The importance and some implifications of a scientific investigation of the phenomenon of kundalini by Gopi Krishna

There are well-known and well-attested cases of individuals who, in trance or semitrance, bloom into great healers, clairvoyants, expounders of religious truths, prophesiers, oracles and the like. With voluntary cultivation there is no end to the possibilities of the metamorphosis. With better knowledge of the mechanism of the discovery of safer methods to activate it, the products of kundalini can bloom into prodigies in every sphere of human knowledge, into geniuses of the highest order, into prophets, seers, healers, and clairvoyants of surpassing stature, beyond anything we can imagine at present.

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The study can be divided into five broad parallel departments. The first of these would consist of a thourough study of the oral and written tradition. There are thousands of books on kundalini and yoga extant in India. The ancient esoteric treatises, including the Tantras, contain valuable hints about the serpent powers. The Vedas, the Upanishads and the Puranas provide another fertile source. A study by a team of scholars can provide valuable material to initiate an empirical investigation of the phenomena.

There is a huge mass of literature formed by the self-revelations and other utterances of the medieval saints of India. It can also provide precious clues here and there and substantiate the information contained in the scriptural texts. The writings of the Western mystics, Sufis, Taoists, and the Tibetan yogis should provide a valuable mine of information.

Religious lore of all faiths and the books on magic, alchemy, or the occult, existing from ancient times, can also supply valuable material bearing on the subject. Well-known documents on kundalini can begin the study, which can then be extended gradually to cover the sources available for this research.

The study of the oral tradition is equally important. The hint, I, myself, received about the danger of an awakening occuring through the pingala or the solar nerve, was based on oral tradition. These facts are not generally mentioned in the books. The hints are transmitted orally by the preceptor to the disciple and acted upon in times of need.

For instance, in the event of an awakening leading to the generation of a high degree of heat in the system, the remedy prescribed is to lay on a coat of wet clay over the body or to immerse it in a pool of water up to the neck. For the heat experienced at the crown of the head or the space between the eyebrows, the rubbing of sandalpaste is recommended. In fact, the mark applied by Hindus to the forehead is done as a sign of hommage to the ajna chakra. It is only when kundalini enters this center that higher faculties of the mind make their appearances. The application of a mark to the forehead, which is such a common feature of worship or even adornment in India, and sometimes appears as a product of superstitituon to foreigners, carries a highly esoteric significance of the serpent power.

The second province of research would cover those cases in which kundalini is congenitally active. There are five categories of the individuals belonging to this class – the born mystic, the man and woman of genius, the prodigies, the mediums and the psychotics.

The ecstatic visions of the mystic, the creations of genius, the performance of the prodigy, the phenomenon of the medium, the nightmares of the insane are all, without exception, the products of this enhanced flow of a more potent form of bioenergy into that brain.

I am positive about the fact that a morbid activation of kundalini can lead to psychoses in a variety of forms. I myself passed through phases akin to them during the period of my transition from one state of consciousness to the other.

The third province of research can be provided by born mystics, geniuses, mediums, and prodigies in whom kundalini is more or less active from birth.

The fourth province for study can be furnished by those in whom there occurs an activation of the serpent power later in life without in any way affecting the sanity of their minds.

The fifth and most important area of research would be provided by those cases who voluntarily offer themselves for the bold exploit of rousing the serpent power. Among the ardent seekers after illumination in all parts of the world, there must be some who would readily lend themselves for an undertaking in this nature. This requires the establishment of a well-managed institution where the disciplines can be given.

I am advocating a scientific investigation of kundalini because it would, in the long run, lead to the formulation of a symptomology of the awakening. This in turn would tend toward the discovery of the force responsible for mystical experience, samadhi, or ecstacy. The lives of Plotinus, Saint Catherine, Saint Teresa, the Sufi poets Jami and Rumi, Paramhamsa Ramahrishna and others provide a clear testimony to what I say.

Gopi Krishna

Source : Kundalini, Evolution and Enlightenment by John White