Response to Sudhir Kakar: Psychoanalysis and Eastern spiritual healing traditions

Dr. Kakar suggests that an idealizing transference is central to the guru-disciple relationship, but in this situation the origin and evolution of this transference is quite different than it is in the psychoanalytic relationship. Dr. Kakar respects this relationship - indeed he believes that psychoanalysts could benefit from meditation training - but he casts the entire guru-disciple situation in terms of idealization and its healing potential. He claims that spiritual disciplines imparted by a teacher are attractive because they promise ‘immediate healing by the spiritual teacher’ (p. 8) rather than simply spiritual development. For Dr. Kakar, one's unconscious motive for spiritual practice is the consolidation and development of the self rather than spiritual evolution - that is, all disciples are idealization-hungry personalities seeking to heal their self disorders. In fact, he believes that the guru reaches levels of the psyche that are so regressed they are usually only touched in therapy with borderline patients. This is because spiritual teachers are capable of extraordinary empathy as a result of meditation practice that reduces the intrusion of the personal self. Their heightened empathy accounts for the teachers’ healing ability and fosters a selfobject merger, which allows the guru to be - psychologically speaking - always and everywhere available to the disciple. Dr. Kakar contrasts the guru's attempt to foster idealization, by asking for complete surrender, with the analyst's effort to consolidate a sense of personal agency (p. 12).

I believe that Dr. Kakar has exaggerated the importance of idealization by using it to explain too much. It is true that, whereas the psychotherapist allows gradual de-idealization to occur so that the transference is interpreted and worked through, the idealization-hungry disciple has little opportunity to resolve his transference. Consequently, he remains emotionally in thrall to the guru unless traumatic disappointment o