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david_obsidian
USA
2602 Posts |
 Posted - Dec 28 2005 : 6:30:00 PM
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I think Yogani is right not to categorize samadhi. There are a few good reasons for not doing so, and Yogani has mentioned some. There are more.
One is that Samadhi is notoriously difficult to describe. Categorizing experiences that are notoriously difficult to describe in the first place has obvious pitfalls.
Another is that I believe different people go through experiences in different order. One will have A, B, C, D while another will have B, then A, skip C entirely, and go on to D. So imposing a ranking in that case is obviously unhelpful. Someone might think they have gone backwards.
Worse maybe, you absolutely can have a very 'advanced' experience while you are not very advanced in general. If you misunderstand yourself as being advanced, it can cause problems for you and the 'followers' you might pick up....
(I am not saying, by the way, that there are not some things that tend to go in a specific order. But the whole thing is complex and there is actually a lot of flexibility in spiritual development. All of the maps are rough. )
The various schools tend to 'push' the experiences in the order experienced by their founders or current illustrious teachers. To a certain extent, they also cultivate the order that they believe in, that is, the order they believe can tend to follow from their sequences of practices (which adds to their justification for describing the order).
Then there are the 'political' and 'human' problems that will follow when experiences are ranked. And then people will fake experiences in order to gain 'rank'. ( Not that the ranking is so good anyway, even without the faking. )
-D |
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not categorizing samadhi
