HEINRICH ZIMMER
447
rationalism, Zimmer was unconvinced by the idealism of progress. In–
stead of seeking his pleasure, however, in the
Douleu".en cage dada
a
La nage,
in the delirious images of Surrealism, or on the brink of the
abyss of the early Existentialists, he dove into Oriental mythology and
metaphysics; for there, as he had seen, was an idea of life precisely the
opposite of that represented in the contemporary West.
He began the study of Chinese under the distinguished Dutch Sin–
ologist Johann Maria de Groot-"a perfect embodiment," as
Zimmer
described him, "of the gentle wise Taoist Old Man"-who wakened his
interest in Tantric Buddhism. When Sir John Woodroffe's edition of
the Sanskrit texts of Tantric Hinduism began appearing in the early
'20s, Zimmer was fascinated-"seemingly," as he said, "to no concrete
purpose. I was simply caught up by it. I stuck to it as does a babe to
its bottle." In 1924, while preparing a paper for a periodical devoted
to Asiatic art, he discovered that his knowledge of the T antra was en–
abling him to comprehend hitherto unsuspected fundamental meanings
in Hindu and Buddhist architecture, sculpture, and painting, and the
article developed into his first important book: "Aesthetic Form and
Yoga in Indian Iconography"
Kunst/orm und Yoga
im
indischen Kult–
biLd
(Berlin, 1926). The work di sclosed an intrinsic connection between
the psychological experiences of Indian meditation and the fundamental
patterns of Indian art, and so rendered archaic both the purely aesthetic
approach to Oriental masterworks and the sterilities of the usual Occi–
dental, classicistic criticism. It was recognized immediately by the ar–
chaeologists of the French school as presenting something new in prin–
ciple; they began publishing monographs based on the hints in Zimmer's
study. And simultaneously, from another perspective, the psychologist
C.
G. Jung's interest was aroused; for this was the first published analy–
sis of the sacred diagrams of the Orient, and these were clearly counter–
parts, traditionally stylized, of forms that had been spontaneously ap–
pearing in the dreams and hallucinations of J ung's patients.
In defiance of the positivistic atti tude of his scholarly colleagues,
Zimmer had resolved, as a way of understanding, to believe that India's
truths were true-true for man, true for ever, and not merely as func–
tions of a local social context. Vowing not to translate any text before
he somewhat comprehended it (a bold vow for a professional Oriental–
ist), he had made the act of faith, demanded in India of every can–
didate for esoteric wisdom, that if he believed he would learn- St.
Augustine's
credo ut intelligam.
Also, he had condescended to the
Oriental notion that to think according to one system of ideas while
seriously trying to understand another is to invite impotence. "The real
task of this pursuit," as he explained it, "is, how to fit, in a legitimate
