Mount Meru

Mount Meru occupies a structurally indispensable position across the depth-psychological corpus, functioning not merely as a geographical or mythological datum but as the primary symbol of the cosmic axis — the vertical spine around which existence is organized. Evans-Wentz situates Meru at the gravitational hub of Tibetan-Buddhist cosmography, a universal support sustaining all worlds in concentric arrangement. Zimmer reads the mountain as the ‘main pin of the universe, the vertical axis,’ rising from Brahma’s lotus and grounding the totality of Hindu sacred geography. Eliade systematizes the symbolism comparatively, placing Meru alongside Haraberezaiti and the Mesopotamian ‘Mount of the Lands’ as exemplars of the axis mundi — a sacred center where heaven and earth intersect. Jung, characteristically, transposes the cosmological image into depth-psychological currency: in his reading of the Bardo Thödol, ‘transcending the four-faced Mount Meru’ becomes a psychological act, the surrender of egohood before the objective powers of the psyche. Govinda renders Meru as the spatial center proceeding from the vajra’s undifferentiated unity, correlating cosmological structure with the differentiation of enlightened consciousness. Corbin indexes Meru alongside the cosmic mountain Qaf within Iranian Sufi imagination, confirming the motif’s cross-traditional resonance. The key tension in the corpus runs between cosmographic literalism and psychological interiorization.

In the library 10 passages

Mt. Meru (Tib. Ri—rab) the central mountain of Hindu and Buddhist cosmography, round which our cosmos is disposed in seven concentric circles of oceans separated by seven intervening concentric circles of golden mountains, is the universal hub, the support of all the worlds.

Evans-Wentz presents Mount Meru as the cosmographic axis of both Hindu and Buddhist universe-conceptions, the gravitational and structural center upon which all cosmic planes depend.

Evans-Wentz, W. Y., The Tibetan Book of the Dead (Evans-Wentz Edition), 1927thesis

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Sumeru, or Meru, is the central peak of the world, the main pin of the universe, the vertical axis.

Zimmer identifies Meru as the cosmological vertical axis from which all sacred geography — Himalaya, Kailasa, Vindhya — takes its orientation and meaning.

Zimmer, Heinrich, Myths and Symbols in Indian Art and Civilization, 1946thesis

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examples are Meru in India, Haraberezaiti in Iran, the mythical ‘Mount of the Lands’ in Mesopotamia, Gerizim in Palestine — which, moreover, was called the ‘navel of the earth.’

Eliade reads Meru as the paradigmatic instance of the sacred cosmic mountain in comparative religion, one of the universal symbols of the axis mundi connecting heaven and earth at the world’s center.

Eliade, Mircea, The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion, 1957thesis

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it is still possible for him, in each of the Bardo states, to reach the Dharmakāya by transcending the four-faced Mount Meru, provided that he does not yield to his desire to follow the ‘dim lights.’

Jung reinterprets the transcendence of the four-faced Mount Meru in the Bardo Thödol as a psychological act requiring complete surrender of egohood to the objective powers of the psyche.

Jung, Carl Gustav, Psychology and Religion: West and East, 1958thesis

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From this originates space, i.e., our three-dimensional world, symbolized by the ‘four quarters of the universe’, with Mount Meru as its centre or axis.

Govinda correlates Mount Meru’s role as cosmic center with the vajra’s symbolism, linking spatial and cosmological structure to the spiritual differentiation of enlightened consciousness.

Govinda, Lama Anagarika, Foundations of Tibetan Mysticism, 1960thesis

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A river formed of the juice of the fruit of the Jambu-tree flows in a circle round Mount Meru and returns to the tree.

Jung cites the Jambunadi’s circular flow around Meru as part of the mandala-like cosmographic structure of Mahayana Buddhist sacred geography.

Jung, Carl Gustav, Psychology and Religion: West and East, 1958supporting

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None of the great Olympians, the brilliant denizens of Mount Meru, now driven from their paradise into the bitter void of exile, could ever hope to muster the power to rive those defenses.

Zimmer employs Mount Meru as the divine abode of the Hindu gods, establishing it as a mythological paradise from which celestial beings can be displaced by demonic power.

Zimmer, Heinrich, Myths and Symbols in Indian Art and Civilization, 1946supporting

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Meru, Mount, 56 … Mountain: cosmic, 41, 56 (see also Qaf); of dawns, 41

Corbin’s index places Mount Meru in explicit association with the cosmic mountain Qaf of Iranian Sufi imagination, confirming the motif’s cross-traditional significance within his comparative mystical framework.

Corbin, Henry, The Man of Light in Iranian Sufism, 1971supporting

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The Sacred Mountain — where heaven and earth meet — is situated at the center of the world. Every temple or palace — and, by extension, every sacred city or royal residence — is a Sacred Mountain, thus becoming a Center.

Eliade articulates the symbolic logic that makes Meru the archetype for all sacred mountains and centers, demonstrating how cosmological centrality is reproduced architecturally in temples and royal cities.

Eliade, Mircea, The Myth of the Eternal Return: Cosmos and History, 1954supporting

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There are seven lokas, worlds or realms, in Hindu cosmography. This world with all its creatures is one, and above it is space with the stars, followed by a series of celestial realms.

Bryant presents the Puranic seven-lokas cosmography within which Meru is structurally implied as the vertical organizing axis, contextualizing the mountain within yogic commentary traditions.

Bryant, Edwin F., The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali: A New Edition, Translation, and Commentary, 2009aside

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