| Library / Biographies |
Lilian Silburn Biography
Lilian SilburnLilian Silburn was born in Paris on 19 February 1908 to a French mother and a British father. From her childhood she had a feeling of divine grace and kinds of ecstasies, but she was a child and then an active, cheerful adolescent, already a good swimmer, well integrated into the world. She was also very independent, having a taste for the great outdoors and solitude.
She wanted to enter religion, but her as parents opposed, she opted for studies of philosophy (followed from 1938 to 1948), believing that it would help her to approach the ultimate Truth to which she aspired.
At the Sorbonne, she was close to the French philosopher Gaston Bachelard, but she turned early towards Indian spirituality, learning Sanskrit, Pali, and even Avestan1, following the teachings of Louis Renou, Paul Fouché and Paul Masson-Oursel.
She became particularly interested in Kashmiri Śivaism. She graduated from École Pratique des Hautes Études, with a thesis on the Śivasūtravimarśinī of Rajanaka Kṣemarāja, a tantric Śivaite text.
In 1947, her study on Kashmiri Śivaism and Tantrism appeared in the first volume of L’Inde classique. She was then also writing her doctoral thesis, Instant et Cause, Le discontinu dans la pensée philosophique de l’Inde. She then entered the Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS) where she spent her entire career as an Indianist.
Desiring to deepen her knowledge of these traditions which would be the object of her research throughout her life, Lilian Silburn went to India in 1949 to work with Swami Lakshman Joo.
She lived in difficult conditions not far from Swami’s ashram and returned regularly for the next ten years, during which time she studied the major texts of Kashmir Shaiva philosophy, in particular Tantrāloka2 of Abhinavagupta. It was through Silburn that André Padoux, another prolific scholar of Kashmir Shaivism came to meet Swami Lakshman Joo.
But she also hoped to find in India a spiritual master who would open for her a way to Realization, beyond any religious form.
She found that in the city of Kanpur, in the Sufi master Radha Mohan Lal Adhauliya - a Kayasth Hindu.3 He had been initiated into a branch of the Naqshbandiyah Sufi lineage.4
She immediately recognized his exceptional nature and through him she was going to live a transformative mystical experience. What struck her then was "the extraordinary writing of the Guru and his brother and the marvelous writing of the Sufi". With these masters, she fell into "a simplicity of silence that [she] had never dreamed of", "all structures have fallen".
In October 1950 her Guru sent her to Kumbh Mela5 For two weeks she roamed the forest in a deep mystical state, sleeping under the trees, eating what a sannyasi gave her, forgetting everything: "I was completely drunk, and half lost". She returned to the Guru who made her live intense mystical states with strength and depth. Those days were exhausting as her living conditions in Kanpur were very uncomfortable.
She returned to France in June 1951, but she maintained a constant spiritual bond with her Guru until his death in 1966.
Starting in 1951 Lilian Silburn set about carrying out the task entrusted to her by her guru, to make his teaching known in France. She gave initiation to a small number of people who were "capable" and, on a lower level, brought together a small group at her place in Le Vésinet, for one or two evenings per week. Annual gatherings of several dozen participants were also dedicated to the guru.
Silburn also continued her work as a researcher at the CNRS by translating and publishing Sanskrit texts from Kashmiri Śivaism, ranging from Paramārthasāra of Abhinavagupta (1959) to Spandakārikā (1990) ) and Hymns to Kālī, all published in the collection of “Publications de l’Institut de Civilisation Indienne de l’Université de Paris”.
Towards the end her life she wanted to publish the translation she had made with the Swami Lakshman Joo of chapters two to five of the Tantrāloka. Always intellectually active, she worked on it until her last weeks. Lilian Silburn passed away on 19 March 1993 at Le Vésinet.
Works
• Instant et cause; le discontinu dans la pensée philosophique de l'Inde.
• La Kuṇḍalinī, ou, L'énergie des profondeurs: étude d'ensemble d'après les textes du Śivaïsme non dualiste du Kaśmir.
• Le Bouddhisme.
• L'Inde classique, manuel des études indiennes (with Louis Renou, Jean Filliozat, Pierre Meile, Anne-Marie Esnoul).
• Aux sources du bouddhisme. (with Catherine Despeux, Marinette Bruno).
Translations
• Hymnes aux Kālī, la roue des énergies divines: études sur le śivaïsme du Cachemire, école Krama
• Vijñāna Bhairava
• Vātūlanātha sūtra avec le commentaire d'Anantaśaktipada
• Abhinavagupta, La lumière sur les tantras: chapitres 1 à 5 du Tantrāloka
• Abhinavagupta, Le Paramārthasāra
• Abhinavagupta, Hymnes de Abhinavagupta
• Bhaṭṭanārȳaṇa, La bhakti: le Stavacintāmaṇi
• Kṣemarāja, Śivasūtra et Vimarśinī
• Maheśvarānanda, La Mahārthamañjarī
• Vasugupta, Spandakārikā, stances sur la vibration de Vasugupta et gloses de Bhaṭṭa Kallaṭa, Kṣemarāja, Utpalācārya, Śivadṛṣṭi (chapitre I) de Somānanda
• Vatulanatha, Vatulanatha Sutra
Sources
https://journals.openedition.org/assr/28209
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lilian_Silburn
Footnotes
1. Avestan, also known historically as Zend, comprises two languages: Old Avestan (spoken in the 2nd millennium BCE) and Younger Avestan (spoken in the 1st millennium BCE). The languages are known only from their use as the language of Zoroastrian scripture (the Avesta), from which they derive their name. Both are early Iranian languages, a branch of the Indo-Iranian languages within the Indo-European family.
2. Tantrāloka, "Light on Tantra," is the masterwork of Abhinavagupta, who was the most revered Kashmir Śaivism master on Tantra.
3. The Kayasth were traditionally in the service of Mughals
4. The Naqshbandi or Naqshbandiyah is a major Sunni order of Sufism. Its name is derived from Baha-ud-Din Naqshband Bukhari. Naqshbandi masters trace their lineage to the Islamic prophet Muhammad and Abu Bakr, the first Caliph of Sunni Islam.
5. Kumbh Mela or Kumbha Mela is a major pilgrimage and festival in Hinduism. It is celebrated in a cycle of approximately 12 years at four river-bank pilgrimage sites: the Allahabad (Prayag) (Ganges-Yamuna Sarasvati rivers confluence), Haridwar (Ganges), Nashik (Godavari), and Ujjain (Shipra). The festival is marked by a ritual dip in the waters, but it is also a celebration of community commerce with numerous fairs, education, religious discourses by saints, mass feedings of monks or the poor, and entertainment spectacle. The seekers believe that bathing in these rivers is a means to prāyaścitta (atonement, penance) for past mistakes, and that it cleanses them of their sins. The festival is traditionally credited to the 8th-century Hindu philosopher and saint Adi Shankara, as a part of his efforts to start major Hindu gatherings for philosophical discussions and debates along with Hindu monasteries across the Indian subcontinent.
YOU MAY ALSO LIKE
