Modulating Desires Through Devotion
Hindu Devotionalism and the Science of Managing Desire
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/jch.30745Keywords:
Bhakti, Cognitive Historiography, Desire, Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇava, Hinduism, Religion and Science, Sādhana.Abstract
Among Indian religions, desires for the mundane are typically viewed as sources of suffering and impediments to liberation. To modulate these and other soteriological impediments, many traditions developed transformational paths of practice. One of the most prominent of these is the Gaudiya Vaisnava path of devotion, which celebrates Krsna as the highest deity. The goal is not merely liberation, but to develop uninterrupted loving devotion for Krsna. However, self-interested desires remain critical impediments. To overcome these desires and reach the goals of the path, early Gaudiya theologians recommended various practices of devotion. Drawing on scientific research on desire-modulation, I argue that many of these practices would be effective for modulating desires because of the ways in which they manipulate situation and stimulus controls, attention allocation, and processes of valuation. This analysis has implications for our understanding of the development of the Gaudiya path, the development and success of certain kinds of Hindu religious practices over time, and the power of religious practices more generally for modulating desires.
References
Anonymous. 1971. Srimad Bhagavata Mahapurana, trans. C. L Goswami and M. A. Shastri. 2 vols. Gorakhpur: Gita Press. Reprint, 2012.
Arias-Carrión, Oscar, Maria Stamelou, Eric Murillo-Rodríguez, Manuel Menéndez-González and Ernst Pöppel. 2010. “Dopaminergic Reward System: A Short Integrative Review”. International Archives of Medicine 3(1):1–6. https://doi.org/10.1186/1755-7682-3-24
Baars, Bernard J., and Stan Franklin. 2003. “How Conscious Experience and Working Memory Interact”. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 7(4): 166–72. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1364-6613(03)00056-1
Berridge, Kent C. 1996. “Food Reward: Brain Substrates of Wanting and Liking”. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews 20(1): 1–25. https://doi.org/10.1016/0149-7634(95)00033-B
Broo, Måns. 2003. As Good as God: The Guru in Gaudiya Vaisnavism: Åbo Finland: Åbo Akademi University Press.
Bryant, Edwin F. 2009. “The Subject Matter of the Yoga-Sutras”. In The Yoga Sutras of Patañjali, trans. and ed. Edwin F. Bryant, xlv-lviii. New York: North Point Press.
Brzezinski, Jan K. 1992. “Goloka Vrndavana: A Translation of Jiva Gosvami’s Gopala-Campu (Chapter One)”. Journal of Vaisnava Studies 1(1): 61–98.
Buswell, Robert E., and Robert M. Gimello. 1992. “Introduction”. In Paths to Liberation: The Marga and Its Transformations in Buddhist Thought, eds. Robert E. Buswell and Robert M. Gimello, 1–36. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.
Cunningham, William A., and Philip David Zelazo. 2007. “Attitudes and Evaluations: A Social Cognitive Neuroscience Perspective”. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 11(3): 97–104. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2006.12.005
Dasgupta, Surendranath. 1922. A History of Indian Philosophy: Vol 1. Delhi: Motilal Banarasidass. Reprint, 1991.
Finkel, Eli. J., and Christopher Eckhardt, I. 2013. “Intimate Partner Violence”. In The Oxford Handbook of Close Relationships, eds. Jeffry A. Simpson and Lorne Campbell, 452–76. New York: Oxford University Press.
Gosvamin, Jiva. 1982–1986. Bhagavata Sandarbha of Jiva Gosvamin, ed. Haridasa Sastri. 6 vols. Vrindavan: Srigadadharagaurahari Press.
Gosvamin, Jiva. 2005. Sri Bhakti Sandarbha, trans. Satya Narayana Dasa. 3 vols. Vrindavan: Jiva Institute.
Gosvamin, Jiva. 2014. Sri Bhagavat Sandarbha: God – His Qualities, Abode and Associates, trans. Satya Narayana Dasa. Vrindavan: Jiva Institute of Vaishnava Studies.
Gosvamin, Rupa. 2003. The Bhaktirasamrtasindhu of Rupa Gosvamin, trans. David L. Haberman. New Delhi: Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts and Motilal Banarsidass Publishers.
Gupta, Ravi. 2006. “Making Space for Vedanta: Canon and Commentary in Caitanya Vaisnavism”. International Journal of Hindu Studies 10(1): 75–90. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11407-006-9003-7
Gupta, Ravi M. 2007. The Caitanya Vaisnava Vedanta of Jiva Gosvami: When Knowledge Meets Devotion. London and New York: Routledge.
Haberman, David L. 1988. Acting as a Way of Salvation: A Study of Raganuga Bhakti Sadhana. New York: Oxford University Press.
Halbfass, Wilhelm. 1991. Tradition and Reflection: Explorations in Indian Thought. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.
Hardy, Friedhelm. 1983. Viraha-Bhakti: The Early History of Krsna Devotion in South India. Delhi: Oxford University Press.
Heatherton, Todd F., and Dylan D. Wagner. 2011. “Cognitive Neuroscience of Self-Regulation Failure”. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 15(3):132–39. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2010.12.005
Heintz, Christophe. 2011. “Cognitive History and Cultural Epidemiology”. In Past Minds: Studies in Cognitive Historiography, eds. Luther H. Martin and Jesper Sørensen, 11–28. London and Oakville, CT: Equinox Publishing.
Hofmann, Wilhelm, Malte Friese and Fritz Strack. 2009. “Impulse and Self-Control from a Dual-Systems Perspective”. Perspectives on Psychological Science 4(2): 162–76. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-6924.2009.01116.x
Hofmann, Wilhelm, Roland Deutsch, Katie Lancaster and Mahzarin R. Banaji. 2010. “Cooling the Heat of Temptation: Mental Self-Control and the Automatic Evaluation of Tempting Stimuli”. European Journal of Social Psychology 40(1): 17–25.
Hofmann, Wilhelm, and Lotte Van Dillen. 2012. “Desire: The New Hot Spot in Self-Control Research”. Current Directions in Psychological Science 21(5): 317–22. https://doi.org/10.1177/0963721412453587
Hofmann, Wilhelm, and Hiroki P. Kotabe. 2014. “Handbook of Emotion Regulation, Second Edition”. In Handbook of Emotion Regulation, ed. J. J. Gross, 346–60. New York: Guilford Publications.
Holdrege, Barbara A. 2011. “Vraja-Dhaman: Krishna Embodied in Geographic Place and Transcendent Space”. In A Companion to the Bhagavata Purana, eds. Ravi M. Gupta and Kenneth R. Valpey. New York: Columbia University Press.
Holdrege, Barbara A. 2014. “Meditation as Devotional Practice in Jiva Gosvamin’s Philosophy of Education”. ISKCON Studies Journal 2: 45–70.
Holdrege, Barbara A. 2015. Bhakti and Embodiment: Fashioning Divine Bodies and Devotional Bodies in Krsna Bhakti. Milton Park: Routledge.
Kaviraja, Krsnadasa. 1999. Caitanya Caritamrta of Krsnadasa Kaviraja: A Translation and Commentary, trans. Edward Dimock and Tony K. Stewart. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Kemps, Eva, Marika Tiggemann and Rebecca Christianson. 2008. “Concurrent Visuo-Spatial Processing Reduces Food Cravings in Prescribed Weight-Loss Dieters”. Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry 39(2): 177–86. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbtep.2007.03.001
Knudsen, Eric I. 2007. “Fundamental Components of Attention”. Annual Review of Neuroscience 30(1): 57–78. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.neuro.30.051606.094256
Larson, Gerald James. 1987. The Encyclopedia of Indian Philosophies. Vol. IV: Samkhya, eds. Gerald James Larson and Ram Shankar Bhattacharya. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.
Martin, Luther H., and Jesper Sørensen. 2011. Past Minds: Studies in Cognitive Historiography. London and Oakville, CT: Equinox Publishing.
Martinez, Michael E. 2010. Learning and Cognition: The Design of the Mind. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.
Nelson, Lance. 2004. “The Ontology of Bhakti: Devotion as Paramapurusartha in Gaudiya Vaisnavism and Madhusudana Sarasvati”. Journal of Indian Philosophy 32(4): 345–92. https://doi.org/10.1023/B:INDI.0000044295.57338.04
Potter, Karl H. 1963. Presuppositions of India’s Philosophies. 1st Indian edn. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers Pvt. Ltd.
Potter, Karl H. 1980. “The Karma Theory and Its Interpretation in Some Indian Philosophical Systems”. In Karma and Rebirth in Classical Indian Traditions, ed. Wendy Doniger O’Flaherty. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Schweig, Graham M. 2003. “Visvanatha’s Gurvastakam and the Understanding of Guru in Chaitanyite Vaishnavism”. Journal of Vaisnava Studies 12(1): 113–26.
Van Dillen, Lotte F., Esther K. Papies and Wilhelm Hofmann. 2013. “Turning a Blind Eye to Temptation: How Cognitive Load Can Facilitate Self-Regulation”. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 104(3): 427–43. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0031262
