That Thou Art - The Unknown Dimensions

Indu Pande’s  ‘That Thou Art : The Unknown Dimensions’  is not an easy read, but the difficulty has its own reward. It’s like climbing a tough hill: the trek is exhausting, but the view at the top is recompense for the effort.  The protagonist , Anna Lindermier  is the daughter of the Munich based  psychotherapist-clinical psychologist couple Dr Franz and Bertine Lindermier. She had   suffered a major childhood trauma when she witnessed the Munich massacre of 1972. A group of Palestinians had  shot dead some Israeli athletes in the Olympic village, not on account of any individual rivalry against anyone of them, but for the flag they carried and the passport they held.

After  studying psychiatry at the University of Heidelberg and the Jung Institute of Analytical Psychology, Zurich, Anna began her teaching career at the Ludwig Maximillan University of Munich. It was in Zurich that she was initiated into the works of  Keyserling whose ‘Diary of a Philosopher’  stated that ‘new psychology was nothing but a rediscovery of what was already known by the ancient seers of India’. Convinced that India was ‘the birthplace of contemplative psychology, where the ontological base and the epistemological super structure are  in harmony’  she set out to find a Guru to bridge the gap between ‘critical reason and supra rational intuition’.

This introduction   is necessary to foreground that her deep quest to discover answers was rooted in the philosophical tradition of the West. She had read  Plato, Aristotle and Socrates, Acquinas, Descartes, Berkely Goethe, Kant, Hegel, Schopenhauer and of course the modern psychoanalysts and existentialists Freud, Jung, Adler, Simone De Beauvoir, but obviously the questions in her mind, especially about how and why ‘civilized’  societies engage in violence, remained unresolved. 

Her Indian sojourn starts at Aahna - an upscale  resort close to the Corbett Park - named after the legendary Jim Corbett who became a conservationist after having been a trophy hunter. Her next stop is Rishikesh. Enroute, her driver-interlocutor Prem Singh  explains the plethora and hierarchy of local gods from Gram Devata, Kul Devata, Sthan Devata, to a host of malevolent and benevolent deities. He tells her about Jagar, the shaman-like ritual as well as the legend of Nanda Devi. While at Rishikesh, she picks up books on Yoga by  Swami Krishnananda and Sri Aurobindo. The bookshop owner directs her to an ‘old fashioned ashram’  whose inmates were followers of Krishnananda, and this sets the context for her onward journey to Tripatha Ashram in Harshil. While on the winding mountain roads, she wonders: if philosophers could have travelled across space and time, what would kind of  conversations would  Immanuel Kant and Sigmund Freud have had with Patanjali and  Krishan Dwaipayan Vyas ?

The Tripatha ashram was located on the banks of Jalandhari, a tributary of Bhagirathi. Here she meets Rohitashwa ,or Rohit for short – who tells her the story of Trishanku and Nachiketa to explain the ‘mysterium tremendum et fasinans’  of life. She wants to hear his story, but he first narrates to her the tale of this unique ashram which received substantial funding from its European patrons.

The story of Tripatha’s founder ,Madhav begins at the Rishikesh ashram of Swami Someshwaranand, who identifies him as a ‘mumukshu’, an aspirant seeking ‘moksha’.  Madhav joins the Gurukul Kangri at Haridwar for a deeper study of the Atharvaveda , the foundational text of Ayurveda . After his graduation , he  joins the Someshwaranand  ashram  as a practioner -teacher of both Yoga and Ayurveda . It is here that Veronica – the sophisticated sexual seductress – tries to tempt him, but there is a twist in the tale. She had not bargained her vulnerability in a two-way relationship, for the peace and tranquility of the monastic set up affected her deeply. Her  relationship with Madhav became one of mutual respect and positive collaboration for a cause. He  accompanies her to  Italy to teach  Yoga at the ski resort of Abetone in Tuscany. Here he  also  delves into a deep study of Dante’s ‘Divine Comedy’. Was the journey to Paradiso possible only through Inferno and Purgatory ?

During his five years in  Europe , he drew  lessons from Renaissance, Italian art, architecture and  design, German engineering, French cuisine. He also  absorbed  the landscapes of the Alps and Mediterranean . But when  Madhav  yearns  to return to his ancestral home at Harshil,   Veronica and her influential  friends extend  their financial support for the  establishment of the  Tripatha Ashram.

Anna insists on hearing Rohit’s journey as well. He starts with the story of his kaleidoscope. As a child, he had dissembled the ‘magical toy’  which gave him innumerable patterns of colours , shapes and symmetries. This led him to  realize that the magic was not in the parts, but in the configuration thereof. Over time , this   led him to the realization that  even ‘as we assume all objects to be static, the universe is actually a movement conditioned by space -time, and changing every moment ’. During a trip to Rishikesh when he was fifty, he met Leonardo Veritiero, a marine engineer, and  their  first discussion was on the sinking of Titanic in the freezing waters of the North Atlantic. Rohit acknowledged that some of his first Vedantic  insights came from the conversations with Leonardo .  This  went to show that the knowledge of the East could be well understood and propagated by the Western adherents as well.

Anna’s questions

We now come to Anna’s questions starting with Ko ‘ham : Who am I ? Rohit then explains to her the four Mahavakyas -Pragyanam Brahman - consciousness is the Absolute, Aham Brahmasmi - I am the Absolute , Tat Twan Asi – That  Thou Art That, and Ayam Aatma Brahman – My Self is the Absolute. Anna asks ‘why is it that a copy of the Bhagwat Gita is kept in all the rooms ? The answer comes from Sri Aurobindo who describes it  ‘as a scripture which professes Vedantic Yoga, an amalgam of Karma Yoga ( yoga of action ) with Gyan Yoga ( yoga of knowledge ) and Bhakti Yoga ( the yoga of devotion )’. Rohit also explained to her that Lord Krishna’s discourse was about elevating his disciple’s psycho -physical consciousness to a spiritual level where physics and metaphysics were the same’.

The discussion then moves on the Categorical Imperative of Kant, which finds resonance with  Nishkama karma in one’s own Swadharma : action as a duty without any regard to outcome. The Hypothetical Imperative on the other hand is Naimittik Karma - where action is performed to ensure a desirable outcome. Rohit then tells her the lore of Valmiki, Prajapati, Narada and Janaka and Buddha.  These narratives contained profound truths in simple language for the householder and the lay person to understand   deeper metaphysical questions. Acharya Shankar’s commentary on the Upanishads, and his ability to galvanize all of Bharat in his short life of thirty-two years left Anna wondering if such a person existed in flesh and blood, for unlike the earlier seers, there was a definite timeline to his birth, travels and establishments – and the Tripatha Ashram also claimed a definite affiliation to Badrinath and Kedarnath Dhams.

Were there any final solutions , or clear-cut answers ? She realizes on her return flight  that   the final message of the Bhagwat Gita was contained in the aphorism Yadiccha Tada Kuru (Chapter 18, Verse 63) : ‘you have access to all the knowledge , ponder over it completely, and then do as you wish’.