Abstract:
Meditation has acquired new meanings in the urban scene in the last decades, attracting more and more people concerned with mental health. The inclusion of meditation in acknowledged health procedures is related to the construction of scientific explanations that authorized its use and, as a result, furthered its transference from the religious sphere to the health knowledge area. Referring to Weberian concepts, we argue that this process means, in fact, the disenchantment of meditation. In this connection, the aims of this paper are to discuss changes in religious and health values that led to the disenchantment of asiatic contemplative practices, as well as to highlight possible affinities of such process with the demands of contemporary capitalism.
Key-words:
Meditation; mind-body therapies; destradicionalization; secularization