Naive Sensualism, Docta Ignorantia. Tibetan Liberation Through the Senses

Abstract

Liberations through the senses are the soteriological practices of the Tibetan Buddhists, a counterpart to and an elaboration on what in Europe is occasionally described, somewhat contemptuously, as "rattling off one's prayers". Linked with folk beliefs and rituals and labelled "naive sensualism" in European ethnographic terminology, Tibetan "liberation through senses" are all those religious behaviours (as well as related sacred objects) - such as listening to and repeating mantras, circumambulation of stūpas, looking at sacred images, tasting relics, smelling and touching sacred substances - which are accompanied by a belief that sensual contact with a sacred object (sculpted figure, painting, mandala, stūpa, holy man, tree, mount, book, substance, etc.) can give one hope and even certainty of achieving liberation. This study argues against ethnological conclusion, classifying such a kind of behaviour as a typical example of non-reflective folk-religiousness. The text is concerned with an in-depth interpretation of "liberations through the senses." The soteriological idea of endless repetition, associated with the process of destroying the discursive consciousness, is projected on the background of comparative religion. Subsequently, the full soteriological cycle, beginning with rattling off prayers and ending with "a borderline experience," is traced in the Tibetan and other religious materials.

Consuming the Lama

“…As is common in Tibetan (and South Asian) contexts, the bodies of spiritually superior beings are transformed through religious practice to such an extent that even in death their bodily wastes, by-products and flesh are given the same status as the living person from where they originated (Martin, 1994: 273–4; Tokarska-Bakir, 2000: 77). In the course of the funeral ceremonies, participants were informed that Bokar Rinpoche’s dead body continues to carry a soteriological power, and accordingly various methods were used to ‘extract and benefit’ from its properties (Ramble, 1982: 353; cf.…”

Tibetan Buddhist Embodiment: The Religious Bodies of a Deceased Lama

“…Liberation through seeing, hearing, considering, touching or praising the lama are among the physical means by which blessings can be bestowed and spiritual mastery endowed (Bokar Rinpoche, 1995: 58;Freemantle and Trungpa, 1975;Tokarska-Bakir, 2000). These activities continue through the posthumous form of the lama who can be embalmed as a mardung.…”

“…These activities continue through the posthumous form of the lama who can be embalmed as a mardung. In these mediums of 'carnal contact' (Tokarska-Bakir, 2000), it is as if the practitioner and their objects of devotion, the 'perceiver' and the 'perceived', are 'interdependent' and 'of the same stuff' (Abram, 1997: 67). This reciprocal presence speaks of a flesh that animates the world despite the appearance of inert objects.…”

Returning from the dead: Contested continuities in Tibetan Buddhism

“…The socio-historic dispositions of inter-lineage debate (Jackson, 1994;Martin, 1994;Tokarska-Bakir, 2000) are explored as a structural basis that has shaped the diversity of Tibetan Buddhism and functioned to reproduce and refashion an eclecticism of religious ideology and praxis in a contemporary milieu. The cleavages between the monastic community and the laity, and between the various Buddhist schools themselves, have a contentious history in Tibetan Buddhism and its scholarly representations.…”