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Ramakant Sinari - The Method of Phenomenological Reduction and Yoga
Ramakant Sinari - The Method of Phenomenological Reduction and Yoga
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RAMAKANT SINARI
TheMethod
ofPhenomenologic
Reduction
andYoga
IT IS NOW BEING INCREASINGLY RECOGNIZED that the greatest
contribution of phenomenology disciplinein philosophyis its
to the scientific
attemptto record,as uncommitted witnessesof the world, all that we ex-
perience. From Edmund Husserl to Jean-Paul Sartre, phenomenologists,
whatevertheirlanguage-oriented differences,have always concentratedtheir
attentionon the study of the constitutionof human consciousnessand its
encounterwithitselfand withthe world.Althoughthereis sufficient evidence
in supportof the thesisthat some of the ancientphilosophiesof the Orient
engagedin a similartask,theirmotivationwas an eternalescape fromlifeand
the world,and, therefore,theirinfluencewas not considerablyfeltoutsidethe
realm of religion,mysticism,and philousia.1The most obvious reason why
the apparentlyphenomenological searchof Hindu and Buddhistsages did not
take the shape of a methodis that it ever remainedwith thema moral and
highlydiffusedcult. The creditfor establishing, for the firsttime,the most
radical procedureof studyingevery experienceby the withdrawalof one's
consciousnesstowardits "roots"as suchgoes to Husserl.
As a matterof fact,Husserl's slogan "Back to thethingsthemselves"'a(Zu
den Sachen selbst) is muchmorerigorousthaneven the positivists'insistence
in philosophyon remainingwithinthe verifiable"given." For he not only
made the world of sense-perception the starting-pointof his philosophizing,
but also, by advancingdeeper,rejectedall the conventionalattributesgivento
it, until he could come upon a presuppositionlessorigin of experience-
formation. What he aimedat is thatprimordialreflection by whichconscious-
ness is linkedwithitsveryobjects,and at theentirestructure of the"essences"
(Eidos) of thingsacquiredby mind.The phenomenological reductionthathe
performedwas free fromany preconceivednotionsabout the realityof the
1 The word is coined
by WilliamHaas in his The Destinyof the Mind (London:
Faber and Faber, 1956), p. 134,and is defined
by himas "thedesireforIsness."
la Quoted by Marvin Farber,"Phenomenology," in Living Schools of Philosophy,
D. D. Runes,ed. (Ames, Iowa: Littlefield, Adams& Co., 1962), p. 312.
217
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218 RAMAKANT SINARI
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PHENOMENOLOGICAL REDUCTION AND YOGA 219
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220 RAMAKANT SINARI
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PHENOMENOLOGICAL REDUCTION AND YOGA 221
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222 RAMAKANT SINARI
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PHENOMENOLOGICAL REDUCTION AND YOGA 223
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224 RAMAKANT SINARI
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PHENOMENOLOGICAL REDUCTION AND YOGA 225
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226 RAMAKANT SINARI
18Ibid., p. 4.
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PHENOMENOLOGICAL REDUCTION AND YOGA 227
by theyogin,he rightly
necessary bearsa feeling
thathe does staydetached
fromall "is-ness,"thathis dissolvement in nothingnessis beyondall restraints
fromand compromiseswiththe mattersof fact.
V~caspatimisra's'9explanationthatsamprajiiatasamadhiand asamprajiata
samJdhiare so interrelated that the formeris only a means to the latteris
widelyaccepted.Besides,theconsistency withthe
of theyogins'preaching
of
spirit
principal theUpanisads warrants
that samadhi practiced a way
be as
leadingto the emancipationof consciousnessfromworldlyreality.It has not
evenbeenhintedby Husserl,or,forthatmatter,
by anyotherWesternphe-
nomenologistor existentialist, that the ultimateobjective of transcendental
reductionis to be cherishedas a panacea for mundaneills. Therefore,when
one studiesthegoal of asamprajiiatasamadhi,one is bound to acknowledgeit
as a total emptiness,a permanentarrestof all psychophysical experiences,a
stateof completewithdrawal(nirodha) fromtheworld. It is neversuggested
by theyoginsthata returnfromthissphereback to naturalexistenceis, in any
sense, desirable.Life's deliverance,moreover,demandsa closure of the pos-
sibilityof new experience--ajivan-mwkti--in whichconsciousnessposits it-
selfas indistinguishable frombeing and nothingness.20 For the Yoga school,
not only is this deliveranceintofullinanityrealizable,but,when actuallyat-
tained,it transforms even one's view of one's own self,recreatingtherebya
"twice-born"freepersonality.
It was said above that the transcendental consciousnessat which Husserl
aims is a regionwherethe entireinheritedconceptionof the world ceases to
function.Husserl is tacitin maintaining thatthe transcendental consciousness
or the transcendental intentionalityis still In
reflective. his second Cartesian
Meditation,he draws a distinctionbetween"natural" and "transcendental"
reflection. The former,he says,is of everydaylifeand representsa psychical
process whichthe world is the "given" content.The latter,whichhe also
to
calls "transcendental-phenomenological reflection,""consists in looking
at and describingthe particulartranscendentally reducedcogito,but without
participating, as reflectivesubject, in the natural existing-positing that the
originallystraightforward perception contains ... ."21 He remarksin the Ideas
thatreflection is the name given to "acts in whichthe streamof experience,
with all its manifoldevents (phases of experience,intentionalities)can be
graspedand analysedin the lightof its own evidence."22
The word "reflection," in thephrase"transcendental is intended
reflection,"
19The authorof the famousSadikhya-tattva-kaumudi
(9th century).
20Accordingto Sartre,nothingness
is themetaphysical
groundof humanexistence.
21
Husserl,CartesianMeditations,
p. 33.
22Husserl,Ideas, p. 200.
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228 RAMAKANT SINARI
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