Psychologia, 1960,3,100-112.

PSYCHOTHERAPEUTIC OBSERVATIONS ON THE ZEN DISCIPLINE - ONE POINT OF VIEW -

ERNEST DECKER

~raCllse University

psychotherapeutic observations on Zen, which attempt to equate its result with that effected by psychoanalysis, have generally been uncritical. Obviously, no word can be final in the present state of knowledge, and the entire question is open to and in need of much more thorough study. But there is one need which is not being met, it seems, and that is for a critical antidote, at the very outset, to a too complete equation of Zen with psychoanaly­ sis. This essay is an attempt in this direction, and criticism that it may stir up by its view of Zen will be scientifically welcome. Every parti pris repr'esents a point of departure, which is looked back to as knowledge advances, with inevitable misgivings about initial naiveness and unconscious bias reflecting one's own values. Any opportunity made available for a cross-fertilization of Eastern and Western views is uniquely in the scientific interest. One of the first psychiatrists to offer a survey of the psychological essentials of Zen was­ Albert Stunkard.* Most of his observations, representing insights of a skilled specialist, are right to the point. What Stunkard left unsaid seems to reflect the need for deeper study and more historical perspective on Zen. Deficiencies in his analysis stem from too rigorous a comparison of Zen to the psychoanalytic situation per se, as we shall see further on. Aspects of Zen which have "striking counterparts in current psychotherapeutic prac­ tice," are enumerated.** The first such element is the necessity for the presence of a master -a feature which in Zen is central to an acquisition of all the skills and to monastic life:

"This necesity reveals the interpersonal character underlying the Zen methodology." (page 423)

The manner in which the master acts upon the student is compared to the psychoanalytic method: the need to maintain a "delicate balance" between the "encouragement necessary to maintain the subject's participation, and the frustration required for his continued self­ examination." (page 424) Furthermore, Stunkard understands that the koan study "might be expected to lead to­ a certain degree of bewilderment." And, as he indicates, the central issue from a psychiatric point of view is "to account for the enormous emotional investment in such apparent non-­ sense." (page 424) The need for a resolution of ambivalence in the interpersonal relationship is particular­ ly clear to the psychiatrist-interpersonal adaptation under stress, and not reality-testing is. the main issue at stake for the disciple. Or, in the author's words:

* "Interpersonal Aspects of an Orieatal Religion," Psychiatry, 1951, 14, pp. 419-431. ** All the attributions which follow are from Stunkard, op. cit., unless otherwise noted. 100 PSYCHOTHERAPEUTIC OBSERVATIONS ON ZEN 101

" ..• if the master is the essential element of the training, the koan achieves its importance as it serves to relate the master and his disciple. The fact that all meditation is done in anticipation of the next contact with the master makes this most probable. And in a peculiarly apt way the koan symbolizes the impossible task of the child trying to find out what the parent wants; for he cannot give the right answer, and somehow the necessity that he do so grows." (page 425) This frustration leads to regression, and the "old reality loses its appeal." (page 425) The new task before the disciple is to win over the forbidding authority figure of the master, and it is this that becomes all-important. "The student attempts all his tricks of intellect, all his methods of feeling." In Eugen Herrigel's Zen in the Art of Archery (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1953), he recounts how he painfully arrived at a trick release of the bow-aimed to please the master, and not really to trick him. In other words, he wished to relieve the master's stressful censoriousness.* The stressful nature of the Zen discipline is apparent in the fact that there is no communication or symbolic mediation that can solve the koan dilemma: "The nature of the problem which is set is such that its solution is clearly and from the first beyond any attempt to understand it through the use of symbols. Instead Zen attempts a continuous con­ trontation of the student with the problem of defense as such-that is, with the problem of symbol mediation." (page 426) In psychoanalysis, on the other hand, a premium is put on symbol recall in free association. "if for no other reason than for the purpose of communication between the analysand and analyst." (page 426) The auther indicates that the koan method of extreme frustration might be expected to "lead to a deeper regression than one which relies in part at least on symbols." (page 426) " And there is evidence that such is the case, that regression occurs to pre-verbal stages of ego orga­ nization. In the experience of Enlightenment, one of the most striking aspects of the descriptions is what appears as a loss of ego boundaries •.. 'As I walked along I became aware that I was the same as the trees at which I was looking. It was not that I had ceased to be myself, but I had be­ come the trees as well." "Here is an abandonment of defense to a degree unknown in psychoanalytic procedure, an abandonment of defense not only against anxiety, but even against the loss of ego integrity. It is no wonder that accounts of the Enlightenment experience have a psychotic ring." Stunkard's observation on satori is that it seems to involve "no special insight." (page 4271 Rather, what occurs, is a change in the functioning of the individual. As we indicated else­ where (Ph. D. dissertation referred to above) even this change in functioning is not im­ mediate-satori is best understood as fmal introjection of the new value system, or superego of the master.** One of the tasks Stunkard sets himself is the psychiatric explanation of the arbitrary and irresponsible conduct described in the mondos (description in the literature, of persons who got satori.) The novice may hit or otherwise mock the master, etc. The auther

* This account of his Zen training by a Westerner who spent over six years learning Zen through archery, is an especially valuable document in any analysis of Zen as psychotherapeutic. The writer has treated this account at length in a Ph. D. dissertation now being submitted (Syracuse University. Advisor: Pro£ Douglas G. Har­ ing). Suffice it to insist here on the fact that the clear-cut dominance-submission pattern in the master-disciple relationship is unmistakable. Successful resolution of the Zen tuining leads, of course, to a conversion, or re­ education. But this is a therapeutic result achieved by introjection of the master's own superego-a process typi­ cal of any authoritarian or support therapy. ** It is possible that Stunkard confuses descriptions of states which precede satori with satori itsel£ 102 BECKER

uses Abraham's view that "the goal of therapy is the resolution of the patient's ambivalence and narcissism." (page 427) The origins of ambivalence are found "in the state of infantile helplessness and the con­ sequent dependence upon an outside source of security and satisfaction." Ingratiating tech­ niques alternate with hostility toward authority; the hostility gives way to attempts at concili­ ation,and the cycle "tends to perpetuate itself." Resolution of this ambivalence must be achieved by a resolution of the "infantile dependence upon symbols of authority." "Once this is achieved, it confers a freedom from. the threat of the disastrous consequences of un­ conscious attitudes, and permits action on a spontaneous basis impossible when ingratiation is a chief concern." (page 427) Stunkard sees in the Zen accounts of irreverence for authority reported in the mondos a therapeutic result precisely in Abraham's terms-a resolution of the ambivalence in the master-disciple relationship: the student slaps the master, and both laugh, etc. Bateson, et al., in their discussion of the "double bind" seem to agree with this point ofview.* Refer­ ring to the situation in which a stick is held over the pupil's head by the master, they com­ pare it to the double bind situation. The master says, "If you say this stick is real, I will strike you with it. If you say this stick is not real, I will strike you with it. If you don't say anything I will strike you with it." (page 254) In the double-bind situation, the schizophrenic is dis­ oriented. But, in the Zen situation, they claim that the disciple can achieve enlightenment by an assertive action: "The Zen pupil might reach up and take the stick away from the Master - who might accept the response, but the schizophrenic has no such choice ..." (page 254) Again, Zen is understood as having definite therapeutic results in its resolution of ambivalence toward authority. Stunkard finds this all the more remarkable, in that it comes against a back­ ground of "strongly patriarchal cultures of China and particularly Japan," where there is "painful acceptance of the traditional" on the part of the submissive individual. (page 427) Several qualifications are needed to this interpretation of a worth-while therapeutic re­ solution of ambivalence in Zen - a result that closely parallels the aims of psychoanalysis. This point is crucial, since most of the acceptance of Zen as a therapy, in the view of Westerners, is based on such an interpretation: spontaneous individuation and freedom derived from a resolution of ambivalence. From a psychoanalytic point of view, such an interpretation is quite natural. Gordon W. Allport has called attention to the general need for shock in personal­ ity change: "It is not commonly enough recognized that psychoanalysis is in part a form of psychological shock treatment. The patient finds himself, with considerable relief, thinking, and uttering shock­ ing ideas, sometimes lewd, sometimes blasphemous ... Feeling secure with his analyst, he dares to attack the rigidity of his own conscience, and to tumble the idols of his own infancy. Such men­ tal rioting is purging in its effect, startling and relieving." (The Individual and His Religion. New York: Macmillan, 1950, pp. 83-84) Clearly, the utterance of shocking and blasphemous ideas is a part of Zen training. From the Zen anecdotes there is little doubt that a psychological shock treatment is taking place. Obviously, what new materials the ego can incorporate which were previously "shock­ ing" are culturally defined. In Freud's culture, oedipus and latent homosexuality are powerful

------*C;egory B;teso~,~D. D. Jackson, Jay Haley, and John Weakland. "Toward a theory of schizophrenia," Behavioral Science, 1956, 1, 251-264. PSYCHOTHERAPEUTIC OBSERV ATIONS ON ZEN 103 confrontations which. when admitted by the individual. give a sense of self-mastery. For the oriental. a burning of a statue of the Buddha. or a reply that the Buddha is only "three pounds of flax" are conceivably quite contrary to childhood learning. The incorporation of this blas­ phemy into the ego signals a kind of adult maturity and freedom - a relief of previous super­ ego restraints. (In fact. historically. Zen was considered-by other sects-dangerous to Japan­ ese culture just because of its iconoclastic teachings.) Furthermore. as Weininger indicated. religious conversion generally is characterized by a new. more broadly permissive superego. and freedom from parental attachments. * Nor is it a secret that Freud himself was rather frightened by the impulses released in psychotherapy.** Aggression against the analyst for the hostility he arouses in the new trans­ ference can be powerful. In support therapy. where the authoritarian aspect of the analyst is strongest. tensions find an outlet through prescribed physical exercises. hobbies. and occupa­ tions. (The Zendo may indeed need its work routine to absorb latent hostility of the monks.) As W olberg indicated. the technique of supportive therapy is criticizable on the grounds of the frustration that the patient experiences as a result of the therapeutic situation - tension and hostility may become intense enough to break through repression, and "acting-out" of im­ pulses may result "which may be destructive to the patient and to the therapeutic relation­ ship."*** The patient may marshal his aggression and "violently break his ties with the therapist." (page 561) After all, one of the chief problems of therapy is the resolution of the transference arti­ ficially created in the analysis. The clear-cut ending, especially in psychoanalytic therapy, marks the successful cure. But. the ending may be "negative." as indicated, the patient may violently or aggressively turn against the therapist. Or. the ending may not be either positive­ ly or negatively clear-cut - the relationship may "drag on" and the patient's dependency on the therapist continue indefmitely. It is to be expected that. in Zen, the close master-pupil relationship, the extreme authoritarian aspect of the master. and the apparently deep transfer- ence, would present marked difficulties of ending. There is every reason to believe that such is the case: that a view of Zen as a therapy which uniformly effects a clear-cut resolution of the dependency - and therefore of the ambivalence - it creates, does not examine the facts closely enough. Some disciples never reach satori-it is one of the axioms of Zen that only the elite few can attain satori: the rest. the mass of novices and trainees in the skills of Zen, are thus conde­ mned to a continued dependency relationship that may extend over a lifetime. One is never perfect - perfectability is a process of constant application under the master or under his symbol. Herrigel, for example, was very anxious about how he should get on without the Master upon his return to Europe. The Master, releasing the pupil from his personal hold. created a strong symbolic tie: "In farewell, and yet not in farewell, the Master handed me his best bow. 'When you shoot with this bow you will feel the spirit of the Master near you. Give it not into the hands the curious!

* Benjamin Weininger. "The interpersonal factor in the religious experience, "Psychoanalysis, 19553, No. 4,27-44. ** Ruth 1. Monroe. Schools ofPsychoanalytic Thought. New York: Dryden, 1955 pp. 521-522. ***L.R. Wolberg. The Technique of Psychotherapy. New York: Grune and Stratton, 1954 p. 526. 104 BECK ER

And when you have passed beyond it, do not lay it up in remembrance! Destroy it, so thit noth ing remains but a heap of ashes.' " (Herrigel, op. cit. p. 90) The bow represents the Master's continued presence: "Even if broad seas lie between us, I shall always be with you when you practise what you have learned." (page 89) Thus, thele is no real weaning of the pupil, his dependence is sustained. There is absolutely no indication, in either of the accounts by the Herrigels, of any hap­ py equalitarian camaraderie between the pupil and the master, even after attainment of Sato­ ri.* There is no indication on the part of the master of the acceptance of any aggressiveness or disobedience on the part of the pupil. Indeed, with both the Herrigels, ending was very for­ mal-a test to pass in public and the awarding of a diploma testifying to their skill; the mas­ ter decided at which point the disciple was ready for the ending. It seems erroneous to con­ sider only the reported endings in the early accounts from the literature, as a basis on which to conclude that Zen represents a resolution of ambivalence toward authority in the sense of full, complete individuation and freedom. The original historical aim of Zen, in Japan, seems to have been to create good warriors, within an ethic characteristic of their status. The thorny problem for those early masters seems to have been the same as that of the modem therapist: " ... the patient must not be allowed to interpret bits of 'acting out' as a true resolution of his problems, even when his behavior is positively good." (Monroe, op. cit. p. 319) When the disciple seizes the stick with which he is threatened, or when he slaps the master in answer to a question-it is evidently up to the master to determine whether this represents a true grasp of the new value system - direct, uninhibited action in the place of cerebration. Or whether, on the other hand, it represents an aggressive acting-out, an exercise of one's impulses quite independent of any understanding as to what they mean of should mean. In any case, the acceptance of the slap, or of the aggressive act of the disciple cannot mean the end of the Master's authority, any more than the termination of Herrigel's training meant such an end. At best, resolution of the ambivalence to to authority is bought at the price of introjecting the superego of that authority. One is free from the domination of the particular mortal person of a master, but one has become a convert to his value system. In terms of a re­ ligious conversion, one replaces a more personally constraining superego by a more permis­ sive, more symbolic one. The social benefits of a reform therapy were already evident in the fearless performance and warrior ethics of the samurai as a class. They are even more evident in the practice of flower arrangement. There is no danger that prolonged exposure to the unique norms of a sub-culture will alienate the individual from the outside world. After all, as Weininger point­ ed out, the significant thing about a positive conversion experience is that it makes a useful member of society. (op. cit. pp 38 fr.) And Gordon W. Allport hat correctly glimpsed the aim of Zen: " ... in Zen therapy ... the stress seems to be on restored cohesion with the group." ("Personality, Normal and Abonrmal," in The Sociological Review, 1958, 6, No. 2, Dec. p. 178) Gusty Herrigel's account of her training in flower arrangement reveals the patent

* Mrs. Herrigel, Gusty L. Herrigel, wrote an account of her Zen training in flower arrangemenrt: La Voie des Fleurs-Le Zen dans l'artJaponais des compositiotlSjlorales. Lyon: Derain, 1957. PSYCHOTHERAPEUTIC OBSERVATIONS ON ZEN 105 emphasis on social morality: "The instructions given to the pupils are also applicable in life, in the forms of a voluntary adapta­ tion to daily existence." (op. cit. p.27) Once the art of the samurai, today by far the majority of the pupils, as reported by Mrs. Her­ rigel, are female students. In addition, corporations, banks and companies make available flower arrangement training to their employees. (page 29) One of the precepts that Mrs. Herrigel's Master used in his instruction was, significantly, "Be submissive to authority and to parents." (~tre soumis aux autorites et aux parents.") (page35) After this digression, let us return to Stunkard, who concludes his psychotherapeutic observations on Zen with other possible therapeutic achievements of the discipline. The first is the "resolution of narcissism," the elimination of an excessive self-preoccupation. The author indicates that it is to the resolution of the intrusion of the self in the task at hand that Zen is devoted. Consciousness of self is so lost that the goal and the act become one, and nothing stands between them. There seems to be too much interpretative license in this analogy. After all, there is nothing to indicate an abnormal degree of narcissism in the novice in the first place. Even more, a normal degree of narcissism is desirable, and by Stunkard's own previous admission, breakdown of the self and ego boundaries may be one of the extreme pathologi­ cal effects of the koan discipline. Finally, the author indicates that the goal of analysis is: " ... a sufficient reduction of anxiety in the patient so that he no longer need rely on distortion of reality (parataxic dIstortions) to maintain his security. This is evidenced by a minimization of such distortions to the extent that the person as he knows himself is that same as he is known to others." (page 429) Stunkard then makes an analogy between this kind of distortion, and the tenets of Buddhist philosophy. In Buddhism, illusions about the real nature of the world and compulsive attach­ ment to these illusions is the principal source of error and unhappiness:

H ••• the person is unconscious- in the same sense in which the term is used in psychoanalysis -of the presence of illusion in his actions. And, as in psychoanalysis, it is only after a long and arduous training that he can dispense with his illusions. (page 430) However, as we shall see more clearly, to eqate by analogy a reform method with an insight technique, by elastic use of symbols, is far from scientific. Stunkard neatly sidesteps the issue: "It appears that the principal difference between the ideas of illusion and parataxic distortion lies in the character of the reality they are said to obscure. And this is not a problem of psychology." (page 430) 'Stunkard sees quite clearly, however, that Zen is a religion: whereas in Christianity there is -surrender of the individual to faith in God, "Zen recognizes the surrender, and the faith, without the God." (page 431) If there is no God, then there is at least the Master, who be­ .comes the object of a symbolic tie. But there is a God in Zen, very much of a God, in fact, reflected in a firm belief in Cosmic Will and Universal Becoming. Erich Fromm's psychotherapeutic observations on Zen have recently appeared in this publication ("Psychoanalysis and Zen Buddhism," Psychologia, 1959, 2, pp. 79-99) and the views he presents are a part of his contribution to a forthcoming book, which will include a contribution from Dr. D.T. Suzuki. There is often an air of foolish bravado in the outsider's .criticism of the views of a specialist on the latter's home ground. Fromm's competence to discuss the psychotherapeutic aspects of Zen is unquestioned. However, the infelicities in his .comparisons of Zen and psychoanalysis are due to a frank attraction to Zen values as they are 106 BECKER hopefully understood on the most ideal level, by a Western humanist, who seems to lack perspective in Oriental history. In his discussion of satori he is right to the point: "Satori is not an abnormal state of mind; it is not a trance in which reality disappears. It is not a narcissistic state of mind, as can be seen in some religious manifestations." (page 82) Fromm does not, like Stunkard, seem to confuse the state whicn often precedes satori, in the literature, with satori itself. Satoriis dearly the final introjection of the new value system, the "acquisition of a new view-point. (page 83) The crucial task of the Master, as we indicated above, is confirmed by Fromm: " ... it is .. to differentiate between genuine sa/ori experience ... and a pseudo-experience which can be of a hysterical or psychotic nature, in which the Zen student is convinced of having obtain­ ed satori, while the Zen master has to make it clear that he has not ..." (page 83) Satori is final value interiorization. "Hysterical" or "psychotic" satori is really aggressive act­ ing-out; or, attempted manipulation of the new symbols without complete acceptance or understanding of the new value system*. Comparing the Zen master to the psychotherapist, Fromm says: "The master does not call the student, he wants nothing from him, not even that he becomes en­ lightened; the student comes of his own free will and goes of his ownfree will." (pages 85-86, italics added) It is quite apparent, both from the monastic accounts in the literature and from the first­ hand experiences of the Herrigels, especially Eugen Herrigel, that the disciple is not at all free to go of his own free will. The gradient nature of the therapy and the attendant trans­ ference bind him to the dominance-submission relationship. Obviously, he could tear him­ self away-though all of the pressures would be in the contrary direction. The double-bind is a bind in the true sense of the word**. (And here in the West one has heard the expres­ sion "to be hooked" by a therapist.) In affirmation of the fact that the master wants nothing from the student, that he is simply at the student's disposition in order to help him attain a genuine experience, Fromm quotes Suzuki: (For the master) " ... there is nothing to explain by means of words, there is nothing to be given out as a holy doctrine." (Introduction to Zen, p. 49) Nothing seems further from the facts. The entire account by Herrigel is a testimonial to a continued indoctrination in the symbols of a new view of reality-the holy doctrine is being­ continually expounded as all explallation of Herrigel' s successes or failures in learning the Zen skilL Fromm, like Stunkard, sees a common element in Zen and psychoanalysis in their in-­ sistence on independence from any kind of authority. But in interpreting the resolution of ambivalence to authority, it is apparent that even though the ambivalence may be resolved,. there is no real individuation: the pupil is at least very symbolically bound to the superego·

* One cannot avoid the impression-perhaps erroneous-from a close reading of the many accounts of satori in the earlier literarure, that examples of aggressive acting-out are indiscriminately included among cases of" "true" satori. Also, cases which have the unmistakable flavor of object breakdown and submission are termed. examples of satori. The formalized endings recounted by the Herrigels seem to testify to a more sophisticated, handling of their own method by the modern Zennists, than was perhaps the case of the masters of old. This is. pure speculation at this stage of study. ** See Bateson, et. al., op. cif. for a vi vid conceptualization of this phenomenon. PSYCHOTHERAPEUTIC OBSERV ATIONS ON ZEN 107

-of the master. There is the informative statement in Herrigel's account, to the effect that the new master - the enlightened pupil-is "ready for any sacrifice" : "With a gratitude as great as the uncritical veneration of the beginner, as strong as the saving faith of the artist, he now takes his Master's place, ready for any sacrifice." (page 66) Fromm, in fact, quotes from Herrigel's account in support of his contention that the master "does not want any irrational authority, any power over the student, or the continued depend. ence of the student on the master." (page 88) But the bow presented to Herrigel by the master is a definite symbolic link - the pupil is never really weaned from the new value sys­ tem, even if he is separated from the master. Quite obviously, irrational authority need not exist when one has accepted as one's OIVIl the master's reality framework. Fromm indiCates that Freud stressed the need for an impersonal attitude on the part of the therapist, whereas he himself, with Ferenczi and Sullivan, underscored the need for a relat­ edness between therapist and patient as a condition of understanding. However, says Fromm, all agree "that this relatedness must be free from all sentimentality, unrealistic distortions and especially, from any-even the most subtle and indirect-interference of the analyst in the life, aims and ideas of the patient." (page 89) Gusty Herrigel's account of her training in flower arrangement, and the precepts implanted by the master, can leave no doubt as to the utter incompatibility of Zen with psychoanalysis on this point. The dominance-submission relationship is used expressly to change the aims and ideas of the pupil. One can hardly CO!ll­ pare Zen and psychoanalysis as does Fromm, in their objective neutrality. The use of the koan parallels, for Fromm, the psychoanalytic procedure: "The Koan makes it impossible for the student to seek refuge in conventional thought; the Koan is like a barrier which makes further flight impossible. The analyst does - or should do - someth­ ing similar ... He must take away one rationalization after another, one crutch after another, until the patient cannot escape any longer and breaks through the fictions which fill his mind ..." (page 89) And then, in an olympian statement: "The more psychoanalysis developed, the clearer it became that effective insight was not a thought, but an experience of , seeing' something as new ... The authentic psychoanalytic insight ... arrives without being forced. It cannot be adequately formulated in words ... and it leaves the person who experiences it a changed person. The connection between the psychoanalytic attitude toward conscious thought and psychoanalytic 'insight' with the corresponding Zen attitude and Zen en­ lightenment hardly needs any further comment." (Loc. cit.) Let us grant to the specialist the veracity of his observations on the noncognitive nature of the psychoanalytic "insight" that causes a changed functioning; although it seems that this is the change that takes place after the emotional catharsis in analysis which, after all, is agreed upon by all as having primacy over any "intellectual" understanding by the patient. But, to equate the discipline of the koan, and its destroying of a logical causal view of reality, to the psychoanalytic taking away of the rationalizations and distortions of reality of the neurotic personality, seems to overlook an important distinction: The koan discipline does away with an habitual way of viewing external reality, via a dominance-submission relation­ ship: In psychoanalysis, the primacy of the emotional catharsis is indisputable, but the mind is used, in accustomed logicllI, causal thinking, to reinforce this catharsis via understanding: one is dispelling rationalizations about oneself-not abolishing a way of seeing the entire world Qf external reality. Now it may well be argued - in line with Stunkard's observation - that 108 BECKER the psychoanalyst sees "parataxic distortion" whereas the Zennist sees "illusion" - and one can take his choice. In other words, "what reality is one obscuring with what distortion?" Nor is a "logical, causal view of reality" an absolute: The Zennist scoffs at a logic that seeks to equate subjects in order to establish identities, whereas the psychoanalyst scoffs at a logic that seeks to equate predicates in order to arrive at the same result.* But, the impression of abso­ lute relativity that is conveyed is false. Paleologic, the equation of predicates, is a logic of emotionally-determined premises, as Arieti indicates: "The Virgin Mary was a Virgin, I am a virgin, therefore, I am the Virgin Mary." And emotionally-determined premises are not the best means for coping with external reality - however effective they may be in providing comforting beliefs in stressful areas ofliving. Fromm holds that the psychoanalytic "insight" does not appear "in our brain but .. in our belly." Of course, the psychoanalytic experience, as an emotional catharsis, creates a new individual, or rather one who functions differently. But can this be equated with Zen? After all, the psychoanalytic re-orientation is a clarification, a new orientation to one's own super­ ego, effected, optimaily, by understanding one's repressions and self-constraints; it is not an entirely new superego, effected by supportive, suggestive methods. Repression is lifted and self-understanding created by examining unconscious materials, not by re-orienting the in­ dividual to a new view of external reality. Fromm attempts to circumvent this distinction by calling attention to infelicities in the psychoanalytic terminology: "First of all I should like to point again to the terminological difficulty which, I believe, unneces­ sarily complicates matters; the use of the conscious and the unconscious, instead of the functional terms of greater or lesser awareness of experience of the total man. I believe, if we free our discussion from these terminological obstacles, Suzuki's discussion tends to confirm my suggestion that the true meaning of making the unconscious conscious expresses essentially the same goal as that of enlightenment." (page 92) The crux of the matter is here, and evidently Fromm's option for the Zen value system pre­ vents him from seeing it: if you abolish the theoretical structural system-unconscious versus conscious - then you are no longer talking about therapeutic un-repression as the bringing up of unconscious materials. You are talking, rather, about a total "eu-function" within a new value framework that utilizes the "total man" : regardless of what the individual learns about himsel£ Fromm makes this quite clear: "When Suzuki speaks of the Zen-man as being in 'direct communication with the unconscious,' I would prefer the formulation: being aware of his own reality, and the reality of the world in its full depth and without veils." (page 92) This may be achieved by insightful, critical transference analysis. But one doesn't get this· awareness by using Suzuki's methods: one simply gets a new package view of reality that re­ places the old view. One does not exercise insight, but simply employs newly adopted sym­ bols. Even a cursory reading of Herrigel will make the psychological dynamics quite clear: the symbols the pupil has 'adopted come as a stress-relieving response to the frustrations of the dominance-submission relationship. The new world view of Zen is not an awakened in­ sight; it is rather a conditioned insight in the full sense of the world. Fromm and Suzuki are

* See Silvano Arieti's conceptualization of "paleologic" in Interpretation of Schizophrenia, New York: Bruu­ ner,1955. PSYCHOTHERAPEUTIC OBSRVATIONS ON ZEN lOt) not really talking about the same thing. Insisting on the priority of "total experience" over "intellectual insight", Fronllll points out that Freud, in his earlier years, believed that giving the patient the proper information was enough to cure him, and Fromm bemoans the fact that some analysts still have not a­ bandoned this concept of intellection. He adds that Freud never expressed himself "with full clarity" on the difference between intellectual insight and the total experience which occurs in "working through." (page 93) "But this new and not intellectual insight is the aim of psychoanalysis." (page 93) But surely, even in transference analysis where un-repression is only incidental, the working-through is characterized, in Alexander's terms, by a "more and more precise verbalization of all the details of the emotional patterns." (Franz Alexander, "Therapeutic Factors in Psychoanalytic Treatment," Psychoanalytic Quarterly 1950, 19,482- 500.) Working-through without any intellectual insight at all would not be psychoanalysis - even if that insight takes a minor second place to the purely emotional aspects of the working-through. In psychoanalysis, the working-through is rendered profitable to the in­ dividual by punctuation with insights that are purely cognitive - that make an appeal to the patient's logic as his defenses crumble: "You are acting this way because you think I am your father," etc. In Zen too, there is an alternative reality offered in explanation of one's emo­ tional frustrations -~ "you cannot get off a good shot because you have too much will," ete. But the difference is obvious 'and vital: The latter is an imposed view of reality which, in order to be accepted by the individual, requires a total change in his logical, causal apprehen­ sion of the world. Psychoanalysis, in its revelation of insights, appeals to a logic already pos­ sessed by the healthy part of the patient-the individual is being communicated with, in part at least, in terms which he can understand. He has only to unlearn the distorted part of his reality apprehension. Referring again to Freud, Fronllll says that in his aim of replacing Id by Ego, the sector of the unconscious to be uncovered was a small onc in proportion to the total personality, and was determined by the therapeutic need to cure a particular symptom: "There was no interest in recovering unconsciousness outside of the sector related to the symp­ t0111 formation." (page 95) In spite of the widening of the sector of the unconscious to be uncovered, by Jung, Adler, Rank and the other Neo-Freudians, the extent of it to be therapeutically handled was deter­ mined by the desire to cure this or that symptom or this or that neurotic character trait. Un­ conscious contents representing unsuccessful repressions which affected one's ability to cope consciously were considered the cause of one's illness-treatment was confined to that sector of the unconscious: "It did not encompass the whole person." (page 95) The direction of Fromm' s reasoning is clear: " ... if one follows the original aim of Freud, that of making the unconscious conscious, to its last consequences, one must free it from the limitations which followed from Freud's own instinc­ tual orientation, and from the immediate task of curing sickness. If one pursues the aim of full recovery of the unconscious-then this task is not restricted to the instincts, nor to other limited sectors of experience, but to the total experience of the total man; then the aim becomes that of overcoming alienation, and of the subject-object split in perceiving the world; then the uncover­ ing of the uncollScious means the overcoming of affective contamination and cerebration; it means the disappearance of the state of repressedness." (page 95) no BECKER

Therapeutically-via psychoanalysis-the impossibility of realizing this aim is obvious. Id is replaced by Ego by means of working-through and insight. Or, in transference analysis, attention is confined to interpersonal processes largely. How, then, does one make the entire unconscious conscious? One is obliged to stick to the sector of the unconscious that has ther­ apeutic significance because that is the part of the unconscious that is troublesome. If, ·how­ ever, one takes for granted that the unconscious possesses creative powers, then a value is at­ tached to revealing those powers. But, how is this to be effected? Not, obviously, by the same methods of therapeutic uprooting of the repressed sector. There is no way of effecting, logi­ cally, a release of something that is not repressed. Therefore, the original aim of Freud can­ not be followed to its last consequences by using the psychoanalytic method. In order to ef­ fect a release of something that is not repressed - in order to give full creative power to the total individual, he nmst acquire a new value system as a total individual. If this is the case, then one has no business either using the psychoanalytic terminology, or equating the psy­ choanalytic method with this goal-psychoanalysis and Zen are not comparable. However, Fromm is much too thorough a professional to be oblivious to the real dif­ ferences between Zen and psychoanalysis. He differentiates two areas of comparison between Zen and psychoanalysis - aims and methods. In the former' - aims - he claims that the two methods coincide if one carries Freud's principle of replacing Id by Ego to its conclusion. But, in the area of "methods" From11l admits that there is a marked difference-a difference upon which we have been insisting throughout: the koan is a frontal attack that cannot be separated from the entire framework of Buddhist thinking-from the Buddhist world view. Psychoanalysis, on the other hand, is an "analytical," psychological-empirical method, that makes a person "less of a stranger to himself," that "uncovers illusion within oneself." (page 98) Thus, in his closing paragraphs, Fr0111l11 differentiates sharply between the Zen frontal attack within a value system, and the analytical, empirical nature of psychoanalysis. In doing this, he has, in our opinion, gone a long way to nullifying his entire previous discussion. In closing, Fromm become extremely tentative about his entire formulation: "I have suggested that the method of uncovering the unconscious if carried to its ultimate conse­ quences may be a step toward enlightenment, provided it is taken within the philosophical con­ text which is most radically and realistically expressed in Zen. But 01111' a great deal ojjllrtherexperi­ cllce ill applyillg this met/lOd call show how far it call lead. At this .1I01llelll the ,Jiew expressed here implies 01111' a possibility a/ld thlls has the character of a hypothesis to be tested." (page 98, emphasis added) The position that we are taking here, is that the two methods, Zen and psychoanalysis, cannot possibly lead to the same ends. The extreme authoritarian figure of the support analyst is duplicated in Zen, to a degree that surely no psychoanalyst would sanction. From accounts in the literature, there is no re­ straining the intensity of the transference into which the novice is plunged -- a restraint that present-day analysts advise. The transference neurosis seems much more intense then any real life situation, probably due to the 6ct that the disciple never knows what exactly is de­ manded of him until his regression becomes so complete that he simply surrenders to the new superego after along conditioning process. The pupil's old authoritarian frustrations are re­ enacted with heightened intensity in the master-disciple dyad -- and the pupil has only one choice: to yield anew by incorporating the new superego. He is not led to any clarification PSYCHOTHERAPEUTIC OBSERVATIONS ON ZEN 111 of his old conflicts or of his unconscious contents. Nor do sharp differences between Zen and psychoanalytic technique end here. One of the most recurrent problems in psychoanalytic literature is the problem of counter-transfer­ ence-the emotional entering-into the analysis on the part of the therapist himsel£ His alo­ ofness and objectivity are not compromised by sympathetic friendliness, but his usefulness as an impartial helper is seriously impaired by any personal, emotional involvement in the ther­ apy. Despite all claims of impartiality and disinterested objectivity made for the master, he seems to enter emotionally into the situation to a degree that would not be sanctioned in psy­ choanalysis: Accounts in the literature in which the master administers affectionate strokings on the back of the disciple, or the breaking off of the therapy because of an "affront" by the disciple-Herrigel's attempted "trick" loosing of the arrow, do not at all seem to typify a properly detached objectivity. There are abundant indications of counter-transference in the Zen literature. That the Zen therapy "works" in a very real sense, that it creates an individual who is convinced of a new-found strength and contentment, is not unexplainable in psychothera­ peutic terms. Incorporation of a new superego does not have to be accompanied by insight and self-knowledge-this is the well-known technique of support therapy. Support therapy aims at a strengthening of the ego in reference to the other structures. As Hartmann has observed: " •.. there is no doubt that the strengthening of the ego, one consequence of analysis ... may also result in the ego's taking over in its own organization certain functions that had previously been executed by the other sub-structures of personality (id and super-ego)." (H. Hartmann, "On Ra­ tional and Irrational Action," Psychoanalysis aud the Social Sciences, (G. Roheim, cd.) N.Y.; Inter­ national Universities Press, 1947, vol. 1, p. 391.) One way of strengthening the ego is to bring it into line with "the claims of the superego." (I. M. Carson and S. T. Selesnick: "Ego Strengthening Aspects of Supportive Psychotherapy," Amer. Journal of Psychotherapy, 1959, 13, No. 2, p. 303.) From Herrigel's account, it would seem that Zen effects precisely this alignment: the new functioning ego, emerging in a mastery of the skill being learned, meets approval of the superego in a ready explanation of every success - and disapproval for every failure. As long as the ego continues to expand by proper learning within this new value system, the superego continues to be approving and permissive. May, commenting on the length of the psychotherapeutic process, indicates that this is necessary because therapy is basically a learning process: "Regardless of the fact that in many instances insight may emerge as a sudden experience (and one only realizes later how long a building-up process was required to arrive at the point where a sudden insight was possible) .•• the important process is still one of changing reactions, attitudes, and ha­ bit patterns that are complex and have infinite ramifications. "* What is learned in this learning process, basically, is the ability of a stronger ego to work within a less restrictive superego framework. The "sudden insight", culmination of the

* RolIo May, "Historicall and Philosophical Presuppositions for Understanding Therapy," in Mowrer, O. H, ed., Psychotherapy- Theory and Research. N. Y., 1953, p. 34. The emphasis is added for a comparison to Fromm's comments on the "sudden insight" nature of the therapeutic cure, discussed above. This is a much more rational, causal explanation of this il\sight - it is simply the sudden culmination of a learning process. 112 BECKER learning process, or the therapy, seems to be nothing else than the sudden apprehension that one can indeed act on the basis of a new superego. One of the difficulties in Zen is the distinguishing of "true" from "false" satori - real apprehension of the value system versus the simple exercise of imagined new powers. In other words, the ego that is built up must derive and use its powers within the superego that is in­ culcated. The old superego is replaced concomitantly with the build-up of ego strength operating within the new value framework. Conscious understanding, or insight by the pa­ tient into his unconscious is sacrificed to the need to obliterate the old superego. Ego replac­ ing Id is not an absolute dictum of therapy where the enhancing of ego strength via re-repres­ sion is the goal. An individual whose psychic "economy" has been re-arranged by re-re­ pression, ego strength and a new superego, can function perfectly well without the need for any insight into himsel£ But this is not psychoanalysis. Ego strength in Zen seems to be built up by increased progress and proficiency in the Zen skill. But the environment of the Zen master-disciple interaction is a true sub-culture, isolated from the widespread values of the world at large. There is a magical quality surround­ ing the esoterics prototaxically and verbally imparted by the master to the disciple. And the creative activity of the Zen skill seems to provide experiential confirmation of the other­ worldly values of the Zen sub-culture. Effective adjustment to environment and role respon­ sibilities can be maintained by periodic, rejuvenating withdrawal; it is perhaps here that Zen can be said to be therapeutic in a true sense, and is at the same time at a polar remove from the result effected by psychoanalysis.

MS. received I 25,60.

Ernest Becker (1924-) graduated from Syracuse University in 1950. Ph. D. in Cultural Anthropology from Syracu,e University, 1960. Assistant in Sociology and Anthropology, Syracuse University, 1958-1960. Instruc­ tor in Anthropology, Department of Psychiatry, New York State College of Medicine, (Upstate Center) Syr­ acuse, N. Y. Member, Phi Beta Kappa, Sigma Xi. Ph. D. Dissertation on Zen and Psychotherapy, from which this article is taken, is in preparation for publication by W. W. Norton & Co.