Krishna’s Dharma: Deconstructing and Reconstructing, Arjuna and Us

Religious texts are volatile. The unpredictable and evocative energy within religious texts provokes believing interpreters to give up their lives for others, and at other times take the lives of others. The Bhagavad-Gita, a poetic interlude within the mythical epic the Mahabharata, is not immune to these diabolically opposed exegetical potentials. The Gita takes up many of the thematic conundrums found in the Mahabharata, but most notably the Gita illustrates the concept of dharma using god-like figures and figurative rhetoric. Sanskrit scholar Barbara Miller mentions in her translation of the Gita that dharma,  “stems from the root word drh, ‘to sustain.’ A concept of complex significance in Indian culture, its basic meaning is ‘that which sustains’”(158). Simple enough, right? The complex ambiguity of Krishna’s dharma within the Gita and how it challenged Arjuna within the Mahabharata’s context has been the source of exegetical debate since the Gita’s conception. Two millenniums later, spiritual, political, and academic interpretations of the Gita still bloom; dharma cannot be ignored as every person, every kingdom, must face the question: How is appropriate inter-action to take place?

Considered an ancient text, the Gita contains many teachings of Krishna that sound all too familiar with rhetoric of current politicians and religious leaders. Krishna’s call to “wage this war of sacred duty” (2.33) is, seemingly, similar to President Bush’s reaction to those behind the World Trade Center towers’ destruction: “Given the nature and reach of our enemies, we will win this conflict…by meeting a series of challenges with determination and will and purpose” (Lincoln 100). Why turn to this religious text within a socio-historical context such as ours when religion is accused of being the source of so much violence?  The answer is in Krishna’s re-visioning of dharma that is found in the Gita—a re-visioning that takes readers beyond the surface scenes within the Gita to reach a dharma that is for Arjuna then, and our present. Furthermore, exploring Krishna’s dharmic teachings for a world-age where adharma is rampant might enable suggestive re-visioning for today. It is to the Song of the Lord, and the Lord of Song, to which we, as a collective Arjuna, now turn.

Now is as Good as Then: Krishna Re-Appearing.

            Hinduism assumes that the cosmos is involved in a continuous cycle of creation and destruction (Gita 9.7), and Krishna’s dharma re-visioning is said to materialize when adharma settles in, when “chaos prevails”(4.7). These periods of adharma are known in the Hindu cosmology as Kaliyuga, which Heinrich Zimmer elucidates as follows: “Egoistic, devouring, blind and reckless elements now are triumphant and rule the day. Kali means the worst of anything; also, ‘strife, quarrel, dissension, war, battle’” (15). Krishna’s dharma is absolutely essential for this period, otherwise destruction and chaos would prevail (Gita 3.23-35). This fits within the larger context of the Mahabharata, as the Gita is situated immediately prior to the Pandavas and Kurus warring one another. That is, Krishna’s re-visioning of dharma is performed in that sacred scene of adharma, where wars over “sacred duty” take place (1.1).

            The appearance of “Krishna” is enigmatic and tricky in itself. “Krishna” is put in quotation marks because clarification of what is meant by this term is needed. It is asserted here, emphatically so, that “Krishna” is a personified archetypal force that is conceptualized in anthropomorphic imagery, referring to what Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj suggests as, “… the indwelling principle within you—the atman, which is given various names” (137). This “indwelling principle” is expanded in the Gita as the indwelling spirit exists within all of nature as it does in humanity: “Learned men see with an equal eye a scholarly and dignified priest, a cow, an elephant, a dog, and even an outcaste scavenger” (Gita 5.18, cf. 13.3, 15.13-15). That is, the world-soul (brahman) and human-soul (atman) are intricately intertwined in matters of dharma for, if dharma is to sustain, then the entire cosmos must function harmoniously in order for nature and humanity to sustain and be sustained. “All this around me, and my own existence—experience within and without—are the warp and woof of the subtle fabric”(Zimmer, 26). This “subtle fabric” appears—in image and teaching—in breath taking and, seemingly, odd fashion in the Gita and throughout history, in different countries, figures and names.

The oddity of such perennial materialization, however, is due to the nature of its context; that is, the peculiar dharma forcefully appears when adharma is rampant. Krishna is notorious in Hindu mythology for disrupting social norms and notoriously well loved for doing so. Discussing Hindu stories that involve the thievery of Krishna, John Hawley notes that, “Krishna doesn’t use force, but his skill in stealing away what people hold dear is unparalleled; and he doesn’t kill, but he manages to unburden people of their ordinary lives” (163). As Ruth Katz points out, Krishna’s character in the Gita is marked as, “…a playful trickster…Krishna’s trickery implies an open defiance of traditional morality…” (241). Arjuna’s dilemma, to defend dharma (1.37), is seen in his reticence to kill his fellow kinsmen (1.28-31). Deciphering dharma is tricky when adharma is rife, let alone when family is involved. It is only fitting that Krishna would be seen as a trickster in a period that is replete with disorder and evil; truth, peace, and acceptance are certainly antithetical to social norms in such periods. It is not surprising, then, to see that Krishna’s presence in the Gita functions as a shocking implosion of Arjuna’s presuppositions. It takes a persona such as Krishna—or Jesus, Ghandi, Martin Luther King, et cetera—to awaken dharma, reverse social adharma and re-verse perennial truths that lead to restoration (4.8).

Krishna’s reorienting of Arjuna’s disillusionment takes up more than just the convoluted confusion of whether to engage in war; according to the Gita, the fundamental purpose of dharma is, “To protect men of virtue and destroy men who do evil” (4.8). The enactment of dharma is the internal renunciation of all fruits from action (2.55, 2.71, 5.21) and the carrying out of one’s personal dharma (2.31, 2.33) for the sake of social and cosmic welfare (3.11-16). As Jacqueline Hirst says in her contribution to The Fruits of Our Desiring: “Order in human society is, from the beginning, grounded in cosmic order and taught as such” (52). Arjuna is told to give up his previously embraced notion of dharma and find solace in the dharmic re-presenter who appears in Kaliyuga periods (18.66).  For Arjuna, in the larger context of the Mahabharata, this meant seeing through his attachment for his kinsmen and performing actions that seemed all together adharmic. To see through such horrific scenes is never easily accepted, as Krishna must repeat himself time and again for Arjuna to renounce the attachments that are seemingly normative when performing actions (examples—2.15, 2.22, 2.48, 2.55).

Set in the mythical context of the Mahabharata, the Gita presents this dharmic dilemma in hyperbolic settings so as to portray the difficulty in ascertaining how to uphold dharma. The Gita should be seen, however, more like a springboard than a bed to snuggle into, for the Gita and its dharmic teachings should be understood as recontextualizing previously held dharmic perspectives. Dharma, then, is a fluid concept and allows its applicability to twist and turn given the context in which it is being ascertained. Krishna’s archetypal reappearances and re-visioning is summed up by Ruth Katz: “God, then, is seen as the protector of dharma even as he acts within the yuga structure, changing with the shifting environment” (231). Krishna then will appear quite differently than Krishna now, but there will be an aura of familiarity, which will be spelled out later.

Speed up two millenniums. Today, Western culture is inundated with so much “war” rhetoric—from the war on drugs to the war on terrorism—that Michael Hadley writes, “War, in short, is now a ‘way of being’” (190). Put simply, since 9/11 the West’s mythic perception is constructed by a notion that took place on September 11^th, 2001: we are at war—militarily, economically, ethnically, and religiously. The evening news is sated with vivid images of violence, chaos, and hatred—at home and abroad. All the news reports confirm Zimmer’s definition of Kaliyuga, the age of adharma, the age when, supposedly, Krishna’s revelatory dharma is suppose to manifest.

Krishna’s Re-Visioning

Dharma, according to the Gita’s Krishna, is the detachment approach to reality where individual, social, and international boundaries are transcended (3.7, 3.25, 4.10, 5.11). As stated above, Arjuna’s dharmic visioning was deconstructed and the restructured dharma is one where brahman and atman are intimately interconnected. Within this interconnectivity, though, the individual is not lost.  As Krishna is quoted in 3.35, “Your own duty done imperfectly is better than another man’s done well. It is better to die in one’s own duty; another man’s duty is perilous” (cf. 18.47). Thus, when Krishna admonishes Arjuna to “Look to [his] own duty” (2.31) and to “stand up and resolve to fight the battle!” (2.37), Krishna is upholding the warrior’s dharmic role while redefining Arjuna’s presumption of social dharma. Individual duty and social duty are not so cleanly dichotomized in such re-visioning. In fact, while non-attachment to consequences is Krishna’s advice, this does not infer an amoral or entirely relativistic ethic. Nicholas Sutton notes that, “…it is only right action that is to be executed without desire” and the continuance of this is, “…entirely to do with the welfare of this world” (329). Thus, non-attachment is explicitly concerned with nourishing this tangible world, verses a transcendental world, and the non-attached motive is to be enacted in behavior that has trans-personal consequences.

Like the unity that exists as multiplicities, and the multiplicities that form unity (11.5-7, 13.30, 14.4, 18.20), the specificity of “non-attachment” and “right action” is ambiguously applicable. Thus, the Gita’s context makes Krishna’s admonition to fight understandable. To read this too literalistic, though, is to miss the point. The point is that dharmic re-visioning consists in disrupting the Kaliyuga disruption as a means of seeing clearly, of seeing through to the welfare of the world (12.4, 12.12). The Gita presents Arjuna seeking the council of Krishna as Arjuna questions how such a horrendous crime against honor in warring against family can be committed (1.34, 37). Arjuna’s difficulty is not only in killing his kinsmen, but this is coupled with the fact that to do so would be antithetical to his sense of dharma, the underlying order of the cosmos that is to be harmoniously engaged with. Hence, Krishna’s advice is ultimately directed towards the following: how to exist and engage with the order that sustains the cosmos—both on social and individual, macro and microcosmic levels. The vague applicability of dharma calls for constant conscious awareness of one’s historical context and how to behave in a dharmic manner, a manner that is fundamentally concerned with the sustenance of the world at large.

Krishna, Dharma, and…Us?

            To insert a concept like dharma in a postmodern, post-9/11 world—rife with chaos, pluralism, and violence—is capable by the very nature of Krishna’s visionary re-visioning found within the Gita. As Jacqueline Hirst notes, “[The Gita] may ask us…to go beyond our initial understandings of dharma, discarding or recontextualizing them as we go, to that which is truly dharmic” (55). What is dharmic has been repeatedly summarized with “sustaining the welfare of the world.” Considering the nuclear, environmental, ethnical, and biological threats facing the modern world, it would do well to offer some suggestive ways of recontextualizing dharma in our own Kaliyuga.

Literalistic readings of the Gita are, unfortunately, all too popular in recent and contemporary history. It is well known that the Gita was dear to Richard Oppenheimer, father of the atomic bomb. Mark Juergensmeyer notes that members of the Hindu Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and the Hindu nationalist party, the BJP have defended several acts of violence by quoting from the Gita (95).  The Gita is far from being an exception in matters of violent religious interpretations. The rise of current religious violence is coupled with an intense upsurge of globalization, providing a contemporary scene where national and hemispherical boundaries are transcended daily.

The sustaining of one country ultimately depends on the sustenance of other countries in relation—economically, ecologically, politically, and in matters of human rights. Krishna’s restructuring of Arjuna’s concept of dharma is, for readers today, an international—indeed a cosmic—restructuring. Contemporarily, Arjuna is seen in each individual, and as a collective whole, as there is collective hope for a Krishna re-visioning that enables each country  to establish dharma nationally and internationally—those two so inherently entwined in our day. Problems arise, though, when the order that is sought is re-visioned in such a radical way that it implodes the anticipatory expectations clung to. While there are many examples of contemporary adharma in our Kaliyuga, a suggestive dharmic re-visioning towards the cacophonic relationship between the West and the Middle East will be focused on. This indicatory re-visioning will explore how the dharmic teachings in the Gita might provide insight for a world where the field of dharma is truly cosmic in scale. If such re-visioning does not take place, Agni might make an appearance in a nuclear way that would truly put an end to the chaos—once and for all.

As noted above, individual dharma is to function conjointly with cosmic dharma to “lead to freedom” (Gita 11.5) and is for “sustaining this entire world” (10.42). Unfortunately, since its imperialistic inception the West has characteristically been demonic: “[the West has said] I have gained this wish today, and I shall attain that one; this wealth is mine, and there will be more. I have killed the enemy, and I shall kill others too; I am the lord, I am the enjoyer, successful, strong, and happy.” (16.13-14). The West, specifically America, flourishes in its economical surplus and political might, all the while sustaining an adharmic identity that caricaturizes “divine traits that lead to freedom” (16.5). Focusing entirely on the interests of sustaining our national welfare, the United States has failed to harmonize its dharma with global dharma. Such national-centrism has resulted in a Kaliyuga that infiltrates in nearly every darkened corner of the world.

Since the Gulf War of 1991, the United States has sustained harsh sanctions on Iraq, “…which [have] caused widespread misery, including the deaths of over half a million Iraqi children, [and] were ‘worth the cost,’ as U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright famously put it” (Loy 96). The following list, far from exhaustive, exhibits the overwhelming adharma enacted by the U.S. government:

            …in 1965, the United States sponsored or assisted a military coup

            in Indonesia that involved the deaths of over half a million people…

            in the year 2001 alone the United States refused to join 123 other nations

            in banning the use of production of antipersonnel bombs and mines…

            Bush declared the Kyoto global warming protocol “dead” and refused

            to participate in revising it, because that might harm the U.S. economy…

            the United States was the only nation to oppose the U.N. Agreement to

            Curb the International Flow of Illicit Small Arms…In addition, the

            United States ha not ratified the Comprehensive (Nuclear) Test Ban

Treaty, signed by 164 nations but opposed by Bush (Loy105).

 

Given the unavoidable globalization that is in motion, the question is not whether or not the West should be internationally involved. The question is: what is the West’s dharmic role to enable international harmony where each country focuses on its own dharmic responsibility (Gita 3.35, 18.47) in such a way that will bring global peace (12.12)? In a country that promotes its motto as “liberty and justice for all”, violence has been the action taken in hopes of securing this nationalistic attachment. Two and a half centuries after America’s inauguration, two and a half centuries of working towards liberty and justice for all, the one thing that has been attained without failure has been violence—within and without national borders.

The Gita provides a disarming portrait of dharma. Recall that dharma essentially means “that which sustains” (Miller 158). In the wake of our Kaliyuga, the destruction of the cosmos has never been more perceivable and there are no lacking options that can be taken to actualize this. Violence has proven, it would seem, to be ineffective in creating global dharma. Hence, what if what the Mahabharata calls the highest dharma, that of ahimsa (non-violence), were attempted? What if the re-contextualizing of dharma in our age was to retract from our nationalistic attachments and seek a global dharma where countries work together for peace, compassion, and sustenance for all creatures (Gita, 12.4, 12.12-13)? Contemporarily, re-visioning dharma would call for a global paradigm shift, one where nuclear, military, and imperialistic weapons of mass destruction implode on themselves along with the present adharmic vision that poses itself as dharmic.

Concluding…for now.

In the Mahabharata Arjuna follows Krishna’s advice and the Pandavas defeat the Kurus. However, the Gita is ambiguous as to who or what Arjuna is to fight. This ambiguity is heightened considering Krishna’s teachings of how brahman and atman are so intricately intertwined, thus one should treat all creatures equally (4.35, 5.7, 6.29-32, 13.28). Who then is Arjuna to fight? “Great Warrior, kill the enemy menacing you in the form of desire!” (3.43). Arjuna then, and Arjuna now, is to fight against desires of attachment. The attachment of the West to attain nationalistic ideals while ignoring international needs is analogous to the short-sided disillusionment of Arjuna that Krishna deconstructs. To promote non-violence in an age of extreme violence would certainly be tricky, but the warning signs seen on every 6 o’clock evening news report suggest that such trickery is imperative if our world is to be sustained.

The entire scenario is left to interpretation, and the Gita, like any ancient extant text, has its fair share of interpretations. The current international situation will have future historians performing their own interpretations of how dharma was incorporated, and sadly often ignored in our Kaliyuga. A re-appearance of Krishna is most certainly needed, but are we willing to embody Krishna today? This exploration opened with a question, implying a need for an answer. The answer just might lay in the questioning – by breaking the bonds of present attachments, the West can enable questioning to happen, which will open up opportunities to view things anew. This question must first be addressed: Is the West willing to actually question their current sense of dharma? May the evening news’ one day report, like that of Sanjaya, that there was rejoicing, for dharma was actualized in an adharmic age. May history say, on a global scale, that for a time, “fortune, victory, abundance, and morality [did] exist” (18.78).

 

 Works Cited

 

Hadley, Michael. “The Ascension of Mars and the Salvation of the Modern World.” The Twenty-first Century Confronts Its Gods: Globalization, Technology, and War. Ed. David J. Hawking. Albany: State University of New York, 2004. 189-208.

Hawley, John Stratton. “The Thief in Krishna.” The Inner Journey: Views from the Hindu Tradition. Ed. Margaret H. Case. Sandpoint, ID: Morning Light Press, 2007. 162-171.

Juergensmeyer, Mark. Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious

Violence. Los Angeles and London: University of California, 2000.

Katz, Ruth. Arjuna in the Mahabharata: Where Krishna Is, There Is Victory.

Columbia, SC: South Carolina UP, 1989.

Lincoln, Bruce. Holy Terror: Thinking About Religion After September 11.

Chicago and London: University of Chicago, 2003.

Loy, David R. “The West Against the Rest? A Buddhist Response to The Clash of Civilizations. The Twenty-first Century Confronts Its Gods: Globalization, Technology, and War. Ed. David J. Hawking. Albany: State University of New York, 2004. 95-110.

Hirst, Jacqueline. “Upholding the World: Dharma in the Bhagavadgita.” The Fruits of Our Desiring: An Enquiry into the Ethics of the Bhagavadgita For Our Times. Ed. Julius Lipner. Calgary: Bayeux Arts, 1997. 48-63.

Maharaj, Sri Nisargadatta. The Nectar of Immortality: Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj’s Discourses on the Etnernal. Ed. Robert Powell. San Diego: Blue Dove Press, 1996.

Miller, Barbara Stoller, trans. The Bhagavad-Gita: Krishna’s Counsel in Time of

War. New York: Bantam Dell, rpt. 2004.

Sutton, Nicholas. Religious Doctrines in the Mahabharata. Delhi: Motilal

Banarsidass, 2000.

  Zimmer, Heinrich. Myths and Symbols in Indian Art and Civilization. Ed. Joseph

Campbell. Princeton: Princeton UP, rpt. 1974.

Digging Deeper through the Hill

The attempt to bridge Western and Eastern thinking has only been as of recent, and this attempt seems to have as many advocates as devil advocates. The depth psychology movement shares in this tug-of-war and depth psychologists likewise differ in their (un)appreciation for inviting Eastern philosophies into their field of study. Carl Jung is well known for his appreciation of Taoism and the I-Ching, though even in the Jungian movement there is no consensus on incorporating Eastern ideas in this prominently Western school of thought. Archetypal psychology cannot avoid the invasion of Eastern thought in the Western world, and using the East’s numerous mythologies solely for the purpose of corroborating a pre-established Western way of understanding the psyche will reveal an Apollonic archetype, though Dionysian they attempt to portray themselves. The focus of the present paper is on the archetypal figure of the Bhagavad-Gita’s Krishna and will be coupled by the earlier developments, specifically those of James Hillman, of that branch of depth psychology termed archetypal psychology. The amalgamation of Krishna as an archetypal source with that of Hillman’s notions of soul will lead us to see similarities between Western and Eastern modes of understanding, and standing under, the soul and how Krishna leads us beyond the radical re-visioning of James Hillman.
Hillman’s breakthrough work Re-Visioning Psychology revolutionizes what is meant by the “psyche” and painstakingly argues for what he calls a “polytheistic psychology” (167-171). In the preface to the 1992 edition, Hillman explicitly admits that he as not “gone East” but stayed in the “Western tradition” (xxii). The adamancy of staying within the Western tradition of psychology, of studying and theorizing of how to articulate the psyche, is analogous to the West’s tendency to stay within our limited worldview and present it as the way of understanding, the way of seeing. That is, it is Apollonic. If there is to be such a thing as depth-psychology that poses itself to be a field directed towards a way of understanding the human psyche, then it must at least attempt to integrate a worldview that has long existed prior to the West’s and is ever present today in the West. Prior to this conscious decision to stay within the Western tradition, Hillman’s archetypal psychology is tinted time and again with Eastern concepts. This is jumping too far too quickly, though; an examination of what is being referred to as “the archetype of Krishna” will first be delineated.
Krishna in the Bhagavad-Gita: A Figure Amongst figures
Krishna’s commentary on reality and how the human fits within reality is found in the Bhagavad-Gita. In the Gita, Krishna is an anthropomorphized figure of Atman, the soul of the cosmos that infiltrates all of existence and, in humans, resides in each individual. Krishna pervades the whole universe by his non-manifested form and all of the cosmos exists in him (12.4). This anthropomorphized archetypal perspective infers that all the multiplicities that abound throughout the cosmos all derive from and are sustained by an infusing and fusing force: “…al that exists is woven on me, like a web of pearls on thread.” Yet, this unifying ideation that infiltrates Krishna’s imagery and teachings does not dismiss the reality of multiplicities. Hinduism assumes a pantheon, but even the gods that make up the constellation of the Hindu pantheon, along with the rest of Nature, derive from this Source (10.2); Heinrich Zimmer reminds us in Myths and Symbols of Indian Art and Civilization that the gods which make up the Hindu pantheon are actually derivatives of, manifestations of, something beyond themselves: “But the gods are themselves the production of a greater maya: the spontaneous self-transformation of an originally undifferentiated, all-generating divine Substance” (25). This “divine Substance” is, in the language of the Gita, that of Krishna: “[Humanity], see my forms in hundreds and thousands; diverse, divine, of many colors and shapes” (11.5).
This all said, it is important to keep in mind that this is not sheer monism. A.C. Commenting on 18.55 of the Gita, Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, founder of the International Society of Krishna Consciousness, mentions that, “One should not misunderstand that the word visate, ‘enters into Me,’ supports the monist theory that one becomes homogeneous with the impersonal Brahman” (824). Thus, the innumerable manifestations that are inherently part of reality are really multiplicities of a Source. Simultaneously, they are manifesting multiples of Krishna, which infers they are not ends in themselves, but are images of that which resides behind, beyond and below them. The multiplicities, then, are quite real images that symbolize the vast variation of life: “…the supreme infinite spirit…Its hands and feet reach everywhere; its head and face see in every direction; hearing everything, it remains in the world, enveloping everything” (Gita 13.13). A hand is not a foot, though they are compartments of an entire body—so it is with Krishna. In depth psychology and its pantheon of archetypes, Krishna is typically seen as one archetype amongst a host of others; however, it is argued here that the Krishna of the Gita is, much like “psyche” or “soul”, the container in which all other archetypes manifest. Krishna, then, is the quintessential of what it means to be archetypal: “Archetypal images demonstrate difference, differing from each other and infinitely deferring a fixed meaning” (Post-Jungian Criticism: Theory and Practice, 43).

The above paragraphs are a summarization, not an exhaustive description of Krishna in the vast Hindu tradition or even a covering of all the diverse interpretations of Krishna in the Bhagavad-Gita. The basic overview of who and what Krishna is a springboard into the body of depth psychology, most notably that of James Hillman’s earlier works. Jung differed from Freud in that Jung was willing to travel East in his psychological experimentation; Hillman, a pupil and yet guru of Jungian ideation, started East but, as noted in the opening paragraph, intentionally turns his attention West and chooses to stay within that tradition. What follows is a transcription of the descriptions of Krishna above into depth-psychological terminology. Following this intertwinement will be a brief exploration of how Krishna, and all that Krishna infers, might be leading depth-psychologists past the idolatrous gods that depth-psychology currently revels in.
Worlds Colliding and Coalescing.

Putting Krishna-consciousness in depth-psychological language immediately leads to one of, if not the, most recognized depth-psychologists today: James Hillman. The attempt to intertwine philosophical worldviews is a precarious endeavor; miss-representation of one or the other is all too common. While anachronisms might occur, an attempt of exchanging the imagistic teachings of Krishna with depth-psychological jargon might prove beneficial. Krishna, representing the soul of the cosmos, is the archetypal source from which all subsequent archetypes stem from. As the psyche contains both the conscious and unconscious, so Krishna exists in manifest and invisible realms, knowable and unknowable. The physical and psychical manifestations of the archetypal source have archetypal backgrounds themselves, evidenced by the mass of depth-psychological literature that juxtaposes Greek mythology with the archetypal diversity found within the psyche (though rarely do users of Greek myths ask if there is something beyond the archetypal images being referenced).
It is Hillman’s first scholarly book, Emotions, where there are obvious parallels between Hillman’s notion of “soul” and the archetypal imagery described of Krishna above. For Hillman, psyche is the banal term that he replaces with the more ambiguous and poetic word soul (Suicide and the Soul, 47). And, as Hillman notes, “The psyche as a whole…is the original text through which all translations and correlations must be referred” (Emotion 273). In the paragraph that follows he delineates this notion of soul: “It is the psyche which is the formal ground of human experience and behaviour [sic]. And emotion, as the energetic stuff of the psyche…is the primary state of activity of the soul” (273). The human experience—conscious or unconscious, awake or asleep, imaginary or empirical, et cetera—is found in the psyche/soul. “We must keep in mind here that the central and total, inner and outer, quality and pattern are ways of talking about a single complex, the psyche. By tradition the psyche is one, even if divisible into many factors” (Emotion 271). In the Gita this is stated Hindu style in 8.3: “Eternal and supreme is the infinite spirit; its inner self is called inherent being; its creative force, known as action, is the source of creature’s existence.” This “infinite spirit”—that which is both inner and outer, immanent and transcendent—is, of course, portrayed through the anthropomorphic figure imaged as Krishna.
The psyche is, “the container of the energetic aspect” (Emotion 275), and yet like Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Hillman adamantly denies that such psychological articulation is akin to monism. Hence, psyche/soul is to be understood as the unity where diversity abides in, the soil from which archetypal forces germinate, blossom, and return to. The plethora of archetypes that most depth psychology illustrates through references to Greek mythology derive from a single Source—call it soul or Krishna—and are not dissolved by their similar originating point. Atman, the Hindu term for “God within”, is personalized through Krishna in the Gita and, as Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj points out, is diversely recognized: ““But here God means in the indwelling principle within you—the atman, which is given various names. These represent this ‘inner-God’ who will respond no matter what names of other Gods you chant” (The Very Fount of Bliss in The Inner Journey: Views from the Hindu Tradition, 299). This is the Hindu way of saying the psyche is the generating container where archetypes stem from, and to which they return. It is for this reason that Krishna, as Atman in person, is seen by Arjuna as having no beginning, middle, or end—that is, the human psyche and its manifesting archetypes are figured in the Gita by and through Krishna. “Lord of All, I see no end, or middle or beginning to your totality” (Gita 11.16).
Parting Ways
The “soul” of Hillman and Krishna of the Bhagavad-Gita are microcosmic representations of a macrocosmic trend—the coalescing of Eastern and Western meta-psychological understanding. However, where Hillman and Krishna both preach of the God within, they part ways as Hillman spends more and more time writing and inter-viewing on his polytheistic campaign. It is difficult to not smirk as one reads the words of Krishna: “Votaries of the gods go to the gods, ancestor-worshippers go to the ancestors, those who propitiate ghosts go to them, and my worshipers go to me” (9.25). The vast amount of time and energy spent on validating the gods within has put an overcast of Hillman’s earlier work on soul. It is noteworthy that while Emotion, first published in 1960, focuses on “the primacy of soul” (272) and yet the 1992 reissue is prefaced with polytheistic language (xi, xii, xiv). The diversity of the psyche, articulated with words like “archetypes”, “gods”, and “goddesses”, has been the focus of depth-psychology since Hillman’s Re-Visioning and little attention has been given to the Source of this re-visioning. Hillman re-visions the psyche through his concept of soul, that perspective which includes all the diversity that manifests itself from a Source.
Harold Davis notes that Hillman is considered a postmodern psychologist, and as such his adamancy on difference verses singularity is not surprising (Jung, Freud, and Hillman: Three Depth Psychologies in Context, 184-187). Perhaps Hillman’s contextual milieu explains his polytheism—authenticating a decentralized, differentiated psyche. However, if Hillman is part of a deconstruction campaign, as Davis notes similarities between Hillman and Jacques Derrida (185), it would only be logical to follow Hillman to his logical conclusion and deconstruct—see through—the pantheon of archetypal gods he so vehemently apologizes for. The past two millennium have been marked by countless monotheistic apologists; Hillman on the other hand—though part of the same body—is a polytheistic apologist.
As Krishna is analogous to the soul, the God within, so his manifestations (Gita, ch. 11) are interchangeable with the hosts of archetypes that stem from the soul of each individual, from the souls of humanity. To interpret Krishna in the Bhagavad-Gita through a monistic lens is a fallacy, as mentioned above. Similarly, seeing the teachings of Krishna as transcendental should also be avoided, for Krishna frequently and consistently urges Arjuna to take action (ex. 2.3 and 18.59-60). Thus far Krishna is in line with Hillman’s existential tendencies, as Davis reminds us that, “…the way for [Hillman] is through this world, not around it; psychologizing is about engaging the world, not denying or withdrawing from it or transcending it” (177). The psyche may be more accurately described as hosting many gods, but these gods make themselves known in and through the psyche. It is with the psyche, as with Krishna, that one perceives, experiences, and interacts with the universe; with the dissolution of the psyche comes the closure of one’s experience—inner and outer—of this world. Put simply, without soul, from where would the archetypes, the “gods within”, manifest themselves? Hillman would agree: from the soul.
A Krishna-Conclusion: Looking Beyond the Hill
Krishna of the Gita impersonates what depth-psychology refers to as psyche and soul, and it is with a Krishna-lens that one sees through the depth-psychological-pantheon of Greek mythology. Imaginary as it might be, one must question if Hillman’s looking back East to Greece does not stop short—if he should have kept heading East. Depth psychologies preoccupation with Greek mythology as the backdrop for the human psyche and all its diversity (i.e.—“pathologies”) prevents them from seeing through their own myth. The majority of depth psychology, if not Hillman than his followers, has fallen to Hillman’s own warning: “Archetypal here refers to a move one makes rather than a thing that is. Otherwise, archetypal psychology becomes only a psychology of archetypes” (A Blue Fire, 26-7). Yet credit must be given where credit is due.
Hillman, again in his earlier career, did go East. His commentary on Gopi Krishna’s Kundalini is insightful and re-visionary in itself as Hillman interpolates depth psychological insights to Gopi’s experiences. Hillman critiques the West’s Cartesian pathology of splitting mind and body, material and mental (68). Hillman even praises Kundalini yoga in its conceptual framework that prevents Gopi from having to grapple with what the West categorizes as “pathologies” (70). And yet, Hillman cannot help but conclude his commentary by noting that, “All the Gods are within” (250, emphasis mine). The adamant advocacy of a polytheistic psyche seems to be pathological itself as Hillman is captured by this mythical way of seeing.
Krishna-consciousness enables one to acknowledge the gods within; in fact, Krishna forewarns Arjuna that suppression of the gods’ force is detrimental to the individual for the gods will have their way despite our denying them (18.59). As Krishna comes into being through his own magic (4.6), so the psyche is constituted and sustained by a host of forces that are archetypal, and yet these archetypes are constituted and sustained by the soul. Like Hillman’s soul as perspective (Re-Visioning, x), so Krishna should be seen as a way of seeing. When Krishna-consciousness sets in, though, one realizes that the archetypes that are manifested and capture us are manifestations of one’s self. The manifestations might be articulated as “gods within”, but these gods serve and are served by the God within; they are created by and destroyed by the soul. It must be restated, however, that this does not denigrate, transcend, or belittle the very real heterogeneity that the soul/psyche manifests in each individual. Indeed, “see [the] forms in hundreds and thousands; diverse, divine, of many colors and shapes” (11.5) that reside within and materialize through each individual. Simultaneously, though, Krishna’s imagery and teachings deconstruct the assortments of life and then construct a unification that is constituted by, and could not exist without, the innumerable multiplicities that exist macro and microcosmically; externally and internally; that is, cosmologically and psychologically.
While depth psychology continues to theorize and practice polytheistic psychology, soul is working through their work. As manifestations of the soul, embodying archetypes, they serve and are served by the all-sustaining soul that enlivens us all. It is this soul that the Hindu’s designate in the humanly divine, or is it divinely human, Krishna. Until depth psychology can integrate the psychical understanding of the East, it will remain a strictly Western movement that intentionally sets its limits to its own chosen mythical perspective. One must ask, how deep is depth psychology willing to go? So deep that it looses itself and its hosts of Greek gods? Krishna reminds us, as he has for millions of adherents throughout the millenniums, in such a way that can only be archetypal, that even the archetype has a Source.

A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada. Bhagavad-gita As It Is. New York: Macmillan Company, 1972.

The Bhagavad-Gita: Krishna’s Counsel in Time of War. Trans. Barbara Stoler Miller. New York: Bantam Dell, 1986.

Davis, Harold. Jung, Freud, and Hillman: Three Depth Psychologies in Context. Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers, 2003.

Hillman, James. A Blue Fire. New York: Harper & Row, 1989.

-Emotion: A Comprehensive Phenomenology of Theories and Their Meaning. Evanston, IL: Northwestern UP, 1972.

-Re-Visioning Psychology. New York: HarperCollins, 1975.

-Suicide and the Soul. New York: Harper and Row, 1964.

Krishna, Gopi. Kundalini: The Evolutionary Energy in Man, with a Psychological Commentary by James Hillman. Boston: Shambhala, 1997.

Zimmer, Heinrich. Myths and Symbols in Indian Art and Civilization. Ed. Joseph Campbell. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1946.

Post-Jungian Criticism: Theory and Practice, edited by James S. Baumlin, Tita French Baumlin, and George H. Jensen

The Inner Journey: Views from the Hindu Tradition. Ed. Margaret H. Case. Sandpoint, ID: Morning Light, 2007.