Ecstasy

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Described by parapsychologist F. W. H. Myers as "a change in the centre of perception from the material into the spiritual world," ecstasy is a state of rapture in which insights and visions of the invisible world unfold. It is characterized by an exaltation of sensory faculties. It is common to all religions and is one of the most-attested psychic experiences in both civilized and primitive countries.

The Waldenses, Italian Protestants of the twelfth century, sustained persecution from Roman Catholic forces with the superhuman strength and energy that came to them in ecstastic states. They routed French and Savoyard troops that were fifty times more numerous. During the war in the Cevennes, three thousand religious enthusiasts stood their ground against sixty thousand men of the king commanded by the best generals of France. In like measure, the Convulsionaires of St. Médard in the eighteenth century endured frightful blows—which could have felled an ox—on their chests and stomachs while in the ecstatic state.

Ecstatic states were frequently reported of Christian saints and were integral to the experience of such mystics as St. Teresa of Avila. In evaluating claims of visions of the Virgin Mary, officials of the Roman Catholic Church ask, among other things, whether or not the person was in a state of ecstasy during the vision.

In Hindu mysticism, ananda is the name given to the blissful condition of higher consciousness, and gurus often adopt a name extolling the virtue of such activities as meditation in producing that state.

It is clear that there are degrees of ecstasy, ranging from euphoric to transcendental states. Hindu mystical teachings have charted the different stages of samadhi, mystical trance, with their qualitative degrees of ecstasy. Samadhi is the aim of traditional yoga systems, in which body, mind, and spirit are controlled and purified.

In some forms of tantric yoga, the vital energy known as kundalini, commonly the dynamic of sexual experience, is transformed into spiritual force as it follows its pathway through subtle channels along the spine and through the vital centers in the body (chakras) to the crown of the head, culminating in mystical experience accompanied by blissful sensations. However, this particular yoga is said to be more likely to result in sexual fixation and obsession.

Similar to tantric yoga is the sex magic of Western occultists developed in the late nineteenth century out of the alchemical tradition. Aleister Crowley, best known for his experimentation and development in this field, viewed sex as the primary tool available to the magician in raising magic energy.

In both the Eastern and Western mystical tradition, many have argued that celibacy is the more rewarding lifestyle for those on the mystical path. In such celibate systems, the mundane ecstatic pleasure of sex has supposedly been sublimated into spiritual force, and the ecstastic experience has been transcended in mystical union.

In the 1960s, as transpersonal psychology developed, consciousness studies became a primary area of research. Ecstasy was pigeonholed under such categories as the "highest state of consciousness" or "expanded state of consciousness." Note was made of the many ways of inducing such states of their desirability. Attempts have also been made to correlate such states with various measurable body states, but progress has been difficult because most such states occur spontaneously and in the context of sacred activity.

Sources:

Avalon, Arthur [Sir John Woodroffe]. The Serpent Power. Madras, India, 1922.

Bucke, R. M. Cosmic Consciousness: A Study of the Evolution of the Human Mind. N.p., 1910.

Danielou, Alain. Yoga: The Method of Re-Integration. London: Christopher Johnson, 1949. Reprint, New Hyde Park, N.Y.: University Books, 1955.

Gopi Krishna. Kundalini: The Evolutionary Energy in Man. Boulder, Colo: Shambhala, 1970.

James, William. The Varieties of Religious Experience. London, 1902.

Row, M. C. Nanjunda. Cosmic Consciousness, or the Vedantic Idea of Realisation of Muktu in the Light of Modern Psychology. Madras, India, 1910.

Underhill, Evelyn. Mysticism: A Study in the Nature and Development of Man's Spiritual Consciousness. London: Methuen, 1911.

White, John, ed. The Highest State of Consciousness. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday Anchor, 1972.

MDMA.