Jeffrey J. Kripal

Jeffrey J. Kripal (Ph. D., University of Chicago, 1993) is the J. Newton Rayzor Professor of Religious Studies and Chair of the Department of Religious Studies at Rice University, Houston, Texas. His areas of interest include the comparative erotics and ethics of mystical literature, American countercultural translations of Asian religions, and the history of Western esotericism from ancient gnosticism to the New Age.Fact|date=September 2008

Kripal's 1995 book ' was a psychoanalytic study of the Bengali mystic Ramakrishna.Fact|date=September 2008 "Kali's Childs primary thesis is that a great deal of Ramakrishna's mystical experiences were generated by the lingering results of childhood traumas, and sublimated homoerotic and pedophiliac passions.Fact|date=September 2008 Kripal never claims that Sri Ramakrishna actually molested children.Fact|date=September 2008 He argues that "Ramakrishna’s mystical experiences...were in actual fact profoundly, provocatively, scandalously erotic." [Jeffrey J. Kripal, "Kali's Child: The Mystical and the Erotic in the Life and Teachings of Ramakrishna", p. 2] The book "Kali's Child" got mixed reception among scholars, and caused intense controversy among both Western and Indian audiences which still persists unresolved.cite journal
last = Urban
first = Hugh B
title = Reviewed work(s): Kali's Child: The Mystical and the Erotic in the Life and Teachings of Ramakrishna by Jeffrey J. Kripal
journal = The Journal of Religion
volume = 78
issue = 2
pages = pp. 318-320
publisher = The University of Chicago Press
date = Apr., 1998
url = http://www.jstor.org/stable/1205982] cite journal
last = Roland
first = Alan
title = Ramakrishna: Mystical, Erotic, or Both?
journal = Journal of Religion and Health
volume = 37
issue = 1
pages = pp. 31-36
publisher = Springer Netherlands
date = March, 1998
DOI = 10.1023/A:1022956932676
url = http://www.springerlink.com/content/hu55hq066jh60241/?p=9568dbec04cb4ae387947dfe3d2c33a3&pi=1
quote = "... Kali's Child still swirls around in controversy"] [ J. S. Hawley, "The Damage of Separation: Krishna’s Loves and Kali’s Child", 2004] The book came into limelight and created controversy in India after a scathing review written by religious scholar Narasingha Sil was published in "The Statesman".

In 2003, Kripal wrote a foreword to "The Knee of Listening", a book by American guru Adi Da. In it he said, referring to Da's writings:

In my opinion, this latter total corpus constitutes the most doctrinally thorough, the most philosophically sophisticated, the most culturally challenging, and the most creatively original literature currently available in the English language. [ [http://www.kneeoflistening.com/f1-kripal.html Foreword by Jeffrey Kripal ] ]

Notes

Works

*"Esalen: America and the Religion of No Religion" (Chicago, 2007)
*"On the Edge of the Future: Esalen and the Evolution of American Culture" edited with Glenn W. Shuck (Indiana, 2005)
*"Encountering Kali: In the Margins, at the Center, in the West" edited with Rachel Fell McDermott (California, 2003)
*"Crossing Boundaries: Essays on the Ethical Status of Mysticism" edited with G. William Barnard (Seven Bridges, 2002)
*"Roads of Excess, Palaces of Wisdom: Eroticism and Reflexivity in the Study of Mysticism" (Chicago, 2001)
*"Vishnu on Freud’s Desk: A Reader in Psychoanalysis and Hinduism" edited with T.G. Vaidyanathan (Oxford, 1999)
*"Kali's Child: The Mystical and the Erotic in the Life and Teachings of Ramakrishna" (Chicago, 1995, 1998)
* "The Serpent's Gift: Gnostic Reflections on the Study of Religion" (Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2006), 232 pp.

External links

*" [http://smallworldpodcast.com/?p=603 Interview with Jeffrey J. Kripal] " - [http://smallworldpodcast.com small WORLD Podcast] 2007
* [http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/453699.html An excerpt] from "Esalen: America and the Religion of No Religion."