Reviewrd the book Mantra , edited by Harvey P. Alper

·期刊原文
Reviewrd the book ' Mantra ', edited by Harvey P. Alper
Kohn, Richard J.

Philosophy East & West
Vol. 43 No.4
1993
Pp.756-763
Copyright by University of Hawaii Press

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Mantras, those ubiquitous and enigmatic utterances
characteristic of the religions of India and of cultures that
have fallen under her spell, are the subject of a valuable
collection of essays published by SUNY Press as a part of its
Series in Religious Studies (Robert Cummings Neville,
Editor). The contributors are all expert in one or more
periods of Sanskrit philosophical literature, and their
essays are uniformly well grounded and soundly researched.
Assembled by Harvey P. Alper--this was indeed the last work
of that distinguished Indologist--these are essays in the
original and best sense of that term: attempts to explain a
phenomenon that does not easily yield to understanding. So
obdurately hermetic are mantras that the authors cannot even
agree whether they are language. Even if mantras do not mean
anything, however, they are certainly intended to do
something, and the instrumentality of mantras is a theme
introduced by Alper and taken up in a variety of ways by many
of the other contributors.

Looking at mantras in the context of the Rgveda, Ellison
Banks Findly sees them as "performative speech" (p. 16), as
"pure power encapsulated" (p. 17). The mantra takes its power
from its eloquence and from the "transcendent truth of the
cosmic and human orders" (rta) (p. 19). As early as the
Rgveda, Findly opines, revelation of such truth is not
"dependent on a deus ex machina" but is to be found in the
human heart. Be that as it may, part of a mantra's power
comes from its divine associations. Agni, god of fire (and of
the fires of inspiration), "stays the heavens with truthful
mantras" (.Rgveda 1.67.5; cited p. 21), and along with truth
(rta, satya), Agni is the power behind mantras in the
earliest period (p. 23). Later in the development of the
.Rgveda, power shifts from the gods to the priests who
worship them. Now mantric efficacy is seen to rest on the
fact that they are "pronounced by the seers." The
instrumentality of the mantra is encoded in its very
etymology, rendered here as "instrument" (-tra) of "thought"
(man-) (p. 26). But thought only becomes instrumental, Findly
argues, when it is put into words. Thus the term
"incorporates the Rgvedic seers' sense that their words in
ritual actually do something" (p. 27). In the words of the
Veda, "If this mantra remains unspoken / It will bring no
joy, even on the most distant day" (10.951cd; p. 26).

The poet Archibald Macleish liked to observe that a "poem
should not mean, but be." In a similar vein, for a number of
years Frits Staal has argued that, in a certain deep sense,
rituals have no meaning. Here, Professor Staal examines the
use of mantra in all four vedas and finds that mantras do not
consist of language. As usual, his argument is as eloquent as
it is controversial. How can we but admire an article which
renders the same bit of vedic Sanskrit in these two ways:

(1) Hey hey hey! BANG bang bang bang bang bang BANG bang
bang bang bang bang BANG bang bang bang bang! Hey
hey hey! Born as brahman first in the ea-east, Vena
has shone out of the glimmering horizon. He has
revealed its highest and lowest positionemes, the
womb of being and of non-be-be-ying. Hey hey hey!
BANG bang bang bang bang bang BANG bang bang bang
bang bang BANG bang bang bang bang bang! Hey hey,
hey man! Brahman shines in the highest heaven of the
gods brahman shines in the highest heaven of the
gods brahman shines in the highest heaven of the
gogodeses! (P. 50) (2) P[sup 3](QR[sup 5) [sup
3]P[sup 3] X P[sup 3](QR[sup 5])[sup 3]P[sup 2]P[*]
Y The taxonomy of mantras that Staal proposes in the
second example (p. 56) is itself a valuable
contribution; it helps us compare mantras on a
structural level.

The patterning of meaningless vocalizations is something that
Staal also sees in the songs of birds and the babbling of
infants and madmen. There is much to be said for his claim
that although mantras often may consist in part of language,
they are indeed not language. After all, we might say, by
analogy, the literary dimension of a book tends to recede
when it is used to press flowers. Staal's position that
mantras do not consist of language leads him to conclude that
mantras actually "predate language in the development of man
in a chronological sense" (p. 71). Whether or not this bold
speculation is convincing, it is stimulating to see mantras
considered in such a wide time span. Theorists both inside
and outside the Indic tradition have often claimed that
mantras take their power from their ability directly to
access deeper levels of consciousness. By placing the ball in
the court of evolution, Staal's argument gives the
traditional view a new twist. From this vantage, the deeper
levels of consciousness are part of what evolution has made
us heir to, and the Buddhist philosopher Nagarjuna and the
like-minded Vedantin Gaudapada, who once wrote "No one in
bondage, no one seeking perfection," become the handmaidens
of evolution The mystical state is a prelinguistic state of
mind that can be reached when language is renounced, through
silence, mantras, or rites. The absence of language accounts
for most or all of its allegedly blissful nature. But it also
explains certain philosophical and theological ideas and
doctrines.... Accordingly, mantras do not transform a person
or lead to a new existence; on the contrary, they give access
to a state or condition that at all times was already there.
(P. 80)

Wade T. Wheelock compares the use of mantra in vedic and
tantric ritual. Like Staal, Wheelock finds it difficult to
make mantra fit into the contemporary philosophy of language,
for example, as a "speech act" as defined by J. L. Austin and
John Searle. While Staal examines the patterns of
polisyllabic mantras, Wheelock analyzes their grammar. In
contradistinction to Staal, for whom the single-syllable
mantra, or bija, is the epitome of the nonlinguistic quality
of mantras, for Wheelock the "deep-structure" of a mantra
like ram, which invokes fire, reveals the sentence "I am
fire" (p. 103). Other cases, however, are "sonic in medium
but inarticulate," such as when bija mantras are strung
together to form the mula- or root-mantra of a deity, e.g.
"hrim srim krim Paramesvari svaha" (p. 114). The point of
tantric meditation is to identify with the deity. For
Wheelock, vedic language, with its long association with
invoking the deities, finds a natural place in tantra. By
analyzing its structure and ritual context, Wheelock is able
to gloss an opaque utterance like "hram to the heart, namah"
as "To you, who are the heart of the deity I offer homage"
(p. 104). Tantric rites usually have a single actor. Vedic
ritual, on the other hand, has a multiplicity of roles. Vedic
mantras, both in content and grammatical form follow this
multiplicity. An adhvaryu or other priest may say in the
first person indicative "with the arms of Indra, I pick you
up" (p. 105), whereas a yajamana, or patron, whose brush with
the divine is of a more transient nature, flips between the
second and first persons, "You are Visnu's step.... I step
across the earth" (p. 106). On the deepest levels, though,
for Wheelock the difference in vedic and tantric mantras
results from the radical difference in their world view. In
the vedas, man and god ultimately are separate; they must be
joined by articulated correspondences (bhanda) given voice in
mantras. In tantra, however, man and god are one, and mantras
attempt to "express sonically the collapse of the manifest
universe into a single category" (p. 117). Kenneth G. Zysk
examines the medical traditions of the Ayurveda. Mantras were
a part of treatment from even the time of the Artharvaveda.
One hymn (6.12), for example, refers to a treatment for
snakebite-- By that [mantra] which was known by the
brahmanas, by the sages and the gods [and] which was in the
past, will be in the future and is now in the mouth, I cover
the poison. (P. 128) By the time of the Ayurveda, at the
beginning of the Christian era, it was deemed practical to
supplement these mantras with a more tangible antidote, in
case, for example, the mantra had been recited "with the
proper accents and syllables missing." Mantras were also a
crucial part of the collection and compounding of medicines,
such as "the elixir which promotes sexual desire in old age
(ayuskamarasayana) " (p. 133). In general, however, the
movement in Ayurveda was away from mantras and toward other
types of treatment. The Susruta Samhita, for example, avers
that wounds should be cleaned and treated "as if it were a
mantra," or, as your family doctor might say, religiously.

John Taber meets a question head on that Staal and Wheelock
treat in passing: "are mantras speech acts?" In the West, it
has become the stuff of legend (or at least newspaper filler)
that the Indians have laid claim to having invented
everything from the aeroplane to the A-bomb. In terms of
philosophy, at least, they may be right. The Indian
philosopher approached his task with the same gusto as the
Indian architect. No stone was left uncarved; horror vacuae
ruled the day. It should be no surprise, then, that the
question of whether mantras are speech acts should have been
addressed somewhere along the line. Looking at the writings
of the Mimamsa philosopher Sabarasvamin (A.D. 200--400),
Taber finds the following question, "kim vivaksitavacana
mantra utavivaksitavacanah"-- "Do mantras express an intended
[meaning] or not?" (p. 145, 160 n. 2), or, in Searlian terms,
"are mantras speech acts?" Sabara sets up an opponent, one
Kautsa, who questions the meaningfulness of mantras on a
number of grounds.

They speak of things that do not exist (RV 4.58.3 mentions a
being with four horns, three feet, two heads and seven
hands); they attribute purposes to unconscious objects ("O
plant, protect this one! " TS 1.2.1) ; they are self
contradictory ("Aditi is heaven; Aditi is the atmosphere," RV
1.89.10). (P. 146)

"Some of them, " Kautsa believed, "are simply
incomprehensible" (p. 146) . Interestingly, Kautsa here
supports the traditionalist view. His arguments are not meant
to undermine the notion of the efficacy of mantras, but to
affirm it: mantras work because they have magical power, not
because of any meaning. It is the Mimamsa apologist Sabara
who, in his attempt to demystify the vedas, takes the
innovative position that mantras have meaning. Thus, Taber
concludes, "To be sure, Mimamsa does not explicitly work out
a theory of speech acts, but the basic elements of such a
theory serve as a framework for many of its discussions" (p.
159). The quest for the meaning of mantras (or the lack
thereof) takes a different tack in Harold Coward's analysis
of the Vakyapadiya by the fifth century grammarian
Bhartrhari. For Bhartrhari, the idea of language is
inextricably bound up with meaning. "All knowledge," he
claims, "is, as it were, intertwined with the word" (p. 167).
Coward is the only contributor to pick up Staal's gauntlet.
If Staal finds mantras devoid of meaning, Coward asserts, the
deficiency lies more with Staal's definition of meaning than
with mantras themselves. "Meaning, for Staal, is obviously
conceived quite differently from meaning for Bhartrhari. It
would seem to be the modern positivist definition of meaning
as one-to-one correspondence that Staal is applying here" (p.
169). For Bhartrhari, meaning is not piecemeal. In Coward's
succinct explanation, "just as a painting is perceived as a
whole, over and above its different parts, so our cognition
of a mantra is of a meaning whole, over and above the
sequence of uttered sounds" (p. 170). Ultimately, Bhartrhari
appeals to the experience of those whose ignorance has been
cleansed by the repetition of mantra. As Coward states, "as
long as such direct perception is reflected in the experience
of people, Bhartrhari's explanation of the meaningfulness of
mantras will remain viable" (p. 172). Ludo Rocher looks at
mantras in the context of the Sivapurana. Despite its claim
to be a panacea for mantric malaise--the Sivapurana claims
that until it appears on earth "mantras will be in discord"
(p. 178)-it naturally concentrates on mantras dedicated to
Siva himself. Chief of these in the Sivapurana's view is om,
and the purana finds several ways to homologize each
penstroke of that quintessential mantra with the forces of
the universe. The purana elevates mantra beyond all other
religious activity. At the height of its enthusiasm, Rocher
explains, "Even a single utterance of the five-syllable
mantra is ten million times better than any form of tapas,
ritual, or vrata" (p. 180). It is no wonder that the effects
of one million Sivamantras are so stunning: they can turn a
warrior into a brahman and a woman into a man--"If a brahman
woman learns the pancaksaramantra from a guru and recites it
500,000 times, she obtains longevity; by reciting it another
500,000 times she becomes a man and, eventually achieves
liberation" (p. 184) . But such power has its price.
Bead-bedecked travelers returning from India may be dismayed
to hear "that wearing rudraksas without reciting mantras is
not only useless but leads to residence in a terrible hell
for the duration of fourteen Indras" (p. 181). Perhaps there
should be a sign to that effect in Delhi airport. Despite
such fascinating tidbits, readers who are not Sanskritists
will find Rocher's text rough going, a disadvantage in a
collection aimed at a wider community of scholars. We are
told, for example, without further comment, that "japa is
said to be a part of sattvikapatas (5.20.11,15); it is the
domain of the gods and yatinam urdhvaretasam" (p. 181). The
second half of the article, a typology of the mantras which
the purana asserts to be vedic, will be of interest only to
scholars of the vedas and puranas themselves. Gerhard
Oberhammer continues in Rocher's vein with a discussion of
Saivite mantras. Like Rocher's essay, his "The Use of Mantra
in Yoga Meditation" is aimed largely at a specialist
audience. Patanjali's definition of mantra in the Yoga-sutras
is "the one denoting him (isvarah) is the pranava" (YS 1.27;
cited p. 204), which we might gloss for simplicity's sake as
"orb denotes god." In Oberhammer's view, Patanjali is being
deliberately simplistic here: after all, if a "trivial
linguistic denotation" were the point, why not use "Siva,"
which is a name for god, rather than "om," which is not. For
Oberhammer, the answer lies outside of Patanjali's
"nontheistic spirituality" in the theology of the Pasupatas.
According to Pasupata belief, the power of a mantra does not
lie in the mantra itself, but in the sovereignty of Siva. In
the words of the Pasupata theologian Kaundinya, it is
"accepted by Mahesvara and made his own" (p. 219). Thus,
Oberhammer suggests at the end of this closely argued essay,
"in using these mantras in meditation, Siva communicates
himself for the salvation of men" (p. 220). The field shifts
from Saivism to Vaisnavism in Sanjukta Gupta's discussion of
"The Pancaratra Attitude to Mantra." In the Saiva view, the
power of mantra comes from god's "power and majesty," or, to
use Oberhammer's term, his sovereignty. The Pancaratra, an
early Vaisnava sect, emphasizes god's mercy, defining "the
power of mantra (mantrasakti) " as "the expression or
embodiment of god's saving grace (anugrahamurti)" (p. 224).
Though detailed, Gupta's discussion never loses sight of
broader philosophical and theological issues. Rooting his
discussion in a clearly laid-out summary of Pancaratrin
doctrine, Gupta demonstrates how theological and cosmogonic
concepts are worked out in the Pancaratrin use of mantras.
Unlike the Mimamsaka philosophers, for whom sound itself was
supreme reality, the devotional Pancaratrins gave sound
second place in their scheme of creation, after their
personal god. To use Gupta's metaphor, "this ideal speech is
imprinted on god's thought like a craftsman's blueprint of
the ensuing creation" (p. 229). Among all sounds mantra takes
pride of place; it is sound's "salvific aspect" (p. 231). The
mantra is not only the deity in sonic form, but it is the
deity's primary form and the form in which the sadhaka
meditates on the deity. Being a step in the creation of our
illusory world, sound has a primary place in unraveling the
illusion. Adding to our lore on the syllable om, Gupta shows
how, in the Pancaratrin analysis, it "contains all the cosmic
stages of creation," (p. 237): each component, "a" "u" "m"
and the pure nasal "m" corresponding to a form of the deity.
The penultimate contribution in this collection is by Alper
himself, an exercise in hermeneutics that pairs a Kashmiri
Saivite approach to mantra with Wittgenstein's later works.
So specific is Alper's focus that he restricts himself to two
works, Ksemaraja's interpretation of mantra in the
Sivasutravimarsini on the one hand, and Patrick Sherry's
interpretation of Wittgenstein in Religion, Truth and
Language-Games on the other. Hence his title, "The Cosmos as
Siva's Language-Game: 'Mantra' According to Ksemaraja's
Sivasutravimarsini." It is not that Alper views Ksemaraja as
a proto-Wittgensteinian. For Alper, "The concepts
language-games, forms of life, and the Umgebung of speaking
are heuristic. They do not oblige us to go on a treasure hunt
for forms of life hidden in medieval Sanskrit texts. They do
call for a particular style of reflection" (pp. 254-255).
Language-games, the concept that the act of speaking is a
game or at least like one, take on a new dimension in the
Saivite context. There, Alper argues, nothing less than "the
cosmos is Siva's game encompassing language game" (p. 267).
Moreover, the limited, errant form of consciousness which
binds us to the world is also a function of language. Thus,
Alper concludes, For Ksemaraja, then, the great mantra is a
vital, effective tool of redemption, the skeleton key to the
cosmos. It liberates because it recapitulates in its inner
structure the inner structure of bondage that is believed to
be at once linguistic and cognitive. (P. 280) Such a brief
snippet does scant justice to Alper's tightly woven
thirty-five pages, in which Wittgenstein and Sherry and
Sivasutra and Ksemaraja form the warp and weft of a richly
textured intellectual fabric. Fittingly, Andre Padoux, who,
as the author of a series of essays onng back to 1963, might
be called the father of modern mantrology, has the last word.
In his essay "Mantras--What are They? " Padoux plays
discussant, tying up themes of his fellow essayists and
amassing a comprehensive list of suggestions for future
research. All too often in collections such as this, each
essay seems conceived in a vacuum. One of the great virtues
of this volume is that Alper allowed the authors to interact,
not only Padoux in his excellent summation, but the other
authors as well. This provides for a lively debate and a
thought-provoking contribution to the study of the subject.
With Gupta's, his own, and Padoux's essays placed at the end,
Alper is clearly aiming for a strong finish--a good strategy
in a long collection. However, part of these essays' strength
is their clear exposition of the context in which their
separate questions are raised. Thus, for example, Alper's
short summary of Saivite doctrine might be of more use if his
essay were before rather than after Rocher and Oberhammer's
efforts. If this is a caveat, it is a minor one in a
collection as strong as this. Each essay is a well-considered
effort, rich in detail and firmly grounded in the Sanskrit
tradition. A good storyteller leaves his audience begging for
more, and Alper has done a marvelous job at whetting his
reader's appetite. Several authors mention what the guardians
of Indian orthodoxy often call "lower" uses of mantra, giving
fascinating glimpses of the dangers of promiscuous
bead-wearing and whispering of snakebite and aphrodisiacs,
but although both Staal and Alper warn us of the danger of
uncritically accepting indigenous exegeses, all the essays
clearly emphasize the soteriological aspect of mantra over
its more mundane uses. To use Indian parlance, where is the
"bhukti" to counterbalance all the talk of "mukti"? Here and
there we find an anecdote drawn from present-day mantra
belief and practice, but where is an article devoted to the
ethnography of mantra in modern India? Nor will one find
reference to Buddhist mantra or to the thriving mantrayana of
Nepal and Tibet. Clearly, Alper has left ample room for a
second and even a third collection of essays bearing the
title "Mantra." It is to our sorrow that he will not be there
to edit them.