Mystical Man in India.

It is the contention of this paper that there is interpretive value in looking at aspects of mystical experience from the perspective of the psychological development of man's growth from childhood to maturity, it is not argued that mystical experience is a simple function of psychological crises in human development, but it is maintained that psychoanalytic interpretations of human development do provide clues for gaining a new perspective on mystical experience and can contribute to building a mystical anthropology. The mystical traditions of India provide the context (or the analysis. Based on these many traditions it is possible to suggest a four-fold typology of mystical experience oriented primarily around the stages of human development. Enough texts are readily available in the Sanskrit Literature to set the typology in a psychological, sociological, and linguistic framework that is reasonably homogeneous and integral. The typology includes the following kinds of mystical experience; (a) unitive, (b) isolative, (c) copulative, and (d) nihilative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]