, ANDREAS, "The World of the Early Hunter" (1967)

For the most part, and for those most truly involved, in the end Shamanism is a calling. One does not chose to become a Shaman, but "chosen." There are typically four steps associated in the process of becoming a Shaman: (1) one is the invitation or the selection out by a Shaman, (2) is the initiation by a Shaman, (3) is the Symbolic Death of the Shaman. And (4) is generally considered to be a "rebuilding" of the Shaman's energy system from where it is derived, the Power of the Shaman.

In an almost contrast to the common theme of the above, Carlos Castaneda, who is said to have apprenticed under a Yaqui Indian Shaman that he refers to interchangeably as a sorcerer and man of knowledge named Don Juan Matus says that to become a Shaman or man of knowledge there are seven components that must be followed or mastered. Castaneda says he garnered his seven components from Don Juan through the lineage his teacher's teacher, a Shaman-sorcerer known as a Diablero, an occult spell-master with evil powers said to have the ability to shape shift. There is some controversy if Don Juan Matus was a real person or a composite of several different people, but one or several, most agree Castaneda's observations regarding Shamanism, although possibly somewhat complicated, remain valid:

The goal of my teachings is to show how to become a man of knowledge. The following seven concepts are its proper components: (1) to become a man of knowledge is a matter of learning; (2) a man of knowledge has unbending intent ; (3) a man of knowledge has clarity of mind; (4) to become a man of knowledge is a matter of strenuous labor; (5) a man of knowledge is a warrior; (6) to become a man of knowledge is an unceasing process; and (7) a man of knowledge has an ally.

These seven concepts are themes. They run through the teachings, determining the character of my entire knowledge. Inasmuch as the operational goal of my teachings is to produce a man of knowledge, everything I teach is imbued with the specific characteristics of each of the seven themes. Together they construe the concept "man of knowledge" as a way of conducting oneself, a way of behaving that is the end result of a long and hazardous training. "Man of knowledge," however, is not a guide to behavior, but a set of principles encompassing all the unordinary circumstances pertinent to the knowledge being taught.

Each one of the seven themes is composed, in turn, of various other concepts, which cover their different facets. (source)

Meher Baba, among the well-known Gurus of this century in India, underwent what could be called by psychopathology borderline experiences. After his meeting with his first Guru, an old Sufi woman, he remained six months in a sort of catatonic state; he could induce this same state in others, although for less time. Part of his activity was devoted to dealing with masts, the "God-intoxicated". But, in a center where he had collected eighteen subjects, he had the conviction, shared also by his disciples, one of whom was a medical doctor, that only four of them were genuinely God intoxicated, while two were weak of mind, and twelve rather schizophrenic.

The sage strays from the trodden paths of society in order to discover inside him new roads: new in as far as in each generation only a small number of people succeed in discovering them. He is an "intravagant", to use the lapsus of Lanza del Vasto who asked a visitor coming to see him for the first time: "Why have you come to visit an ‘intravagant’ (i.e., an introvert) like me all the way up here in this remote area?" The "madness" of the sage is a way of making people around him realise the superficiality of social conventions, as shown by this anecdote:

"One evening, Maharaj Nimkaroli Baba was squatting on a dirty road when a group of ‘important’ people, poets, judges, officials, came to see him. Since they were standing around Maharaj, he asked them: ‘why do you not sit down?’ With some hesitation they sat in the road. Immediately, Maharaj got up: ‘Fine, we may go!’..."

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Click here to see: POWER OF THE SHAMAN: Where Does It Come From, How Does It Work?

Click here to see: MIDEWIWIN: Secret Ojibwa Medicine Society

Click here to see: ZEN, THE BUDDHA, AND SHAMANISM

Click here to see: OBEAH: Afro-Caribbean Shamanism

Click here to see: Shamanic Trance States

Click here to see: She Shaman

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Jacques Vigne is nowadays spending most of his time as a hermit. He hopes that readers will understand that he does not want to receive more. If you want to contact Jacques Vigne you may do so by writing either:

The Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, PO Box 4437, Stanford, CA94309, USA

The International Association for Spiritual Psychiatry, 31 rue des Meuniers, 92150 Suresnes, France Derniere miser jour: 1.3.1999

The Jacques Vigne web page can be reached by clicking HERE

YOGA, YOGI:

Yoga is that which ‘unites’ (yuj -- to yoke) the Jivatman (the individual soul) with the Paramatman (the Supreme Self or God).

ANY path of spiritual discipline which helps achieve this union is ‘Yoga’. [Swami Harshananda, Hinduism: Through Questions and Answers, p. 38.] So, a Yogi, although not typically applied in use to Buddhist or Zen contexts, is STILL one who, depending on terminology, practises the science of union with the Supreme Self, God, or the Absolute. See Sunyata.