Cultural Histories of Meditation Practice and Interpretation in a Global Perspective

12-16 May 2010 Halvorsbøle Jevnaker, Norway Programme

Wed 12 May 15-16 Opening (Halvor Eifring) Coffee and tea break 16.30-18.30 Ancient Hebrew and Judaic meditation (chair Masaya Mabuchi) Terje Stordalen: Ancient Hebrew Recitative Meditation (discussant Bart Dessein) Michael Swartz: Mystics without Minds? Body and Soul in Merkavah Mysticism

(discussant Jongmyung Kim) Alan Brill: Meditative Prayer in Cordovero (discussant M.D. Muthukumaraswamy) Lawrence Fine: Spiritual Friendship as Contemplative Practice in Hasidism (discussant

Øyvind Ellingsen) 19.00-20.00 Dinner Thu 13 May 8-8.45 Breakfast 9-10.30 Islamic meditation (chair Jens Braarvig) Jamal Elias: Textual Instructions on the Practice of Dhikr in the Early Kubrawiya

(discussant Per Rönnegård) Shahzad Bashir: Movement and Stillness: The Practice of Sufi Zikr in Fourteenth-

Century Central Asia Paul Stange: The Inner Islamization of Java: A Politics of Attention (discussant Halvor

Eifring) Coffee and tea break 11-12 Early Christian meditation (chair Jens Braarvig) Per Rönnegård: Melétē in Early Christian Ascetic Texts (discussant Stephen Eskildsen) Henrik Rydell Johnsén: Practice of the Jesus Prayer in Early Christian Monasticism and

the Matrix of Philosophical Meditation (discussant Morten Schlütter) 12-13 Lunch 14.30-16 Later Christian meditation (chair Per Rönnegård) Mary Frohlich: Teresa Of Avila’s Evolving Practices of ‘Representing’ Christ in Prayer

(discussant Gustaaf Houtman)

Nicolas Standaert: The Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola in the China Mission of the Early Seventeenth Century (discussant Henrik Rydell-Johnsén)

Judi Loach: Painting in the Mind: the Early Jesuit Development of Ekphrastic Meditation, as Exemplified by Louis Richeome's "Peinture Spirituelle" (discussant Svend Davanger)

Coffee and tea break 16.30-18 Biomedical meditation research (chair Henrik Rydell-Johnsén) Are Holen: Mindfulness and Mental Attitude in Modern Meditation Practices Øyvind Ellingsen: Biomedical Classification of Meditation Techniques (discussant Judi

Loach) Svend Davanger: The Natural Science of Meditation: A “Black Box” Perspective?

(discussant Ching-wei Wang) 19-20 Dinner Fri 14 May 8-8.45 Breakfast 9-12 Hindu yoga and tantra (chair Svend Davanger) Edwin Bryant: The Seven Stages of Samādhi in Patañjali’s Yoga Sūtras (discussant

Robert Sharf) Knut Axel Jacobsen: Meditation Practices in a Contemporary Sāṃkhya-Yoga Tradition

(Peter Flugel) Coffee and tea break Johannes Bronkhorst: Can There Be a Cultural History of Meditation? With Special

Reference to India (discussant Harold D. Roth) M.D. Muthukumaraswamy: Vedic Chanting as Householder's Meditation Practice in

Tamil Śaiva Siddhānta Tradition (discussant Sarah Shaw) 12-13 Lunch 14-16 Hindu, Jain and Sikh meditation (chair Øyvind Ellingsen) Daniel Gold: Two Yogic Paths to the Formless Lord: the Hindi Sants’ Ways Out of the

Body (discussant Louis Komjathy) Peter Flugel: Meditation in the Jain Tradition Asha Mukherjee: Jaina Meditation: Self-purification Process through Karmic Cycle

(discussant Mary Frohlich)

Kristina Myrvold: Remembering the Divine Name: Religious Perceptions and Practices of Nām Simran in the Sikh Religion (discussant Tse-fu Kuan)

Coffee and tea break 16.30-18 Mid-conference discussion (Are Holen) 19-20 Dinner Sat 15 May 8-8.45 Breakfast 9-12 Early and Theravada Buddhist meditation (chair Knut Jacobsen) Jens Braarvig: Words for ‘Meditation’ in Classical Yoga and Early Buddhism (discussant

Paul Stange) Bart Dessein: Contemplation of the Repulsive: Bones and Skulls as Objects of Meditation

(discussant Jamal Elias) Tse-fu Kuan: Mindfulness and Concentration: Cognitive Operations in Buddhist

Meditation (discussant Donald Baker) Coffee and tea break Gustaaf Houtman: Vipassana in Burma: Self-government and the Ledi Anapana

Tradition (discussant Asha Mukherjee) Sarah Shaw: How Meditation Objects are Described, Taught and Used in Pāli Text and

Narrative (discussant Lawrence Fine) 12-13 Lunch 14-16 Tibetan and Chinese Buddhist meditation (chair Kristina Myrvold) Geoffrey Samuel: Tibetan Longevity Meditation: Technique and Structure in the ’Chi-

med Srog-thig (Immortal Life-Essence) Practice (discussant Johannes Bronkhorst) Ching-wei Wang: Approaches to the Lotus Samādhi before the Seventh Century in

China: An Analysis of Textual and Iconographical Evidence (discussant Masaya Mabuchi)

Halvor Eifring: Spontaneous Thoughts in Meditative Traditions (discussant Michael Swartz)

Coffee and tea break 16.30-18 Chán / Sôn / Zen Buddhist meditation (chair Terje Stordalen)

Robert Sharf: Meditations on Mindlessness in Early Chán Buddhism (discussant Edwin Bryant)

Morten Schlütter: On the History and Evolution of Kōan Introspection in Chinese Chán (discussant Daniel Gold)

Jongmyung Kim: Discourses on Buddhist Praxes in Contemporary Korea: Issues, Analysis, and Alternatives (discussant Madhu Khanna)

19-20 Dinner Sun 16 May 8-8.45 Breakfast 9-12 Daoist and Confucian meditation (chair Shahzad Bashir) Harold Roth: Meditation in the Classical Daoist Tradition (discussant Kristina Myrvold) Louis Komjathy: Daoist Clepsydra Meditation: Late Medieval Quánzhēn Monasticism

and Communal Meditation (discussant Nicolas Standaert) Stephen Eskildsen: Red Snakes and Angry Queen Mothers: Hallucinations and

Epiphanies in Medieval Taoist Meditation (discussant Geoffrey Samuel) Coffee and tea break Donald Baker: The Popularity of Cinnabar-field Meditation in Korea (discussant Shahzad

Bashir) Masaya Mabuchi: The Role of Meditation in Song-Yuan-Ming Confucianism and the

Emergence of the Philosophy of Three Religions in One (discussant Jens Braarvig) 12-13 Lunch 13.30-15 Concluding discussion (Halvor Eifring)

Other papers Drafts submitted for inclusion in the conference volumes: Bhikkhu Anālayo: The First Absorption (Dhyāna) in Early Indian Buddhism: A Study of

Source Material from the Madhyama-āgama. Augustine Casiday: Byzantine Vocal (Aniconic) Meditative Practices and Visualising

Salvation: On the Counter-Reformation Classics Popularised by St Nikodimos of Mt Athos (1749-1809)

Jeffrey Cooper: Tracing the ”Pathless-Path of Prayer”: Is There a Meditation Method in Meister Eckhart

Madhu Khanna: Yantra and Cakra Homologies in Tantric Meditation (discussant Alan Brill)

Rur-Bin Yang 楊儒賓: Neo-Confucian “Maintaining Diligence” and “Maintaining Tranquility” 主敬與主靜

The following papers will be submitted for publication in the conference volumes: Bettina Bäumer: Creative contemplation [bhāvana] in the Vijñāna Bhairava Eitan Fishbane: Intention and Contemplative Technique in Kabbalistic Prayer Hanna Havnevik: The gcod and rdzogs chen meditational practices of the Tibetan yoginī

and nun Ani Lochen Rinpoche [1865-1951] Livia Kohn: Insight Meditation in Buddhism and Daoism: the Role of Culture and

Cognition in Meditative Practices Giuliana Martini: Meditation on the Unattractive in a Mahāyāna Work in Khotanese Serafim Seppälä: Meditation in East Syrian Mysticism Columba Stewart: The Use of Short Verbal Formulae and the Emphasis on Tears in the

Meditative Practices of John Cassian and Diadochus of Photike Antonio Terrone: Meditation on Illusory Bodies, Bliss-Emptiness, and Lamps: The Great

Perfection System [rdzogs chen] in the Tibetan Buddhist Tradition

List of participants Donald BAKER, University of British Columbia, Canada Shahzad BASHIR, Stanford University, U.S.A. Jens BRAARVIG, University of Oslo, Norway Alan BRILL, Seton Hall University, U.S.A. Johannes BRONKHORST, University of Lausanne, Switzerland Edwin BRYANT, Rutgers University, U.S.A. Svend DAVANGER, University of Oslo, Norway Bart DESSEIN, Ghent University, Belgium Halvor EIFRING, University of Oslo, Norway Jamal ELIAS, University of Pennsylvania, U.S.A. Øyvind ELLINGSEN, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norway Stephen ESKILDSEN, University of Tennessee, Chattanooga, U.S.A. Lawrence FINE, Mount Holyoke College, U.S.A. Peter FLUGEL, London University, U.K. Mary FROHLICH, RSCJ, Catholic Theological Union of Chicago, U.S.A. Daniel GOLD, Cornell University, U.S.A. Are HOLEN, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norway Gustaaf HOUTMAN, Royal Anthropological Institute, U.K. Knut Axel JACOBSEN, University of Bergen, Norway Henrik Rydell JOHNSÉN, Lund University, Sweden Jongmyung KIM, Academy of Korean Studies, Republic of Korea Louis KOMJATHY, University of San Diego, U.S.A. Tse-fu KUAN 關則富, Yuan Ze University, Taiwan Judi LOACH, Cardiff University, U.K. Masaya MABUCHI 馬淵昌也, Gakushuin University, Japan Asha MUKHERJEE, Visva-Bharati University, India M. D. MUTHUKUMARASWAMY, National Folklore Support Centre, India Kristina MYRVOLD, Lund University, Sweden Per RÖNNEGÅRD, Lund University, Sweden Harold ROTH, Brown University, U.S.A. Geoffrey SAMUEL, Cardiff University, U.K. Morten SCHLÜTTER, University of Iowa, U.S.A. Robert SHARF, University of California, Berkeley, U.S.A. Sarah SHAW, Oxford University, U.K. Nicolas STANDAERT, Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium Paul STANGE, Murdoch University, Australia Terje STORDALEN, University of Oslo, Norway Michael SWARTZ, Ohio State University, U.S.A. Ching-wei WANG 王晴薇, National Yunlin University of Science and Technology, Taiwan

This conference was made possible by the generous support of the following institutions:

The Institute for Comparative Research in Human Culture, Oslo

Kultrans, University of Oslo

PluRel, University of Oslo

Department of Culture Studies and Oriental Languages, University of Oslo

Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange, Taipei

Research Center for Monsoon Asia, National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu