Module-17
Mystic Literature
Objective: The objective of this module is to make the readers aware of the mystic literature of
the world. However, the mystic literature is a vast field with varied genres. Therefore, this
module aims to focus on some select writers of mystic literature.
Rumi
Kabir
Walt Whitman
British Romantic Poets
Rabindranath Tagore
Swami Vivekananda
Sri Aurobindo
Jiddu Krishnamurti
Background:
The ancient literature of the world mostly comprises of scriptures, sacred texts, classical plays,
epics and treatises. All these branches of literature were didactic and propagated the doctrine of
art for society’s sake. There was nothing called mystic literature as such. We all know that the
term came into fashion much later in the last decade of the 19th century, when critics like
William James, Evelyn Underhill and Walter Stace streamlined the scattered discussion on
mysticism and defined the characteristics of it. Prior to the formalisation of the term, the element
of mysticism had been there in The Gita, and in the writings of Plato and Plotinus. Later, in the
13th and 14th centuries, writers like Rumi and Kabir expressed their mystic realisation very
prominently in their poetry, which could not be categorised under religious literature. The image
of mysticism as we find in chapter xiv of The Gita, speaks of our union with the supreme self in
us. The concept of supreme self is also there in the writings of Plotinus.
For I am the image of Brahma, the Immortal and Immutable, of Righteousness eternal,
and of joy culminating in the One (Mukherji: 2000, 130).
Plotinus (204 AD- 270 AD) in the The Six Enneads has explained in details about the self and the
soul. In the first tractate of The First Ennead, he says that the soul is a living organism.
We may treat of the Soul as in the body- whether it be set above
it or actually within it- since the association of the two constitutes
the one thing called the living organism, the Animate.
A little later in the same tractate, he explains the concept of the soul. There we see that he knew
very well the concept of soul as explained in Oriental Scriptures that the individual soul is the
spark of the divine soul and the divine soul “shines’ into all.
1
, In that the Divinity is contained in the Intellectual-Principle and Authentic-Existence; and
We come third in order after these two, for the We is constituted by a union of the
supreme, the undivided Soul-we read- and that Soul which is divided among [living]
bodies. For, note, we inevitably think of the Soul, though one undivided in the
All, as being present to bodies in division: in so far as any bodies are Animates, the Soul
has given itself to each of the separate material masses; or rather it appears to be present
in the bodies by the fact that it shines into them: it makes them living beings not by
merging into body but by giving forth, without any change in itself, images
or likenesses of itself like one face caught by many mirrors.
We can say the teachings of The Gita and Plotinus can be the example of early mystic literature.
Mawlana Rumi :
Mowlana Jalal al-Din Mohammad Rumi (1207-1273) was a Sufi mystic poet from Turkey.
Sufism, as we know, is a way of experiencing the Truth through love and devotion. For some, “it
might also include a predilection for divine vision, including lights, glimpses of heaven, angels,
or even God. As such it involved an individual and personal orientation toward God” (Franklin
D. Lewis, 2007: 21). Sufi mystics belong to the class of the ulama, who had been the
practitioners of “mystical or interior spirituality. They concentrated on a person’s inner attitude
and orientation…” (22). Sufism had nothing to do with religious piety and rituals. Sufi mystics
2
Mystic Literature
Objective: The objective of this module is to make the readers aware of the mystic literature of
the world. However, the mystic literature is a vast field with varied genres. Therefore, this
module aims to focus on some select writers of mystic literature.
Rumi
Kabir
Walt Whitman
British Romantic Poets
Rabindranath Tagore
Swami Vivekananda
Sri Aurobindo
Jiddu Krishnamurti
Background:
The ancient literature of the world mostly comprises of scriptures, sacred texts, classical plays,
epics and treatises. All these branches of literature were didactic and propagated the doctrine of
art for society’s sake. There was nothing called mystic literature as such. We all know that the
term came into fashion much later in the last decade of the 19th century, when critics like
William James, Evelyn Underhill and Walter Stace streamlined the scattered discussion on
mysticism and defined the characteristics of it. Prior to the formalisation of the term, the element
of mysticism had been there in The Gita, and in the writings of Plato and Plotinus. Later, in the
13th and 14th centuries, writers like Rumi and Kabir expressed their mystic realisation very
prominently in their poetry, which could not be categorised under religious literature. The image
of mysticism as we find in chapter xiv of The Gita, speaks of our union with the supreme self in
us. The concept of supreme self is also there in the writings of Plotinus.
For I am the image of Brahma, the Immortal and Immutable, of Righteousness eternal,
and of joy culminating in the One (Mukherji: 2000, 130).
Plotinus (204 AD- 270 AD) in the The Six Enneads has explained in details about the self and the
soul. In the first tractate of The First Ennead, he says that the soul is a living organism.
We may treat of the Soul as in the body- whether it be set above
it or actually within it- since the association of the two constitutes
the one thing called the living organism, the Animate.
A little later in the same tractate, he explains the concept of the soul. There we see that he knew
very well the concept of soul as explained in Oriental Scriptures that the individual soul is the
spark of the divine soul and the divine soul “shines’ into all.
1
, In that the Divinity is contained in the Intellectual-Principle and Authentic-Existence; and
We come third in order after these two, for the We is constituted by a union of the
supreme, the undivided Soul-we read- and that Soul which is divided among [living]
bodies. For, note, we inevitably think of the Soul, though one undivided in the
All, as being present to bodies in division: in so far as any bodies are Animates, the Soul
has given itself to each of the separate material masses; or rather it appears to be present
in the bodies by the fact that it shines into them: it makes them living beings not by
merging into body but by giving forth, without any change in itself, images
or likenesses of itself like one face caught by many mirrors.
We can say the teachings of The Gita and Plotinus can be the example of early mystic literature.
Mawlana Rumi :
Mowlana Jalal al-Din Mohammad Rumi (1207-1273) was a Sufi mystic poet from Turkey.
Sufism, as we know, is a way of experiencing the Truth through love and devotion. For some, “it
might also include a predilection for divine vision, including lights, glimpses of heaven, angels,
or even God. As such it involved an individual and personal orientation toward God” (Franklin
D. Lewis, 2007: 21). Sufi mystics belong to the class of the ulama, who had been the
practitioners of “mystical or interior spirituality. They concentrated on a person’s inner attitude
and orientation…” (22). Sufism had nothing to do with religious piety and rituals. Sufi mystics
2
