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Tantra

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Tantra

Sex, Secrecy, Politics, and Power

in the Study of Religion

Hugh B. Urban

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS

Berkeley

.

Los Angeles

.

London

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University of California Press

Berkeley and Los Angeles, California

University of California Press, Ltd.

London, England

© 2003 by the Regents of the University of California

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Urban, Hugh B.

Tantra : sex, secrecy, politics, and power in the

study of religion / Hugh B. Urban.

p.

cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

isbn 0-520-23062-0 (alk. paper).—

isbn 0-520-23656-4 (pbk. : alk. paper)

1. Tantrism.

2. Tantric Buddhism.

I. Title.

bl1283.84 u73

2003

294.5'514—dc21

2002073270

Manufactured in the United States of America

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05

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03

10

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1

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum

requirements of ansi/niso z39.48–1992 (r 1997)

( Permanence of Paper).8

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In memory of Hugh Bayard Urban, Sr.

(1926–2001)

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Contents

List of Illustrations

ix

Preface and Acknowledgments

xi

List of Abbreviations

xv

Introduction: Diagnosing the “Disease” of Tantra

1

1. The Golden Age of the Vedas and the Dark Age

of Kàlí: Tantrism, Orientalism, and the Bengal

Renaissance

44

2. Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess: Tantra and

Political Violence in Colonial India

73

3. India’s Darkest Heart: Tantra in the

Literary Imagination

106

4. Deodorized Tantra: Sex, Scandal, Secrecy,

and Censorship in the Works of John Woodroffe

and Swami Vivekananda

134

5. Religion for the Age of Darkness: Tantra and the

History of Religions in the Twentieth Century

165

6. The Cult of Ecstasy: Meldings of East and West

in a New Age of Tantra

203

Conclusion: Reimagining Tantra in Contemporary

Discourse

264

Notes

283

Bibliography

337

Index

367

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Illustrations

f i g u r e s

1.

Illustration for Kàlí Cigarettes

18

2.

Kàlí, goddess of destruction

20

3.

A modern Kàlí

21

4.

Billboard for Shaitan Tantrik

39

5.

Procession of Kàlí

77

6.

Mahà Kàlí

78

7.

Sri Aurobindo as a young man

90

8.

Sir John Woodroffe

137

9.

Sri Ramakrishna

149

10.

American Tantra, from Third Millennium Magic web site

204

11.

Pierre Bernard, demonstrating the Kàlí mudrà

210

12.

Aleister Crowley

219

13.

Osho

236

14.

The imagining of Tantra

266

15.

Aghorí and tàntrika s in Rishikesh

267

16.

Cover illustration for Tàràpíåher Bàmàbatàr,

a popular comic book

276

t a b l e s

Table 1

97

Table 2

103

ix

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Preface and Acknowledgments

The Extreme Orient

and the Quest for Ecstasy

O Mother! At your holy lotus feet I pray that I have not

transgressed all the Veda and Artha Tàstras and destroyed

your worship; with this fear, I have revealed many profound

matters. Please forgive me for whatever sins I have incurred

by revealing these secret things. . . . Forgive me, for, with an

ignorant heart, I have revealed the most secret things of your

tantra s.

KKãJànanda ÄgamavàgíMa,

BKhat-Tantrasàra (sixteenth century)

For the last 150 years . . . we have been orientalizing; in re-

ality, it is precisely because the whole world is Westernizing

that the West is becoming more permeable to Indian philoso-

phy, to African art . . . to Arabic mysticism. Hindu philoso-

phy, African art acquire a consciousness of self by virtue of

those structures through which Western civilization assimi-

lates them.

Michel Foucault, interview,

“Who Are You, Professor Foucault?” (1967)

This book was born in large part out of my own long and deeply am-

bivalent relationship to the phenomenon of “Tantra” or “Tantrism” and

its role in the contemporary Western imagination.1 It is the product of my

own fascination with this most tantalizing aspect of the “exotic Orient”—

this brand of Indian spirituality that seemingly could combine sexuality,

sensual pleasure, and the full range of physical experience with the reli-

gious life. Coming as I do from a fairly strict and conservative middle-

xi

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xii

Preface and Acknowledgments

class Episcopalian background, and generally bored with that brand of

Christianity, I was drawn naturally to Tantra—an enticing and wonder-

fully Other form of religion that seemed in every way the perfect oppo-

site of the stodgy religion of my childhood. Many years ago, as a college

freshman sitting in on an “Introduction to Eastern Religions” class, I was

captivated by accounts of sexual rituals, the use of alcohol and other in-

toxicants, and the explicit violation of conventional social laws, all in

the name of a powerful, ecstatic religious experience. In Tantra, it

seemed, I had discovered the ideal alternative to (and wonderfully lib-

erating inversion of ) everything I thought “religion” was supposed to be

about; it seemed the embodiment of everything my upbringing was not. 2

My own first immersion in the world of Tantra occurred many years

later, as a graduate student, when I undertook a detailed study of the role

of secrecy in one particular sect—the Kartàbhajàs, or “Worshipers of the

Master”—which emerged in the Calcutta area at the end of the nineteenth

century. The focus of my work at that time was the difficult question of

how one could—and indeed whether one should—study a tradition such

as Hindu Tantra, which is emphatically esoteric, meant to be understood

only by initiated insiders.3 However, in the course of my study, I was faced

by an even more difficult, self-reflective question: why was I, a middle-

class, Episcopalian, white kid, so fascinated with a bunch of poor, lower-

class Bengalis performing secret rituals and engaging in illicit sexual ac-

tivities? Still more broadly, why has Tantra now assumed such a central

place in American popular culture, with pop stars like Sting practicing

seven-hour-long Tantric sex and New Age gurus offering Tantric work-

shops such as the “Path to Total Ecstasy”? Is this part of what Marianna

Torgovnick called our “primitive passion” and our “quest for ecstasy”—

that is, the contemporary Western search for an irrational, mystical, or

ecstatic experience that we feel we have lost amid a rationalized, demys-

tified, modern world? Torgovnick writes: “Westerners seem like Adam

and Eve banished from the Eden of the primitive, convinced that some

ecstatic primal emotions have been lost, almost as penalty for being West-

ern. Yet . . . what is now sought in the primitive is really a reflection or

projection of something . . . in the West.”4

In the course of my probing into the mysteries of Tantra, I inter-

viewed, studied under, and became friends with a number of Tantric

practitioners in West Bengal, Assam, Himachal, and Uttar Pradesh. Like

many curious travelers, both Western and Indian, I was fascinated by

the aura of secrecy, power, and danger that surrounds great Tantric cen-

ters, such as the cremation ground at Tàràpíåh, West Bengal, or the tem-

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Preface and Acknowledgments

xiii

ple of Kàmàkhyà in Assam, where rather grisly animal sacrifices are still

performed on a regular basis. And I encountered a wide variety of re-

sponses and reactions to my curiosity. In Tàràpíåh for example, I tried

to question one skeptical and worldly older Aghorí about the infamous

“fifth M” of Tantric practice— maithuna, or sexual union with a female

partner. After my repeated prodding, he finally lost his patience and ex-

claimed, “All you Americans want to know about is sex. Don’t you get

enough of that in your own country? Go back home to your ‘pornogra-

phy’ and your ‘free love.’” On the other hand, I also met a wide range

of gurus who were quite proud of their powerful esoteric knowledge and

seemed more than happy to “advertise their secrets” to a well-funded

Western researcher. For many self-proclaimed tàntrika s, the claim to pos-

session of such knowledge appears to be closely related to their aspira-

tions for status, prestige, money, and even a possible trip to the United

States.5

This book thus represents a moment of intense self-reflection, self-

scrutiny, and self-criticism, one that I think has larger implications for

the field of South Asian studies and the history of religions as a whole.

It raises the question of just why so many intellectuals in the West are

fascinated by this hitherto obscure and esoteric Indian religion. Why has

Tantra come to saturate American pop culture, with slick paperbacks pro-

moting it as The Art of Sexual Ecstasy and web sites offering Tantric ad-

vice for the “multiorgasmic Man”? Is this simply a case of cross-cultural

voyeurism? Or are we in fact caught up in networks of neocolonial or

neoimperialist exchange, the ultimate impact of which we have not yet

begun to fathom?6

Troubled by these questions, I set out to try to unravel the complex

genealogy of Tantra and our contemporary fascination with this most

“extreme” of all Oriental traditions. It was an investigation that led me

from ancient Sanskrit manuscripts in Calcutta and Kathmandu to the

annals of British colonial rule, to the revolutionary writings of the Ben-

gal nationalists, to the scandalous antics of contemporary New Age neo-

Tantric gurus and the techno-Tantra of the World Wide Web. In the

process, I found this genealogy to be far more complicated than I had

ever imagined, and surely far more interesting than a simple imperialist

imposition of a Western category onto a colonized subject. On the con-

trary, “Tantra” appears to me a densely tangled web of intersecting

threads, both Eastern and Western, ancient and modern, woven through

the intricate cross-cultural interplay of scholarly and popular imagina-

tions, and creatively reimagined in each new historical era.

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xiv

Preface and Acknowledgments

A brief note on transliteration: I have followed a Sanskritic model of

transliteration for most of the South Asian terms in this text. There are,

however, a few exceptions, particularly in the case of Indian authors

whose names have been rendered by themselves or their disciples into

English, often with little consistency. Names and titles that I have trans-

lated directly from Sanskrit or other languages will therefore be rendered

with Sanskrit diacritics (e.g., Svàmí or Trí). But names and titles that have

been published in English without diacritics will be left as printed

(Swami, Svami, Shri, or Sri). All translations in this book are mine unless

otherwise stated.

Because Tantra is such a lively and controversial topic, it was perhaps

inevitable that new works would appear that I would be unable to in-

corporate into this book. At least three important studies were published

during the very late stages of this book’s production, which I feel I should

note but which I cannot discuss in any detail here. The first is David Gor-

don White’s The Kiss of the Yoginí, an excellent study of the role of sex-

ual rituals and sexual fluids in Tantric practice. The second is Ronald M.

Davidson’s Indian Esoteric Buddhism, an original and impressively

thorough new look at the social context of early Buddhist Tantric move-

ments in India. And the third is Martine van Woerken’s The Strangled

Traveler, arguably the best and most comprehensive study of the

“Thuggee” myth and its role in the British colonial imagination. I regret

being unable to discuss these important texts here, and I encourage in-

terested readers to use them as a supplement to this book.

I am deeply indebted to the following people for their help in the re-

search and writing of this book: first, the various gurus, sàdhaka s (practi-

tioners), and devotees I have encountered in the course of my wanderings

in the Orient; second, my various American gurus, most importantly,

Wendy Doniger and Bruce Lincoln; third, my fellow sàdhaka s and sàd-

hikà s on the strange path of the Western study of Tantra, above all, Jef-

frey J. Kripal, Rachel Fell McDermott, and Glen A. Hayes; fourth, the

various scholars who have offered me feedback and criticism on this book

in its various manifestations, including André Padoux (who kindly

shared with me his own observations on the construction of “Tantrism”

as a modern category), Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya (who kindly al-

lowed me to interview him regarding his life, politics, and scholarship),

Paul Muller-Ortega, and David Gordon White; and finally and perhaps

most importantly, my personal bhairaví-guru, Nancy, and the more fully

enlightened members of our doga lineage, Shakti and Moses.

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Abbreviations

AV

Atharva Veda, with the commentary of SàyaJa. Calcutta: Bib-

liotheca Indica, 1896. Trans. William Dwight Whitney. Cam-

bridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1905.

BP

Bhàgavata PuràJa. Bombay, 1832. Trans. Ganesh Vasudeo

Tagare. New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas, 1976–78.

GST

Guhyasamàja Tantra: A New Critical Edition. Ed. Yukei Matsu-

naga. Osaka: Toso Shuppan, 1978.

HT

Hevajra Tantra: A Critical Study. Trans. David Snellgrove. Lon-

don: Oxford University Press, 1959.

KT

KulàrJava Tantra. Ed. Arthur Avalon. New Delhi: Motilal Ba-

narsidas, 1965.

LP

TríMríràmakKãJalílàprasaGga, by Svàmí Sàradànanda. Calcutta:

Udbodhan Kàryàlay, 1965.

MT

MahànirvàJa Tantra. Calcutta: Ädi Bràhma Samàj, 1876.

Trans. Arthur Avalon, The Tantra of the Great Liberation:

MahànirvàJa Tantra. New York: Dover Publications, 1979.

NUT

Niruttara Tantra. Ed. KulabhÜãana Ràmadatta Tukla. Prayàg:

Kalyàna Mandir PrakàMana, 1979.

xv

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xvi

Abbreviations

RV

The Rg Veda, with the commentary of SàyaJa. 6 vols.

London: H. Frowde, 1890–92. Trans. Wendy Doniger

O’Flaherty. New York: Penguin Books, 1981.

SvT

Svacchanda Tantra, with commentary by Kãemaràja.

Ed. M. K. Tàstrí. Trínagar: Kashmir Series of Texts and

Studies, 1921–35.

TA and TAV

Tantràloka of Abhinavagupta, with the commentary,

vivaraJa, of Jayaratha. Ed. M. K. Tàstrí. Trínagar:

Kashmir Series of Texts and Studies, 1921–38.

VST

VíJàMikhatantra: A Taiva Tantra of the Left Current.

Trans. Teun Goudriaan. New Delhi: Motilal Banarsi-

das, 1985.

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Introduction

Diagnosing the “Disease” of Tantra

If at any time in the history of India the mind of the nation

as a whole has been diseased, it was in the Tantric age, or the

period immediately preceding the Muhammadan conquest of

India. . . . The story related in the pages of . . . Tantric works

is so repugnant that excepting a few, all respectable scholars

have condemned them wholesale. . . . No one should forget

that the Hindu population of India as a whole is even today

in the grip of this very Tantra in its daily life; . . . and is suffer-

ing from the same disease which originated 1300 years ago

and consumed its vitality. . . .

Someone should take up the study comprising the diagno-

sis, etiology, pathology and prognosis of the disease so that

more capable men may take up its treatment and eradication.

Benyotosh Bhattacharyya,

An Introduction to Buddhist Esoterism (1932)

The category “Tantra” is a basic and familiar one today in the vocab-

ulary of most scholars of religions and generally considered one of the

most important and controversial forms of Asian religion. In academic

discourse, Tantra usually refers to a specific brand of religious practice

common to the Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain traditions since at least the

seventh century; above all, it is identified as a particularly radical and

dangerous practice that involves activities normally prohibited in main-

stream society, such as sexual intercourse with lower-class partners and

consumption of meat and wine. Not surprisingly, given the rather racy

nature of the subject, interest in Tantra has skyrocketed in the past two

decades in both the popular and scholarly imaginations. On the academic

level, Tantra has become one of the hottest topics in the field of South

1

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2

Introduction

Asian studies, generating a large body of provocative (and often con-

troversial) new scholarship.1 Still more strikingly, Tantra has also become

an object of fascination in the popular imagination, where usually it is

defined as “sacred sex” and often is confused with Eastern sexual man-

uals such as the Kàma SÜtra and Western occult traditions such as Aleis-

ter Crowley’s “sex magick.” As we can see on the shelves of any book-

store, Tantra pervades Western pop culture, appearing in an endless array

of books, videos, and slick web sites. Indeed, the phrase “American Tan-

tra” is now even a registered trademark, representing a whole line of

books, videos, and “ceremonial sensual” merchandise.2

And yet, as André Padoux points out, the category “Tantrism”—as a

singular, coherent entity—is itself a relatively recent invention, in large

part the product of nineteenth-century scholarship, with a tangled and

labyrinthine history.3 When it was first discovered by Orientalist schol-

ars and missionaries in the eighteenth century, Tantra was quickly sin-

gled out as the most horrifying and degenerate aspect of the Indian mind.

Identified as the extreme example of all the polytheism and licentious-

ness believed to have corrupted Hinduism, Tantra was something “too

abominable to enter the ears of man and impossible to reveal to a Chris-

tian public,” or simply “an array of magic rites drawn from the most ig-

norant and stupid classes.”4 Yet in our own generation, Tantra has been

praised as “a cult of ecstasy, focused on a vision of cosmic sexuality,”

and as a much needed celebration of the body, sexuality, and material

existence.5

This ambivalence has grown even more intense in our own day. On

the one hand, the scholarly literature often laments that Tantra has been

woefully neglected in the study of Asian religions as “the unwanted

stepchild of Hindu studies.”6 On the other, if we peruse the shelves of

most popular bookstores or scan the rapidly proliferating web sites on

the Internet, it would seem that Tantra is anything but neglected in mod-

ern discourse. As we see in endless publications, bearing titles like

Tantric Secrets of Sex and Spirit or Ecstatica: Hypno Trance Love Dance,

Tantra has become among the most marketable aspects of the “exotic

Orient.” Borrowing some insights from Michel Foucault and his work

on sexuality in the Victorian era, I will argue that Tantra has by no means

been repressed or marginalized; on the contrary, like sex itself, Tantra

has become the subject of an endless proliferation of discourse and ex-

ploited as “the secret.”7 Indeed, one might say even that Tantra repre-

sents the ideal religion for contemporary Western society. A religion that

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Introduction

3

seems to combine spirituality with sensuality, and mystical experience

with wine, women, and wealth, Tantra could be called the ideal path for

spiritual consumers in the strange world of “late capitalism.”8

But despite the contradictory and wildly diverse constructions of Tan-

tra, both popular and scholarly, there is still one key element that all of

these imaginings share, namely, the very extremity of Tantra, its radical

Otherness, the fact that it is considered to be the most radical aspect of

Indian spirituality, the one most diametrically opposed to the modern

West. As Ron Inden has argued, the India of Orientalist scholarship was

constructed as the quintessential Other in comparison to the West. Con-

ceived as an essentially passionate, irrational, effeminate world, a land of

“disorderly imagination,” India was set in opposition to the progressive,

rational, masculine, and scientific world of modern Europe.9 And Tan-

tra was quickly singled out as India’s darkest, most irrational element—

as the Extreme Orient, the most exotic aspect of the exotic Orient itself.10

This book traces the complex genealogy of the category of Tantra in

the history of religions, as it has been formed through the interplay of

Eastern and Western, and popular and scholarly, imaginations. What I

hope to achieve is by no means just another anti-Orientalist critique or

postcolonial deconstruction of an established category—an exercise that

has become all too easy in recent years. Rather, I suggest that Tantra is

a far messier product of the mirroring and misrepresentation at work be-

tween both East and West. It is a dialectical category—similar to what

Walter Benjamin has called a dialectical image—born out of the mirroring

and mimesis that goes on between Western and Indian minds.11 Neither

simply the result of an indigenous evolution nor a mere Orientalist fab-

rication, Tantra is a shifting amalgam of fantasies, fears, and wish fulfill-

ments, at once native and Other, which strikes to the heart of our con-

structions of the exotic Orient and of the contemporary West.

I hope that this book will offer not only a valuable contribution to

our knowledge of South Asian religions, but also, more important, a keen

insight into the very nature of cross-cultural dialogue, the mutual re- and

misrepresentations of the Other that occur in every cross-cultural encoun-

ter. In the chapters that follow I explore a series of reciprocal exchanges

between East and West, played out in several key historical encounters—

from the severe criticisms of Tantra by early European scholars and the

reactions of Hindu reformers, to the paranoid imaginings of British au-

thorities and the uses of Tantra by the revolutionary Indian nationalists,

to the wildly exoticized representations of Tantra in English and Indian

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4

Introduction

fiction, to the role of Tantra in contemporary New Age and New Reli-

gious movements. Finally, I explore some possible ways to redefine and

reimagine Tantra in a more useful form in contemporary discourse.

t h e “ d i a l e c t i c a l i m a g e ” o f t a n t r a

The moment one hears the word “Tantrism,” various

wild and lurid associations spring forth in the Western

mind which add up to a pastiche of psychospiritual

science fiction and sexual acrobatics that would put

to shame the most imaginative of our contemporary

pornographers.

Jacob Needleman, The New Religions (1970)

But just what is Tantra? Few terms, it would seem, are at once so per-

vasive, so widely used, and yet so ill-defined in contemporary discourse,

both popular and academic. As Herbert Guenther put it, Tantra is per-

haps “one of the haziest misconceptions the Western mind has evolved.”12

It is a term that permeates literature, movies, and the Internet, as we

now find alternative-rock groups described as “Tantric” and pop stars

like Sting claiming to have achieved seven-hour orgasms by means of

Tantric sexual techniques.13 Yet it is a term that most people would be

hard pressed to define.

As we will see in more detail, the Sanskrit word tantra has appeared

since Vedic times with an enormous diversity of meanings; it has been

used to denote everything from a warp or a loom (e.g., AV 10.7.42), to

the “chief potion or essence of a thing,” to simply “any rule, theory or

scientific work” ( Mahàbhàrata 13.48.6).14 Probably derived from the root

tan, “to weave or stretch,” tantra is most often used to refer to a par-

ticular kind of text, which is “woven” of the extended threads of many

words. Yet, as Padoux points out, such texts may or may not contain

materials that we today think of as “Tantric.”15

For most American readers today, Tantra is usually defined as “sacred

sexuality,” “spiritual sex,” or “sex magic”—that is, the unique synthe-

sis of religion and sexuality, which is also often identified with diverse

spiritual traditions from around the world, such as European sexual

magic, Wicca, Kabbalah, and even certain Native American practices.

“Tantra is the only spiritual path that says that sex is sacred and not a

sin,” as one recent author, Swami Nostradamus Virato, defines it. “The

art of Tantra . . . could be called spiritual hedonism, which says ‘ eat drink

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Introduction

5

and be merry but with full awareness. ’ . . . Tantra says yes! to sex; yes!

to love.”16 According to an even more explicit New Age appropriation—

the “American Tantra” espoused by California eros-guru Paul Ramana

Das—the sexual magic of Tantra has now become a hyperorgasmic event

of truly cosmic proportions:

American Tantra (tm) is a fresh eclectic weaving of sacred sexual philoso-

phies drawn from around the world, both ancient and modern. . . . Making

love is a galactic event! . . . We intend to co-create neo-tribal post-dysfunc-

tional sex and spirit positive . . . generations of gods and goddesses in the

flesh. On the Starship Intercourse we greet and part with: orgasm long

and prosper!17

Thus, according to many popular accounts, such as that of the great

“neo-Tantric” master, the notorious Osho-Rajneesh, Tantra is not even

a definable religion or philosophy; it is more of a nonreligion, an an-

tiphilosophy, which insists on direct experience, not rational thought or

dogmatic belief: “The Tantric attitude . . . is not an attitude. It has no

concepts, it is not a philosophy. It is not even a religion, it has no theol-

ogy. It doesn’t believe in words, theories, doctrines. . . . It wants to look

at life as it is. . . . It is a non-attitude.”18

Unlike many recent scholars, however, I do not think that the popu-

lar American and New Age versions of Tantra can be dismissed as the

mere products of “for-profit purveyors of Tantric sex,” who “peddle their

shoddy wares.”19 Rather, I see these contemporary neo- tàntrika s (how-

ever absurd they might appear to those in the academy) as important

representations of the ongoing transformations of Tantra in culture and

in history.

Not surprisingly, given the vast semantic range of the term and the di-

versity of texts and traditions using it, modern scholars struggled for gen-

erations to come up with some kind of usable definition for Tantrism.

Not only is the very notion of Tantrism, as a unified, singular, abstract

entity, itself largely the product of modern scholarship, but it has been

subjected to an enormous variety of conflicting and contradictory inter-

pretations. As Benyotosh Bhattacharyya commented in 1932, “Many

scholars have tried to define the Tantras; but every one of their descrip-

tions is insufficient. . . . The definitions of Tantra given by students of

Sanskrit literature are not unlike the descriptions of an elephant given

by blind men.”20

At one end of the scholarly spectrum, as we see in the earliest Orien-

talist and missionary accounts, Tantrism was defined as the most debased

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6

Introduction

form of Hindu idolatry and the most shocking confusion of sexuality

with religion. The “so-called Tantric religion,” as Talboys Wheeler

defined it in 1874, is essentially a cult wherein “nudity is worshipped in

Bacchanalian orgies which cannot be described.”21 At the complete op-

posite end of the hermeneutic spectrum, however, there is Sir John

Woodroffe’s highly apologetic, sanitized definition, which largely excises

or rationalizes Tantra’s alleged sexual content: indeed, in Woodroffe’s

redefinition, far from being a decline into depraved licentiousness, Tan-

tra becomes a noble and orthodox tradition in continuity with the most

ancient teachings of the Vedas and Vedànta: indeed, “Tàntrikism is noth-

ing but the Vedic religion struggling . . . to reassert itself.”22

In more recent years, there appears to have been a remarkable shift

back to the opposite end of the spectrum, toward an emphasis on Tan-

tra’s sexual and scandalous aspects—though this time in a far more pos-

itive, even celebratory sense. As we see in the more romantic definitions

of Mircea Eliade and other European historians of religions, Tantra rep-

resents a much needed affirmation of sexuality and bodily existence, much

older than the Vedic Aryan tradition with its patriarchal ideology; it is

a “great underground current of autochthonous and popular spiritual-

ity,” centering around the worship of the Mother Goddess, which later

burst forth into mainstream Hindu and Buddhist traditions.23 For other,

still more enthusiastic authors like Philip Rawson, Tantra is nothing less

than “a cult of ecstasy” that “offers a uniquely successful antidote to the

anxieties of our time.”24 As we will see, it is in large part through the di-

alectical play between these extremes—from Victorian horror at Tantric

licentiousness, to Woodroffe’s sanitization and defense of Tantric phi-

losophy, to the neoromantic celebration of Tantric sexual liberation—

that the notion of Tantrism has been formed in the modern imagination.

In the face of this intense confusion and contradiction, many schol-

ars have abandoned the very idea of asserting a singular, monothetic

definition for Tantra.25 As Douglas Brooks argues, Tantra is not some-

thing that can be defined as a singular, unified category; rather, it can

only be described by what Jonathan Z. Smith calls a “polythetic classi-

fication,” in which a large number of characteristics are possessed by a

large number of class members. Various scholars have offered different

enumerations of such characteristics, ranging from six (Jeffrey Kripal)

to eighteen (Teun Goudriaan).26 Brooks, for example, suggests the fol-

lowing ten properties of Tantric phenomena: (1) they are extra-Vedic;

that is, not part of the conventional canon of Hindu scriptures; (2) they

involve special forms of physical discipline, such as kuJjaliní yoga; (3) they

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7

are at once theistic and nondualistic; (4) they contain elaborate specu-

lations on the nature of sound and the use of mantras; (5) they involve

the use of symbolic diagrams, such as yantras or maJjalas; (6) they place

special stress on the importance of the guru; (7) they employ the bipo-

lar symbolism of the god and goddess; (8) they are secret; (9) they pre-

scribe the use of conventionally prohibited substances (e.g., wine, meat,

sexual intercourse); (10) they require special forms of initiation in which

caste and gender are not the primary qualifications.27 Unfortunately, how-

ever, Brooks gives no indication as to just how many or which of these

characteristics a given phenomenon must have to be usefully identified

as Tantric; nor does he account for the large number of traditions that

share most or all of these characteristics and yet would deny vehemently

that they have anything to do with the “scandal and smut” of Tantrism.28

In sum, as Donald Lopez puts it, tantra has long been and still remains

one of the most elusive terms in the study of Asian religions—a kind of

“floating signifier . . . gathering to itself a range of contradictory quali-

ties, a zero symbolic value, marking the necessity of a supplementary con-

tent over and above that which the signified contains.”29 Yet the reasons

for this difficulty in defining Tantra are not far to seek. As I will argue,

Tantra is a highly variable and shifting category, whose meaning may

differ depending on the particular historical moment, cultural milieu, and

political context. We might say that Tantra serves as a kind of Rorschach

test or psychological mirror of the changing moral and sexual attitudes

of the past two hundred years. As N. N. Bhattacharyya comments:

Most of the modern writers on this subject insist solely on its sexual ele-

ments, minimal though they are compared to the vastness of the subject,

and purport to popularize certain modern ideas pertaining to sex problems

in the name of Tantra. Thus the historical study of Tantrism has been hand-

icapped, complicated and conditioned by the preoccupation of those work-

ing in the field.30

For this very reason, however, the various definitions of Tantra also of-

fer us a fascinating window onto the history of the history of religions,

revealing the particular historical moments and political contexts of those

who have defined it.

We “Post-Victorians”

Tantrism . . . is India’s most radical contribution to

spirituality. The underlying idea of Tantrism is that even

the most mundane occurrence can serve as a means of

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Introduction

transcendence. . . . Sex is no longer feared as a spiritual

trap but is employed as a gateway to heaven.

Georg Feuerstein, Holy Madness (1990)

In the United States, sex is everywhere except in sex.

Roland Barthes, Empire of Signs (1982)

One of the most pervasive themes in contemporary literature on Tantra—

in both its popular and scholarly forms—is the notion that this tradition

has been ignored, marginalized, and repressed consistently by Western

scholarship. As Brooks argues, this “unwanted stepchild of Hindu Stud-

ies” has been a persistent source of embarrassment to scholarship.

Brooks presents his own work as an act of retrieval and restoration that

will completely revise our prejudiced and distorted understanding of Hin-

duism: “The Tantric traditions . . . are routinely treated as trivial or tan-

gential to the mainstreams. . . . Just as our previously deficient under-

standing of Christianity has been corrected by considering mysticism . . .

so our understanding of Hinduism will be revised when Tantrism . . . [is]

given appropriate scholarly attention.”31

While I have great respect for Brooks’s work on South Indian Tantra,

I must point out that this claim is, so far as I can tell, quite inaccurate.

It is true that the body of texts known as tantra s have long been misun-

derstood by Western scholars; yet even in the nineteenth century, West-

ern scholars and popular writers appear not to have trivialized or mar-

ginalized the tantra s, but in fact to have been fascinated by, often

preoccupied and obsessed with, the seedy, dangerous world of the

Tantras. And surely, since the pioneering work of John Woodroffe, and

continuing with historians of religions like Mircea Eliade, Heinrich Zim-

mer, Agehananda Bharati, and many others, Tantra has become one of

the most popular and pervasive topics in contemporary discourse about

Indian religions. In short, far from being denied and ignored in modern

literature, Tantra has arguably become one of the most widely discussed,

fashionable, and marketable forms of South Asian religion. As Guenther

remarked as early as 1952, “There is hardly any other kind of literature

that has met with so much abuse . . . or has so much fascinated those

who . . . thought the Tantras to be a most powerful and hence strictly

guarded means for the gratification of biological urges.”32

This fascination with the Tantras—and this complex mixture of prud-

ish repugnance and tantalizing allure—has only grown all the more intense

in recent years. According to one of the most common tropes in recent

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9

New Age and popular religious literature, our sexuality has been repressed

and denied by the stifling institutions of Christianity; therefore, to real-

ize our true potential, we must turn to the ancient arts of the Orient—

above all to the sexual magic of Tantra—to liberate the immense well-

spring of power within us. So reads an article on the tantra.com web site:

Sex as an art form has yet to mature in the West. Social repression and

internalized guilt have prevented Westerners from a frank and joyous ex-

ploration of sexuality. . . . The Orient did not consider sex apart from . . .

spirituality. . . . All variations of sexual postures were . . . venerated. Sex

was given a place of honor. . . . The parameters of sexual behavior in the

East extend way beyond the West’s narrow spectrum of normalcy.33

Surely few other forms of Hinduism or Buddhism have generated as much

literature in the past twenty years, both scholarly and popular, as the

Tantras. One need only peruse the shelves of any bookstore or surf the

Internet to see that Tantra has come to capture the Western popular imag-

ination no less than it has the academic. Now books such as Ecstasy

through Tantra and Tantra: The Art of Conscious Loving are commonly

available; as are any number of videos on “Tantric massage,” workshops

such as “Extended Orgasms: A Sexual Training Class,” and web sites

where we encounter the “Church of Tantra,” the “alchemy of ecstasy,”

and so on.34 Indeed, we now also can order a wide range of sexual-spir-

itual commodities from the online “Tantra gift shop,” including herbs,

aphrodisiacs, and other stimulating elixirs. In short, as Rachel McDer-

mott aptly observes in her study of the recent explosion of interest in the

Tantric goddess Kàlí: “Interest in Tantra, while strong in the last decade,

has skyrocketed in recent years, with magazines championing it, Web sites

whose sole purpose is to explicate and illustrate it, and newsgroups whose

conversations center around its use.”35

A similar narrative of “repression” and the present need for “libera-

tion” centers around the role of women in the Tantras. From its origins,

discourse on Tantra has focused particularly on the role of women in

Tantric practice, and above all, their alleged role in sexual rituals. Yet

many recent authors, such as Miranda Shaw, have fiercely argued that

the role of women in Tantra has been consistently ignored, repressed, or

marginalized by the (mostly male) scholars in the academy. According

to Shaw, this is nothing other than a lingering residual effect of Euro-

pean colonialism and prudish Victorian attitudes: “The scholarly char-

acterizations of the Tantric Buddhist yoginis as ‘lewd,’ ‘sluts,’ ‘depraved

and debauched’ betray a vestige of Victorian indignation not only at non-

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Introduction

marital sexual activity of women but also at the religious exaltation . . .

of women.”36

At this point, I must wonder whether Shaw has been reading the same

scholarship as I have. The available literature seems to me to demon-

strate that the role of women by no means has been ignored or excluded

but, on the contrary, often has been celebrated and exaggerated. While

it is true that some authors have pointed out the exploitative use of

women in Tantric ritual, the majority of modern scholars appear to have

celebrated the status of women in Tantra as a much needed affirmation

of femininity, motherhood, and the forces of nature. Consider, for ex-

ample, the works of some of the most influential scholars like Mircea

Eliade and Heinrich Zimmer: “Tantrism,” Eliade suggests, represents

nothing less than “a religious rediscovery of the mystery of woman,

for . . . every woman becomes the incarnation of the Takti. . . . Woman

incarnates both the mystery of creation and the mystery of Being, of every-

thing that is, that becomes and dies and is reborn. . . . We must never

lose sight of this primacy. . . of the Divine Woman . . . in Tantrism.”37

And of course, even more audacious assertions of the freedom and power

of women in Tantra can be found in the seemingly endless array of New

Age and popular religious literature in the contemporary West. In one

recent and very enthusiastic work, Tantra: The Cult of the Feminine, the

Woman of the Tantras is now praised as “the Erotic Champion,” hold-

ing a role far greater than that offered by any contemporary feminist

movement.38

In sum, it would seem that neither Tantrism nor the women of Tan-

tra have been marginalized or repressed in Western discourse: it is per-

haps more accurate to say that Tantra has been exaggerated and, ulti-

mately, commercialized— celebrated as the sexiest, most tantalizing

offering of the exotic Orient. Despite the claims to liberate and redeem

Tantra, much of the recent literature on the subject in fact only contin-

ues the worst tendencies of Western “Orientalism” and exoticism iden-

tified by Said and other postcolonial critics: the long-held image of India

as the quintessential, irrational “Other” of the West.39

In this sense, Tantra would appear to play much the same role in the

modern imagination as did “sexuality” during the Victorian era, as Michel

Foucault has described it. Far from being simply prudish and repressive—

as the predominant modern rhetoric would have it—the Victorian era

was in fact pervaded by a deeper interest in and endless discourse about

sexuality: “What is peculiar to modern societies . . . is not that they con-

signed sex to a shadow existence, but that they dedicated themselves to

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11

speaking of it ad infinitum, while exploiting it as the secret.”40 Conversely,

our own generation—the generation of we “other Victorians”—is seem-

ingly obsessed with the rhetoric of “unveiling” and “liberation,” of com-

ing out of the closet and freeing itself of the prudish bonds of the Victo-

rian era.

If sex is repressed, that is, condemned to prohibition . . . then the mere fact

that one is speaking about it has the appearance of a deliberate transgres-

sion . . . we are conscious of defying established power . . . we know we are

being subversive.

What stimulates our eagerness to speak of sex in terms of repression is

doubtless this opportunity to speak out against the powers that be, to utter

truths and promise bliss, to link together enlightenment, liberation and

manifold pleasures.41

So too, I would argue, much of the contemporary rhetoric about the re-

pression of Tantra reflects an obsession with the scandalous, seedy, sexy

side of Tantra, and a similar claim to “liberate” it from the prudish Vic-

torian biases of our scholarly forefathers.

Oh No—It’s Something “Postcolonial”

“Oh it’s something post-colonial” . . . the latest

catchall term to dazzle the academic mind.

Russel Jacoby, “Marginal Return” (1995)

From the outset of a study like this, however, I feel I need to address a

few of the anticipated objections of my readers. No doubt, some will

groan in tired dismay at the very suggestion of this project—a project

that might appear, at first glance, to be just one more of the many Said-

ian critiques of Orientalism or another clever deconstruction of a famil-

iar category. Let me make it clear, first of all, that my aim is by no means

to prove that Tantra “never existed” or that it is purely a colonialist fan-

tasy or a “Western category imposed upon Asian traditions.”42 Rather,

I aim to reveal the complexity, plurality, and fluidity of the many varied

traditions that we now call Tantra. The abstract concept of Tantrism,

like “Hinduism,” is a relatively recent creation. Like religion itself, as

Jonathan Z. Smith reminds us, it is the product of human imagination

and our own “imaginative acts of comparison and generalization.”43 But

it is not solely the product either of the Western mind or the scholarly

imagination; rather, it is a complex hybrid creation of Eastern and West-

ern and scholarly and popular imaginings. Moreover, this does not mean

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Introduction

that we cannot still speak of Tantric texts, Tantric people, and Tantric

practices. In short, rather than constructing abstract monolithic isms, it

is perhaps more fruitful to look at specific forms of discourse, ritual acts,

and historical actors, located in particular social, political, and economic

contexts, which we, as scholars “imagining religion,” find it useful to la-

bel as Tantra.

Thus, what I hope to do here is something a bit more subtle and nu-

anced than a just another postcolonial white-male-bashing. In fact, I am

in many ways skeptical of the recent proliferation of postcolonial dis-

course in the academy. As critics like Aijaz Ahmad have pointed out, there

are a number of troubling problems inherent in the discourse of post-

colonialism. First, it tends to oversimplify the colonial situation, por-

traying it as a simple Manichean binarism of colonizer and colonized,

imperial oppressor and native victim.44 By overemphasizing the radical

impact of Western power on the rest of the world, much postcolonial

discourse, dividing global history into pre- and postimperial epochs, risks

lapsing into a more subtle form of imperialism, viewing all human his-

tory from the standpoint of European expansion and the progress of mod-

ern capitalism.45

As Benita Parry and others argue, much of the anti-Orientalist discourse

tends to place more or less all of the agency, knowledge, and power on

the side of the colonizer. In so doing, it tends to reduce the colonized to

a mere passive materia to be reformed in the imperial gaze, a helpless

victim lacking the possibility to resist, challenge, and subvert Western

representations.46 What we need, in short, is a more complex and inter-

active model of the encounter between East and West. This does not, how-

ever, have to be a simple romantic celebration of the colonized Other in

its noble struggle to resist colonial domination—a cause that has become

increasingly popular in recent years. Rather, we must examine both the

ability of indigenous cultures to resist or contest and their tendency to

mimic, cooperate, or collude with Western representations of the exotic

Orient. Instead of a simple process of imperial domination and native

resistance, we seem to find “a dense web of relations between coercion,

complicity, refusal, mimicry, compromise, affiliation and revolt.”47

Finally and perhaps most problematically, much of the recent post-

colonial literature tends to ignore, elide, or gloss over the more subtle

forms of neocolonialism and cultural imperialism still very much at work

in the West’s dealings with formerly colonized (and yet to be colonized)

peoples in the Third World. As Ahmad has powerfully argued, much of

the postcolonial literature is in fact complicit with a new form of eco-

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13

nomic imperialism, as consumer capitalism now spreads to virtually every

corner of the globe. Just as capitalist industries have appropriated the

material resources of Third World peoples and mass-marketed them to

a Western audience, so too postcolonial theorists have capitalized upon

the exotic cultural goods of formerly colonized peoples, packaged them

in sexy, attractive wrappings, and marketed them to a host of intellec-

tual consumers in the Western academy.48

We need to move beyond a predictable, postcolonial, anti-Orientalist

reading of Tantra, to examine the more interesting ways in which this

category has functioned in precolonial, neocolonial—and also quite non-

colonial— contexts alike.

Theory and Method:

From History of Religions to Genealogies of Religion

Genealogy does not pretend to go back in time to re-

store an unbroken continuity that operates beyond the

dispersion of forgotten things; its duty is not to demon-

strate that the past . . . continues secretly to dominate

the present. . . . Genealogy does not resemble the evo-

lution of a species. . . . On the contrary, to follow the

complex course of descent is to maintain events in their

dispersion; it is to identify the accidents, the minute

deviations—or the complete reversals—the errors . . .

and the faulty calculations that gave birth to those

things that continue to exist and have value for us.

Michel Foucault, “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History” (1984)

My approach to the problem of Tantra will be that of an historian of re-

ligions, in the full sense—that is, an historian who critically interrogates

those phenomena claiming to be eternal or transcendent, in the light of

their most concrete social and political contexts. Here, I understand the

task of the historian of religions to go beyond a simple Eliadean quest

for universal symbolic patterns or a search for the sui generis essence of

religion as the product of homo religiosus; rather, we must also exam-

ine myths and symbols as the works of living, historically situated human

beings, as products of homo faber, inextricably enmeshed in social, po-

litical, and material struggles.49 The history of religions, as Bruce Lin-

coln points out, therefore bears a deep tension at its very heart: for the

historian of religions must examine the most material, human, and tem-

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Introduction

poral aspects of those phenomena that claim to be suprahuman and ahis-

torical: “To practice history of religions . . . is to insist on the temporal,

contextual, situated, interested, human and material dimensions of those

discourses . . . that represent themselves as eternal, transcendent, spiri-

tual and divine.”50

Going still further, however, I will also approach the problem of Tan-

tra as an historian of the history of religions; that is, I will trace the ge-

nealogies of (this particular category of ) religion by critically examining

the ways in which we scholars have constructed and manipulated our

own objects of inquiry, grounding our own imaginings of Tantra firmly

in their unique social, historical, and political contexts.51 The genealogy

of Tantra will therefore turn out to be something of a political history

of the history of the history of religions, tracing the ways in which both

Western and Indian authors have defined and redefined “Tantra” in re-

lation to specific scholarly, ideological, and political interests.

The imagining of Tantra, we will find, has been anything but a simple

process or the result of a straightforward, linear narrative. Rather, it is

the result of a tangled genealogy, as conflicted and contested as the history

of encounters between India and the West over the past several hundred

years. To trace this genealogy is not a matter of reconstructing a tidy his-

torical progression leading up to our own era, but rather of piecing to-

gether the fragmented, contradictory, and often quite erroneous tangle of

discourses that have given birth to this strange hybrid construction. It is

a matter of tracing, as Foucault puts it, “the accidents . . . the complete

reversals—the errors, the false appraisals and the faulty calculations that

gave birth to those things that continue to have value for us.”

The Dialectical Image:

A Cross-Cultural Play of Mimesis and Misrepresentation

Where thought comes to a standstill in a constellation

saturated with tension, there appears the dialectical

image, it is the caesura in the movement of thought. It

is to be sought at the point where the tension between

the dialectical oppositions is the greatest.

Walter Benjamin,

“Erkenntnistheoretisches, Theorie des Fortschritts” (ca. 1937)

If my general method is that of an historian of religions, the various

hermeneutic tools I employ to make sense of this category are drawn from

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15

a wide range of disciplines, employing a number of comparative insights

borrowed from many cultures and fields. Above all, I hope to use some

of the insights of Michael Taussig, specifically the key notions of the “di-

alectical image” and the cross-cultural play of “mimesis,” which he in

turn adapts from Walter Benjamin. As a dialectical category, Tantra is a

complex, shifting fusion of both Western and Indian discourse, a com-

posite construction of Orientalist projections, indigenous counterpro-

jections, and the play of misrepresentation between them.

On one side, the image of Tantra clearly has been the result of a cer-

tain displacement of many deep-seated fears, anxieties, and desires

within the Western imagination, projected onto the screen of the exoti-

cized Other of India. As Gustavo Benevides comments in his study of

Giuseppe Tucci, one of Europe’s greatest scholars of Buddhist Tantra,

“The vision of the Orient nurtured by these intellectuals was in most cases

a screen upon which they could project their own understanding of the

Occident: either the triumphant discovery that the West was superior to

the East, or the melancholy realization that the East possessed a magic

no longer present in West.”52 Richard King has recently explored a sim-

ilar dynamic in his study of Western scholarship on mysticism and the

construction of India as the “mystic East” in the Orientalist imagina-

tion. Rather strangely, however, King makes absolutely no reference ei-

ther to the role of sexuality in mysticism or to Tantra—a category that

was a key, I will argue, in the Western imagining of India, and a crucial

part of the modern imagining of mysticism, particularly in its most dan-

gerous and aberrant forms.53

In this sense, the image of Tantra is closely related to the broader con-

struction of “the primitive” or “savage” in modern anthropological and

popular discourse. As Torgovnick puts it, “the primitive is the screen upon

which we project our deepest fears and desires”; indeed, “the West seems

to need the primitive as a precondition and supplement to its sense of

self: it always creates heightened versions of the primitive as nightmare

or pleasant dream.”54

Yet surely it would be a mistake to assume that this has been an en-

tirely one-way process of projection, an imaginal creation of the West-

ern mind. The category of Tantra is every bit as much a product of the

Indian imagination’s counterimagining, mimicry, and mirroring. As Wil-

helm Halbfass has argued, Indian intellectuals have consistently redefined

themselves in the face of the encounter with the West—often by adapt-

ing Western categories and constructions: “Indians reinterpreted key con-

cepts of their traditional self-understanding, adjusting them to Western

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Introduction

modes of understanding. By appealing to the West, by using its concep-

tual tools they tried to defend the identity of their tradition.”55 Since at

least the mid-nineteenth century, the category of Tantra has been reap-

propriated and reinterpreted by Indian authors as a basic part of the ways

in which they understand their own traditions. The idea of Tantra—with

all its immoral and scandalous connotations—has become a basic part

of the way in which many Indians now interpret their own history: “We

cannot look at Tantrism as mere perversion without at the same time

looking at ourselves as a nation of perverts. . . . It is necessary to know

how our ancestors had such absurd beliefs in order to understand how

we have become what we are today.”56 The imagining of Tantrism is thus

very similar to that of “Lamaism” in the case of Tibetan Buddhism. As

Donald Lopez observes in his incisive study of the modern imagining of

Shangri-La, “the abstract noun, coined in the West, has become natu-

ralized as if it were an empirical object, the manipulation of which has

effects beyond the realm of rhetoric.”57

Thus the construction of Tantra is neither a simple indigenous fact nor

the mere product of Western projection and fantasy: it is the complex re-

sult of a long history of mutual misrepresentation and mirroring at work

between both Western and Eastern imaginations—a kind of “curry ef-

fect” (to play on Agehananda Bharati’s metaphor of the “pizza effect”)

or a game of cross-cultural Ping-Pong.58 This is an especially acute ex-

ample of what Friedrich Max Müller long ago called “that world wide

circle through which, like an electric current, Oriental thought could run

to the West and Western thought returns to the East.”59

It is in precisely this sense, I would suggest, that Tantra can be under-

stood as a unique example of a dialectical image, to borrow Walter Ben-

jamin’s apt phrase. As a “constellation saturated with tension,” the di-

alectical image brings together past and present, ancient myth and

contemporary meaning in a single, highly charged, symbolic form.60 In

contrast to the romantic notion of the “symbol”—imagined as a unified,

coherent cipher of some hidden meaning—the dialectical image is a pow-

erful juxtaposition of conflicting and contradictory elements that “crys-

tallizes antithetical elements by providing the axes for their alignment.”61

The image of Tantra is precisely this kind of juxtaposition of conflicting

forces—or rather, a complex series of such juxtapositions—which brings

together sex and spirituality, hedonism and transcendence, the profane

and the sacred, even consumer capitalism and mystical ecstasy, in a va-

riety of shifting configurations.

This dialectical image of Tantra, in turn, lies at the pivot of a com-

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17

plex play of representations and imaginary projections—a play of mime-

sis. As Michael Taussig defines it, elaborating upon Benjamin’s essay “On

the Mimetic Faculty,” mimesis is the basic human power of imitation and

representation of the Other. It is our capacity to grasp alterity, to make

sense of the foreign or unknown, which takes place in all cultures and

historical periods. But it becomes especially intense in periods of colo-

nial contact, when cultures are dramatically confronted with a radical

Otherness that brings domination and imperial control. The colonizing

powers, for their part, construct a variety of imaginary representations

of native peoples—as savage, primitive, feminine, emotional, or violent,

rather than rational or scientific. Projecting their own deepest fears of

disorder or subversion, together within their own repressed desires and

fantasies, the colonizers construct a kind of negative antitype of them-

selves within the mirror of the colonized Other.62

And yet, particularly in cases of colonial contact, mimesis is a two-

way street. Colonized peoples also have their own forms of mimesis, their

own ways of imaginatively representing the colonial Other. Not only do

they frequently mimic, parody, and satirize their colonial rulers in vari-

ous ways, using the mimetic faculty to appropriate the mysterious power

of the white man, but they also seize upon the imaginings of the colo-

nizers, often by turning those notions on their heads and manipulating

them as a source of “counterhegemonic discourse.” The play of mime-

sis is, in short, a complex back-and-forth dialectic of interlocking im-

ages, a “circulation of imageric power between selves and antiselves, their

ominous need for and their feeding off each other’s correspondence.”63

It is just this kind of circular play of images between Eastern and West-

ern imaginings, I would suggest, that has given birth to the complex cat-

egory of Tantra. And it is the ongoing dialectic of images that has led to

the constantly shifting nature of the category, which assumes new va-

lences in changing historical and social contexts. Like the concept of the

primitive or the shaman, Tantra is a profoundly Janus-faced category:

attacked in some historical periods as uncivilized or subhuman, and cel-

ebrated in other periods (particularly our own) as a precivilized “unsul-

lied original state, a sort of Eden before the fall when harmony prevailed,”

when sex was free and unrepressed, when the body had not yet been sub-

jected to modern Western prudishness and hypocrisy.64 As we see, for ex-

ample, in the strikingly “dialectical” image of Kàlí (figures 1–3), Tantra

lies at a nexus of contradictory forces at work between India and the West.

For European Orientalists and colonial authorities, the image of Kàlí was

singled out as the most extreme example of the dangerous immorality

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Figure 1. Illustration for Kàlí Cigarettes, a nationalist brand. Calcutta Art

Studio (1879).

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19

and depravity that were running rampant in the subcontinent; yet for the

radical leaders of the revolutionary movement in Bengal, this same im-

age could be seized and exploited, transforming the Tantric goddess into

a symbol of Mother India in violent revolt against her colonial masters

(see chapter 2). In our own day, Kàlí has been taken up by feminist writ-

ers, in both India and in the West, as a radical symbol of women’s lib-

eration and empowerment (see chapter 6). I hope, then, to trace the tan-

gled genealogy of these dialectical imaginings of Tantra as they have been

transformed and reconfigured over the last several hundred years.

Structure and Outline of the Book: A Dialectical Argument

There is no privilege to the so-called exotic . . . it is all

history. There is no “other.” . . . Nevertheless the histo-

rian of religion will . . . gain insight from the study of

materials which at first glance appear uncommon or re-

mote. For there is extraordinary cognitive power in . . .

“defamiliarization”—making the familiar seem strange

in order to enhance our perception of the familiar.

Jonathan Z. Smith, Imagining Religion (1986)

We penetrate the mystery only to the degree that we

recognize it in the everyday world, by virtue of a di-

alectical optic that perceives the everyday as impene-

trable, the impenetrable as everyday.

Walter Benjamin, “Surrealism” (1929)

Mirroring the dialectical, hybrid, and shifting nature of the category of

Tantra, this book will proceed in a dialectical fashion, tacking back and

forth between Western and Indian imaginations. Each chapter will be

structured around the reciprocal exchanges, the reactions and counter-

reactions, between East and West, as they have been played out in a se-

ries of key historical encounters. In so doing we will discover that the

various discourses surrounding Tantra may not always tell us much that

is terribly useful about any particular form of Asian religion, but they

do tell us a great deal indeed about the concrete social, political, and moral

contexts in which these discourses emerged. Indeed, the discourses about

Tantra are an integral part of larger cultural and governmental issues—

the ruling of British India, the regulation of the colonial body and its

sexuality, the construction of a reformed Hindu identity, the fight for In-

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20

Introduction

Figure 2. Kàlí, goddess of destruction. From Augustus

Somerville, Crime and Religious Belief in India (Calcutta:

Thacker, Spink, 1931).

dian independence, the politics of scholarship in the modern study of re-

ligions, and the global spread of consumer capitalism at the start of the

millennium.

I begin, later in this introduction, with a brief genealogy of the term

tantra in Indian literature, retracing the many tangled ways in which

the “thread” of tantra has been stretched and interwoven throughout

Indian history. Chapter 1 will then discuss the age of Orientalism, ex-

amining the first British depictions of Tantra and the ways in which they

played into the colonial political programs and the sexual-moral ideals

of Victorian culture. At the same time, I will also explore the many ways

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21

Figure 3. A modern Kàlí. Cover illustration, by Mary Wilshire, for Trina

Robbins, Eternally Bad: Goddesses with Attitude (Berkeley, Calif.: Conari

Press, 2001). Courtesy of the artist.

in which these images were in turn reappropriated and transformed by

nineteenth-century Indian authors, for example, Ràmmohun Roy and

the leaders of the Bengal Renaissance.

In chapter 2, I will explore the political role of Tantra in the imagi-

nations of the British authorities, particularly in their fears of criminal

activity and the association of secret Tantric cults with revolutionary ag-

itation. Indian revolutionaries of the early twentieth century in turn

played upon and exploited those very fears, using Tantric imagery to ex-

press nationalist ideals and terrorist violence.

Chapter 3 will delve into the realm of the popular imagination, ex-

amining the often wildly exaggerated and exoticized image of Tantra

in Victorian novels and Indian popular literature. Here I will explore

the rich confluence of Orientalist constructions, colonial paranoia, and

poetic license that fed into the literary portrayals, both Eastern and

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Introduction

Western, of the seedy Indian underworld in the nineteenth and twentieth

centuries.

In chapter 4, I will examine the various attempts, on the part of both

Western and Indian authors, to deodorize, sanitize, or reform Tantra. The

most famous of these is the eccentric Supreme Court judge and secret

tàntrika (practitioner of Tantra), Sir John Woodroffe, who is regarded

as the founding father of Tantric studies. His legacy of reform and san-

itization of Tantra would be mirrored and echoed in various ways by a

great many Indian authors, such as Swami Vivekenanda and the disci-

ples of Sri Ramakrishna.

Chapter 5 will then look at the “revalorized” place of Tantra—and

perhaps even Tantro-centrism—in the work of twentieth-century histo-

rians of religions, such as Mircea Eliade, Heinrich Zimmer, and Julius

Evola. As we will see, there were often many political—and in Evola’s

case, explicitly fascist—ramifications in their scholarly reconstructions

of Tantrism. However, we will also examine the role of Tantra in mod-

ern Indian scholarship, where it likewise has become a key part of vari-

ous cultural and political discourses surrounding Indian national iden-

tity and even the rise of communism in regions like West Bengal.

Finally, chapter 6 will engage the increasing fusion between East and

West, as in our own time Tantra becomes more and more a part of pop-

ular culture and New Age religion. I will examine the widespread pop-

ular impact of Tantra as manifest in the Tantrik Order in America, the

“sex magick” of Aleister Crowley, the cult of Osho-Rajneesh, and the

growing the search for Tantric ecstasy online, in the strange new world

of cyber space. We might even say that the contemporary appropriation

of Tantra—with its fusion of spirituality and materialism, sacred tran-

scendence and this-worldly profit—has in many ways become the ideal

religion of late-twentieth-century Western consumer culture, or perhaps

even the “spiritual logic of late capitalism.”

In the conclusion I try to go beyond a mere deconstructive genealogy,

offering instead some constructive comments as to how we might begin

to reimagine the category of Tantra in contemporary discourse. Above

all, I will argue, we need to move beyond both the early Orientalist hor-

ror of Tantra as a scandalous perversion and the contemporary celebra-

tion of Tantra as an affirmation of sensual pleasure. Instead, I will argue

for a more historical, contextual, socially, and politically embodied ap-

proach to Tantra that roots these traditions solidly in their material cir-

cumstances and lived contingencies.

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23

s t r e t c h i n g t h e t r u t h :

“ t a n t r a ” a n d t h e t a n t r a s i n i n d i a n h i s t o r y

A very common expression in English writings is “the

Tantra”; but its use is often due to a misconception. For

what does Tantra mean? The word denotes injunction

(vidhi), regulation (niyama), Màstra generally or trea-

tise. . . . A secular writing may be called Tantra.

We cannot speak of “the Treatise” nor of “the Tan-

tra,” any more than we can or do speak of the PuràJa,

the SaFhità. We can speak of “the Tantras” as we do

of “the PuràJas.”

Sir John Woodroffe, Shakti and Shàkta (1918)

. . . as in spinning a thread we twist fibre by fibre . . .

Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations (1958)

Given the profound ambiguity of the category and the conflicting West-

ern interpretations of its content, perhaps we should begin with a brief

analysis of the term tantra in Indian literature. Not only is tantra a kind

of “floating signifier . . . gathering to itself a range of contradictory qual-

ities”; but to use perhaps a more fitting Indian metaphor, tantra is a tan-

gled “thread” that has been spun out, intertwined, and often snarled in

myriad complex ways throughout the dense history of Indian religions.65

The historical origins of the vast body of traditions that we call Tan-

tra are today lost in a mire of obscure Indian history and muddled schol-

arly conjecture. As Padoux observes, “the history of Tantrism is impos-

sible to write” based on the sheer poverty of data at present.66 In what

follows, I will by no means attempt to reconstruct this history—a for-

midable, perhaps hopeless task that has already been attempted by more

capable scholars. Instead, I will try to retrace the complex genealogy of

the term tantra itself, in order to show the diverse and heterogeneous

body of concepts and traditions this term has been used to designate. For

the sake of simplicity, I will focus here primarily on Indian, Sanskrit, and

vernacular uses of the term tantra; I will not engage the interesting prob-

lem of related terms in other languages, such as the Tibetan rgyd, the

Chinese mi-chiao, or the Japanese mikkyo, or the complex genealogy of

tantra outside the Indian context.67

There is of course no lack of myths and legends about the origins of

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Introduction

particular tantra s. Many of the Hindu tantra s offer their own narrative

of a mythic origin, often in the form of the tantràvatàra or “descent of

the text,” in which Lord Tiva or the Goddess reveals the scripture. Accord-

ing to the narrative of the Tantraràja Tantra, for example, the teaching

was originally revealed by Tiva to the supreme Takti at the dawn of the

first cosmic age; it was then transmitted through a series of nine Nàthas,

or perfected masters, who descended in a chain from Tiva’s realm to earth,

through whom the tantra was revealed to humankind: “by these nine,

the tantra was spread throughout this world; the Primordial Supreme

Takti revealed it in the KKta Yuga. ”68

Meanwhile, contemporary scholars have come up with a variety of

quasi-mythical origin-narratives of their own. The two most common ones

are (a) the pre-Aryan/tribal–origin narrative and (b) the Vedic-origin nar-

rative. The former had its origins in nineteenth-century Orientalist liter-

ature, was later popularized by historians of religions like Mircea Eli-

ade, and has now become a standard trope in most New Age versions of

Tantra. According to this view, Tantra is rooted in the ancient Indus Val-

ley civilization, which is alleged to have been a matriarchal culture cen-

tering around goddess worship and fertility cults. With the coming of

the Indo-Europeans or “Aryan invaders,” sometime around 1700 b.c.e.,

the story goes, sexual practices and goddess worship were pushed un-

derground, where they survived as the “autochthonous substratum” of

later Hinduism; only a millennium later did they resurface and work their

way into the textual record. At the same time, Eliade and others have

argued that Tantra is closely tied to non-Hindu, indigenous, and “abo-

riginal” traditions, such as the many tribal groups that survive today,

above all in the marginal areas like Bengal, Assam, and the northwest

mountains.69

The other common scholarly narrative takes the opposite stance. Since

the time of Woodroffe, many defenders of the Tantras have argued that

they are not only in continuity with Brahmanical Vedic traditions, but

that they are in fact the very essence and inner core of Vedic teachings.70

This emphasis on the elite, nonpopular, and Sanskritic side of Tantra con-

tinues in a more nuanced form in much of the recent scholarship on Tan-

tra. Downplaying its antinomian, radical, and transgressive aspects, many

authors appear to have followed Woodroffe in trying to present a ver-

sion of Tantra that is “not based upon a popular movement but was the

outgrowth of the specialized position of an intellectual elite of religious

functionaries from the upper classes, as a rule, of Brahmans.”71

Yet the genealogy of tantra, I think we will find, turns out to be far

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25

messier, more ambiguous, and more interesting than either of these schol-

arly narratives. In keeping with its etymological meaning of “stretching”

and “weaving,” tantra will perhaps turn out to be less a unified singular

entity than a series of complex threads that have been woven, spread out,

and extended in manifold ways throughout the rich fabric of Indian history.

Weaving the Web of Words and Worlds:

Tantra in Early Indian Literature

The poets stretched forth the seven threads to weave

the warp and woof [of the ritual].

Rg Veda (RV 1.164.4–5)

The Sanskrit word tantra can be found in the earliest known texts of an-

cient India, appearing as a key term in the hymns of the Rg and Atharva

Vedas (ca. 1500–1000 b.c.e.), and woven throughout the later history

of Indian literature. Yet its meaning is by no means either simple or fixed.

A number of authors have suggested possible etymologies for the term,

some defining it as “shortening” or “reduction,” others tracing it to the

noun tanu (body), and still others deriving it from tantrí (to explain) or

tatrí (to understand).72 However, most scholars seem to agree (with

PàniJi, a Sanskrit grammarian) that the term probably derives from the

root tan, which means basically to stretch, to spread, or to weave, and,

metaphorically, to lay out, to explain, or to espouse.73 As William Ma-

hony suggests, the imagery of thread and weaving is one of the most

evocative themes throughout the early Vedic literature; it is used to de-

scribe both the language of the Vedic poets, who “weave their words out

of the fabric of a timeless language,” and the creation of the universe out

of the supreme Brahman, which is likened to “the finely drawn thread

on which creatures are woven” (AV 10.8.38).74 Perhaps most significantly,

tan is a key verb used in the classic cosmogonic hymn (RV 10.90), which

describes the origin of the universe out of the sacrificial dismemberment

of the primordial man, Puruãa. The body of Puruãa is divided up and

“spread out” into the parts of the universe, just as a thread is spun and

woven by a loom: “When the gods spread out [atanvata] the sacrifice

with the Man as the offering, spring was the clarified butter, summer the

fuel, autumn the oblation. . . . [T]he gods, spreading the sacrifice, bound

the Man as the sacrificial beast” (RV 10.90.6, 15). Hence, as Wendy

Doniger O’Flaherty notes, this key verb tan is used simultaneously to re-

fer to the performance of the sacrifice, which is spread out over the rit-

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Introduction

ual ground, and to the origin of the universe, which is “spread upon the

cosmic waters, or woven, like a fabric.”75

The Upaniãads (700–400 b.c.e.) continue this play upon the imagery

of weaving evoked by the root tan, adding to it the metaphor of the spi-

der spinning its threads (tantu). Just as a spider covers itself with its own

web, so too “the one God covers himself with things issuing from the

primal source . . . as a spider with the threads [tantubhik].”76 “As a spi-

der sends forth its thread . . . so do all the vital functions, all the worlds,

all the gods and all beings spring forth from this Self.”77 Thus all of re-

ality, along with the sacred language that reflects it, is the product of this

stretching out of the One into the variegated fabric of the universe.

Derived from this seminal root tan, the noun tantra is thus first used

in the Vedic hymns to denote a kind of weaving machine, a loom or,

specifically, the warp and woof (RV 10.71.9; AV 10.7.42). Even here, how-

ever, it often has the extended meaning of the “weaving” of speech: the

visionary poets who composed the Vedas wove them with the threads of

words as if upon a loom. However, as J. C. Heesterman points out, tan-

tra as “loom” is also a metaphor standardly used for the sacrificial rit-

ual, which is similarly stretched and spread out through the many inter-

woven threads of the ritual acts.78 As the Rg Veda puts it:

The sacrifice that is spread out with threads on all sides, drawn tight with

a hundred and one divine acts, is woven by these fathers as they come near:

Weave forward, weave backward, they say as they sit by the loom that is

stretched tight. The Man stretches the warp and draws the weft; the Man

has spread it out upon this dome of the sky. (RV 10.130.1–2)

Later, in the BràhmaJas (ca. 1200–900 b.c.e.), tantra is extended from

the sense of “weaving words” and “weaving rituals” to a more abstract

level, whereby it refers to the essential part of a thing, the main point or

characteristic feature of a given system.79 And by the period of the great

Sanskrit epic the Mahàbhàrata (ca. 500 b.c.e.–500 c.e.), the range of

tantra has been expanded to refer simply to “any rule, theory, or scientific

work” (13.48.6). Thus, later authors like the great philosopher TaJkara

use tantra simply to refer to any system of thought (e.g., Kapilasya Tan-

tra, meaning the SàFkhya system).80 However, according to Sir Monier-

Williams, the term would eventually be extended and used throughout

Sanskrit literature in an almost infinite variety of ways, to denote every-

thing from “an army, row, number or series” (BP 10.54.15), to a magi-

cal device or diagram (often synonymous with yantra) to “a drug or chief

remedy.”81

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27

But perhaps most commonly, tantra is used much like the term sÜtra,

which derives from the verb suc, “to sew,” to designate a particular kind

of discourse or treatise. According to one common definition, a tantra is

simply “a scripture by which knowledge is spread” (tanyate vistàryate

jñànam anena iti tantram)—a text, however, that may or may not con-

tain any of the secret and transgressive materials that today we think of

as Tantric (for example, the Pañcatantra, a popular collection of fables).82

In sum, as Padoux observes, the substantive noun “Tantrism” appears

nowhere in Indian literature prior to the modern period. It is “assuredly

a Western creation,” with a fairly recent history.83 However, we do find

the adjective tàntrika, which has been used sometimes as a counterpart

and contrast to the adjective vaidika (Vedic, pertaining to the Vedas).

One of the passages most often cited by modern scholars is a brief one

in KullÜka Bhaååa’s commentary on the Laws of Manu, “revelation [Mruti]

is twofold, vaidika and tàntrika. ”84 In other words, revealed scripture

can be classified into that which belongs to the traditional canon of the

Vedic texts and that which appeals to an extra-Vedic source of author-

ity. Yet, rather oddly, despite the frequency with which this passage is

cited by modern scholars, Bhaååa does not elaborate this point at all be-

yond this one terse statement and provides no further explanation of what

tàntrika means. Moreover, this vaidika/tàntrika distinction by no means

resolves the semantic muddle presented by tantra. If anything, it only com-

pounds it a hundredfold, for now tàntrika seems to be a generic term re-

ferring not just to what we today think of as Tantra, but to all non-Vedic

texts that claim revealed status. So we are left wondering how to distin-

guish Tantra as a category apart from any other Indian literature that

claims an extra-Vedic origin and authority.

Some of the PuràJas also use the vaidika/tàntrika distinction to de-

scribe the primary ways of worshiping of the deity, in accordance with

different social and spiritual types (see BP 11.3.47). According to the

Padma PuràJa, vaidika worship is prescribed for Brahmans and the other

twice-born classes, while tàntrika offers even lowly M Üdra s a way to wor-

ship God: “The worship of ViãJu is of three kinds: as laid down in the

Vedas, as laid down in the Tantras, and mixed. The vaidika or the mixed

one is laid down for bràhmaJa s and others. The tàntrika is enjoined for

even a MÜdra who is ViãJu’s devotee.”85 Yet quite strikingly, these texts

do not associate tàntrika with any of the sexy, scandalous, or transgres-

sive practices that we associate with the term; nor do they identify tàn-

trika worship with those deviant sects—such as the Kàpàlikas, PàMupatas,

and Vàmas—who are, elsewhere in the PuràJas, vilified as dangerous and

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Introduction

deluded cults, and who are typically identified by modern scholars as

quintessential tàntrika s.

Continuing the Search: Tantra and the First Texts Called Tantra s

Since it is unalterably present, like the sky (in every-

thing) beginning with sentient beings and ending with

Buddhas, it is termed “Tantra as actuality” because of

its continuousness.

Padma dkar-po (trans. Guenther, The Tantric View of Life)

As for the smile, the gaze, the embrace, and the union,

even by the tantra s the secret language of these four is

not mentioned.

Hevajra Tantra (HT 2.3.53–54)

Given the incredible semantic polyvalence of the term tantra in Sanskrit

literature, we might wonder if we can find any clearer definition of the

term within the tantra s themselves. There is of course a vast body of texts

called tantra s, as well as related texts called yàmala s, àgama s, nigama s, and saFhità s, which spread throughout the Hindu, Jain, and Buddhist

communities over the past twelve hundred years. The Tibetan canon, for

example, preserves almost five hundred such texts, along with over two

thousand commentaries and interpretive works. Within the Hindu tra-

dition, we find tantra s composed by the VaiãJava Pàñcaràtra school, the

lost tantra s of the Sauras, as well as the more famous tantra s of the Taivites

and Tàktas. Tantra s are found in more or less every corner of the sub-

continent, with powerful strongholds in the northeast (Bengal, Orissa,

and Assam) and the northwest (Kashmir), and later spreading to the far

south (Tamilnadu and Kerala). Buddhist tantra s would eventually spread

not only throughout India, but also to Nepal, Tibet, China, Japan, and

parts of Southeast Asia.86

Yet precisely when or where these texts emerged is largely a mystery.

In fact, we cannot find any concrete reference to Hindu texts called tantra s

until the ninth century, at the earliest; the tantra s are nowhere mentioned

in the Mahàbhàrata, which claims that there is nothing in the world that

is not contained within it; nor do any of the early Chinese pilgrims to

India make any reference to the tantra s. Even more striking is the fact

that none of the great compendiums of Indian philosophical systems—

such as Màdhava’s SarvadarManasaFgraha (fourteenth century) or the

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29

SarvasiddhàntasaFgraha— contains any section on Tantra, even though

they do contain discussions of specific traditions such as àgama, pratyab-

hijñà, and so on.87

The earliest known reference to texts called tantra s seems to lie in Bà-

Jabhaååa’s classic fantasy tale, Kàdambarí (seventh century), where we

meet a strange, crazy, and rather comical old sàdhu (holy man) from

South India, who “had a collection of palm-leaf manuscripts, tantra s and

mantras.” Yet we are told virtually nothing about these manuscripts, nor

is it clear exactly what tantra means in this context.88 Thus, as Gupta

and Goudriaan admit, “the existence of the Hindu Tantras cannot as yet

be proved for the period before 800,” when we find the oldest epigraphic

mention of specific tantra s. According to an inscription of Sdok kak Thom

in Cambodia, at the beginning of the ninth century (802?), King Jayavar-

man II’s court priest Tivakaivalya installed a royal cult based on the doc-

trine of four tantra s brought from elsewhere. Of these texts, named as

the Tirascheda, Nayottara, Sammohana, and VíJàMikha Tantra s, only the

last survives.89

There has also been a long, heated, and never resolved debate over the

question of the primacy of Hindu or Buddhist Tantra. Scholars on both

sides have argued fiercely for either a Buddhist or Hindu basis for Tan-

tra, with some arguing for Vedic origins and others for inherently non-

Vedic roots within the Buddhist tradition.90 But in any case, it seems likely

that the oldest known texts called tantra s are the Buddhist Guhyasàmaja

Tantra and Hevajra Tantra. The older of these, the Guhyasamàja, has

been dated anywhere from the third to the eighth century.91 Even here,

however, the use of the term tantra is by no means either clear or par-

ticularly helpful in understanding the category of “Tantrism.”92

In one terse and cryptic passage, we are told that tantra can be defined

as prabandha. This term prabandha, in turn, is one that carries a wide

range of meanings, denoting everything from a “ligament” to a “poetic

composition”; but here it seems to mean something like “continuity” or

“continuous series.” And this continuous series consists of three things:

“Tantra is explained as ‘continuity’; that continuity is threefold, divided

into Ground [àdhàra], Nature [prakKti], and Inviolability [asaFhàrya].

Nature is the Cause; Inviolability is the Fruit; and Ground is the Means—

thus the threefold meaning of tantra” (GST 18.34–35).93 According to

the interpretations of later Tibetan commentators, the threefold “con-

tinuous series” here is the progress of the initiate along the path to

nirvàJa. It is the path that leads from the unenlightened state, through

the means of spiritual practice, to the fruit of awakening or Vajradhàra

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Introduction

(“diamond bearer”): “The Tantra shows the continuous progress of a

candidate (Tantra of Cause) along the Tantric Path (Tantra of Means) to

the high goal of Vajradhàra (Tantra of Fruit).”94 Tantra thus seems to be

the “thread of continuity” that carries the disciple along the path from

ignorance to liberation.

When we turn to the second early Buddhist tantra, the Hevajra, which

probably reached its final form by the eighth century, we find other oc-

casional uses of the term tantra. Indeed, the Hevajra itself claims to be

the revelation of the inner core of all the tantra s—“That which is con-

cealed in all the tantra s is here finally made manifest” (HT 2.5.66), now

revealed by Lord Buddha as the heart of all the most esoteric practices:

“Then the adamantine Lord spoke to the yoginí s of the Means, which

are the basis of all tantra s [sarvatantranidànam], of the Union, of con-

secrations, and of secret language, of the different Joys and moments, of

feasting and the rest” (HT 2.3.1). Yet it seems clear that in both the

Guhyasamàja and in the Hevajra, tantra is not used to refer to a unique

religious movement or overarching category; it simply refers to a kind

of text, and thus to one of the many elements that comprise the path to

liberation, neither more nor less important than the other meditations,

rites, or initiations.95

In general, it would seem that the term tantra is not the one most often

used in Buddhist literature; much more common are the terms Vajrayàna

(diamond or thunderbolt vehicle) or Mantrayàna (mantra vehicle), which

designate a new spiritual path, going beyond both the Hínayàna (lesser

vehicle) and the Mahàyàna (great vehicle) (GST 5). Yet even these are by

no means easily defined terms. As Dasgupta comments, all we get from

the Buddhist literature are “mere cursory descriptions, none of which

suggests any correct definition of Vajrayàna. In fact, Vajrayàna cannot

be defined; for it incorporated so many heterogeneous elements that any

attempt at strict definition would be futile.”96

Eventually, the Vajray àna Buddhists would elaborate a hierarchical

classification of texts into four kinds of tantra s. This is often traced back

to one cryptic passage in the Hevajra Tantra, which speaks in very elu-

sive terms of the four gestures—the “smile,” “gaze,” “embrace,” and

“union”—which are said to be even more secret than all the tantra s:

“What may be said of the secret language, that great convention of the

yoginí s, which the M ràvaka s (disciples) and others cannot unriddle? . . .

As for the smile, the gaze, the embrace, and the union, even by the

tantra s the secret language of these four is not mentioned” (HT

2.3.53–54).

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31

Although it is by no means clear what the precise meaning of this verse

might be, it had become common by the time of the great Tibetan the-

ologian and founder of the dGe lugs pa school, Tsong-ka-pa (1357–1419),

to associate these enigmatic “gestures” with four classes of tantra s . Thus

we have a progression of kriyà (action), caryà (practice), yoga, and anuttara-yoga (supreme yoga) tantra s, revealed through a series of increas-

ingly esoteric consecrations. However, as Tucci points out, this well-

known fourfold division of the dGe lug school was by no means the only

way of carving up the vast body of Vajrayàna literature; rather, there

were a variety of fourfold, fivefold, sixfold, and other divisions common

in different schools.97

In sum, it would seem that the Buddhist literature provides us neither

with a clear definition of tantra nor with a simple or consistent classifi-

cation of all the many texts called tantra s. As Lopez concludes in his own

insightful deconstruction of the term in the Buddhist tradition, tantra per-

haps cannot be understood as any kind of substantive, unified category

by itself; rather, it seems to function in a contrastive relation to the term

sÜtra. The path of the tantra s is thus a kind of “supplement” to the path

of the sÜtra s, just as the Vajrayàna imagines itself to be the supplement

to the Hínayàna and Mahàyàna traditions.98

Spreading the Knowledge That Saves: Tantra in the Hindu Tantra s

A tantra always spreads and saves . . .

[tanute tràyate nityaF tantramithaF . . . ]

PiGgalàmata (1174)

It should be carefully kept secret, this essence of the

tantra s which is difficult to obtain [ gopitavyaF prayat-

nena tantrasàraF sudurlabham].

VíJàMikhatantra (VST 312)

When we turn to the Hindu tradition, we find little help in discerning a

clear or simple definition of tantra. It is true, of course, that many Hindu

texts do speak of the “essence of the tantra s” (tantrasàra), the “essential

meaning discussed in the tantra s” (tantrapratipàdyam arthatattvaF), and

the “established truth of the tantra s” (tantra-siddhànta) (NUT 1.1; VST

100). Yet one is hard pressed to find any clear definition of tantra in these

texts, much less any notion of larger movement or tradition conceived

as “Tantrism.”

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The VaiãJava Pàñcaràtra tradition, for example, produced a large

body of esoteric ritual and philosophical texts beginning around the

fifth century. As F. Otto Schrader points out, the Pàñcaràtras use tan-

tra interchangeably with the more common term saFhità to refer to

particular compositions; both terms, moreover, are used rather gener-

ically to refer to “the main topics of a philosophical or religious system”;

for example, “PàMa Tantra,” meaning the PàMupata school of Taivism.

Thus the Pàñcaràtra text Ahirbudhnya SaFhità (AS 60.20) describes

itself as tantrasàra, which Schrader renders simply as “the essence of

philosophy.”99

Many later texts of the Taiva and Tàkta schools do give us occasional

hints as to possible definitions of the term tantra. According to one often-

cited definition that appears in the Kàmika Ägama, “It is called ‘ tantra’

because it promulgates great knowledge concerning Truth and mantra,

and because it saves [tanoti vipulàn arthàFs tattvamantrasamàMritàn/trà-

JaFca kurute yasmàt tantram ityabhidhíyate].”100 Other texts, such as

the Svacchanda Tantra, also give some partial definition of the adjective

tàntrika. For example, one who pursues the tàntrika method or way (tàn-

triko nyàyah) is described as follows: “He by whom the senses are con-

quered and whose mind is fixed . . . he whose intellect is still with regard

to his own affairs or those of others . . . this, in short, is said to be the

tàntrika method” (SvT 10.71–73). The Niruttara Tantra also uses the

vaidika/tàntrika distinction to contrast the consecration ceremony of

kings with that of the truly wise (jñànin s). Whereas royal consecration

is based on Vedic injunctions, the esoteric consecration of truer know-

ers is concealed in the tantra s. “The consecration of kings follows the

vaidika procedures; but the consecration of the truly wise is hidden within

all the tantra s . The wise perform the consecration by preparing the kula

cakra” (NUT 7.2–3). Yet none of these definitions indicates that these

authors think of themselves as belonging to a particular school, move-

ment, or religious tradition called “Tantrism.” And the definitions they

provide of tantra, as a text which spreads knowledge and saves, or tàn-

trika, as a method based on conquering the senses and stilling the mind,

do little to distinguish this from any other yogic path aimed at spiritual

liberation.

However, if the authors of the tantra s don’t seem to think of themselves

as belonging to a “Tantric tradition” or to Tantrism as a distinct move-

ment, they do think of themselves as belonging to other sorts of traditions

and lineages: that is, they describe themselves as Tàkta (worshipers of

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33

Takti), Taiva (worshipers of Tiva), Krama (literally, “gradation,” “method,”

or “way”), or Trika (“triadic”), but not typically as “Tantric.” Among the

most important of these schools is the Kula, which is often identified with

the semimythical Siddha Matsyendranàth (see TA 29.32).101 Thus the clas-

sic KulàrJava Tantra, one of the most influential tantra s of the medieval

period, speaks frequently of the kula path (kulamàrga), kula dharma, kula

scriptures (kulaMàstra), and “Kaula” is used as a substantive noun for the

tradition as a whole (KT 1.119, 12.43, 2.23, 11.98). In several places we

find a hierarchy of schools, ascending from the Vedic, to the VaiãJava,

to the Taiva, to the highest path of Kaula:

Vedic worship is greater than all others. But greater than that is VaiãJava

worship; and greater than that is Taiva worship; and greater than that is

DakãiJàcàra. Greater than DakãiJàcàra is Vàmàcàra; and greater than

Vàma is Siddhànta; greater than Siddhànta is Kaula—and there is none

superior to Kaula. Deví, this Kula is more secret than secret, more essential

than the essence, greater than the supreme, given directly by Tiva, proceed-

ing from ear to ear. (KT 2.4–9; cf. NUT 1.13, 1.25)102

Yet nowhere here do we find “Tantrism” imagined as a coherent move-

ment or school.

Many later works would eventually attempt to construct some sort

of classificatory schema in order to organize all of the various literature

proliferating under the titles of àgama, nigama, tantra, yàmala, and so

on. Thus, we find a number of varying lists of the major texts: for ex-

ample, the NavamísiFha mentions forty-nine tantra s, seventeen saFhità s, eight yàmala s, four cÜjàmaJi s, three pàñcaràtra s, and more. However,

probably the most common way of carving up the vast territory covered

by these various traditions is the threefold division into saFhità, àgama,

and tantra. Thus the saFhità s of the Pàñcaràtra school are traditionally

said to be 108 in number, the àgama s of the Taivas said to be 28, and

the usual number for the tantra s is held to be 64 (VST 9). Yet there is

significant disagreement as to precisely which texts belong among these

tantra s.103 Such formalized lists of texts are quite common in Hindu lit-

erature, and can also be seen in the enumerations of the principle Up-

aniãads or the lists of the eighteen major PuràJas.104 However, as Wood-

roffe pointed out, this by no means indicates existence of a distinct

religious movement or tradition; no one, for example, would use a term

like “PuràJism” to describe the wide range of philosophical systems

and devotional traditions covered in the vast body of literature called

PuràJas.

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The Essence of the Tantra s? Abhinavagupta and the Kashmir School

Just as stars, remaining in the clouds, do not shine in

the sunlight, so too the tantra s of the siddhànta s do not

shine in the kula àgama [siddhàntatantràJi na vibhànti

kulàgame].

Jayaratha (TAV 1.6)

Perhaps the most logical place to look for some kind of coherent inter-

nal definition of Tantra would be in the work of the great theologians

and systematizers, such as the later Bengali Tàkta digests105 or the works

of Kashmir Taivite school. Foremost among these are the works of the

monumental Kashmiri philosopher and aesthetician Abhinavagupta (ca.

950–1050). In his classic works, the Tantràloka (Light on the tantra s)

and Tantrasàra (Essence of the tantra s), Abhinava sought to create a grand

synthesis and hierarchical ordering of all the known schools of Taivism,

ultimately placing his own school of the Trika (Triad) at the summit, as

their culminating goal. Thus we find a gradation of the orthodox Taiva

Siddhànta and Ägamic Taivisim, followed by the left- and right-hand

paths (Vàma and DakãiJa), and then the schools of the Mata, the Kula,

and finally the Trika: “The essence of all the tantra s, present in the right

and left traditions, which has been unified in the Kaula, [is to be dis-

covered] in the Trika” (TA 37.26).106 This is perhaps the closest we come

to an idea of “Tantra” as a singular, comprehensive category that em-

braces most of the traditions that we now identify by the term.

In other places, however, Abhinava uses the term tantra very differ-

ently. According to his commentator, Jayaratha, all the many schools cov-

ered in the Tantràloka can be divided into two main groups: the

tantraprakriyà (tantra method or mode) and the kulaprakriyà. In fact,

he suggests that the kula is actually a higher path than the tantra (see

TAV 1.6). Here tantra is used to refer primarily to the more conservative

monistic Taiva tradition, while kula is used for the more radical, trans-

gressive, and antinomian tradition, which tend toward the extremes of

sexual and amoral activities: “the [Tantra] prohibits the following of the

religious practices such as the worship of the external phallic form, keep-

ing of matted hair, visiting sacred places, etc., but the [Kula] allows per-

fect freedom in regard to them.”107 Yet strangely, despite his otherwise

meticulous analysis of terms and categories, Abhinavagupta nowhere ap-

pears to state any clear definition of tantra. As Rastogi observes, “It is

disquieting to see that Abhinava, even though subjecting his observations

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35

to the minutest analysis, nowhere mentions ‘his’ conception of Tantra-

Prakriyà in contrast with Kula Prakriyà. It remains for his students to

make their own conclusion.”108 There are, to be sure, a few places where

Abhinavagupta offers brief passing glosses on the meaning of tantra; yet

as Rastogi concludes, these are really quite vague and do little to help us

distinguish Tantra from any other of the other main Taiva schools:

Such descriptions fail to enlighten us about the precise nature and subject

matter of tantra. . . . “Unswerving mind control and controlled senses—

these two things are said to constitute the essential features of the tantra s”

(SvT 10.71–72). . . . This is all that we find expressly mentioned in the es-

sentials of Tantric culture. But this, too, does not give us insight into the

bases of the Tantric way of thinking.109

Later commentators, such as Kãemaràja, attempted to resolve these ap-

parent contradictions and confusions in Abhinava’s work by trying to dif-

ferentiate, organize, and hierarchize the various schools of tantra, krama,

kula, trika, and so on, in a somewhat clearer way. Yet interestingly enough,

for Kãemaràja, tantra actually becomes an inferior and limited position

that is ultimately surpassed by both the kula and the trika philosophies:

“The tàntrika s say the Self-Essence is transcendent; those who adhere to

the kula tradition say it is immanent; but the followers of the trika phi-

losophy hold it to be both transcendent and immanent.”110 In short, for

Abhinavagupta and his followers tantra is neither a clear, consistent cat-

egory nor one that is applied generically to a larger body of traditions

conceived as “Tantrism.” Its meaning is not only ambiguous, but also often

defined as an inferior or limited spiritual path—as Padoux puts it, one

that is “more general, more exoteric, shall we say less ‘tantric’?”111

Texts of Delusion to Protect the Deluded:

Perceptions of Tantra by Non- Tàntrika s

There are various non-Vedic texts in the world, such as

the Vàma, Kàpàlika, and Bhairavàgama. They were ex-

pounded by Tiva for the sake of delusion and have no

other cause. They were taught because of the curses of

Dakãa, BKghu, and Dadhica.

Devíbhàgavata PuràJa (7.39.26 ff.)

One of the most insightful ways to try gain an understanding of any re-

ligious concept or tradition—particularly one as elusive as tantra—is to

examine the ways in which nonmembers and critics of the tradition have

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Introduction

viewed it. How, in other words, has it been negatively defined by its op-

ponents? Yet even here, we are left at something of a loss, since there is

no recorded reference even to texts called tantra s until the seventh or

eighth century; and there is no reference to Tantrism as a distinct tradi-

tion in any Indian literature prior to the modern era. What we do find,

however, is a large number of interesting descriptions of various sects

and individuals, who would much later come to classified as “Tantric.”

Perhaps the earliest reference to such groups is a passage from a fourth

century c.e. portion of the Mahàbhàrata (12.335.40), which names the

PàMupatas and the Pàñcaràtras as “non-Vedic.” However, far more col-

orful and vivid descriptions appear in the PuràJas, which often identify

Tiva as the founder of specifically non-Vedic and transgressive sects, such

as the Kàpàlikas, PàMupatas, and Vàmas. According to the KÜrma

PuràJa, for example, Tiva is said to have taught these false and hereti-

cal non-Vedic paths in order to help save certain individuals from still

worse heresies by which they had been deluded. Assuming his terrible

form, covered in ashes and adorned with skulls, Tiva revealed the Kàpà-

lika, Vàma, PàMupata, and other texts as lures to attract certain people

away from even more dangerous teachings, using them as stepping stones

to lead them ultimately back to the Vedas:

When ViãJu learned that Gautama had cursed the sages to be outside the

pale of the Vedas he went to Tiva and said, “There is not even a drop of

merit in a man who is beyond the Vedas. Nevertheless . . . we must protect

them. . . . Let us make texts of delusion to protect and delude the evil ones

beyond the Vedas.” Tiva agreed and they made the Kàpàla, PàMupata, Vàma

and other texts. . . . Tiva descended to earth . . . and begged for alms from

those who were outcaste, deluding them as he came . . . saying you will go

to hell, but then you will be reborn and gradually work your way to the

place of merit.112

A similar narrative appears in the Bhàgavata PuràJa which tells us

that the non-Vedic, antinomian Taivite sects were created as a kind of

spiritual antidote to the teachings of the Buddha. Because of the Bud-

dha’s austere teachings about suffering and renunciation, the story goes,

so many people had become monks that civilization and government had

ground to a halt. Thus, in order to counteract this excessive austerity and

set the world back on its proper course, “Lord Tiva taught the path of

indulgence in wine, meat and sex. Let the foolish and impure men who

wear long hair, apply ashes and carry bones be admitted in the Tiva-díkãà

in which intoxicating drink is held sacred” (BP 4.2.2).

Finally, as we will see in more detail in chapter 3, there are also many

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37

lively and often quite hilarious descriptions of these non-Vedic sects in

Sanskrit drama and fiction. For example, the Mattavilàsa, a comic farce

attributed to the Pallava ruler Mahendra-varman (ruled 600–630 c.e.),

centers around a drunken Kàpàlika named Satyasoma. Primarily inter-

ested in alcohol and sex, Satyasoma describes the liquor shop as a kind

of sacred space, comparable to the sacrificial enclosure, and the liquor

to the sacred Soma beverage of the Vedic rite. As he indulges all the senses,

he sings, “Drink up to intoxication, Look deep into your lover’s eyes,

Wear fancy clothes from every nation.”113 BàJabhaååa’s famous Sanskrit

tale Kàdambarí contains an equally amusing description of a demented

old ascetic whom some have identified as very “Tantric” in appearance.

A devotee of the goddess CaJjíkà, he is parodied for his useless magi-

cal charms and his hypocritical attitudes toward sex: “Though he had

taken a vow of celibacy he often threw powder that was thought to make

women sexually active on the old female ascetics who had come from

foreign lands. . . . Not being refined, he did whatever he pleased.”114

Yet as vivid and entertaining as these accounts are, they nowhere speak

of Tantra as a distinct sect, school, or religious tradition. While they

clearly conceive of Kàpàlikas, PàMupatas, and other extreme groups as

distinct traditions, they do not identify them as tàntrika (even though,

as we have seen, the PuràJas and other texts do identify other non-Vedic

forms of worship as tàntrika); nor does there appear to be any concept

of Tantrism as a singular tradition in the early Indian imagination.

Black Magic and Fulfillment of All Desires:

Tantra in the Indian Popular Imagination

With the help of the mantra s and yantra s written in this

book, you can perform many un-do-able deeds. Not

only will you turn your hard times into good times, but

you will attain the sight of hidden wealth, prosperity in

business, victory in litigation . . . the quick marriage of

sons and daughters . . . healing illness, success in exams,

the six acts of immobilization, killing, etc.”

Trí Brahmànanda, Sarvva Manaskàmanà Siddhi Pustaka

All of the sources discussed thus far have been Sanskrit texts—and hence

primarily the domain of well-educated, upper-class men, generally Brah-

mans. However, one finds a rather different, often neglected, yet no less

important perspective on tantra when one looks to the living vernacular

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Introduction

languages of India, the “mother tongues,” as opposed to the patriarchal

and typically elitist tongue of Sanskrit.115 One often need only mention

the word tantra to many Indians (as I did to my Bengali teacher in Cal-

cutta) to elicit responses of “ooph!” “Mà go!” (literally, “Oh, mother!”

used as an emphatic expression) and a clucking of tongues. In most ver-

nacular languages today, the term tantra is typically associated with a

whole range of intense associations, usually relating to the darker realms

of the magical, the immoral (sometimes the illegal), and the occult. “The

word ‘Tantra’ in vernacular languages . . . is frequently used to conjure

notions of black magic, illicit sexuality, and immoral behavior. It is also

clear . . . that Tantrics are considered ‘powerful’ people.”116

In the case of modern Bengal, for example, tantra has come to carry

particularly dark and nefarious implications. For the great Bengali saint

and national hero Sri Ramakrishna, for example, Tantra was something

fraught with an aura of danger and power, surrounded by “shame, dis-

gust, and fear,” and considered at once a very rapid but also rather seedy

and scandalous path to liberation. “Everything they do is a secret,” Ra-

makrishna declares, for “that which in the Vedas . . . is said, ‘Don’t do

this, this shouldn’t be done,’ in the Tantras is called good.”117 In my own

research in Bengal, I encountered a similar attitude toward the dark,

frightening world of Tantra. In my exploration of the Kartàbhajà sect,

which emerged in the Calcutta area at the turn of the nineteenth century,

I found that Tantra is consistently associated with moral depravity, crim-

inal behavior, and illicit sexual practices such as parakíyà love, or inter-

course with another man’s wife. By the late nineteenth century, the

Kartàbhajàs had become a kind of laughingstock throughout Calcutta

society, attacked as a degenerate Tantric sect and widely satirized for their

fraud, trickery, and licentiousness. As the satirist DàMarathí Rày paro-

died them in his humorous poem “Kartàbhajà,”

They have a separate tantra; abandoning the mantra s of all other gods,

they are initiated by a human mantra.

Religion is mixed up with all irreligion;

they turn every deed into the enjoyment of sensual pleasure.

In all their teachings there is deception and fraud.118

Even today, this mysterious and scandalous notion of Tantra survives

in the Indian popular imagination. During a recent trip through north

India, I happened to pick up a colorful Hindi book at a roadside stall,

entitled Tàbara Tantra Mantra Tàstra, whose cover shows a black-robed

figure holding a flaming skull. Seeing the book in my hands, a curious

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39

Figure 4. Billboard for Shaitan Tantrik, directed by A. Kumar. Photo by the

author (Cuttack, Orissa, January 2000).

passerby smiled knowingly at me and exclaimed, “Ooh! Taitàn indrajàl!

[Satanic black magic].” In January 2000, I saw a film playing in Orissan

theaters, entitled Shaitan Tantrik, starring a ghoulish and grinning, fat,

bald Tantric priest whose main goal is to abduct beautiful women in or-

der to perform human sacrifice and other nefarious rites (see figure 4).

The poster advertising the film depicts the villainous Tantric priest sur-

rounded by young maidens whom he carries away to sacrifice to the

bloodthirsty goddess Kàlí. In sum, if tantra in the Sanskrit texts simply

means a particular treatise that “spreads knowledge and saves,” tantra

in the popular imagination means something quite different indeed—a

frightening, dangerous path that leads to this-worldly power and con-

trol over the occult forces on the dark side of reality.

From Tantric Sects to Tantric Sex: Is Tantra Really All That “Sexy”?

Sexual union is the libation; the sacred precept is the

shedding of semen. . . . The pleasure derived from

sexual union is of the nature of the Supreme Bliss.

KKãJànanda ÄgamavàgíMa, BKhat-Tantrasàra

(sixteenth century)

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Most of you [in America] . . . believe that the sexual

element in Tantra is somewhat nice and romantic and

lovely and full of nice warm love-making. Nonsense.

The sex of Tantra is hard-hitting, object-using manip-

ulative ritual without any consideration for the other

person involved.

Agehananda Bharati,

“The Future (if Any) of Tantrism” (1975)

If it is true that there is no singular monolithic category of “Tantrism”

prior to the modern period, but only a wide array of specific historical

texts called tantra s, which in turn contain different and conflicting

definitions of tantra, the next question then becomes: do these texts re-

ally contain any of the scandalous, sexy, and transgressive materials that

we today associate with the category of “Tantra”?

The short answer to this question is: yes, of course they do. Many tantra s

do indeed contain explicit descriptions of sexual rituals, the manipulation

of sexual fluids, consumption of wine and meat, and other transgressive

practices (such as the infamous five M’s, or five forbidden substances of

meat [màFsa], fish [matsya], wine [madya], parched grain [mudrà], and sexual intercourse [maithuna]). “No one succeeds in attaining perfection

by employing difficult and vexing operations; but perfection can be

gained by satisfying all one’s desires,” as the Guhyasamàja puts it (GST

7.3). In the Hindu tantra s, the union of the male and female is commonly

used as the supreme symbol of the eternal union of Tiva and Takti, the

primordial masculine and feminine, passive and active principles that lie

at the foundation of all reality (see TA 29.110–11).119 For the Buddhist

tantra s, conversely, this union typically symbolizes the wedding of the pas-

sive wisdom (prajñà) and the active skill-in-means (upàya), which together

are the essence of perfect liberation. In some cases, at least, this union is

to be performed physically, through actual intercourse between male and

female practitioners in a ritual context. As the KulàrJava Tantra puts it,

in fairly explicit terms, “Without thousands of pots of liquor, without hun-

dreds of heaps of meat, and without the nectar of the vulva and penis ,

O Beautiful-Hipped One, I will not be pleased” (KT 8.107), and “The

union of Tiva and Takti by which procreation occurs, O Kàlí, is the union

of the kula-devotees; that is considered to be samàdhi” (KT 8.109).

The longer and more accurate answer to this question, however, is

that the meaning, role, and significance of these sexual practices is nei-

ther consistent throughout the tantra s nor anything like what most con-

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41

temporary Western readers imagine them to be. As David Gordon White

observes, sexual rituals clearly play an important role in many Tantric

traditions from an early date; yet the interpretation of these rites has

often been grossly misunderstood by Western authors, scholarly and

popular alike. Moreover, there is tremendous difference of opinion

within the tantra s themselves as to precisely how such practices are to

be performed and how they are to be interpreted. Within both the Hindu

and Buddhist traditions, here has been a long and tangled debate over

the question of whether sexual imagery in the tantra s should be taken

literally—as actual physical intercourse between males and females—

or purely symbolically—as an internalized, spiritual union between the

male and female principles of creation.120

Even in those traditions that do advocate a literal interpretation of

sexual rites, there is enormous difference of opinion as to how and why

such acts should be performed. The tantra s disagree intensely over the

most fundamental questions: Should the semen be ejaculated into the fe-

male body at the moment of orgasm? Or should it be sublimated and

withdrawn upward into the male body?121 Is the pleasure of orgasm

something accidental to the ritual? Or is it the very essence of the act, as

the manifestation of the supreme bliss of divine Consciousness?122 What

is the role of the sexual fluids? Are they to be manipulated physically and

consumed by the practitioners as a sacramental meal? Or are they to be

internalized and transformed into some nonphysical essence?123 And what

is the role of the female in all of this? Is she a necessary partner, who also

achieves spiritual power from the union? Or is she a mere tool to be used

by the male and then cast aside? (“What about the woman?” Bharati

pointedly asks, “That’s the most embarrassing question you can ask any

Tantric”).124 There is no clear consensus on any of these questions, ei-

ther within the tantra s or among contemporary scholars. While for some,

sex in its most literal sense lies at the heart of the tantra s, for others, it

is something that is only symbolic, secondary to the true essence of Tan-

tra, which is philosophical, spiritual, and nonphysical.

Ultimately, anyone who wades through a few Sanskrit tantra s soon

realizes that, even when they do contain descriptions of sexual acts, they

are usually buried beneath hundreds of pages of rather dull ritual details;

typically, they are cast in terms that most modern readers would proba-

bly find disappointingly brief, general, and often quite “unsexy.” “There

is nothing glamorous about Tantric sexual intercourse,” Feuerstein con-

cludes.125 As I will argue in what follows, the popular image of Tantra

as something seedy, scandalous, and sexy is largely a creation of the mod-

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Introduction

ern age: it is the complex result of the demonization of Tantra by Orien-

talist authors and indigenous reformers, combined with the exoticization

and sensationalization of Tantra in the modern popular imagination.

t h e t a n g l e d t h r e a d s o f t a n t r a

I know the finely drawn thread on which all creatures

are woven; I know the thread of that very thread; there-

fore, I know the great brahman.

Atharva Veda (AV 10.8.38)

. . . the strength of the thread does not reside in the fact

that some one thread runs though its whole length . . .

Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations

What we have found in our brief genealogy of the term tantra in Indian

literature is by no means the consistent linear narrative of the evolution of

a coherent religious movement. Rather, it is the ongoing construction and

reconstruction, deployment and redeployment of the “floating signifier”

of tantra in a wide variety of historical contexts. As authors like Woodroffe

and Snellgrove long ago pointed out, it makes little more sense to speak

of “Tantrism” as a singular category of Asian religion than it does to speak

of “PuràJism,” “SÜtra-ism,” or “Textism,” for that matter.126 As such, the

imagining of “Tantrism” is similar to the category of “mysticism” in the

West, as described by recent authors like Grace Jantzen and Richard King.

As Jantzen observes, the monolithic and ambiguous category of mysticism

has been imagined in different ways in relation to different social, politi-

cal, and spiritual interests over the last several hundred years, and it con-

tinues to be redefined in our own era: “The idea of mysticism is a social

construction and . . . it has been constructed in different ways at different

times. . . . The current philosophical construction of mysticism is there-

fore only one in a series of social constructions of mysticism, and like the

others, is implicitly bound up with issues of authority and gender.”127

So the question becomes: how are we to usefully describe the many

texts and traditions that are now commonly lumped under the heading

of Tantrism? Should we abandon the term altogether and substitute some

other term or perhaps a series of terms (e.g., simply refer to the Tàkta,

Kaula, Trika, Vajrayàna, and other individual schools)? I will save a more

complete statement of my own suggestions for a reimagining of Tantra

in contemporary discourse for the conclusion of this book. For the time

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Introduction

43

being, however, let it suffice to say that Tantra is perhaps best under-

stood not as a unified or coherent movement; rather, in keeping with the

etymology of the term, it is better understood using Wittgenstein’s anal-

ogy of the thread, which he employs to explain the complex way in which

all of our abstract concepts are formed. None of our concepts, such as

“language” or “number,” can be defined by the presence of a single uni-

fying feature that runs through all languages and all numbers; rather they

are comprised of many distinct fibers, “a complicated network of simi-

larities overlapping and crisscrossing, sometimes overall similarities,

sometimes similarities of detail,” which are interwoven “as in spinning

a thread we twist fibre by fibre.” In contrast to the Atharva Veda, quoted

above—and perhaps more in agreement with the Buddhist doctrine of

anàtman (no-self )—Wittgenstein sees no central unifying core or “thread

of the thread” running through these overlapping fibers:

The strength of the thread does not reside in the fact that some one

thread runs though its whole length, but in the overlapping of many fibres.

But if someone wished to say: “there is something common to all these

constructions—namely, the disjunction of all their common properties”—

I should reply, Now you are only playing with words. One might as well

say, “Something runs through the whole thread—namely the continuous

overlapping of those fibres.”128

Similarly, I would argue for an equally decentered and pluralized view

of Tantra . Rather than search for some single thread that runs through

all the many traditions discussed above, perhaps it would be more use-

ful to think of all of these as many overlapping fibers. This surely not to

say that Tantra simply “doesn’t exist”; rather, it suggests that it is best

seen not as a coherent, unified tradition, but as a fluid and shifting col-

lection of particular texts, practices, and traditions, woven and rewoven

with a variety other traditions—not only with other texts called yàmala,

saFhità, àgama, nigama, and so forth, but also with a host of other non-

Sanskritic and vernacular texts and traditions. Just as the cosmos itself

is “spread out” like the threads on a loom or like the web of a spider, so

too Tantra extends like a network of overlapping, often tangled and con-

tradicting threads that stretch throughout the dense fabric of Indian his-

tory. Most importantly, the meaning of Tantra is never fixed or singular,

but is the complex result of the encounter between indigenous traditions

and the scholarly imagination—an encounter that has from the begin-

ning been closely tied to specific historical, intellectual, and political in-

terests. But it is also an encounter through which both Indian and West-

ern self-representations are transformed in the imaginal exchange.

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c h a p t e r 1

The Golden Age of the Vedas

and the Dark Age of Kàlí

Tantrism, Orientalism,

and the Bengal Renaissance

The Tantras [exert] great influence in later days. . . . The

worship assumes wild, extravagant forms, generally obscene,

sometimes bloody. It is divided into two schools—that of the

right and that of the left. The former runs into mysticism and

magic in complicated observances, and the latter into the most

appalling licentiousness. . . . We cannot go further into detail.

It is saddening to think that such abominations are committed;

it is still more saddening that they are performed as part of

divine worship. Conscience, however, is so far alive that these

detestable rites are practiced only in secret.

J. Murray Mitchell and Sir William Muir, Two Old Faiths (1891)

Now look at the trickery of these stupid popes that whatever

is considered to be highly sinful and opposed to the Veda is

regarded as virtuous. . . . The use of meat, wine . . . and copu-

lation are considered as means of attaining salvation.

Swàmí Dayànanda Saraswatí, The Light of Truth (1927)

The origins of “Tantra” or “Tantrism” as a scholarly category are ulti-

mately inseparable from the unique historical encounter between West-

ern and Indian imaginations that took place during the colonial era. Tan-

tra as we know it is to a large degree a complex creation of what Mary

Louise Pratt calls the “contact zone,” that is, “the space of colonial en-

counters . . . in which peoples geographically and historically separated

come into contact with each other . . . involving conditions of coercion,

44

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The Golden Age of the Vedas

45

radical inequality and conflict.”1 To reiterate, however: this is surely not

to say that Tantra is simply a colonialist fabrication or Orientalist pro-

jection onto the colonized Other. Rather, it is to say that the colonial era

witnessed a clear “trend toward conceiving of a new entity called Tantrism

as a specific modality of Indian religious experience,”2 as the diverse body

of texts known as àgama s, nigama s, saFhità s, tantra s , and so on, and the vast body of traditions known as Kàpàlika, Pàñcaràtra, Kula, Krama,

Tàkta, Trívidyà, and others, were gradually assimilated into a singular

universal entity.

In this chapter I will examine the earliest discussions of Tantrism as

a distinct entity, which appear in European missionary works, Oriental-

ist scholarship, and the early Indian reform movements such as the

Bràhmo Samàj and the Ärya Samàj. What we find here is a fairly con-

sistent dichotomy between different conceptions of “Hinduism” and the

“Indian mind”: at one extreme, the ideal of an ancient, pure, and un-

corrupted Golden Age, identified with the Vedas and Upaniãads, and on

the other extreme, the nightmare of a modern, perverse, and degenerate

era, embodied in the licentious idolatry of the tantra s.3

Discourse about Tantra, as we will see, was thus bound up with the

construction of Western cultural identity, and above all with the prob-

lem of sexuality and sexual deviance in modern Europe. As early as the

romantic era, the “mystic Orient” has been imagined as the exotic world

of forbidden sexuality and dark sensuality, in both its most positive and

negative forms.4 However, this fetishization of the sexual, exotic Orient

was only continued and intensified during the Victorian era in England.

As Foucault has argued, nineteenth-century British men and women were

by no means simply the repressed prudes we often imagine them to be;

on the contrary, they were in many cases quite fascinated with sexual-

ity, which they discussed in endless detail. Above all, this era witnessed

a special fascination with sexuality in its most “deviant,” antisocial forms:

homosexuality, transvestism, nymphomania, and all manner of newly dis-

covered psychosexual pathologies. The European fascination with Tan-

tra, I will argue, was very much a part of this larger preoccupation with

sexuality and its aberrations in the Western imagination. And just as the

broader European discourse about sex, as Foucault has shown, was in-

separable from larger issues of “biopolitics,” population control, and na-

tional health, so the discourse about Tantra would become enmeshed in

larger biopolitical issues of governance in Europe’s colonies.5

But at the same time, the discourse surrounding Tantra would also

became a key part of the conceptualization of India and “Hinduism.”

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46

The Golden Age of the Vedas

When deployed by Indian elites and the leaders of the Bengal Renais-

sance, Tantra would also serve as a critical element in the reformation

of Indian religious, cultural, and political identity in the nineteenth cen-

tury. Indeed, discourse on Tantra became a central element in the nar-

rative of Indian history: namely, the widely accepted narrative of the de-

cline of medieval Hinduism, that it had become corrupted with Tantric

immorality, a degeneration that had paved the way for the Muslim (and

thereafter, British) conquest. Hence, one of the most necessary tasks in

the reassertion of a strong and pure Hinduism would have to be the erad-

ication of modern immorality, idolatry, and debilitating licentiousness,

of which Tantra was the most notorious and embarrassing example.

hinduism at its last and worst stage of development:

“ t a n t r i s m ” i n t h e o r i e n t a l i s t i m a g i n a t i o n

Tantrism or Tàktism is Hinduism arrived at its last and

worst stage of medieval development.

Sir Monier Monier-Williams, Hinduism (1894)

The tenets of the Tàktas open the way for gratification

of all the sensual appetites; they hold out encourage-

ment to drunkards, thieves and dacoits; they present

the means of satisfying every lustful desire . . . and lead

men to commit abominations which place them on a

level with the beasts.

“The Tàktas,” Calcutta Review (1885)

It is probably no accident that the emergence of “Tantrism” as a distinct

category of religion occurred at roughly the same time as the emergence

of “Hinduism” itself in the Western imagination. Even as European schol-

ars began to construct the abstract entity called Hinduism—itself largely

“a Western inspired abstraction which until the nineteenth century bore

little resemblance to the diversity of Indian religious belief and practice”6—

they began to imagine Tantrism as one of its primary, though least ad-

mirable, components. As Bernard Cohn suggests, the detailed study and

categorization of Indian society was a critical part of the colonizing

project. In order to be governed, India had first to be analyzed, statisti-

cally evaluated, and categorized: “The conquest of India was a conquest

of knowledge. . . . The vast social world that was India had to be classi-

fied, categorized and bounded before it could be hierarchized.”7

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The Golden Age of the Vedas

47

Conceived as the quintessential Other of the West, as Ron Inden has

persuasively argued, India came to be imagined as an essentially pas-

sionate, irrational, and erotic world—a land of “disorderly imagination”

set in opposition to the progressive, rational, and scientific world of mod-

ern Europe.8 As the widely read ethnographer Herbert Risley put it, “the

Indian intellect has always reveled in the subtleties of a logic which un-

dertakes to reconcile the most manifestly contradictory propositions.”9

At the same time, as Richard King argues, India was also typically imag-

ined as the “mystic East” and the heartland of “mysticism”—the irra-

tional, otherworldly and life-denying flight into transcendental bliss.10

Tantra formed a critical part of the broader project of imagining India,

precisely because Tantra was regarded as the most extreme, irrational

embodiment of the worst tendencies in the Indian mind. Above all, we

might say that it came to embody “mysticism” in its most dangerous and

deviant form—a kind of mysticism that was not simply irrational and

otherworldly, but also polluted with sexual desire and thirst for this-

worldly power.

This Orientalist imagining of India, however, was neither monolithic

nor static; rather, as Thomas Trautmann argues, the Orientalist vision

of India underwent several important transformations. In the course of

the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, it gradually shifted from a be-

nign, romantic vision of the kinship between India and Europe, as we

find in early Orientalists like Sir William Jones, to an increasingly Indo-

phobic view of barbarism and degeneracy, as we see in the work of James

Mill.11 This was a shift that probably was related closely to a larger

change in British attitudes toward Indian culture as a whole, which took

place in the first quarter of the nineteenth century. Up to the end of the

eighteenth century, as Sumanta Banerjee observes, the British government

had generally kept to a policy of nonintervention with regard to indige-

nous religious and cultural traditions; it was deemed more expedient, for

the early leaders of the East India Company, to leave existing religious

practices more or less alone and so avoid offending native sensibilities.

During the period from 1790–1830, however, the British government

began to turn from its original hands-off attitude. Under the influence

of Evangelical and Utilitarian ideals in England, the British began active

efforts at reform, at once religious, moral, and legal. Particularly in the

years after 1813, when the Christian Evangelicals mounted a campaign

to begin missionary work, we find growing exhortations to take strict

measures against Indian social practices—above all, against infanticide,

widow-burning, and “barbaric rituals” such as hook-swinging and ani-

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48

The Golden Age of the Vedas

mal sacrifice: “The conclusion was . . . that the natives needed to be eman-

cipated socially and culturally.”12

Tantra would become an important focus of these shifting attitudes

toward Indian religions and was quickly singled out as one of the native

customs most in need of reform. Both the early romantics and the later

Indophobes agreed that the Tantras represented the worst and most deca-

dent era in Indian history, the one furthest removed from the modern

West. “The enduring legacy of Orientalism,” as Kopf remarks, “ is a con-

trasting set of images: the golden age, which is Indo-Aryan, classical brah-

minical and elitist versus a dark age which is medieval . . . orgiastic and

corrupt.”13

Yet the actual entry of “Tantrism” into Western discourse as a distinct

category is surprisingly late. If we scan the various travelogues of the ear-

liest Europeans to visit India or the first Jesuit missionary accounts, we

find no mention of Tantra or anything even closely resembling it. It is

true that as early as the eleventh century, Muslim travelers like Alberuni,

and later European explorers like Marco Polo, had described various

groups of yogis ( ciugi, as Marco Polo calls them), as well as the alchemical

art of rasayana, which aims at the goals of longevity and immortality.14

Yet this is nowhere described as “Tantra.” Indeed, up to the end of the

eighteenth century, as we see in the works of the earliest British authors

in India, such as John Holwell, Alexander Dow, or Nathaniel Halhed,

Tantrism had not yet emerged as a distinct category or a definable body

of texts.15 Even James Mill’s monument to imperialism, The History of

British India, makes no mention of the Tantras. Though he does briefly

mention the notorious phenomenon of the murderous brigands the

“Thuggee,” he does not link them to the nefarious practices of Tantrism,

as would so many later authors.

The earliest Western references to a body of texts called tantra s come

from the great Orientalist and pioneer in the study of Indian language

Sir William Jones. In his essay “On the Literature of the Hindus” (1790),

Jones makes a brief reference to a corpus of literature called tantra s, which

are generally lumped together with “Mantra, Ägama and Nigama Tàs-

tras,” as an appendage to the Vedas, which consist “mainly of incanta-

tions.”16 In his essay on the gods of India, Greece, and Rome, Jones also

briefly mentions the goddess “Cali” (Kàlí), though his vision of the god-

dess, whom he compares to the goddess Diana “in the splendid opera of

Iphigenia,” is hardly a very Tantric one.17

H. T. Colebrooke—Jones’s fellow pioneer Orientalist and Indo-Euro-

peanist—appears to have had a somewhat greater familiarity with various

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The Golden Age of the Vedas

49

texts called tantra s, and cites the Rudrayàmala Tantra, Kàlí Tantra,

NirvàJa Tantra, and Víra Tantra, among others.18 However, for Cole-

brooke the tantra s are only worth mentioning as the antipode of the

Vedas. Whereas the Vedas embody everything that is noble, pure, and

admirable in the Hindu tradition, its pristine monotheistic past, the

tantra s embody all the polytheism and idolatry that has corrupted Hin-

duism in modern times: “Most of what is taught [in the Vedas] is now

obsolete; and in its stead . . . rituals founded in the PuràJas and obser-

vances borrowed from a worse source, the Tantras, have . . . [replaced]

the Vedas.”19

Rather significantly, the first detailed discussions of the tantra s come

from Christian missionaries. One of the earliest and most influential of

these was the widely read account of the French missionary Abbé

Dubois, who worked for some thirty years in India following his ordi-

nation in 1792. After the defeat of Tipu Sultan in 1799, the Abbé was

invited by Arthur Wellesley to come to Tipu’s capital and reconvert the

Christian community that had been swayed by Islam. Thereafter, he trav-

eled across India, investigating Indian religious practices and recording

them in his manuscript Hindu Manners, Customs, and Ceremonies

(1807). Like many of his European contemporaries, the Abbé was im-

mediately struck by the licentiousness and sexual explicitness of the

Hindu religion; it seemed a lascivious religion aimed at stimulating the

passions of an already overly passionate people: “The shameless stories

about their deities . . . the religious ceremonies in which the principal

part is played by prostitutes . . . all these things seem to be calculated to

excite the lewd imagination of the inhabitants.”20 The Abbé also makes

it clear that his primary motivation in exposing these perversions is to

highlight the grandeur of Christendom, in the hope that “a faithful pic-

ture of the wickedness . . . of polytheism and idolatry would by its very

ugliness . . . offset the beauties and perfections of Christianity.”21

Nowhere was the Hindu’s tendency toward the passionate and ob-

scene more obvious than in the case of Takti-pÜjà or the secret worship

of the Goddess as power. Interestingly enough, the Abbé does not iden-

tify this practice as “Tantra”; yet his vivid account of this nefarious rite

would become a key part of most later European accounts and a key el-

ement in the early genealogy of “Tantrism”:

Among the abominable rites practiced in India is one which is only too well

known; it called Makti-pÜjà. . . . The ceremony takes place at night with more

or less secrecy. The least disgusting of these orgies are those where they con-

fine themselves to eating and drinking everything that the custom of the

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The Golden Age of the Vedas

country forbids and where men and women . . . openly and shamelessly

violate the commonest laws of decency. . . . When all the meat has been

consumed, intoxicating liquors are passed round, everyone drinking with-

out repugnance from the same cup. . . . When they are all completely in-

toxicated men and women . . . pass the rest of the night together, giving

themselves up to the grossest immorality. . . . [T]he meeting winds up with

the most revolting orgy.22

Indeed, one could imagine no greater contrast to the “perfection of Chris-

tianity” than this riotous orgy of drugs, liquor, gluttony, and sex.

But perhaps the most influential early description of the tantra s comes

from the energetic Reverend William Ward, one of the leading figures in

the spread of the Baptist Missionary Society in Bengal and one of the

first Western authors to try to categorize the many diverse sects and castes

of the “Hindoos.” In Ward’s eyes, Hinduism as a whole was “the most

puerile, impure and bloody of any system of idolatry that

was ever established on earth,” a religion of “idle, effeminate and

dissolute people” with “disordered imaginations who frequent their

temples for the satisfaction of their licentious appetites”; and the texts

called tuntra s were the quintessence of this degenerate spirit.23 Published

in 1817, Ward’s book recounts the insidious practices described in the

tuntra s—practices that involve “things too abominable to be revealed to

a Christian public” and caused even his Indian informant to blush with

shame. In one particularly vivid account, Ward recounts the insidious

ritual of the “Chukra” (cakra), or “circle” of Tantric worship:

Many of the tuntras . . . contain directions respecting a most . . . shocking

mode of worship, which is understood . . . by the name of Chukra. These

shastrus direct that the person must, in the night, choose a woman as the

object of worship . . . he must take . . . the daughter of a dancer, a kupalee,

a washerman, a barber, a chundalu or a Musalman or a prostitute; and place

her on a seat . . . and then bring broiled fish, flesh, fried peas, rice, spiritu-

ous liquor, sweetmeats, flowers and other offerings. . . . To this succeeds

the worship of the . . . female, who sits naked* * * * * *

Here things too abominable to enter the ears of man, and impossible to

be revealed to a Christian public, are contained. . . . The learned brahmun

who opened to me these abominations made several efforts—paused again,

began again . . . before he could mention the shocking indecencies prescribed

by his own shastrus. . . .

[The woman] partakes of the offerings, even of the spirituous liquors,

and flesh, though it should be that of a cow. The refuse is eaten by the

persons present, however different their castes. . . . The priest then . . .

behaves towards this female in a manner which decency forbids to be

mentioned.24

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The Golden Age of the Vedas

51

Here we find the key elements that would later become the standard

tropes in virtually all later discussion of the Tantras: (1) violation of

caste and laws of purity; (2) consumption of normally prohibited sub-

stances; and above all, (3) sexual license. In Ward’s opinion, the “sen-

sual rites and black magic” of the Tantras were the clearest sign that the

Hinduism of his time was indeed at low ebb, having degenerated sadly

into immorality and idolatry. “At present, the persons committing these

abominations are becoming more and more numerous. . . . They are per-

formed in secret; but that these practices are becoming frequent is a fact

known to all.”25

The next stage in the development of the category begins in the sec-

ond quarter of the nineteenth century, in the writings of Orientalist schol-

ars such as H. H. Wilson (1786–1860). In Wilson’s account of 1828,

which would become among the most often cited in the later nineteenth

century, a distinct set of texts called the tantra s really emerges as a clearly

defined and relatively unified body of Indian literature. For Wilson, the

tantra s are now considered a “singular category”; even though “they are

infinitely numerous,” they are all nonetheless “basically the same,” such

that a scholar need not read more than one or two tantra s to understand

this (largely worthless) form of Hindu religion.26 Like most Orientalist

scholars, Wilson laments that the immoral and perverse practices of the

tantra s are becoming more and more prevalent in his own day, that they

“have been carried to more exceptionable extremes in modern times,”

and are a clear sign of the progressive degeneration of Hinduism in the

present era. The “nonsensical extravagance and absurd gesticulations”

of Tantric ritual have become “authorities for all that is abominable in

the present state of Hindu religion.”27

However, it is not until the last quarter of the nineteenth century that

we find the abstract category of Tantrism as a true “ism,” a unified body

of beliefs and practices, emerging as a well-defined category in the Ori-

entalist construction of “Hinduism.” It was the Sanskritist Sir Monier-

Williams who was the first to employ the term “Tantrism” as a singu-

lar, monolithic class, which he identifies with “Taktism,” and which he

disparages as the most degenerate form of Indian religion: “The system

[the Tantras] inculcate . . . for convenience may be called Tantrism or

Taktism. . . . Tantrism is Hinduism arrived at its last and worst stage of

medieval development.”28 The classical tradition of the Vedas, Monier-

Williams laments, had become, “in the Tantras, exaggerated and per-

verted,” adulterated with “horrible things” such as “sanguinary sacrifices

and orgies with wine and women.”29 Much of the Tantras are nothing

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The Golden Age of the Vedas

more than “unmeaning sound,” whose aim is to “acquire magical power

and destroy one’s enemies.” As a whole, they may be summarized as mere

“witchcraft, which to Europeans appears so ineffably absurd that the pos-

sibility of any person believing in it seems itself incredible.”30

Finally, by the early twentieth century, as we see in histories of India

like those of J. N. Farquhar or W. H. Moreland, and in popular works

like D. L. Barnett’s Antiquities of India, Tantrism had become infamous.

It is now widely known as a scandalous teaching that makes it a “sacred

duty to practice incest,” engaging in “black art of the crudest and filth-

iest kind” in which “a veritable devil’s mass is purveyed.”31 According

to one of the most vividly imaginative accounts of the early twentieth

century, Tantrism has now been conflated into a bizarre mixture of a Black

Mass, a Roman Saturnalia, a scene from Dante’s Inferno, and a Dionysian

sporagmos:

Shaktas usually meet in a forest glade where, by the light of a huge bonfire,

they begin the ceremony by getting drunk and eating cow’s flesh. On these

nights everything is permissible; Untouchables jostle Kshatriyas, Brahmans

dig knives into the remains of the cow, women come from the from the

Zenana and discard their veils. . . . Stretched on the grass with her sari

thrown off lies a young girl . . . who must allow herself to be embraced

by all the adepts in turn. . . . The culminating act of this abominable orgy

is the slaughter of a young man or woman who, while still alive is torn to

pieces by frenzied Shaktas. . . . [I]t is priests and Black Magicians who lead

the way. . . who promise happiness to these poor deranged people who,

groaning and screaming, wallow in the bloodstained mire.32

Here we find that all of the darkest fears of colonial rule and all the most

perverse fantasies of the Victorian imagination have been combined into

a single fantastic image of sex, violence, and the transgression of every

imaginable moral law.

The Tantric Parasite and the Degeneration of Buddhism

With its adoption of Tantrism so-called, Buddhism en-

tered on its most degenerate phase. Here the idolatrous

cult of female energies was grafted upon the theistic

Mahàyàna. . . . This parasite seized strong hold of its

host and soon developed its monstrous growths which

crushed and strangled most of the little life yet remain-

ing of purely Buddhist stock.

L. Austine Waddell, The Buddhism of Tibet (1895)

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53

Tantra functions as a lamented supplement in the Euro-

pean construction of an original Buddhism.

Donald S. Lopez, Jr., Elaborations on Emptiness (1996)

Not only were the foul practices of the Tantras believed to have corrupted

the Hindu tradition, causing the great decline from ancient Vedic ra-

tionalism to modern polytheism and idolatry, but they were also soon to

be blamed for what Orientalists described as the historical degeneration

of Buddhism. The dominant Orientalist narrative of Buddhist history is

similar to that of the Golden Age of the Vedas described in Hindu stud-

ies. It begins with an original, sober, rational, even Socratic Buddhism,

which was later progressively corrupted and perverted by various mys-

tical-idolatrous and superstitious accretions. As Eugene Burnouf con-

cluded in 1844, “It is certainly not without interest to see Buddhism,

which in its first form had so little of what constitutes a religion, end in

practices so puerile and superstitions so exaggerated.”33

This process of deterioration and decadence, it was believed, had al-

ready begun with the rise of the Mahàyàna tradition, with all its celes-

tial bodhisattvas, elaborate ritual, and theological speculation; and it

would reach its final stage of perversion with the entry of the seemingly

“un-Buddhist” Tantric influence. Running throughout the early discourse

on Buddhism, the dominant metaphor is that of a disease or parasite,

which somehow infected the Buddhist organism in India. As the widely

read Tibetologist L. Austine Waddell recounts this narrative,

About the end of the sixth century, Tantrism or Shivaic mysticism with its

worship of female energies . . . began to tinge both Buddhism and Hindu-

ism. Consorts were allotted to Celestial Bodhisatts . . . most of them were

wild and terrible, and often monstrous. . . . Such was the distorted form

of Buddhism introduced into Tibet about 640, and during the succeeding

centuries Buddhism became still more debased.34

This theory of the decline of Buddhism was soon combined with the

scholarly and popular imaginings about the mysterious, forbidden, in-

accessible land of Tibet, the heartland of Buddhist Tantrism. Waddell de-

scribes the awesome strangeness of the land and its religion, which lies

swathed in “barbaric darkness”: “Tibet, the mystic Land of the Grand

Lama, joint God and king of many millions, is still the most impenetra-

ble country in the world. Behind its icy barriers its priests guard its passes

jealously against foreigners.”35 The Tantric religion of the lamas is found

to be a most “silly and debased belief,” full of “puerile mysticism” and

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The Golden Age of the Vedas

“hideous accretions,” which hardly deserves to be considered a philos-

ophy. In Waddell’s opinion, it might be considered a sinister kind of devil

worship, if it were not so childish or pathetically foolish: “The bulk of

the Lamaist cults comprise deep-rooted devil worship and sorcery. . . .

Lamaism is only thinly and imperfectly varnished over with Buddhist sym-

bolism, beneath which the sinister growth of poly-demonist superstition

appears.”36 Under the grip of such a debilitating spiritual illness, the

people of Tibet can only be helped if they are liberated from parasitic

priests and their oppressive religion: “They have fallen under the dou-

ble ban of menacing demons and despotic priests. So it will be a happy

day indeed for Tibet when its sturdy over-credulous people are freed from

the intolerable tyranny of the Lamas and delivered from the evils whose

ferocity and exacting worship weigh like a nightmare upon all.”37 Of

course, this is precisely what the Chinese government attempted to

achieve when it invaded Tibet and slaughtered thousands of monks dur-

ing the communist invasion in 1959.

Polluting the Blood of the Noble Race: Tantra and the Aryan Myth

. . . the purity of the race was soiled by marriage with

native women . . . and the creed with foul Dravidian

worships of Shiva and Kàlí, and the adoration of the

liGgam.

Isaac Taylor, The Origin of the Aryans (1889)

By the early twentieth century, Tantra thus had become a key part of the

larger Orientalist narrative of South Asian history. In the process, it be-

came a part of the increasingly accepted narrative of the Aryan or Indo-

European race and its progressive conquest of the non-Aryan peoples of

Asia and Europe. According to a wide range of scholars of the late nine-

teenth century, the development of Hinduism in the subcontinent was

described as the result of a (perhaps bastard and unholy) union of the

Aryan and the pre-Aryan cultures. The Aryan represented the “noble”

Indo-European stock, an ancient people believed to have spread from

central Asia, both northward into Europe, giving birth to Greek, Roman,

Germanic, and Celtic cultures, and also southward into South Asia, giv-

ing birth to the ancient Persian and Vedic cultures. The pre-Aryan, con-

versely, was identified with the non-Indo-European or “Dravidian” race,

which now populates most of south India. Finally, thanks to the work

of Friedrich Max Müller, Gustav Oppert, and others, the “Aryan race”

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55

had emerged in the Western imagination as an essentially masculine, ag-

gressive, patriarchal culture, which had progressively invaded and con-

quered the more passive, feminine, and goddess-worshiping non-Aryan

or Dravidian peoples. According to Oppert’s simultaneously racist, sex-

ist, and elitist account, the Aryans worshiped primarily the inner, mas-

culine, and intellectual forces, while the Dravidians worshiped primar-

ily the external, feminine forces of nature; and this, in turn, “explains the

higher status which characterizes the Aryan belief compared with the non-

Aryan. It expresses the gulf which separates the Male from the Female

principle and explains the superiority . . . maintained by the Aryan over

non-Aryan divinities.”38

Not surprisingly, the development of Tantra was quickly identified with

this imagined non-Aryan, Dravidian, goddess-worshiping culture of pre-

Vedic India. Tantra was the very essence of this “feminine,” weak, and

passive race that had initially been conquered by the invading Aryans

but that was now causing the progressive decline of the noble Aryan spirit

in India. Isaac Taylor recounted this narrative, in his Origin of the Aryans

of 1889:

The Aryan invaders . . . are found gradually advancing to the south

and east in continual conflict with the Dasyu or dark skinned aborigines,

who . . . worshipped strange gods . . . till finally the barbarians are sub-

dued and admitted into the Aryan state as a fourth caste, called the blacks

or Sudras. The higher civilization and superior physique of the northern

invaders ultimately prevailed . . . but the purity of the race was soiled by

marriage with native women . . . and the creed with foul Dravidian wor-

ships of Shiva and Kali, and the adoration of the lingam.39

In their own day, many Indologists felt, the “Male Aryan spirit was be-

ing strangled by the overheated female matter of India.”40 The purity of

Aryan culture was being corrupted by indigenous elements like idolatry,

polytheism, and above all Tantra. And this, in turn, naturally justified

rule by a living and still virile civilization of good Aryan stock, namely,

the British.

Classifying the Pathology of Tantrism:

Sex, Secrecy, and Scandal in the Victorian Imagination

In matters of sexuality, we are, all of us, the healthy as

much as the sick, hypocrites nowadays.

Sigmund Freud,

“Sexuality in the Aetiology of Neuroses” (1898)

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Let us ponder all the ruses that were employed for cen-

turies to make us love sex, to make the knowledge of it

desirable and everything said about it precious. Let us

consider the strategems by which we were induced to

apply all our skills to discovering its secrets. . . . [O]ne

day, perhaps . . . people will no longer understand how

the ruses of sexuality and the power that sustains its

organization, were able to subject us to that austere

monarchy of sex, so that we became dedicated to the

endless task of forcing its secret, of exacting confes-

sions from a shadow.

Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality (1978)

In order to understand the notion of Tantra in the Western imagination,

we must also place it against the backdrop of the broader programs of

colonial morality and attitudes toward sexuality in the nineteenth cen-

tury. The British interest in the sexual perversions of the Tantras was part

of a much broader concern with sexuality and its aberrations in the Vic-

torian era. The British upper and middle classes of the nineteenth cen-

tury were fascinated by sexuality: “Paradoxically, it was during the nine-

teenth century that the debate about sexuality exploded. Far from the

age of silence and suppression, sexuality became a major issue in Victo-

rian social and political practice.”41 As Foucault argues, the categoriza-

tion, classification, and control over sexuality was a key element in the

regulation of society as a whole: “The array of sexual discourses . . . ex-

ploited sexuality’s secrets. Sex began to be managed. . . . [P]erversion be-

came codified. . . . Sexuality proliferated as power over it was extended.”42

The Victorian era, in fact, witnessed a tremendous proliferation of

medical treatises on sexuality, in both its proper and perverse forms. View-

ing any deviation from “normal” sex as morally suspect, the Victorian

imagination was obsessed with the identification and classification of sex-

ual aberrations, with the detailed scientific descriptions of every imagi-

nable perversion. Among the most popular works in late-nineteenth-cen-

tury England was Richard von Krafft-Ebing’s textbook Psychopathia

Sexualis (1886), which became the most influential catalogue of devia-

tions. Under the protective cover of “medical nomenclature” and the

“posture of moral outrage,” Victorian readers “could indulge in this

‘medicoforensic’ peep-show of sexual hyperaesthesia, paresthesia, as-

permia, polyspermia, spermatorrhea, sadism, masochism, festishism, ex-

hibitionism, psychic hermaphroditism, satyriasis, and nymphomania.”43

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57

Among the most sinister perversions were those which, under the guise

of transcendental ideals, confused the religious and sensual spheres.

British middle- and upper-class sensibilities of the late nineteenth cen-

tury insisted on the proper separation of religion and sexuality: exces-

sive religious celibacy and sexual licentiousness were both considered dan-

gerous perversions. They came increasingly to regard only one form of

sexual relation to be proper and healthy—namely, heterosexual marriage.

Only the married life offered the via media between celibacy and licen-

tiousness, which “repairs the Fall and leads from earth to heaven.”44 In

an era that valued economic productivity, generation of capital, and re-

straint in consumption, healthy sex had to be useful, productive, and

efficient: “normal heterosexuality appeared in one guise . . . attraction

between men and women that led to marriage and family. Normal sex

was consistent with the values of Victorian industrial society—it was an-

other mode of production.”45

The British interest in Indian sexual practices, and above all the prac-

tices of the Tantras, was a central part of this broader fascination with

sexuality and its aberrations. Just as the imperial project involved a cer-

tain “colonization of the body”—a systematic analysis and diagnosis and

institutional control of the bodies and diseases of colonized people—so

it involved a certain “colonization of sexuality”—an investigation,

classification, and control over the sexual practices and aberrations of

those under imperial rule.46

As Said has observed, imperialism as a whole was very often a “gen-

dered” project. The colonial West was consistently imagined as the mas-

culine, rational, active power that penetrated and possessed the Orient,

which was imagined as feminine, irrational, and passive: “The sexual sub-

jection of Oriental women to Western men fairly stands for the pattern

of relative strength between East and West and the discourse about the

Orient. . . . Orientalism takes perverse shape as a ‘male power fantasy’

that sexualizes a feminized Orient for Western power and possession.”47

For many Orientalists, India was imagined as the “feminine” land par

excellence, the land of weakness and passivity, in opposition to the

strength and virility of the West. As Robert Orme described the Indian

in 1782, “Breathing in the softest climates, having few wants and re-

ceiving the luxuries of other nations with little labor . . . the Indian must

have become the most effeminate inhabitant of the globe.”48

Not only was India commonly imagined as an inherently “feminine”

land, but it was also conceived as a realm of sexual perversions and ab-

normal carnal desires. “Anything and everything that deals with sex, pro-

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creation and human passion is worshipped and glorified,” George Mac-

Munn concluded in his widely read account The Underworld of India. 49

While the Indian male was commonly portrayed as weak and effeminate,

but also lascivious and morally corrupt, the Indian female was imagined

to be excessively sexual and seductive, insatiable in her carnal appetites.

Embodied in the horrific image of the violently sexual goddess Kàlí, In-

dia was at once seductively mysterious and bound up with “debauchery,

violence and death.”50

With its obscene confusion of religion and sexuality, and its deliber-

ate violation of caste and marriage, Tantra came to represent the epit-

ome of this inherent tendency toward depravity. As Shaw suggests, the

use of sexual practices in Tantric worship represented a phenomenon sim-

ilar to that of the devadàsí s or temple courtesans: “an unfamiliar and

disquieting sight to the colonial gaze.”51 But more than just disquieting,

the licentious deeds of the Tantras were also—like sexual aberrations

classified in the Victorian medical texts—objects of intense interest and

often obsessive narration. In his study of the mystics of India, J. C. Oman

makes this point quite clearly: with its depraved tàntrika s, India is the

only country in the world where the bizarre pathologies and mental ill-

nesses (so clearly analyzed and classified by Western psychologists) are

not only widespread, but actually made into religious cults: “Cases, few

and far between, of necrophilism, anthropophagy and coprology are not

unknown to mental pathologists in Europe; but it is only in India that

such perverted instincts could be made the basis of a religious sect.”52

As Foucault suggests, the intense interest in sexuality in the Victorian

era—and particularly the classification of sexual deviations—was more

than a perverse fascination with the forbidden and obscene. Rather, it

was part of the broader expansion of bio-power in modern Europe, a

key element in the larger concern with population, national health, and

the reproduction of the social body in the modern state: “sex was a po-

litical issue: It was at the pivot of the two axes along which developed

the political technology of life. On the one hand it was tied to the disci-

plines of the body. . . . On the other hand it was applied to the regula-

tion of populations.”53 So too, this concern with the sexual deviations of

Tantra appears to have been a key element in the larger project of impe-

rial bio-politics. The classification and categorization of sexual practices,

particularly the most dangerous, antisocial forms, was a crucial part of

the larger imperial project of knowing and thereby better controlling those

under rule. At the same time, by diagnosing this demoralizing disease of

Tantra, which had spread throughout the Indian social body, colonial

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59

authors also justified the need for a more rational, healthy foreign rule

in the subcontinent—the prudent, moral administration of the British.

t h e c o u n t e r - r e n a i s s a n c e :

t a n t r a a n d t h e b e n g a l r e n a i s s a n c e

Modern men could not but seek to get rid of the filth,

superstition and corruption revealed by the searchlight

of Christ. . . . There has been a serious attempt, on the

part of the orthodox, to destroy, drive underground or

deny the worst features of Left-hand Tàktism . . . and

unclean superstition.

J. N. Farquhar, Modern Religious Movements in India (1915)

In the first era of the dissemination of English culture . . .

Bengal resounded with opprobrious criticisms of the

Tantras. No one among the educated in Bengal could

praise them. . . . The educated Bengali of the age was

bewitched by the Christian culture, and . . . any who

attempted to study the Tantras ran the risk of exposing

themselves to contumely from the educated community.

Panchkori Bandyopadhyay, Sàhitya (1913)

The construction of Tantra in the nineteenth century was by no means a

simple, one-way process, a mere projection of European fantasies onto

the mirror of the exotic Other. It was also very much a product of the In-

dian imagination, responding to and interacting with that of its colonial

masters and Orientalist educators. As David Kopf argues, the work of early

scholars like Jones and Colebrooke, together with the college founded in

Calcutta, provided a major intellectual stimulus to the leaders of the so-

called Hindu Renaissance. At the same time, Orientalist constructions of

Hinduism and Indian history also began to inform the ways in which In-

dian intellectuals understood their own traditions. As Halbfass observes,

“Indians re-interpreted key concepts of traditional self-understanding, ad-

justing them to Western modes of understanding.”54 The leaders of the

Hindu reform movements clearly assimilated many Orientalist paradigms,

including the narrative of Indian history as a progressive devolution from

the Golden Age of the Vedas to the modern, degenerate age of the Tantras.

The category of Tantra therefore played an important part in the mod-

ern Indian defense and reconceptualization of its own traditions, par-

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ticularly during the period of Hindu reform in the nineteenth century.

The more virulent defenders of traditional Hinduism, such as the founder

of the Ärya Samàj, Swàmí Dayànanda Saraswatí (1824–83), undertook

a “scathing attack on Tantra,” which he identified as among the chief

causes for the sad state of modern Indian culture.55 Tantra is the epit-

ome of all the “popery” that had corrupted the Hindu tradition with ob-

scene ritual and sensual indulgence: “Now look at the trickery of these

stupid popes that whatever is considered to be highly sinful and opposed

to the Veda is regarded as virtuous. . . . The use of meat, wine . . . and

copulation are considered as means of attaining salvation.”56 As we see

in the following account, Dayànanda regards Tantra as the embodiment

of everything that must be eradicated in order to restore Hinduism to its

original purity; it was the inspiration for his reformist project:

My eyes fell on such an amount of incredible obscenities, mistranslations

of the most ancient texts and absurdity that I felt horrified. In these Tantras

I found that incest was permitted even with mothers, daughters, sisters and

low born maids. . . . They recommend worship of gods in a perfectly nude

state, spirituous liquors, fish, and all kinds of animal foods are allowed for

all. . . . By reading . . . the Tantras, I was fully convinced of the . . . vicious-

ness of the authors of this disgusting literature.57

We find similar attacks on the Tantras appearing in other regions of

India, such as Gujurat in the 1870s. In 1874, for example, an anony-

mous text was published in Ahmedabad, bearing the title Exposition of

the Ägamas, or That Portion of Hindoo Shastras Which Vamees or Left

Hand Sect Follow as Their Books of Revelation, ie. Tantras, Yamalas, Ru-

jusias, &c for the Use of Reformers in India. The unknown author ap-

pears to have been an outspoken member of the newly emerging Swami-

narayan movement. One of the most powerful reforming agents in

nineteenth-century Gujarati society, the Swaminarayans opened their

doors to all castes, argued strongly against sati and female infanticide,

and promoted widow remarriage and other women’s rights. Not sur-

prisingly, many Swaminarayan reformers saw the tantra s as the clearest

example of everything that was wrong with contemporary Indian soci-

ety and the first thing that needed to be eradicated in any genuine social

reform. With their “many immoral and horrible practices,” the tantra s

are “diametrically opposed to all religious or law books, morals and good

customs.”58 The author makes it clear that the dangerous teachings of

the tantra s need to be critically analyzed by leaders of the reform move-

ments; for it is only by comprehending their dangerous threat that such

evils can be eradicated from a moral Hindu society:

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61

They cannot be properly appreciated unless they are . . . unveiled and

thrown open to the reformers who wish to introduce changes in order to

establish a pure form of religion. The object of these pages is to hold up

to light the most filthy, infernal and obscene superstitions . . . of Mantra

Shastris who abound in every town in India. . . . It is hoped that this publi-

cation will induce all those who are concerned in the welfare of this great

nation to unite in one common effort to put down the diabolical tenets

inculcated by the Vami and Kowl sects.59

As Rhinehart and Stewart conclude, texts like these “reflect the climate

of British colonial rule” and reveal the profound impact of Western val-

ues on the Hindus’ self-perception of their own traditions; increasingly

in the colonial era, categories like Tantra, with all their terrible conno-

tations, were now internalized and applied by Indian authors to their

own traditions.60

However, perhaps the most influential discussions of Tantra emerged

in nineteenth-century Bengal, during the period of its so-called renais-

sance. We might even say that the category of Tantra served as a kind of

counter-renaissance; that is, it came to represent the complete opposite

of everything the renaissance stood for, the embodiment of all the idol-

atry and immorality that the reformers hoped to eradicate.61 Following

the lead of the Orientalists, the reformers looked back to the noble, ra-

tional religion of the Vedas as India’s Golden Age, while they despaired

of the modern “age of Kàlí,” in which the perverse rites of the Tantras

ran rampant. As such, Tantra was foremost among those elements of

modern Hinduism that would have to be uprooted if Hindus were to re-

cover an authentic spiritual and national identity.

“Ceremonies Utterly Subversive of Every Moral Principle”:

Ràmmohun Roy, Tantra, and the Bengal Renaissance

The stories . . . in the Tantras are of a nature that, if told

of any man, would be offensive to the ears of the most

abandoned of either sex.

Ràmmohun Roy, “A Defense of Hindoo Theism”

Arguably the most important figure in the shaping of modern Indian un-

derstandings of Tantrism, and of Hinduism as a whole, was the Bengali

reformer Ràmmohun Roy (1772–1833). Known today as the “father of

modern India,” often hailed as a kind of “Indian Martin Luther,” Ràm-

mohun was the leading exponent of social and religious reform during

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the period of the Bengal Renaissance. Born to a Brahman family, Ràm-

mohun was a well-educated and ambitious entrepreneur—a successful

businessman and real-estate agent, as well as a scholar who mastered

Persian, Arabic, and English. Today, he is best known as the pioneer of

liberal political consciousness and Indian nationalism, who first intro-

duced “ethical and professional standards into Indian law, medicine, sci-

ence . . . and civil administration.”62 It was Ràmmohun whom Max

Müller praised as “the first who came from East to West . . . and com-

pleted that worldwide circle through which, like an electric current, Ori-

ental thought could run to the West and Western thought return to the

East.”63 However, as Kopf has argued, Ràmmohun exemplified a gen-

eral pattern among many intellectuals of nineteenth-century Bengal:

namely, their profound “psychological uncertainty” and ambivalence be-

tween the attempt to preserve ancient Hindu traditions and the desire

to modernize India in imitation of the technologically superior West.64

As Halbfass suggests, Ràmmohun stands out as a striking embodiment

of this conflicted encounter and as a sort of “mirror of a hermeneutic

situation in which the foreign came to be adopted as a means of self-

understanding and self-presentation. ”65

The primary goal of Ràmmohun’s work was to purify Hinduism of

what he saw as its modern, degenerate accretions and to restore it to its

original pristine spirit. Against the unthinking dogmatism and blind rit-

ualism of popular Hinduism, he hoped to substitute a liberal and rational

religion; and against the polytheism and idolatry of the contemporary

worship, he hoped to instill a monotheistic faith in the absolute, imper-

sonal Brahman. Though largely rooted in the Upaniãads and Vedànta,

Ràmmohun’s deity is not without a certain trace of Christian influence,

conceived now as “a patriarchal God, the author and governor of the

universe, he by whom the birth, existence and annihilation of the world

is regulated.”66 As S. K. De suggests, one might even say that Ràmmo-

hun in a sense “superimposed Western monotheism onto the monistic

Vedànta of TaGkara.”67

In opposition to the original monotheistic, rational spirit of ancient

Hinduism, modern popular Hindu worship was, for Ràmmohun, a ter-

rible degeneration and corruption. Influenced by Orientalist scholars like

Jones and Colebrooke, Ràmmohun adopted the ideal of the Vedic Golden

Age and its progressive decline, which he then adapted to the traditional

Indian notion of the descending cycles of time. Like the Orientalists, he

divided Indian history into an original era of rational monotheism and

a later period of “Hindoo idolatry with its innumerable gods, goddesses

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63

and temples, which have since been destroying society.”68 As such, he

envisaged his own mission as not unlike Luther’s reformation in Europe,

which had succeeded in purifying Christianity of its later accretions: “I

began to think that something similar might have taken place in India and

similar results might follow from a reformation of popular idolatry.”69

Ràmmohun’s works are filled with severe diatribes against the deca-

dence of popular Indian traditions, and above all, the Màkta tantra s. Like

so many nineteenth-century reformers, he saw the Tantras “as a hor-

rendous and debased form of religious expression, representing a . . . rad-

ical departure from authentic . . . Hindu tradition.”70 At the same time,

however, Roy also stands out as one of the most complex figures in the

history of modern India. His own mother had in fact been a Tàkta and

a devotee of Kàlí, the Tantric goddess par excellence. Yet Ràmmohun

would eventually reject Tàktism and everything associated with it, de-

crying the idolatry of Kàlí’s worship and setting himself forever at odds

with his own mother: “From this time onward his mother opposed and

persecuted him.”71 For Ràmmohun, the dark mother Kàlí was to become

“the symbol of a treacherous mother eager to betray and prone to ag-

gression. She came to be associated with all the other rituals cited as in-

stances of the cultural decadence of the age, against which . . . every re-

former fought.”72 As he wrote in his “Defence of Hindoo Theism,” “In

the worship of Kàlí, human sacrifice, the use of wine, criminal intercourse

and licentious songs are included. . . . Debauchery. . . universally forms

the principal of the worship of her followers. Nigam and other Tantras

may satisfy every reader of the horrible tenets of the worshippers of

[Kàlí].”73

This profound tension between personal inheritance of the Tantric tra-

dition and public disavowal of it is a recurrent theme throughout Ràm-

mohun’s life and in the reform movements as a whole. Indeed, given his

seemingly radically anti-Tàkta, anti-Tantric stance, it is all the more sur-

prising that Ràmmohun should have had an especially close relationship

with one particularly well-known Tàkta Tantric text—the enigmatic text

of the MahànirvàJa Tantra.

“A Woman’s Tantra”: The Strange Case of the MahànirvàJa Tantra

Our land of Bengal used to be ruled by Tantrik works

such as the Tàradàtilaka . . . PrànatoãiJí, Tantrasàra, etc.

Then the MahànirvàJa Tantra did not have so great

influence. Considering the form into which, as a result

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of English education, the mind . . . of the Bengali has

been shaped, the MahànirvàJa is a proper Tantra for

the time. Raja Ram Mohan Roy endeavored to encour-

age the MahànirvàJa because he understood that . . .

the English-educated Bengali community is without

religion and devoid of the sense of nationality and caste.

The MahànirvàJa Tantra alone is fit for the country at

the present time.

Bandyopadhyay, Sàhitya

Among all the strange, esoteric, and often seemingly incomprehensible

works we call the Hindu tantra s, there are few more curious than the

MahànirvàJa Tantra. Although it is probably “the tantra best known in

the West,”74 this text is extremely unusual and unlike virtually any other

tantra in its conception of absolute reality, its description of ritual, its

view of caste, and its attitude toward various social issues, such as mar-

riage and women’s rights. The MahànirvàJa is so unusually restrained

in its description of Tantric ritual that at least one Bengali pundit referred

to it rather disparagingly as a “woman’s tantra. ”75 Moreover, the text

has a rather suspicious history: mentioned nowhere prior to the late eigh-

teenth century, it appears in very few manuscripts in a few select libraries

of Bengal.

A wide range of scholars have suggested that the text is a recent cre-

ation, most likely from the late eighteenth century; in fact, some have

even raised the possibility that it may have been fabricated by Ràmmo-

hun Roy himself. The text was first published by the Ädi Bràhmo Samàj;

two of the earliest manuscripts were contained in Ràmmohun’s library

and in a library of the Bràhmo Samàj; and Ràmmohun’s own guru, Hari-

harànanda Bhàrati, was an initiated tàntrika who wrote the first known

commentary on the text.76 When we look more closely at the doctrinal,

ritual, and ethical content of the MahànirvàJa, moreover, we do indeed

find many elements that have a strangely “modern” flavor.

Comprised of 2,303 verses, the text unfolds as a dialogue between Lord

Tiva and Parvatí on Mount Kailàsa. Tiva begins his dialogue by first re-

counting the evils of this degenerate modern age, in which the traditional

teachings of the Vedas are no longer adequate to feeble minds of human

beings; hence, the once secret teachings of Tantras now must be revealed

openly: “In this age the mantras of the Tantras are efficacious, yielding

immediate fruit. . . . The Vedic rites . . . which were efficacious in the First

Age have ceased to be so. . . . They are now powerless as snakes, the poi-

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65

son fangs of which are drawn” (MT 1.14–23). Unlike many tantra s, how-

ever, the MahànirvàJa does not in any way devalue the authority of the

Vedas; rather, it claims that its own teaching is already implicit within

the Vedas and that it is the true fulfillment or inner core of the Vedic tra-

dition itself (MT 1.10–13).

Unlike most Bengali tantra s, moreover, the MahànirvàJa identifies the

supreme reality not with the goddess Takti or Kàlí, nor with Tiva or any

other personal deity; rather it is an unusually philosophical, abstract,

Vedàntic view of the divine as the one impersonal, omnipresent Brah-

man, described “in Upaniãadic terms.”77 “The Supreme Brahman . . . is

ever Existent. . . . That which is changeless, existent only and beyond both

mind and speech, which shines as the truth amidst the illusion of the three

worlds is Brahman according to its real nature. That Brahman is known

in samadhi yoga by those who look upon all things free of all illusion”

(MT 3.5–8).

This monotheistic description of the divine was naturally attractive

to most Western and anglicized Indian readers, who “admired its noble

exposition of the worship of the Supreme Brahman.”78 For example,

Ernest Payne—who elsewhere attacks Tantrism as the most debased side

of Hinduism, a religion of “blind terror, of uncomprehended forces”—

speaks highly of this text as a “noble passage on the worship of one eter-

nal, omnipresent God.”79

Chapter 7 of the tantra, it is true, contains a hymn addressed of the

goddess Kàlí as the object of personal devotion; however, in comparison

to most other Tàkta texts, which depict the goddess as a horrifying, vi-

olent power, the image of Kàlí in the MahànirvàJa is remarkably benev-

olent and “sanitized.” There is absolutely no mention of the violent, lust-

ful, or cruel aspects of Kàlí, with her love of cremation grounds, human

corpses, or severed heads, so vividly portrayed in other Bengali texts like

the BKhat Tantrasàra. 80 On the contrary, she is “the ocean of nectar of

compassion . . . whose mercy is without limit” (7.13), the “possessor of

beautiful ornaments, adorable as the image of all tenderness, with a ten-

der body” (7.22). As McDermott has argued, the image of Kàlí in Ben-

gal appears to have undergone a general process of “sweetening” dur-

ing the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Gradually, throughout the

colonial period, she was domesticated and transformed from a wild, vi-

olent, and sexual deity into the approachable maternal goddess that we

find today.81 It seems likely that the MahànirvàJa was an important part

of this progressive sweetening and transformation of the goddess in the

colonial era.

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The Golden Age of the Vedas

Compared with many other tantra s, the MahànirvàJa appears to be

unusually sanitized also in its account of Tantric ritual. The infamous

five M’s are mentioned only in one chapter of the text, and the contro-

versial fifth “M” is accorded only a single line (7.24–27). Even when such

things are mentioned, it is only with “great euphemisms.”82 Moreover,

unlike many other left-hand tantra s, which prescribe ritual sex with lower-

class partners like untouchables and menstruating prostitutes, this text

is exceptional in proclaiming that maithuna should be performed only

with one’s own wife: “When the weakness of the Kali Age becomes great

one’s own wife alone should be known as the fifth tattva” (6.14). As

various authors have observed, the text appears to represent a strong re-

forming tendency, which “endorses rituals that would not be threaten-

ing to a Western outlook.”83 As such, it is generally said to be less pop-

ular among many practicing tàntrika s than it is among Hindu reformers

and Western scholars, precisely because of its “timidity and puritanical

outlook.”84

However, perhaps the most unusual feature of this text is the large

amount of space that it devotes to the exoteric and seemingly “un-

Tantric” matters of caste, social interaction, and domestic life. Chapters

8 through 12, which comprise nearly half (1,083 out of 2,303) of the to-

tal verses in the text, are concerned with social rules and practical mat-

ters, most of which are derived from the ManusmKti, YàjñavalkyasmKti,

and Dàyabhàga. As J. Duncan M. Derrett observes, “The legal element

in the tantra is very curious . . . and more extensive than genuine Màstric

[law books] works allow.”85 Chapter 8, for example, gives detailed in-

structions for the role of the castes (jàtis), the stages of life (àMrama), and

the duties of the householder (gKhasta). Devoted in all his actions to the

supreme Brahman, the householder is the pillar of society, holding to-

gether the cohesion of family and society (8.23–36). The caste system is

also emphatically upheld; all the traditional laws set forth by Manu re-

garding the duties of the four varJa s (classes) must be observed, along

with the laws of initiation, ritual, family relations, diet, and business in-

teractions. It is only within the strictly controlled environs of the Tantric

circle that caste restrictions can be suspended; once the secret cakra is

dissolved, normal social relations must be restored.86

Only in its attitudes toward women, marriage, and inheritance does

the text depart significantly from orthodox doctrine. While by no means

egalitarian, the MahànirvàJa has often been praised for its unusually gen-

erous attitude toward women.87 Thus, it condemns the practice of satí

or widow-burning, asserting that every woman is an image of the great

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67

Goddess: “that woman who in her delusion ascends the funeral pyre of

her lord shall go to hell” (10.79–80). More importantly, the text also di-

verges form the traditional ideals of marriage. According to orthodox

law books like the ManusmKti and Dàyabhàga, the most desirable form

of marriage is “Brahma marriage,” in which one weds only within his

own caste. The MahànirvàJa, however, promotes “Taiva marriage,” in

which there is no restriction of caste and age, and which is based on the

mutual consent (parasparecchà) of man and woman (11.269–71). As Der-

rett comments, this probably represents “an attempt to reform the

Hindu law of marriage from within,” inspired largely by Muslim and

Christian models.88

The text’s attitude toward inheritance is equally idiosyncratic. Ac-

cording to the traditional Màstric rules that we find in the ManusmKti or

Dàyabhàga, a wife or father would normally inherit the property of a

deceased male. The MahànirvàJa, conversely, advocates a very different

form of inheritance, based on descent through male heirs; thus the prop-

erty would be inherited by the eldest son, “by reason of his being a de-

scendent” (12.19). As Derrett comments, such a “concept is quite for-

eign to Indian law” and not only has much in common with English

concepts of the descent of property, but appears to be an attempt to trans-

late English legal terms directly into Sanskrit.89

In short, it seems fairly clear that the strange case of the MahànirvàJa

Tantra must be understood within the context of the social, political, and

legal situation of early colonial Bengal. Derrett has argued convincingly

that at least part of the text—namely, the large portions dealing with caste,

domestic order, and property rights— can be explained by changes made

in the British India legal system between 1773 and 1782. Up until 1772,

the British had followed a system of dual government, allowing native

administrators to govern while British authorities remained in the back-

ground. In 1774, however, the English Parliament set up a new system

that created the Supreme Court. At this time, it appeared that British law

would govern all Hindus in all aspects of life; and among the two most

controversial issues were marriage and inheritance—precisely the two

most unusual and idiosyncratic elements in the MahànirvàJa. But by

1782, the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court was curbed and Hindu law

was restored in matters of marriage and inheritance. For these reasons,

Derrett concludes that the MahànirvàJa was written some time in this

eight-year period, most probably in 1775. It was, he thinks, an attempt

to provide a source of ancient authority for the new laws of marriage

and inheritance, which would also be acceptable to the British adminis-

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The Golden Age of the Vedas

trators: “The Tantric religion could be called upon as a law for a com-

munity which would embrace more than caste Hindus. . . . The English

would welcome a book . . . the tone and contents of which would be fa-

miliar to them.”90

However, all of this still leaves unanswered a whole series of impor-

tant questions. Why would a specifically left-hand Tantric text be cho-

sen as the vehicle for these ideas, if they were purely legalistic in nature?

Surely a more orthodox, less controversial sort of Màstra would have been

a more appropriate vehicle? And what about the rest of the text, which

is not concerned with legalistic matters, but rather with the nature of ab-

solute reality and highly esoteric rituals?

In order to understand this text and its role in colonial Bengal, we

need to examine its strange connections with Ràmmohun Roy and the

Bràhmo Samàj. The MahànirvàJa was to become one of the most pop-

ular works among the reformers of nineteenth-century Bengal, and par-

ticularly among the early members of the Bràhmo Samàj. It is clear that

Ràmmohun not only knew the MahànirvàJa well, but used it explicitly

to support his own social and religious ideals. Ràmmohun owned a copy

of the text and had studied various tantra s under Hariharànanda; some

suspect that he may have received Tantric initiation during his stay in

Varanasi in 1803.91

In many of his later writings, Ràmmohun draws upon the “ancient

authority” of the MahànirvàJa in order to support his own reformed

ideals, quoting or paraphrasing it in at least six treatises. In the Càri PraM-

ner Uttara, for example, he praises the “venerable dharma in the

MahànirvàJa. ”92 Not only did he use hymns taken directly from the text

(such as the one beginning “Nàmàste Sate” [MT 3.59]), in a short form

of worship published in Bengali; more important, Ràmmohun cited the

MahànirvàJa in support of many of his own key religious and social plat-

forms, for example, its condemnation of widow-burning, which was one

of his most important agendas. Perhaps most significantly, he referred

explicitly to the Taiva form of marriage taught in the MahànirvàJa,

which, rather conveniently, conformed to his own liberal view of mar-

riage, and which was in fact the only “ancient” authority he could cite

in its support.93

From this discussion of the MahànirvàJa and the work of Ràmmo-

hun Roy, we can see a number of significant parallels that might explain

why this text was so popular among the leaders of the Bengal Renais-

sance. First, both Ràmmohun and the MahànirvàJa conceive of the di-

vine being, not in the sectarian terms of Kàlí, Tiva, or any other personal

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69

deity, but rather in terms of the impersonal, formless Brahman. Second,

both place central emphasis on the doctrine of the degeneration of time:

the Golden Age of Hinduism lies in the distant past, while the present

modern age is filled with corruption, idolatry, and licentiousness. The re-

turn to the purity of original Hinduism therefore demands a recovery of

the original monotheistic, rational spirit articulated in the Vedànta. Third,

the MahànirvàJa and Ràmmohun also share a curious ambivalence to-

ward caste: on the one hand, they both insist on the equality of all human

beings, at least on the transcendent spiritual plane, and they both offer

a hope for freedom for all castes, at least within certain prescribed rit-

ual contexts. On the other hand, they both admit that the caste system

should be observed in daily affairs. And finally, both agree on certain key

legal issues, such as marriage, inheritance, and women’s rights.

It may never be known who the actual author(s) of the MahànirvàJa

were. Despite their close connection with the text, it seems unlikely that

either Ràmmohun or Hariharànanda penned it.94 What seems most prob-

able is that the text was composed in late-eighteenth-century Bengal by

some learned pundit who had extensive knowledge of the Sanskrit

tantra s and of British Indian law. Nonetheless, now that we have placed

it within its historical context, I do think we can begin to answer the per-

plexing question of why an upper-class, well-educated leader of the Ben-

gal Renaissance like Ràmmohun would have been so interested in this

enigmatic text.

The MahànirvàJa, I would suggest, played a strategic role in Ràm-

mohun’s larger program of reform and his defense of Hinduism against

its Western critics. As Dasgupta observes, Ràmmohun seemed to have

picked and chosen those elements of the MahànirvàJa’s purified version

of Tantra that agreed with his own reformist philosophy, while largely

ignoring the rest of the text.95 In this sense, the MahànirvàJa could per-

haps be thought of as what Jonathan Smith calls a “strategy for dealing

with a situation” —namely, the “incongruous situation” of Indian intel-

lectuals under colonial rule.96 As a kind of “purified Tantra,” the

MahànirvàJa offers a solution to the contradiction between the Golden

Age of India’s past and the immorality of modern Hinduism. For the

MahànirvàJa presents a Tantric doctrine that is not idolatrous or im-

moral, but strongly monotheistic and really rather prudish.

David Haberman has examined an analogous phenomenon in the

changing attitude toward VaiãJava bhakti during the nineteenth century.

In the eyes of the British Orientalists—who in turn determined the view

of the British Indian Court—the erotic aspect of VaiãJava bhakti was

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The Golden Age of the Vedas

viewed much like the Tantric tradition: it represented a degraded cor-

ruption of the true Hindu spirit in the modern era. Through the rulings

of the British court, and through the intellectual influence of the British

Orientalists and Hindu reformers, there was a profound change in the

understanding of love and devotion within the bhakti tradition of the

nineteenth century: “The erotic traditions are wrong and should be elim-

inated. . . . The neo-Vedàntine religion of the reformers . . . is given the

approval of the Supreme Court. Hindu theology must be in line with

British morality, which is . . . founded on natural and eternal laws.”97

Much the same kind of interaction between British law and Hindu tra-

dition appears to be reflected in the MahànirvàJa Tantra. The text is re-

ally something of a double-edged sword that accomplishes a twofold task.

Not only does it attempt to reinterpret certain aspects of Indian culture

according to the model of the tantra s, but it also attempts to relegitimize

the Tantric tradition in light of a reformed, modernized Hinduism. Iron-

ically, a tantra would in many ways appear to be the ideal medium for

this kind of reformist agenda. For like other tantra s, the MahànirvàJa

claims to be an ancient, revealed source of authority, but one that has

been kept secret, hidden throughout the ages, revealed only now for this

most decadent and dangerous modern age.

In sum, it seems unfair to dismiss the MahànirvàJa, as many have, as

a modern fabrication or fraud. For all Tantric texts could be said to be

fabrications, insofar as they claim to derive from some ancient or pri-

mordial time, and even to predate the Vedas. Instead, I would suggest

that we regard this text, like all tantra s, as a product of the creative in-

genuity of the human being as homo faber—and also, more importantly,

as a striking example of the changing role of the tantra s under colonial

rule. It is, in short, an original, though perhaps ultimately failed, attempt

to deal with the “situational incongruities” that characterize the en-

counter between Hindu tradition and the ambivalent realities of colo-

nial power.

c l a s s i f y i n g , c o n t r o l l i n g ,

a n d e r a d i c a t i n g t h e t a n t r i c d i s e a s e

At one extreme there is the escape offered by abstrac-

tion . . . and at the other extreme there is wild debauch-

ery . . . . The cultus includes the most barbaric distrac-

tions, drunken orgies, sexual promiscuity and all kinds

of ugliness. . . . Among the Hindus we find the most

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71

beautiful poetry, but always with an element of utter

irrationality: we are attracted by its grace, but . . . re-

pelled by the sheer confusion and nonsense of it.

G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion (1827)

Despite the MahànirvàJa’s curious attempt to purify the image of the

tantra s, the category of Tantrism would only continue to grow more seedy,

scandalous, and repugnant in both the British and Indian imaginations.

By the late nineteenth century, European and Indian scholars alike ap-

pear to have reached a general consensus on the matter: the polytheistic

and licentious tantra s were fundamentally opposed to the pure, rational,

monotheistic Vedas, and so lay at the farthest, most degenerate extreme

of the progressive devolution of Indian history. One of the most com-

mon metaphors used to describe the destructive impact of Tantra was

that it was a “disease”—a debilitating sickness that weakened the In-

dian spirit and made it prone to foreign attack. As Benyotosh Bhat-

tacharyya traced this religious disease in 1932, Tantra was believed to

have originally emerged in some more primitive, uncivilized, and bar-

baric world (perhaps Scythia?), from whence it penetrated into India and

infected, first, Buddhism, giving birth to the “degenerate” Vajrayàna, and

then Hinduism, fatally crippling India’s religious and political structure.98

Most importantly, Bhattacharyya associates the triumph of Tantra with

the moral and political degeneration of the Indian people, which in turn

opened the door to the Muslim conquest: “If at any time in the history

of India the mind of the nation as a whole has been diseased, it was in

the Tantric age, or the period immediately preceding the Muhammedan

conquest of India. . . . The result was the destruction of Buddhism and

the occupation of the country by the Muhammadans.”99 The original

spirit of India was progressively sapped by the Tantric disease, making

way for her inevitable conquest by foreign powers—first by the Mus-

lims, and finally by the British. Therefore, if modern India is to recover

her true spiritual, cultural, and political identity, it is precisely the dis-

eased elements like Tantra that will have to be eradicated from the so-

cial body.

In short, the discourse surrounding Tantra was a key element of self-

definition for both the British and Indian factions during the nineteenth

century. For the British in India, the classification of Tantra and its

pathologies was never a simple matter of intellectual curiosity about an

exotic Eastern environment. It was also an important part of the classifi-

cation of Indian religion, culture, and society as a whole, which was to

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The Golden Age of the Vedas

a large extent carried out in the interest of more effective administration.

For a majority of Orientalist authors, Tantra represented everything that

was most dangerous about the land they hoped to rule. Yet at the same

time, it offered a convenient justification for India’s need to be ruled, its

need to be colonized by a healthy, moral nation . Such a debased coun-

try, where psychological pathologies can become religious cults, is surely

in need of rational administration by a foreign power.

For Indian elites, on the other hand, Tantra came to embody their na-

tion’s own weakness; it stood for everything that made India appear back-

ward, uncivilized, and immoral in comparison to the West. For early re-

formers, the task was thus either to eradicate Tantra altogether, or

else—as in the case of the mysterious MahànirvàJa Tantra—to bring it

into line with British colonial and reformed Hindu values. As we will see

in the following chapters, however, the discourse on Tantra would soon

be played out, not just in the abstract realm of scholarly discourse, but

in the concrete realms of social struggle and political action.

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c h a p t e r 2

Sacrificing White Goats

to the Goddess

Tantra and Political Violence

in Colonial India

Secrecy goes with savagery.

Sir George MacMunn, The Religions and Hidden Cults of India (1932)

Rise up, O sons of India, arm yourselves with bombs, dis-

patch the white Asuras to Yama’s abode. Invoke the Mother

Kali. . . . The Mother asks for sacrificial offerings. What does

the Mother want? . . . A fowl or sheep or buffalo? No. She

wants many white Asuras. The Mother is thirsting after the

blood of the Feringhees. . . . [C]hant this verse while slaying

the Feringhee white goat: with the close of a long era, the

Feringhee Empire draws to an end, for behold! Kali rises in

the East.

Jugantar, Bengali newspaper (1905)

Imagined as the most radical, dangerous, and transgressive of spiritual

paths, in explicit violation of accepted ethical boundaries, Tantra was

soon to be associated in both the Western and Indian imaginations with

the possibility of political violence. If Orientalist authors began to shift

from “Indophilia” to a more critical “Indophobia” in the years after

1833, this suspicious attitude was even more pronounced in the years

following 1857, during the “crisis of the raj” in the wake of the Indian

Mutiny. And it reached its peak in the tumultuous y ears of the early

twentieth century, in the face of a growing, often violent nationalist

movement whose struggle for independence was sometimes bloody.1

Throughout the late nineteenth century, Tantra was increasingly iden-

73

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Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess

tified with the most dangerous subversive movements, such as the crim-

inal Thuggee and the political extremists of the nationalist movement.

“Tantrism acquired a new political dimension as British fears about civil

unrest and mutiny were excited and linked to the supposed degeneracy

of the natives.”2 However, to use Taussig’s terms, we might say that the

colonial paranoia about Tantric savagery was as much a projection of

the “barbarity of their own social relations” as it was a reflection of

any actual Indian reality: “The magic of mimesis lies in the transfor-

mation wrought on reality by rendering its image. . . . In the colonial

mode of production of reality. . . such mimesis occurs by a colonial mir-

roring of otherness that reflects back on the colonists the barbarity of

their own social relations, but as imputed to the savagery they yearn to

colonize.”3

For Indian authors of the nineteenth century, conversely, the attitude

toward the radical practices of Tantra was more complex and ambiva-

lent. For the reformers and the more conservative members of the na-

tionalist movement, Tantra was typically seen as a terrible embarrass-

ment, a major reason for India’s backwardness and lack of political

power, one of the things most in need of eradication on the road to self-

governance. Yet, remarkably, for the more radical, extremist wing of the

nationalist movement, Tantric forms and symbols could also be used pos-

itively, as a source of revolutionary inspiration. Many Indian authors,

such as the young Aurobindo Ghose, would appropriate and exploit the

terrifying image of Tantra, and particularly the violent goddess Kàlí, as

the most powerful embodiment of their political cause. As a powerful

dialectical category, Tantra could not only be employed by colonial au-

thors as proof of Indian backwardness, barbarism, and savagery; it could

also be turned around and redeployed as the symbol of India in violent

revolt against her colonial masters.

In this chapter, I will explore, first, the paranoid fears of Tantric se-

crecy and violence that emerged in the colonial imagination, as we see

in British descriptions of the goddess Kàlí and the criminal gangs of the

Thuggee. I will then examine the ways in which some Indian authors in

turn appropriated the images of Kàlí and Tantra as revolutionary

weapons, exploiting their terrifying power in the colonial imagination.

As we will see in the case of complex figures like Aurobindo, the God-

dess could symbolize both Mother India, in violent rebellion against her

colonial oppressors, and the Divine Mother, seeking some kind of har-

mony with the West in an age of postcolonial compromise.

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Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess

75

t h e p a t h o s o f t h e u n d e r w o r l d :

t a n t r a , c r i m e , a n d d i s s e n t

It is just this presence of some ancient horror, existing

beneath the surface of perfectly reasonable political as-

pirations, which has been a source of trouble to many

a kind Viceroy desiring only India’s good.

Sir George MacMunn, The Underworld of India (1933)

Based in large part on the descriptions of Orientalist scholarship, British

government officials and colonial administrators also began to take an

interest in the tantra s and to contribute a new element to the imagining

of Tantra. For the most part, Tantra was an object intense anxiety for the

colonial authorities, who suspected it of revolutionary agitation and sub-

versive plots. Throughout the European colonial imagination of the nine-

teenth and early twentieth centuries, the fear of subversive political ac-

tivities often went hand-in-hand with the fear of immoral practices among

the natives under their rule. As we see in the cases of the Mau Mau in

Kenya or in various native uprisings in South America, political rebellion

was often believed to be associated with immorality, sexual transgression,

and the violation of social taboos. The rebellious colonial subject threat-

ened not only to subvert colonial rule, but to unravel the moral fabric of

society itself. As Nicholas Thomas observes, “Colonial rule was haunted

by a sense of insecurity,” terrified by the “obscurity of the native men-

tality” and overwhelmed by the indigenous societies’ “intractability in the

face of government.”4 Perhaps this was true nowhere more than in colo-

nial India of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Above all, India was imagined as a land where political activism and

religious fervor were often wedded in the most dangerous form. In the in-

sidious “Indian underworld,” as M. Paul Dare described it, “crime, reli-

gious belief and magic are entangled . . . to a degree inconceivable to the

western mind.”5 As Richard King suggests, the West has long held two

powerful images of Indian religions: on one side, the detached, transcen-

dent otherworldly mystic, and on the other, the “militant fanatic,” the

crazed devotee of mindless religion.6 This association between political

violence and religious extremism became increasingly acute after May

1857, the pivotal moment of the Indian Mutiny, when the Bengal Army

revolted against its British officers, sparking a widespread violent blood-

bath. Allegedly caused by specific religious reasons—the use of beef fat

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Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess

in gun cartridges—the mutiny probably had behind it a host of other cul-

tural causes—such as Christian missionary activity, the prohibition of re-

ligious practices, and the introduction of Western education. Culminat-

ing in the Kanpur Massacre, with the grisly murder of British women and

children prisoners, the mutiny became for the British authorities the epit-

ome of all the “cruelty and impulsiveness” of their subjects and so the

justification for the “moral and racial condemnation of native Indians.”7

Tantra would come to represent the epitome of this dangerous fusion

of religion with political action, a kind of perverse mysticism combining

not just religion and sensuality, but criminal behavior and political unrest.

As Valentine Chirol warned in Indian Unrest, there was an intimate con-

nection between the sexual license of the Tantric secret societies and the

subversive acts of the revolutionary political groups: “The Shakti cultus,

with its obscene and horrible rites . . . represents a form of erotomania

which is certainly much more common among Hindu political fanatics.”8

Above all, this erotomaniac fanaticism seemed to have reached its most

extreme form in the violently sexual figure of the Tantric goddess.

An Orgy of Horrors: Kàlí in the Colonial Imagination

Kàlí is wholly given over to cruelty and blood. She

drinks the blood of her victims. She lives in an orgy

of horrors.

Rev. E. Osborn Martin, The Gods of India (1913)

To know the Hindoo idolatry as it is, a person must

wade through the filth of the thirty-six pooranus. . . .

[H]e must follow the brahmun through his midnight

orgies before the image of Kalee.

William Ward, A View of the History,

Literature, and Religion of the Hindoos (1817)

Throughout the British and European literature of the colonial era, few

figures held such a central role, as a source of mixed horror and fascina-

tion, as did the Tantric goddess Kàlí (see figures 5 and 6). As Friedrich Max

Müller put it, “nothing is so hideous as the popular worship of Kàlí in In-

dia.”9 The goddess of time, darkness, and death (kàla), Kàlí has been a

powerful presence in the Hindu religious imagination since at least the early

centuries of the common era. The first known account of Kàlí as a wild,

bloodthirsty goddess appears in the Mahàbhàrata, during AMvatthàman’s

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77

Figure 5. “Procession of the Hindoo Goddess Kali.” From Colin Campbell,

Narrative of the Indian Revolt: From Its Outbreak to the Capture of Lucknow

(London: G. Vickers, 1858).

night attack on the PàJjavas (10.8.64). In the PuràJas, Kàlí emerges as a

goddess of battle and war, often associated with lower-class people and

non-Aryan tribals. However, her most famous appearance is found in the

Deví-Màhàtmya, a portion of the MàrkaJjeya PuràJa, where she emerges

as the wrathful projection of Durgà, a hideous, bloodthirsty creature, rag-

ing about the field of battle and slaying demons.10 A goddess of military

power and death, she is also the goddess of time itself, associated with de-

struction on a universal scale, the eschatological dissolution of the world

at the end of the age. Portrayed as a “frightening hag with disheveled hair,

pendulous breasts and a garland of skulls,” she is “the embodiment of the

fury which can be raised in the divinity under emergency conditions.”11

Not surprisingly, given her extreme role in the Indian tradition, Kàlí

soon assumed an even more terrifying role in the colonial imagination.

As Ward describes her, Kàlí is the very epitome of that “puerile, impure

and bloody system of idolatry” that is the Hindu faith. With her horrific

violence and rampant sexuality, Kàlí is the most explicit embodiment of

this ghastly perversion that passes under the name of religion:

The dark image of this goddess is a truly horrid figure. . . . [S]he holds

in one hand a scimitar in another a giant skull. . . . [S]he stands upon her

husband . . . to keep him in subjection till the time of the universal con-

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Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess

Figure 6. Mahà Kàlí. From Charles Coleman, The Mythology

of the Hindoos (London: Parbury, Allen, 1832).

flagration. . . . She exhibits the appearance of drunken frantic fury. Yet this

is the goddess . . . upon whose altars thousands of victims annually bleed,

and whose temple . . . is the resort of Hindoos from all parts of India.12

A similar, perhaps even more colorful, account is that of the Scottish mis-

sionary Alexander Duff, who describes Kàlí’s worship as a kind of Sa-

tanic delirium comprised of mindless violence and bloodshed: “Of all

Hindu divinities, this goddess is the most cruel and vengeful. . . . The

supreme delight of this divinity. . . consists in cruelty and torture; her

ambrosia is the flesh of sacrificed victims; and her sweetest nectar, the

copious effusion of blood.”13

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Throughout the accounts of British authors of the colonial era, the

image of Kàlí represents a kind of impenetrable, almost inconceivable

mystery—a source of simultaneous horror and fascination, which the

Western mind cannot fathom but which it feels compelled to describe in

endless, almost obsessive detail. She is a “form to be remembered for its

grotesqueness and startling ugliness,” and “a hideous black woman . . .

with a huge blood-red tongue hanging out of her mouth.”14 As such, she

represents the most primitive substratum of the Indian mind itself:

No one can tell in what age it was that divinity revealed itself to the vision

of some aboriginal . . . seer in the grotesque form of Mother Kali, nor does

any record exist regarding the audacious hand that first modelled . . . those

awful features . . . crudely embodying . . . the very dread of femininity always

working in the minds of a most sensuous people, too prone to fall before the

subtle powers of the weaker sex. . . . [T]he strange shapes of Kali . . . date

back to primeval times, and may be regarded as only the fantastic shadows

of divinity seen . . . in the dim twilight of world’s morning.15

Above all, the figure of Kàlí and the secret rites of her Tantric devotees

were regarded as manifestations of the fanatical side of the Indian mind

and thus as a dangerous source of unrest: “This divinity is the avowed

patroness of all the most atrocious outrages against the peace of society.”16

As Chirol observes in Indian Unrest, the worship of Kàlí represents the

worst example of the manipulation of religious superstition in the service

of political agitation: “The constant invocation of the ‘terrible goddess’ . . .

against the alien oppressors, shows that Brahminism . . . is ready to ap-

peal to the grossest and most cruel superstitions of the masses.”17 Here,

we see a kind of paranoia similar to that found in other situations of colo-

nial domination. As Taussig observes in the case of colonial South Amer-

ica, the fear of native rebellion created all sorts of nightmarish fantasies

of cannibals, head hunters, and shamans threatening to rise up against

law and order: “The uncertainty surrounding the possibility of Indian

treachery fed a colonially paranoid mythology in which dismemberment,

cannibalism . . . body parts and skulls grinned wickedly.”18

The Deceivers: Thugs, Kàlí, and Criminal Activity in Colonial India

Intense devotion to Kalee is the mysterious link that

unites them in a bond of brotherhood that is indissolu-

ble; and with secrecy which for generations has eluded

the efforts of successive governments to detect them.

Rev. Alexander Duff, India and Indian Missions (1839)

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Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess

In a growing body of nineteenth-century literature, both factual and

fictional, the figure of Kàlí and her Tantric devotees began to be associ-

ated with criminal activity and the notorious gangs of robbers (dacoits)

believed to thrive in the underworld of India. “Thieves pay their devo-

tion to Kalee . . . to whom bloody sacrifices are offered under the hope

of carrying on their villainous designs with success.”19 The most infa-

mous of these groups, and the most sinister in the British imagination,

were the gangs known as the Phansigars (“stranglers”) or more widely as

the Thuggee (“deceivers”). To what degree the Thuggee were a real organi-

zation or, rather, the fabrication of British imagination and colonial para-

noia is difficult to say.20 As Cynthia Humes has argued, the British authori-

ties of the early nineteenth century initially regarded the Thuggee as clear

evidence of the dangerous criminal elements within the subcontinent—

and thus as a justification for the need of extensive British rule and the

strict imposition of colonial law. Yet increasingly in the nineteenth cen-

tury, and above all after the mutiny of 1857, the threat of the Thuggee

began to intensify within in the colonial imagination, growing into a sin-

ister nationwide organization, dedicated to the subversion of British colo-

nial rule.21

The legends of the Thuggee first appeared when Dr. Richard Sherwood

published a report on the Phansigars in the Madras Literary Gazette in

1816. According to Sherwood’s account, which would later become one

of the most widely read versions in the colonial era, the Phansigars were

both a criminal and a religious sect, patronized by the local rulers who

gave it protection and shared its profits. They were, in short, “villains as

subtle, rapacious and cruel as any who are to be met with in the records

of human depravity.” Being “skilled in the arts of deception,” the Phan-

sigars would first send ahead scouts in order to identify wealthy travel-

ers on the roads, and then pose in the guise of fellow travelers, walking

alongside the targeted party and gaining their trust.22 Having deceived

their intended victims, the Phansigars would then suddenly break that

trust by strangling their victims from behind, using their trademark hand-

kerchief or scarf.

However, the Thuggee became infamous as a criminal organization only

due to the efforts of Colonel William Sleeman, later renowned as “Thuggee

Sleeman.” Born to a respected Cornish family in a long line of soldiers,

Sleeman arrived in India in 1809 and served in Nepal from 1814 to 1816.

In 1818, Sleeman grew curious about these notorious gangs of mur-

derous robbers and requested to be transferred to the civil service in or-

der to investigate the Thuggee full-time. Soon Sleeman concluded that

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81

the Thuggee were far more than a small band of petty criminals, but

were in fact a nationwide organization—“a numerous and highly or-

ganized fraternity operating in all parts of India.”23 “He believed that

India was under attack—that the foundation of human society was in

danger of being destroyed. . . . He recognized Thuggee as instruments of

the ultimate evil in their day, of that which as an end in itself takes human

life indiscriminately. He was inspired by the belief that Thuggee must be

destroyed.”24

The most intensive period of the Thuggee investigation began in

1831–32, as Sleeman and his men gradually widened their circle from

their initial forays in Bundelkand and western Malwa to spread through-

out the subcontinent: “From the foot of the Himalayas to Cape Comorin,

from Cutch to Assam, there was hardly a province . . . where Thuggee

had not been practiced.”25 In short, as Amal Chatterjee observes, “Thugs,

once ‘discovered’ sprang up all across India. . . . [S]o convinced were the

propagators of the fiction that it began to be recorded everywhere,” as

every petty criminal from highway thief to river pirate was identified with

the “Thuggee menace.”26 Sleeman had meanwhile gathered a vast body

of reports, rumors, and confessions regarding the activities of this group,

eventually publishing them in Ramaseeana; or, A Vocabulary of the Pe-

culiar Language Used by the Thugs. The most famous of these accounts

is the confession of the leader known as Feringhea, “the prince of thugs,”

who reportedly unveiled the secrets of the cult, which were “so incredi-

ble that at first Sleeman would not believe them.”27 In Sleeman’s eyes,

this cult represented an ancient evil in the heart of India, possibly going

as far back as the Tartar and Mogul tribes, and surviving secretly for cen-

turies as the terrifying underbelly of India.

Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of the Thug was precisely his dis-

simulating, duplicitous character—that he was first and foremost a de-

ceiver. While appearing to be a good citizen and loyal subject of British

law, the Thug was in fact a murderous criminal of the most sinister type:

The most astounding fact about the Thug is that . . . he was a good citizen

and model husband devoted to his family and scrupulously straight when

not on his expeditions, presenting a complexity of character utterly baffling

to a student of psychology. It was essential to the safety of their criminal

operations that they should pass as peaceful citizens. . . . Not only had

they left no trace behind of their foul deed, but they concealed their trail

by every art and craft, and with ill-gotten rupees bribed officials, police

and villagers, in whose territory the murders had occurred. . . . It is not

extraordinary that Thuggee remained a mystery; rather it is remarkable

that it was ever brought to light.28

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Thus, if it is true, as Homi Bhabha suggests, that “colonial power pro-

duces the colonized as a fixed reality which is at once an other and yet

entirely knowable and visible,”29 then the Thug is a threat precisely be-

cause he is both unknowable and invisible. He is a deceiver who defies

the all-penetrating gaze of colonial rule.

Whether the Thuggee were a real or an imaginary cult, a rich lore

quickly grew up around them, combining fact and fantasy into a vivid

narrative. Through the combined influence of Sleeman’s personal ac-

counts, the vivid chronicles of Thuggee persecution by Sir Edward

Thornton (1837), and the popular fictional account by Philip Meadows

Taylor (1839), a kind of Thuggee mythology had emerged, much of it

centering on the figure of Kàlí and her Tantric cult.30 Under the form of

Bhowani, it was believed, Kàlí was worshiped by the Thuggee before they

went out on their sprees of killing and banditry. According to the now

infamous Thuggee legend, Kàlí had come in the form of Bhowani in or-

der to kill the demon Rukt Bij-dana. Although Kàlí cut the demon in two,

every drop of his blood that fell to earth gave birth to new demons; there-

fore the goddess created two men from the sweat of her arms and com-

manded them to strangle the demons using a rumal, or handkerchief.

Kàlí then established the cult of Thuggee, dedicated to her, which would

continue the ritual art of strangulation and robbery. Initially, the story

goes, Kàlí had agreed to devour the corpses herself; however, after one

of her devotees looked back to watch her as she consumed a victim, she

refused to eat the bodies any longer. Instead she gave the Thuggee a sa-

cred pickax with which to bury the corpses.

Not only were they thought to engage in rampant violence in the name

of Kàlí, but the Thuggee were also believed to hold dark secret rituals

dedicated to her. These sinister rites were described as a kind of Black

Mass, consisting of blood sacrifice and sacramental consumption of wine

and meat. (While reading these accounts, it is difficult for a modern reader

not to be reminded of medieval Inquisitors’ accounts of witchcraft, or

the Christian Fathers’ accounts of the perverse rituals of certain Gnos-

tic heresies):

A silver or brazen image of the goddess . . . together with the implements

of Phansigari, such as a noose, knife and pick axe, being placed together,

flowers were scattered over them and offerings of fruit, cakes, spirits, &c.

are made. . . . The head of the sheep being cut off, it is placed with a burn-

ing lamp upon it . . . before the image . . . and the goddess is entreated to

reveal to them whether she approves of the expedition.31

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83

A ritual feast . . . took place after every murder, sometimes upon the

grave of the victim. The goor or coarse sugar took the place of the Chris-

tian communion bread and wine.32

In sum, in the eyes of many British officials, the Thuggee and their de-

monic patroness, Kàlí, came to represent the most extreme example of

the natural tendency toward lawlessness, perversion, and murderous in-

stinct lying at the darkest heart of the Indian race:

The dark night of superstition, which has long clouded the moral vision

of India, has given rise to practices so horrible that without the most con-

vincing evidence, their existence could not be credited. . . . That giant power

which has held the human race in chains wherever the . . . doctrines of rev-

elation have not penetrated, has in India reveled in prosperity. . . . Here the

genius of paganism had reared a class of men who are assassins by profes-

sion, called Phansigars or Thugs.33

Thus, with their sinister skills in deception, their ties to indigenous po-

litical corruption, and their devotion to the cruel goddess Kàlí, the Thuggee

seemed to provide the clearest evidence of the need for British rule in the

subcontinent. “These common enemies of mankind, under the sanction

of religious rites, have made every road between the Jumna and Indus

rivers . . . a dreadful scene of lonely murder,” Sleeman lamented, con-

cluding that “we must have more efficient police establishments along

the high roads . . . to root out entirely this growing evil which has been . . .

increasing under the sanction of religious rites.”34

The India that the British found in the late eighteenth century seemed

to them a land sunk in immorality and decay, destroying itself with crim-

inal gangs who preyed upon its own citizens, and woefully misruled by

self-serving ràja s . According to most colonial narratives, India suffered

a profound social breakdown following the collapse of the Mughal em-

pire; the officers of the East India Company found India “ravaged and

exhausted,” strewn with “sacked palaces, vanishing roads, toppled

fortresses . . . and ruined towns.”35 As Sir John Malcolm comments, the

widespread presence of the Thuggee was the most acute example of this

general state of moral and political decay: “the native states were disor-

ganized and society on the verge of dissolution; the people crushed by

despots, the country overrun by bandits. . . . [G]overnment had ceased

to exist; there remained only oppression and misery.”36 At the same time,

the Thuggee cult also revealed the political corruption that was rampant

throughout India. Protected by the local rulers whom they bribed, the

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Thuggee were able to survive due to the greed of the petty kings and a

hypocritical legal system: “In an Eastern court of those days, bribery al-

most always took the place of justice and this, combined with fear, was

responsible . . . for the extreme leniency shown.”37

Given a political system so corrupt, Agent to the Governor-General

F. C. Smith argued, the Thuggee should never be entrusted to the in-

digenous authorities. Instead, they should be tried by the more compe-

tent and efficient authority of the British government: “the feeble efforts

of the native Chiefs having totally failed to suppress them, no Thug

should . . . be made over to a native Chieftain for punishment, experi-

ence having shown their utter incapacity to put them down and expose

their corrupt practices of concealing Thugs for valuable considera-

tions.”38 The suppression of the Thuggee therefore demanded not only

the assertion of British authority over that of local rulers, but also the

formation of new special courts and the spread of British legal structures

over the whole of India: “Nothing but a general system, undertaken by

a paramount power, strong enough to bear down all opposition by in-

terested native chiefs, could ever eradicate such well-organized vil-

lainy.”39 Perhaps the most important of the new legal structures was Act

30 of 1836. Extending Company jurisdiction to territories outside its ac-

tual dominions, the act allowed the offense in question to be tried in any

Company court; it allowed trials to be conducted without any form of

Islamic law; and it allowed conviction on the sole basis of membership

in a gang of Thuggee. Hence this new system provided the ideal legiti-

mation for the persecution of the “Thug menace.” For even if there was

often little evidence against the alleged Thuggee cult that would hold up

in a regular court of law, now the British officials had a new license to

receive and use evidence however they saw fit.

Ultimately, it was believed to be due in large part to the British sup-

pression of Thuggee that the indigenous Indian population finally learned

to respect the just authority of its colonial rulers. For the British had ap-

parently been able to contain and control a disease that had been rav-

aging India for hundreds of years: “Those were the days when British

rule in the East was synonymous with courage, strength and justice. . . .

[T]he Indian had faith in British government and learned to respect it.”40

In sum, the heroic work of Sleeman and his men to suppress the Thuggee

menace was regarded as the most “fitting monument to British rule.”

Just as benign British rule had saved India from its own moral decay and

political chaos, so the selfless labors of Sleeman had saved India from a

disease that had rotted the country from within.

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85

If the only monument to British rule in India was the suppression of Thuggee,

it is doubtful whether any other nation could show a finer one. For . . . the

Englishmen themselves suffered no harmful effects from this malignant en-

terprise and therefore no selfish motive prompted those who were responsi-

ble for suppressing this secret . . . system of murder. What other men of any

other Western nation have deliberately imperiled their lives for years on end

to protect native life only?41

By the late nineteenth century, however, the Thuggee myth had begun

to assume a much darker and more threatening form. If the early nar-

ratives used the Thuggee as an example of India’s lawlessness and the

need for strong British rule, the later narratives reveal a fear that the

Thuggee had grown into something far more dangerous than a mere un-

derground criminal group. Particularly in the decades after the mutiny,

the Thuggee myth grew into a full-blown paranoid fantasy, now imag-

ined as a nationwide political organization, fueled by religious fanati-

cism, and dedicated to the overthrow of British rule itself. As MacMunn

concludes,

Thuggism was rampant all over India, from the Himalaya to the edge of

Ceylon, and east and west from Cutch on the Indian Ocean to Assam on

the Burma border. . . .

For many years the Department of Thuggee . . . kept watch on this

movement lest it should show its head again, and also on various secret

movements, subversive of both civilization and the British Raj. Eventually

it was merged in the Criminal Intelligence Department, whose annals will

make the most astounding reading in the world, in which crime mingles

with Shiva and Vishnu in a manner unknown elsewhere.42

Thus it is not surprising that this criminal menace would soon be linked

to more overt political agitation, as well.

“Perverted Religion and Equally Perverted Patriotism”

In its extreme forms Shakti worship finds expression in

licentious aberrations which . . . represent the most

extravagant forms of delirious mysticism.

Valentine Chirol, Indian Unrest (1910)

The fear of the subversive power of Tantra would reach its height of in-

tensity in the early twentieth century, with the rise of overt political re-

sistance, particularly in hotbed regions like Bengal. Beginning with the

Swadeshi ( swadeshi, “of our own country”) movement, which burst into

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violent agitation after the partition of Bengal in 1905, the nationalist rev-

olutionaries appeared to the British government to represent a danger-

ous combination of religion and politics (a confusion almost as danger-

ous as the perverse mingling of sex and religion). For “in India, indeed,

religion enters into politics as it does into most of the activities of man

which in the West are usually described as secular.”43

This monstrous fusion of religious fanaticism and subversive activi-

ties had reached its terrifying fruition in the revolutionary nationalist

groups of the twentieth century. As the Rowlatt Commission of 1918 re-

ported, the revolutionary outrages in Bengal were “the outcome of a wide-

spread movement of perverted religion and equally perverted patriot-

ism.”44 Calling upon the terrible mother Kàlí for power, worshiping her

with orgiastic violence, and even “sacrificing the white goats” of British

officials to the goddess, they threatened the moral and political fabric of

the colonial state itself. In many accounts, the nationalist movement is

described as nothing less than a pervasive secret organization combin-

ing mysticism and political subversion—an “underground murder cult”

comprised of a “strange melange of masonic ritual and a festival of hor-

rible furious Kali in her wilder aspects.”45

All of this was only natural, however, since the “Indian mind” was

believed to have an inherent tendency toward the fusion of sexual li-

cense and political violence. The revolutionaries exploited this natural

proclivity toward eroticism and criminality, inciting the sexually volatile

young men to vent their frustrations at the British: “The Hindu student,

depraved . . . by too early eroticism, turns to the suggestiveness of the

murder-monger and worships the nitro-glycerine bomb as the apothe-

osis of his goddess.”46 Many authors attributed the prevalence of revo-

lutionary activity among Bengali students to the overstimulating sexual

practices of this culture—specifically the exposure of men to “early eroti-

cisms” and young marriage, which is “terribly reflected in its effect on

erotic young students . . . with their erotic hothouse nature.”

One of the most pitiful of all the manifestations of unrest . . . is the strange

underground movement . . . which has produced a secret bomb and revolver

cult, an assassination society with secret initiation. . . . Behind all the cruelty

and sudden death of the world lies . . . Kali, the goddess of all horror. . . .

“I am hungry” is her cry. “I want blood, blood victims.” . . . Not even the

perverted imaginations of the Marquis de Sade could devise a more horrible

nightmare than Kali. . . . To minds such as students . . . overstrained by pre-

mature eroticism . . . this deity becomes a cult in which half-mystical murder

may be a dominant thought.47

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Here are conflated in the colonial imagination all the worst aspects of

Tantra. Moral corruption, religious perversion, and political unrest

come together around the image of Kàlí and her obscene devotion. In

the colonial imagination, Tantra is not just an example of the “savagery

they yearn to colonize,” but the presence of a savagery that cannot be

colonized, an irrational, violent, and sexual power that threatens to con-

sume the white masters.

k 1 l 2 r i s e s i n t h e e a s t !

t a n t r a a n d r e v o l u t i o n a r y n a t i o n a l i s m

On the day on which the Mother is worshipped in every

village, on that day the people of India will be inspired

with a divine spirit and the crown of independence will

fall into their hands.

Jugantar (1905)

Just when [human beings] seem engaged in revolution-

izing themselves . . . in creating something that never

existed before, precisely in such epochs of revolutionary

crisis they conjure up spirits of the past and borrow

from them names, battle slogans and costumes in or-

der to present the new scene of the world in this time-

honored disguise. . . . Thus Luther wore the mask of the

Apostle Paul, the revolution of 1789 . . . draped itself

alternately as the Roman Republic and Roman Empire.

Karl Marx, Die Revolution (1852)

As in every case of colonial domination, the Indians were by no means

content to remain passive and unreflective, merely accepting the imagi-

nary representations imposed upon them by colonial authorities. On the

contrary, like native peoples in all situations of colonial contact, they had

the potential to engage in a variety of “strategies of appropriation and

subversion,” often by “taking over colonial sources and turning them to

anti-colonial uses.”48 They too had the ability to engage in a fierce war

of images, often by manipulating the figure of Kàlí and transforming her

into a source of anticolonial struggle.

Borrowing Benjamin’s phrase, we could say that Kàlí is an ideal ex-

ample of a dialectical image—a crystallized fusion of past and present,

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ancient religious myth and contemporary politics. Every community, Ben-

jamin suggests, has a kind of “cultural memory” or a “reservoir of myths

and utopian symbols from a more distant Ur-past.”49 These collective

images can be used by established institutions to legitimate existing ide-

ologies and political hierarchies; but they can also be used by oppressed

classes as a source of political awakening. In the form of the dialectical

image, mythic narratives of past traditions, utopian visions, and nostal-

gic longings for lost paradise can be seized upon, “reanimated,” and

transformed into revolutionary visions of liberation.

Paradoxically, collective imagination mobilizes its powers for a revolution-

ary break from the past by evoking a cultural memory reservoir of myths

and utopian symbols from a more distant Ur-past. . . . Utopian imagination

thus cuts across the continuum of . . . historical development as the possi-

bility of revolutionary rupture.

[The] shock of this recognition [can] jolt the dreaming collective into

a political awakening. The presentation of the historical object within a

charged force field of past and present, which produces political electric-

ity. . . is the dialectical image.50

It is in precisely this sense, I will argue, that the terrifying figure of the

Tantric goddess Kàlí was seized by the radical nationalist movement as

an image of revolutionary awakening.

During the colonial era, the image of Kàlí thus became the focus of a

complex play of representation and misrepresentation, a play of mime-

sis, in Benjamin’s and Taussig’s sense of the term. As the basic human

faculty for grasping the foreign or the unknown, mimesis is our ability

to represent the Other.51 Within the colonial imagination, the native is

often represented as the negative antitype of the colonizer: conceived as

savage or feminine, the native embodies the irrationality and back-

wardness against which the colonizer imagines himself. Yet particularly

in cases like the terrifying goddess Kàlí, this image often becomes a fright-

ening mirror that reflects back the colonizers’ own deepest fears, fan-

tasies, and dangerous desires.

At the same time, of course, colonized peoples also have their own

powers of mimesis and their own ways of imaginally representing the

colonizing Other. In some cases, this takes the form of a playful mim-

icry or parody that mocks the colonial ruler; in other cases, it assumes a

more subversive form, as the colonized subject appropriates the repre-

sentations of the colonizers themselves, often inverting them as coun-

terhegemonic weapons of resistance. For example, Taussig points to the

construction of the image of the “shaman” in colonial South America.

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As a powerful dialectical image, the shaman was in large part the result

of a complex play of mimesis between the Europeans and the colonized

Indians. If the colonial rulers had imagined the Indian to be an inher-

ently savage and mysterious creature—a wild man and dangerous sor-

cerer, with threatening magical powers—then the Indians could likewise

seize upon that image. Thus they embraced and exploited it, transform-

ing the image into the dialectical image of the shaman, a figure embodying

the power of wildness and supernatural danger, so threatening to the

white man: “the shaman tames savagery, not to eliminate it, but to ac-

quire it.”52 Hence, the image of the shaman demonstrates the ever threat-

ening power of the oppressed over the oppressor, of the colonized over

the colonizer.

An even more striking example that Taussig cites is the common eigh-

teenth-century European representation of America as a woman, typically

a beautiful naked woman adorned with feathered headdress, bow, and

arrows. This New World/Woman, however, could assume both benev-

olent and terrifying features, imagined either as an inviting maiden await-

ing the European colonizers, “languidly entertaining Discoverers from

her hammock,” or as a horrifying demoness, “striding brazenly across

the New World as castrator with her victim’s bloody head in her grasp.”53

Yet, as Taussig points out, the image of America as female was not only

used by the European colonizers, but it was also reappropriated by the

Indians, who transformed it into a symbol of Indianness, an anti-Euro-

pean, revolutionary spirit (for example, in Pedro Jose Figuero’s famous

painting of Bolivia as a woman wearing a feathered headdress, seated

next to the liberator of the nation, Simon Bolivar [1819]).

An Avatàr That Cannot Be Slain:

Kàlí, Tantra, and the Nationalist Movement

Nationalism is an avatàr that cannot be slain. Nation-

alism is a divinely appointed Takti of the Eternal and

must do its God-given work before it returns to the

bosom of Universal Energy from which it came.

Sri Aurobindo, quoted in Iyengar, Sri Aurobindo (1950)

We find much the same dialectical play of imagery in the role of Kàlí in

colonial Bengal. Above all, in the Bengal nationalist movement, the vio-

lent image of Kàlí was transformed into the supreme symbol of Mother

India fighting violently against her foreign oppressors. The origins of the

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Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess

Figure 7. Sri Aurobindo as a young man. Frontispiece to

Haridas Choudhuri, Sri Aurobindo and the Life Divine

(San Francisco: Cultural Integration Fellowship, 1973).

Bengal nationalist movement lie in the more moderate ideals of the In-

dian National Congress of the last quarter of the nineteenth century, led

by more conservative figures like R. C. Dutt or G. K. Gokhale. However,

its second and most volatile period began in 1904, with the Swadeshi

movement’s more direct challenge to the legitimacy of British rule. Fi-

nally, in 1905, it burst into open conflagration with the British partition

of West Bengal (with Bihar and Orissa) from East Bengal and Assam. In

the period after 1907, the Swadeshi movement began to assume a more

violent and extremist form, abandoning the earlier doctrines of passive

resistance or boycott in favor of the tactics of revolutionary terrorism.54

One of the most outspoken members of the revolutionary strain of

the movement was Aurobindo Ghose (figure 7), a man who in his later

years would renounce the political life in order to pursue the spiritual

path, eventually becoming one of the greatest religious leaders of mod-

ern India. Born in India but educated in England, Aurobindo returned

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91

to his homeland in 1893 to work for the State Service in Baroda. With

the partition of Bengal in 1905, however, Aurobindo decided to leap head-

long into the political maelstrom of Bengal. Leaving his position in Bar-

oda, he arrived in Calcutta at the very height of the Swadeshi movement.

The ideal that Aurobindo came to adopt was that of swaraj, or complete

autonomy for India, which could only be achieved by a radical overthrow

of British power. Although he is credited as one of the first advocates of

passive resistance, Aurobindo also did not hesitate to promote armed re-

sistance. In a just cause, “all methods were permissible”; therefore, “he

shrewdly kept in reserve the weapon of secret revolutionary activity to

be brought into the open . . . when all else failed.”55 As Aurobindo later

wrote of his own involvement in the national movement, “my action in

giving the movement . . . its militant turn or forming the revolutionary

movement is very little known.”56

The primary medium for Bengal’s early revolutionary activities was

a network of secret societies and underground movements. Calcutta,

Dhaka, and other cities were filled with a host of secret organizations,

both religious and political, working on the margins of and often in vi-

olent opposition to the existing social and governmental structures.

Decades earlier, Aurobindo’s grandfather Rajnarain Bose had organized

a secret society, of which Rabindranath Tagore had been a member, ded-

icated to revolutionary action. The two most prominent of these secret

groups were the Anushilan Samiti—which was originally founded by Au-

robindo and others in 1902—and a looser group later known as Jugan-

tar (the New Age).57 As Aurobindo put it in a letter of 1911, his aim was

to instigate “a secret revolutionary propaganda and organization.”58 Al-

though Aurobindo would later deny his involvement with the radical ac-

tions of the Jugantar group, his brother Barindra and other members

clearly regarded him as its founder, chief inspiration, and karta, or boss.

Throughout these organizations, there were often deep connections

between Tàkta Tantra and revolutionary politics. Much of the impetus

for the secret groups came from the well-known novel of Bankim Chan-

dra Chatterjee, Änandamaåh—the story of a group of revolutionary san-

nyàsí s (renunciants, ascetics) and devotees of the Mother Goddess who

hope to overthrow Muslim rule in Bengal. Inspired by Bankim’s work,

Aurobindo and others deployed a network of secret organizations in or-

der to work behind the scenes toward an armed revolution. As Kees Bolle,

Leonard Gordon, and others have observed, the revolutionaries explic-

itly appropriated many structures of Tàkta Tantra, adapting “neo-Tantric

rituals” and initiations to the service of building up an underground

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Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess

revolutionary organization. “Tàkta religious rituals played a significant

role in cementing unity and discipline. . . . The left wing extremists which

organized themselves into revolutionary secret societies followed the

practice of taking vows before the goddess Kàlí.”59 Peter Heehs sum-

marizes the initiatory oath, as recorded by the Government of India Home

Department:

The Sanskrit oath, probably written by Aurobindo, took the form of a Vedic

sacrificial hymn. Invoking Varuna, Agni and other deities . . . bowing down

to the ideal heroes of India that sacrificed their lives to save the mother-

land . . . the oath-takers poured their hatred and shame into the fire . . .

to save the country. Renouncing all life’s pleasures, they vowed to dedicate

themselves to the establishment of the Dharma Rajya [Righteous King-

dom]. . . . Then bowing to a sword, crown of all weapons, the symbol of

death, they lifted it up in the name of the Adya Shakti (original Energy,

conceived as the Goddess Kàlí).60

The public voice of the movement was communicated through the Cal-

cutta newspapers Bandemataram, to which Aurobindo was a regular con-

tributor, and the more radical Jugantar, begun by Aurobindo’s brother,

Barin. The latter openly preached revolution and subversion of British

authority. Calling the Bengali youth to give themselves in “sacrificial

death” to the nationalist cause, the newspaper gave precise directions as

to how one should start a secret terrorist organization and carry out ter-

rorist activities.61 Not surprisingly, Jugantar was prosecuted for sedition

six times before its final suppression in 1908.

Under Barin’s direction, the revolutionaries worked underground, col-

lecting arms and making bombs. Although Aurobindo did not carry out

terrorists acts himself, it seems probable that he both knew of and helped

guide the group’s terrorist activities. What Aurobindo sought was not

random terrorism, but “a full-scale insurrection,” hoping that “success-

ful revolutionary acts might create popular interest and at the same time

intimidate the enemy.”62 Thus, a laboratory was built at the Bengal En-

gineering College in order to make bombs; and on April 30, 1908, mem-

bers of the society at Muzaffarpur threw a bomb intended for Douglas

Kingsford, who was just transferred from his post as chief presidency

magistrate at Calcutta. Tragically, however, the bomb instead hit the car-

riage bearing Kingsford’s daughter.

Despite his violent revolutionary activities, Aurobindo considered his

cause to be not merely political but also profoundly religious. For him,

nationalism was a divine a mission, and religion was the life-blood that

flowed through the organic body of the Indian nation:

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Nationalism is not a mere political program; Nationalism is a religion

that has come from God. Nationalism is a creed which you shall have

to live. . . . If you are to be Nationalist . . . you must do it in the religious

spirit. . . . It is not by any mere political programme . . . that this country

can be saved. . . . What is the one thing needful? . . . the idea that there is

a Power at work to help India, that we are doing what God bids us.63

India in Aurobindo’s day had been offered up to “the secularity of au-

tonomy and wealth, the pseudo-divinities upon whose altars Europe has

sacrificed her soul.”64 Thus Indian youths must now be willing to sacrifice

themselves—and to sacrifice their enemies—to divine cause of national-

ism. Predictably, Aurobindo’s political activities soon attracted govern-

ment attention. The police identified his publications as “the germ of the

Hindu revolutionary movement,” condemning its “combination of reli-

gion and politics” as a “deliberate perversion of religious ideals to po-

litical purposes.”65 According to one official report, his project was “noth-

ing but a gigantic scheme for establishing a central religious society,

outwardly religious but in spirit, energy and work political. . . . [Auro-

bindo] has misinterpreted Vedantist ideas for his own purpose.”66 Finally,

after the disastrous failure of the Muzaffarpur bombing, in May 1908,

Aurobindo was arrested and sentenced to one year’s imprisonment in

Alipur jail.

The Mother Is Thirsty!

Offer sacrifice to me. Give for I am thirsty. Seeing me,

know and adore the original Power, ranging here as

Kàlí, who . . . hungers to enjoy the heads of bodies of

mighty rulers.

Sri Aurobindo, “Bhavani Bharati”

From the outset, the extremist leaders of the nationalist movement had

made use of traditional religious and mythic themes to legitimate their

revolutionary activity. The newspaper Jugantar, for example, employs the

traditional model of the avatàr or successive incarnations, of ViãJu sent

to right the world and combat evil during each cosmic era: “the army of

young men is the . . . Kalki incarnation of God, saving the good and de-

stroying the wicked.”67 But surely the most powerful symbol employed

by the revolutionaries was the Tantric goddess Takti, particularly in her

most frightening incarnation, Kàlí.

Although Kàlí has long appeared in Indian mythology as a goddess

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Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess

of military power and violence, her largely mythological figure was to

assume a very concrete political role in the context of colonial Bengal.

The most famous depiction of Kàlí as the symbol of the motherland ap-

pears in Bankim Chandra’s fictional account of the Sannyàsí rebellion,

Änandamaåh (The abbey of bliss) . As we will see in more detail in chap-

ter 3, it remains unclear whether Bankim’s original intention was to

arouse anti-British revolutionary sentiments, or, on the contrary, to pro-

mote anti-Muslim but ultimately pro-British ideals. In any case, his novel

later would be reinterpreted by the leaders of the nationalist movement

as a weapon against the British and a model for revolution in the name

of the Goddess.68

Perhaps most importantly, Bankim presented the image of the God-

dess as the symbol of the Indian nation, the motherland, who is glorious

in her original splendor and terrible in her present oppression: “Kàlí was

at once the symbol of the degradation of society under alien rule and a

reservoir of unlimited power.”69 In one of the most remarkable passages

in Bankim’s work, the Goddess appears as a fusion of past, present, and

future. Inside the temple at the Abbey of Bliss, we are successively in-

troduced to three goddesses, representing India in three historical peri-

ods. First we meet a beautiful image of Jagaddhatri as the “Mother, what

once was,” as India’s golden past. Then we encounter the terrible Kàlí,

the bloodthirsty image of India in an age of foreign oppression: “Kali,

covered with the blackest gloom, despoiled of all wealth. . . . The whole

of the country is a land of death and so the Mother has no better orna-

ment than a garland of skulls.” Last, we see a third image: a radiant, ten-

armed goddess, who represents the future of India, the liberated nation

in its original glory. “This is the Mother as she would be.”70

During the first years of the Swadeshi movement, Bankim’s novel and

his image of the Goddess became favorite weapons of the revolutionar-

ies. Newly appropriated by figures like Swami Vivekananda and Sister

Nivedita (in her influential book Kàlí the Mother [1907]), and seized upon

by the extremist Bengali journals, the image of Kàlí suddenly assumed a

markedly political form. Aurobindo, in particular, was deeply inspired

by Bankim’s work and his depiction of Mother India. Aurobindo’s trans-

lation of the famous song “Bande Mataram” (Hail to the Mother) be-

came the battle cry of the nationalist movement: “It was the gospel of

fearless strength and force which he preached under a veil and in images

in Ananda Math. ”71 However, Aurobindo also reinterpreted Bankim’s

story, transforming it into a radically anticolonial call to revolution. In

an even more explicit attempt to fuse the political and the religious do-

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95

mains, he drew on the traditional Tantric imagery of the Goddess as power

on both the spiritual and revolutionary planes. As Kumari Jayawardena

suggests, Aurobindo’s “emotional juxtaposing of Mother Goddess and

Mother Country” was an effective image both psychologically and so-

ciologically, which reflected at once the painful personal loss of his own

mother and the traditional power of the Mother in the Indian mythic

imagination: “Aurobindo’s uncompromising opposition to British rule

was couched in the language of the cult of the Mother. Deprived of his

own mother (who was insane) while in Britain for fourteen years, Au-

robindo, in the political and spiritual phases of his life, constantly in-

voked the divine mother who would make India strong again.”72

The most influential work from Aurobindo’s early political period is

a pamphlet entitled Bhawani Mandir, “The Temple of the Goddess,”

published in 1905. Here, Aurobindo lays out his ideal of a secret religio-

political organization, an order of young ascetics who would consecrate

themselves to the liberation of the motherland. The ascetics would meet

at a temple of the goddess Bhawani, a manifestation of Kàlí, hidden in

a secret place where her disciples would prepare for the armed struggle

for independence. Very soon, Bhawani Mandir became among the most

influential works in the national movement, a “handbook for revolu-

tionary groups of Bengal.”73 As Gordon comments, “In Bhawani Mandir,

as in the Tantras, the organ for emancipation and the urge for power go

together. Aurobindo . . . syncretized religious elements and national

messianism. Aurobindo gives fellow Indians a mission to ‘Aryanize’ the

world.”74

The central figure of Bhawani Mandir is the goddess Takti, who is noth-

ing other than “pure power.” She is the world-creating divine energy,

which has existed since the beginning of time, spinning creation into be-

ing; but now, in this most extreme age of crisis in the Kali yuga, she has

become manifest even more openly, with the rise of new political forces

and the spread of violent powers across the earth. Aurobindo even

identifies Takti as the underlying force beneath the power, wealth, ex-

pansion, and industrialization—including the growing military power of

the West—that characterizes the modern world:

Wherever we turn our gaze, huge masses of strength rise before our vision,

tremendous, swift and inexorable forces, gigantic figures of energy, terri-

ble sweeping columns of force. All is growing large and strong. The Shakti

of war, the Shakti of wealth, the Shakti of science are tenfold more mighty

and colossal . . . a thousand-fold more prolific in resources weapons and

instruments than ever before. . . . Everywhere the Mother is at work; from

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her mighty and shaping hands enormous forces of Rakshasas, Asuras,

Devas are leaping forth. . . . We have seen the . . . rise of great empires in

the West. . . . Some are Mleccha Shaktis . . . blood-crimson . . . others are

Arya Shaktis bathed in . . . self-sacrifice; but all of them are the Mother in

Her new phase. . . . She is whirling into life the new.75

But although she is at work everywhere in the modern world, Takti is first

and foremost the power of the Indian nation. While the forces of West-

ernization and industrialization manifest the demonic form of Takti, har-

nessed to destructive ends, the Indian nation reveals the true, Aryan force

of Takti, turned toward spiritual ends. For Aurobindo, this divine Takti

is nothing other than the collective power of India, the combined energy

of each individual Indian soul. “What is our mother-country? It is not a

piece of earth, nor a figure of speech. . . . It is a mighty Shakti, composed

of the Shaktis of all the millions of units that make up the nation.”76

But, Aurobindo continues, in these years of foreign rule the Indian

had become weak and powerless, for he had become ignorant of his

mother, Takti. Like Vivekananda and other spiritual leaders of the early

twentieth century, Aurobindo is painfully aware of the figure of the “ef-

fete babu” in the colonial imagination, the fawning, submissive, emas-

culated servant of British administration. Aurobindo, too, criticizes the

passivity and weakness of Bengalis, calling them to a more virile, mili-

tant stance against their oppressors. He urges his countrymen to find a

new inner strength and even “hypermasculinity”—the warrior ideal of

the kãatriya: “the one thing wanting . . . is strength—strength physical,

strength moral, but above all strength spiritual.”77

As I would argue, the image of hypermasculine militant Bengali was

the counterpart to the image of Kàlí or Takti as the powerful, destruc-

tive goddess. If the colonial imagination had juxtaposed the two images

of the effete, emasculated babu and the lustful, violent Kàlí, the revolu-

tionary nationalists inverted and transformed these two images, juxta-

posing the virile, strong Bengali warrior and the powerful goddess. As

Nandy observes, the nationalists hoped to refashion and remake the self-

image of the Bengali male himself. Whereas the British had continually

ridiculed the Bengali babu as weak, effeminate, morally corrupt, and sex-

ually perverse, the nationalists created an image of the Bengali male as

powerful, militant, and hypermasculine.78 Hence the two images of the

violent, militant goddess Kàlí and the strong, hypermasculine Bengali rev-

olutionary worked together as dialectical complements; and together, they

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t a b l e 1

Male

Female

Imperial

Effeminate, weak,

Overly sexual,

imagination

morally degenerate,

violent, masculine

licentious

Nationalist

Strong, virile, militant,

Violent, strong,

imagination

morally pure, hyper-

but not sexual

masculine kãatriya-hood

represented the dialectical inversion of the imperial imagination, which

had depicted the Bengali male as effeminate and sexually depraved and

the Bengali female as excessively sexual and lustful. All of this could be

schematically represented as in table 1.

At the same time, however, I would also suggest that the image of Takti

as Mother India played a more powerful role as a source of revolutionary

inspiration, serving as a “dialectical image,” in Benjamin’s sense. For Au-

robindo and the other leaders of the Jugantar group drew upon precisely

those elements of the Goddess that the British most feared and despised—

the violent and wrathful Mother-in-arms, who drinks human blood and

wears garlands of severed heads. One of the most powerful images used

by the national movement was taken explicitly from a traditional Tantric

image of Kàlí as Chinnamastà, who stands naked on the corpse of her

husband, Tiva, holding her own severed head and drinking the blood that

flows from it. Bipanchandra Pal, another leader in the revolutionary

movement, offered a new interpretation of this traditional image: it is a

representation of the motherland herself, which has been beheaded by

the British and drinks her own blood in order to survive:

The Mother . . . became Kàlí, the grim goddess, dark and naked wearing a

garland of human heads—heads from which blood is dripping—and danc-

ing on the prostrate form of Tiva. . . . This is the Mother as she is, dark

because ignorant of herself, the heads with dripping blood are those of her

own children destroyed by famine and pestilence; the jackals licking these

drippings are . . . the decadence of social life and the prostrate form of Tiva

means that she is trampling her own God under her feet.79

Now every Indian is called upon to serve as a “priest of Kàlí” and to of-

fer himself as a sacrificial victim to the Goddess, spilling his own blood

in her defense: “The hero, the martyr . . . the grim fighter . . . the man

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Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess

who cannot sleep while his country is enslaved, the priest of Kali who

can tear his heart out of his body and offer it as a bleeding sacrifice on

the Mother’s altar.”80

However, the traditional Tantric image of Kàlí was used not only to

represent the humiliation of modern India, but also to arouse revolu-

tionary fervor and violence. For since her earliest appearances in Hindu

myth, Kàlí has also been the symbol of destruction, bloodshed, and war,

and hence an effective symbol for inciting political violence. As Aurobindo

described the Dark Mother in his “Bhavani Bharati, Mother of India”:

Garlanded with the bones of men and girdled with human skulls, with belly

and eye like a wolf’s hungry and poor, scarred on her back by the Titan’s

lashes, roaring like a lioness who lusts for kill . . . filling the world with

bestial sounds and licking her terrible jaws, fierce and naked, like eyes of

a savage beast, thus did I see the Mother.

Thou naked art Kàlí and utterly ruthless thou art. . . . I bow to Thee as

the violent One, O Ender of worlds. . . . The mighty Mother of creatures

has vanquished the age of Strife . . . in East and West, I hear the cry of the

whole world hastening with the praise on its tongue to this country, the

ancient Mother of the Vedas . . . firmly established in the Aryan country.

Abide forever gracious in this land, O mighty One.81

Nothing now can satisfy this terrible Mother but the spilling of blood.

The rage of Mother India in her violent form has been unleashed, and it

cannot be pacified until it tastes the severed heads of her oppressors. As

the radical newspaper Jugantar exhorts its readers,

The Mother is thirsty and is pointing out to her sons the only thing that

can quench that thirst. Nothing less than human blood and decapitated

heads will satisfy her. Let her sons worship her with these offerings and let

them not shrink even from sacrificing their lives to procure them. On the

day on which the Mother is worshipped in every village, on that day the

people of India will be inspired with a divine spirit and the crown of inde-

pendence will fall into their hands.82

Today, Aurobindo tells us, Bengalis are like Arjuna on the battlefield of

Kurukãetra, on the verge of a holy struggle in which they “must not shrink

from bloodshed” but be willing to give their own lives as sacrificial vic-

tims to the Goddess. Like Kurukãetra, the field of the great bloody

“sacrifice of battle,” the soil of contemporary Bengal becomes the “cre-

mation ground” upon which the violent Kàlí unleashes her terrible power.

But it is also the cremation ground of the great cosmic sacrifice at the

end of time, the conflagration of worlds that signals the end of the old

yuga and the violent dawn of the new.83

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Submitting to the Mother: The Failure of Revolutionary Tàktism

There is one force only, the Mother’s force—or, if you

like to put it that way, the Mother is Sri Aurobindo’s

Force.

Sri Aurobindo,

Sri Aurobindo on Himself and the Mother (1953)

Ironically, despite its powerful shock effect, the nationalists’ use of the

image of Kàlí does not appear to have been successful. For in many ways

it could be said to have played back into the colonial view of India as

morally depraved, a land of barbarous violence and perverse irrational-

ity. As Nandy argues, the self-image created by the revolutionaries also

backfired and worked against them: the “hypermasculine” kãatriya ideal

of the revolutionaries still played by the rules of the colonial views of

sexuality and manhood, replicating the European ideal of the virile, ac-

tive male and the passive, submissive female. It could not succeed in over-

throwing colonial ideology, but ultimately reinforced it.84 Likewise, the

use of Kàlí as a symbol of the nation in many ways only reaffirmed the

Western view of Indians as morally degenerate, violent, and subversive.

The solution that would win out, ultimately, was not the radical pro-

gram of the extremists, but the ideal of passive resistance promoted by

Mahatma Gandhi. By 1910, Aurobindo himself would abandon the rev-

olutionary project and turn inward to the life of the spirit.

During his period of confinement in Alipur jail, Aurobindo claimed

to have received an inner message from God, informing him that he had

a worldwide purpose; he had been chosen “to uplift this nation” and

“give the Indian people freedom for service of the world.”85 Upon his re-

lease from prison in 1910, Aurobindo left the active political realm and

retired to Pondicherry, a small former French colonial town on the west

coast. His own account of this change of heart was that he had received

information that the government intended to search his office and arrest

him; he then received a sudden command from above to go to Chan-

dernagore in French India, where he lived in secrecy and solitary medi-

tation. Immersed in the study of yoga and Indian philosophy, a small

group of disciples eventually gathered around his ashram. Henceforth

he began to write a vast body of works on various aspects of spiritual-

ity, along with poems, plays, and even epics. Despite urgings from many

members of the nationalist movement, Aurobindo never reentered the

political arena, claiming instead that he was having a greater impact on

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Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess

the course of world history through his spiritual teachings. When he was

invited to preside over 1920 Indian Congress, he declined, saying, “I am

no longer first and foremost a politician, but have commenced another

kind of work with a spiritual basis.”86

After his withdrawal from the political life, Aurobindo began to en-

vision a new ideal for the Indian nation and also to imagine a new role

for the Divine Mother. Whereas, in his youth, Aurobindo had conceived

of the Mother in Tantric terms, as Takti, the terrible power of the nation

in revolt, he now began to reimagine the Goddess in a far more benevo-

lent and seemingly “un-Tantric” form. She was now the ideal of pure Spirit,

the embodiment of India as the land of literature, culture, art, and above

all religion. Here I would like to borrow some insights from Partha Chat-

terjee and his analysis of the changing construction of the Bengali bha-

dralok (“respectable classes”) identity in nineteenth-century Bengal. Many

middle-class Bengalis, Chatterjee argues, withdrew from the outward po-

litical sphere, dominated as it was by foreign colonial power. Instead, they

turned inward to the private sphere of religion and domesticity—“an in-

ner domain of sovereignty far removed from the area of political context

with the colonial state”—as the stronghold of traditional Indian values.

For “the strategy of survival in a world that is dominated by the rich and

powerful is withdrawal. Do not attempt to intervene in the world, do not

engage in futile conflict.”87

A critical part of the construction of Indian national identity, as an

inner private sphere in opposition to the colonially dominated public

sphere, was the dichotomy of the “material West and the spiritual East.”

Even as early as 1902, Aurobindo had drawn a sharp distinction between

the materialism or “morbid animalism” of the West and the eternal re-

ligion of India.

Science had freed Europe from the shackles of Christianity but it had not

provided a new system of values to replace the one it had rendered obso-

lete. The result . . . was an upsurge of “morbid animalism” demonstrating

Europe’s “neurotic tendency to abandon itself to its own desires.” . . . Hin-

duism alone among the great embodiments of the old religious and moral

spirit did not . . . stand naked to the assaults of Science. Hinduism there-

fore could serve as the framework for a new world outlook.88

Later in life, Aurobindo would make this dichotomy even more explicit,

identifying “the two principal ways of regarding existence—the spiritu-

ality preserved in the religious traditions of the East and the practicality

represented by the political and economic systems of the West.”89 As

Halbfass points out, Aurobindo may have withdrawn from the political

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101

arena into the spiritual realm in the second half of his life, yet there is a

deep continuity between the two phases. Both are attempts at Indian self-

assertion, attempts to identify a domain of national and religion iden-

tity, a uniquely Eastern cultural sphere, set apart from that of the West:

“Hindu nationalism and spiritualistic universalism dominate the two ma-

jor phases in Aurobindo’s Neo-Hindu life. They are . . . complementary

means of self-assertion.”90

Yet Aurobindo’s new nonpolitical, spiritual ideals would continue to

center on the overarching figure of the Great Goddess, the Mother. The

striking irony, however, is that Aurobindo would later come to identify

the Mother, not with the violent, bloodthirsty, and militant Tantric god-

desses Kàlí, Durgà, or Chinnamastà, but instead with one particular

woman, and most remarkably, a Western woman—Mira Alfassa (later

Mira Richards, 1878–1973). Born in Paris of a Sephardic Jewish family,

Richards had been a student at the École des Beaux Arts and part of the

artistic avant-garde scene in Paris. She had also begun from an early age

to dabble in occultism and Eastern religions, and was soon attracted by

Aurobindo’s unique blend of Western philosophy and Indian mysticism.

Leaving behind home and children, she joined Aurobindo and became

his disciple in 1914. As his new religious community began to gather

around him, Aurobindo eventually elevated Mira to a divine status nearly

equal to his own. After his own wife’s death in 1918, Aurobindo would

grow increasingly closer to Mira. When her husband left her in 1920,

Mira was moved into the master’s house, occupying the quarters adja-

cent to his apartment, where she would remain until his death. Not only

did Mira progressively take over all the details of running the growing

ashram, but, by 1926, she came to be revered as none other than the

Mother herself, the manifestation of the supreme Takti in human form.91

As Aurobindo described her,

There is one divine Force which acts in the universe and in the individ-

ual. . . . The Mother stands for all these but she is working here in the

body to bring down something not yet expressed in this material world

so as to transform life here. . . . [Y]ou should regard her as the Divine

Shakti. . . . She is that in the body, but in her whole consciousness she is

also identified with all other aspects of the Divine.92

As Aurobindo explained in a letter of 1926, Mira was none other than

his own counterpart and complement in the spiritual realm: “Mother and

I are one but in two bodies.”93 While he himself was the embodiment of

the masculine, spiritual Puruãa—which, rather strikingly, he now inter-

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Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess

prets as passive and unacting—the Mother represents the feminine, prac-

tical element of PrakKti or Takti—which is inherently active and dynamic.

As Heehs comments, “His personal force, representing the Purusha ele-

ment, acted in the realm of spiritual knowledge, while Mira’s representing

the Shakti element, was practical. . . . Without the Mother . . . his con-

ception of a divine life on earth could never have been embodied.”94 To-

gether, he and the Mother had been working as the primordial male and

female principles moving through all history, guiding the evolution of

humankind. Not only did their divine interaction lie at the font of cre-

ation and within all the world’s great events, but it even determined the

course of contemporary history, including the onset and final end of World

War II. “The War ended in 1945, with the victory of the Allies, as Sri

Aurobindo had willed.”95

This mother is no longer the violent Kàlí of the tantra s or the blood-

thirsty Takti of the nationalist movement, to be worshiped by strong

kãatriya warriors with offerings of severed heads; rather, it is a loving

mother to whom the soul must surrender itself like a child at her breast:

“when you are completely identified with the Divine Mother and feel

yourself to be no longer another separate being . . . but truly a child and

eternal portion of her force.”96 As Nandy comments on this striking par-

adox, Aurobindo’s choice of a Western woman as his Takti was his final

attempt to resolve the profound oppositions in his life, his long struggle

between East and West, between his English education and his search

for an Indian identity: “For him the freed East had at last met the non-

oppressive West symbolized by the Mother.”97 Hence, we might add to

our schema of contrasting sexual-symbolic images a third pair, the new

Male and Female archetypes of Aurobindo’s postpolitical, spiritual phase

(see table 2).

Following the lead of Partha Chatterjee, I would suggest that the

rather curious union of Aurobindo and Mira Richards is a profound

symbol of the deeper ambivalence underlying Indian nationalism as a

whole. Aurobindo, like many members of the nationalist movement,

struggled to create a uniquely Indian, Hindu identity—an inner, spiri-

tual, and cultural private sphere—set in opposition to the political and

material public sphere of the West.98 Yet at the same time, he clearly ab-

sorbed many of the basic structures and oppositions of the West, in-

cluding the opposition between the inner, private sphere and the outer,

politically active, public sphere. The choice of a Western woman as

Takti—a spiritual mother who replaces the violent, destructive Takti of

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103

t a b l e 2

Male

Female

Colonial

Effeminate, weak,

Overly sexual,

imagination

morally degenerate,

violent, masculine

licentious

Nationalist

Strong, virile, militant,

Violent, strong,

imagination

morally pure, hyper-

but not sexual

masculine kãatriya-hood

Aurobindo’s

Spirit (Puruãa), passive,

Power, Nature

postrevolutionary

inward, inactive,

(PrakKti), outward,

imagination

the Spiritual East

active, the material

West

his revolutionary nationalist period—is a profound symbol of the deeper

conflicts at work the hearts of Aurobindo and other intellectuals of the

early twentieth century. It is a clear embodiment of his own attempt to

identify a uniquely Indian or Eastern identity, in opposition to the ma-

terial West. And yet this identity is itself constructed with Western cat-

egories and terms. As Halbfass comments, “Even in their rejection of . . .

European ideas and orientations, modern Indian thinkers are not free

from such ideas. Explicit or implicit reference to the West, and mem-

bership in a Westernized world, is an irreversible premise of modern

Indian thought.”99

In the face of his failure as a revolutionary opponent of Western dom-

ination in the name of the Tantric mother Kàlí, Aurobindo seems to have

turned instead to a more complex, ambivalent, though perhaps more tol-

erable solution. He has now tried to accommodate the power of the West—

the power of European technology, science, and material advancement—

while at the same time asserting the ultimate spiritual superiority, and

seeming political impotence, of the East. While the dangerous, violent Takti

of the Tantras has failed, a new hope lies in the attempt to incorporate

the Takti of the West.

t a n t r a a n d t h e p o l i t i c s o f c o l o n i a l i n d i a

The pride of prosperity throws man’s mind outwards

and the misery. . . of destitution draws men’s hunger-

ing desires likewise outwards. These two conditions

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Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess

alike leave man unashamed to place above all other

gods, Shakti the Deity of Power—the Cruel One, whose

right hand wields the weapon of guile. In the politics

of Europe drunk with Power we see the worship of

Shakti.

Rabindranath Tagore, “Letters from an On-Looker” (1919)

In sum, the shifting representations of Tantra and the Tantric goddess

might be seen as a metaphor for the changing image of the Indian na-

tion itself in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. A powerful dialec-

tical category, Tantra passed back and forth between colonial and anti-

colonial imaginations, used by some to attack the criminality of the Indian

subject and by others to instigate revolution against the imperial master.

If the colonizers projected onto Tantra the “savagery they yearned to col-

onize,” in the form of criminal Thuggee and subversive agitators, the lead-

ers of the radical nationalist movement appropriated Tantra as the awe-

some power of the Indian people that could not be controlled. The heart

of this play of representations was the Tantric goddess of power—a god-

dess who embodied all the darkest fears of subversion within the colo-

nial imagination and all the hopes for violent revolt among the extrem-

ists. She is thus a fitting symbol for the birth, hope, and failure of the

revolutionary nationalist movement.

Ironically, the use of violence and power did not prove to be a viable

solution for either colonizer or colonized. The radical ideal of the Tantric

Takti gave way to passive resistance of Gandhian nationalism and the

relatively peaceful withdrawal of the British from India in 1947. Thus,

like many Western-educated Indians of his day, Aurobindo ultimately

seems to have sought a kind of compromise, a reconciliation between

the passive spirituality of the East and the active power of the West, now

embodied in his seemingly “un-Tantric” consort, Mira Richards. Hence,

we might be tempted to follow the lead of the members of the Subaltern

Studies collective, such as Ranajit Guha, by regarding Aurobindo’s re-

treat from active politics as yet another example of “the historic failure

of the nation to come to its own.”100 That is, it could be seen as the fail-

ure of genuine resistance, a disappointing compromise with the West. I

would argue, however, that Aurobindo’s solution is better understood

as another example of a strategy for dealing with a situation. Like Ràm-

mohun Roy’s paradoxical use of the MahànirvàJa Tantra in the service

of his own cultural reforms, Aurobindo’s turn from the dark Tantric Takti

to the more benign Western Takti was an ingenious, through perhaps not

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105

entirely successful, attempt to resolve the “situational incongruities” of

India under late colonial rule.

I would like also to point out some larger comparative implications

of this discussion of Tantra and colonial politics. The shifting role of Tan-

tra in the British and Indian imaginations sheds some important light on

the role of religious symbolism in the formation of political identities,

particularly during periods of colonial rule. As Ranajit Guha, Partha

Chatterjee, and others have acknowledged, the power of religious sym-

bolism has long been one of the least understood and most neglected

problems in the literature on subaltern studies.101 Commonly reduced to

a mask of political ideology or an instrument of domination, religious

symbols have seldom been discussed as weapons of insurgency or tools

for revolutionary struggle. As I hope to have shown in the case of Tan-

tra and the goddess Takti, religious symbols can indeed be used as masks

of ideology, to reinforce a given political arrangement; but they can also

be manipulated as profound dialectical images, appropriated by dissi-

dent factions to subvert the status quo and even instigate revolutionary

struggle. Like all symbols, however, the image of the Goddess is an am-

bivalent, even contradictory one, which leads her devotees to both

heroic victories and tragic failures in their fight for independence.

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c h a p t e r 3

India’s Darkest Heart

Tantra in the Literary Imagination

The follower of the Tantric cult professes no austerities. He

seeks to kill desire by an unlimited indulgence which brings

satiety and extinction of emotion. The indulgence is enjoined

by his so-called religion; and his depravity is commended as

a great virtue.

F. E. F. Penny, The Swami’s Curse (1929)

Flee even now—don’t you know that the tàntrika’s worship

consists of human flesh?

Bankimcandra Caååopàdhyày, KapàlakuJjalà (1866)

Much of our richest and most colorful material for the imagining of Tan-

tra comes not from scholarly sources, but from the realm of drama and

the novel. In both India and Europe, the morbid, sexual tales of Tantra

quickly sparked the imaginations of many creative authors, serving as

the vehicle for the expression of intense fears, fantasies, and repressed

desires. In a wide array of Victorian British and Indian fiction, we find

virtually all the themes discussed so far in this book, brought together

in the most vivid and entertaining way: the fears of social degeneracy,

the threat of sexual pollution, the paranoia of criminal or subversive ac-

tivity. Yet the novelists not only adapted these images of Tantra from

Orientalist literature; they also contributed a new imaginary layer of their

own—an often hyperexaggerated layer of fantasy—that in turn fed back

into the Orientalist imagination even as it disseminated the image of Tan-

tra to a popular audience. As Pratt argues in her analysis of colonial

travel narratives, “The fruits of empire . . . were pervasive in shaping

106

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India’s Darkest Heart

107

European domestic society, culture and history ”; y et at the same time,

“Europe’s constructions of subordinated others [were] shaped by those

others, by the constructions of themselves . . . that they presented to the

Europeans.”1 What we find in these novels is a complex feedback loop

between “serious” scholarship and popular culture, between the “hard

facts” of Orientalist research and the vivid play of literary creations.

And it is also a dynamic interplay between Indian and English narra-

tive imaginations.

This sort of fictional portrayal of Tantra is not, of course, entirely a

byproduct of the colonial era. As we have already seen in examples like

BàJabhaååa’s Kàdambarí (see the introduction), many early Sanskrit

works do contain colorful, often quite funny, descriptions of various yo-

gis and ascetics who later came to be identified as tàntrika s. The most no-

torious of these are the Kàpàlikas, or skull-bearers—wandering ascetics

who take a vow to imitate Lord Tiva in his terrible form of Bhairava,

as he travels the earth smeared in ashes and carrying a skull for a beg-

ging bowl. Feared for their awesome occult powers, the Kàpàlikas were

also ridiculed for their alleged practice of the most transgressive ritu-

als, such as intercourse with lower-class women and offerings of human

sacrifice.

Although they seemed to have disappeared by the thirteenth century,

the Kàpàlikas survived as buffoons and favorite targets of satire in San-

skrit fiction. We have already encountered the drunken Kàpàlika Satya-

soma, the main character in Mahendra-varman’s comic farce (see the

introduction). For Satyasoma, enjoyment of wine and women is the surest

road to divine bliss: “The infinite incomparable bliss that wise sages first

discovered, is now as close as one could wish, for we have added a spe-

cial measure. No need to abandon the life of a lover. This bliss includes

all sensual pleasure.”2 Indeed, consumption of alcohol becomes for

Satyasoma the true elixir of Soma that is consumed at the highest

sacrificial rite: “This liquor shop equals the majesty of the sacrificial en-

closure. Here the flag pole equals the sacrificial post; the liquor cup equals

the soma; the drinkers the priests. . . . The thirst of the drinker is the

sacrificial fire.”3

Later in the eleventh century, KKãJamiMra includes an amusing satire

of a Kàpàlika in his drama Prabodhacandrodaya. Inhabiting cremation

grounds, drinking wine from skulls, and offering human sacrifices, the

Kàpàlika is portrayed here as the epitome of all impurity and transgres-

sion. Amid a theological argument between a Buddhist mendicant and

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India’s Darkest Heart

a Jain monk, the Kàpàlika appears and describes himself in rather awe-

inspiring terms: an inhabitant of cremation grounds and a lover of human

flesh, he sees nothing as impure and all as divine:

I, who am adorned with a garland of human bones, who live in the crema-

tion ground and who eat out of a human skull, with an eye purified by the

instrument of Yoga, see the world having differences within itself but being

non-different from God. . . .

We who offer oblations in the fire in the form of human flesh, brains,

entrails and marrow break our fast with alcohol kept in the skull of a

BràhmaJa. Mahàbhairava has to be worshipped with human offerings,

lustrous with streams of blood flowing from the stiff throat which is

freshly cut.4

Above all, the Kàpàlika is the one who seeks the dangerous wedding of

sensual pleasure and transcendental bliss, the paradoxical synthesis of

physical indulgence and spiritual liberation: “Nowhere is happiness seen

without objects of pleasure. . . . [T]he liberated one having a body (equal

to Tiva . . . ) . . . enjoys the pleasant embrace of his beloved who is an

image of Parvatí.”5

Yet although such accounts of licentious, corrupt, and frightening

characters had long appeared in Indian literature, we don’t begin to see

Tantra appearing as a major literary subject until the nineteenth century.

Incorporating, playing upon, and exaggerating the fears of Tantra in the

colonial imagination, many British authors began to portray the hideous

obscenities of Tantra in ever more fantastic forms—not only as licentious

or criminal, but as threatening to all rationality and moral order. Simi-

larly, in a growing body of Bengali, Hindi, and other vernacular novels

of the colonial era, Tantra emerges as a powerful, but deeply troubling

presence lurking in the forbidden margins of Indian society. As such, I

will argue, the representations of Tantra in these novels was a key part

of the national imagining of both England and India in the late colonial

period. As Homi Bhabha, Timothy Brennan, and others have shown, the

novel was a key part of the creation of the modern nation-state as a

unified, bounded, and yet complex “imagined community,” both in Eu-

rope and in the colonies.6 This was especially true of the novels of em-

pire, through which Europe imagined itself against the mirror of its col-

onized Others. But it was no less true of the novels written by Indians

during the colonial era, in which they reimagined themselves as subjects

of foreign power. However, as I hope to show, the disturbing presence

of Tantra was a continuous, haunting threat to that very imagined com-

munity; it was a frightening reminder that the nation is always a fragile,

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India’s Darkest Heart

109

tenuous thing, vulnerable to subversion from within and from without

its imaginary borders.

“ t h e m i n g l e d p e r f u m e o f l o v e

a n d w o r s h i p , s e x a n d r e l i g i o n ” :

t a n t r a i n t h e b r i t i s h l i t e r a r y i m a g i n a t i o n

So here they were in a new world without post or tele-

graphs, laws or order; time itself turned back hundreds

of years. . . . Even the learned and most loyal lingered

on the steps to whisper and call obscure prophecies

and admit that it was wondrous and strange that the

numerical values of the year should yield the anagram,

“ungrez tubbah shood ba hur soorut,” briefly, “the

British shall be annihilated.” For the Oriental mind

loves such trivialities.

Flora Annie Steel, On the Face of the Waters (1896)

The India of the British literary imagination appears to be a land of dark,

mysterious Otherness, a realm of passion and violence, at once seduc-

tive and terrifying. A world where “time itself [was] turned back hun-

dreds of years,” the India portrayed in late-nineteenth-century British

fiction is a place of frightening extremes, where awesome natural beauty

and cultural splendor are pervaded by ignorance, fanatical superstition,

and sexual depravity. It is “a country of unfathomable people, ‘those na-

tives constantly moving in the dark,’ whose . . . proclivities can be

glimpsed by the white man only if . . . he goes amongst them in secret.”7

And Tantra might be said to lie at the deepest core of this world, as

“India’s darkest heart.” Much like the mysterious temple dancer (de-

vadàsí), who combined “spiritual and sexual love,” Tantra was a source

simultaneously of moral horror and erotic allure.8 This fascination with

Tantra and with the dark goddess Kàlí was already apparent in Philip

Meadows Taylor’s widely read narrative of the Thuggee cult, Confessions

of a Thug, but it would become a central preoccupation by the end of

the nineteenth century. As Benita Parry and Lewis Wurgaft have argued

in their studies of British fiction between 1880 and 1930, many novel-

ists were fascinated by what they had heard about the erotic, violent prac-

tices of the Tantras. They filled their works with lurid tales of the horri-

ble, yet strangely seductive Tantric yogis and their lascivious goddess,

the naked, cruel Kàlí. As Flora Annie Steel put it, they perceived a dark

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India’s Darkest Heart

underworld that reeked heavily of “the mingled perfume of love and wor-

ship, sex and religion.”9

Vampires, Villains, and Tantri s: Sir Richard Burton and Tantra

Whereas holy men, holding that subjugation of the pas-

sions is essential to final beatitude, accomplish this by

bodily austerities, he proceeded to blunt the passions

with excessive indulgence.

Sir Richard Francis Burton, trans.,

Vikram and the Vampire (1870)

One of the most important figures in the construction of Tantra in the

literary imagination—and in the modern imagining of Tantra in West-

ern popular culture as a whole—was Sir Richard Francis Burton. Today

most famous as a bold world traveler, adventurer, and the first transla-

tor of the Kàma SÜtra, 10 Burton was also one of the first British authors

to take a serious interest in Tantra. As Edward Rice argues, it is likely

that Burton had some contact with the Tantric practices of a group known

as the Nagar Brahmans during his stay in Baroda in the 1840s, and that

he worked this experience into his writings and translations. He first stud-

ied, then entered into, “one of the most extreme and underground of all

Hindu practices, that of Tantric Yoga. . . . He sought arcane, subterranean

knowledge, hoping to find some key to the mysteries of life in the wor-

ship of . . . the phallic king Shiva and the . . . female power, Shakti.”11

One of the most popular of Burton’s works is Vikram and the Vam-

pire; or, Tales of Hindu Devilry, a loosely translated edition of the San-

skrit collection of folk tales called VetàlapañcaviFMatikà. Burton him-

self admits that he felt an obligation to expand upon the Sanskrit text

with some of his own personal material and his own experiences in In-

dia: “I have ventured to remedy the conciseness of their language and to

clothe the skeleton with flesh and blood.”12 As Edward Rice argues, Bur-

ton actually inserted a number of “Tantric practices that were not in the

original text but which he had learned from personal experience.”13

Thus, Burton’s translation includes the story of a villainous hunch-

backed character, who is driven primarily by greed, lust, and malice. A

gambler, womanizer, and ruthless thief, the hunchback abandons the pro-

hibitions of orthodox society and religion in order to become a nefari-

ous “Tantri.” Engaging in the most obscene rituals with wine, women,

and corpses, he hopes to conquer the senses through such indulgence:

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111

The hunchback became a Tantri, so as to complete his villainies. He was

initiated by an apostate Brahmin, made a declaration that he renounced all

the ceremonies of his old religion . . . and proceeded to perform an abom-

inable rite. In company with eight men and eight women—a Brahman fe-

male, a dancing girl, a weaver’s daughter, a woman of ill fame, a washer-

woman, a barber’s wife and the daughter of a landowner, choosing the

darkest time of night and the most secret part of the house, he drank with

them . . . and went through many ignoble ceremonies, such as sitting nude

upon a dead body. The teacher told him that he was not to indulge shame

or aversion to anything . . . but freely enjoy all the pleasures of sense. . . .

Whereas holy men, holding that subjugation of the passions is essential to

final beatitude, accomplish this by bodily austerities, he proceeded to blunt

the passions with excessive indulgence.14

Here we find the quintessential Tantric ritual, as it had become stan-

dardized in the colonial imagination by the late nineteenth century: blas-

phemous black ceremonies, sex with low-caste women, and complete in-

dulgence of all the senses. Rather remarkably, while the original Sanskrit

text does include the story of the villainous hunchback, it says absolutely

nothing at all about his turn to the dark rites of the Tantras or his par-

ticipation in the terrible cakra pÜjà (circle worship);15 all of this appears

to the be fabrication of Burton’s own fertile imagination, inspired by the

widespread fantasies of Tantra current in nineteenth-century England.

In any case, however, it is not so surprising that Burton’s version of Tan-

tra would later come to be confused with his version of the Kàma SÜtra—

or indeed, that the two would eventually become more or less synony-

mous in the contemporary Western imagination.

Debauchery in the Search for God: Tantra and British Women Writers

Some debauch themselves for wealth, some for lust,

I debauched myself in a search for God.

Elizabeth Sharpe, Secrets of the Kaula Circle (1936)

Some of the most colorful descriptions of Tantra in British fiction would

come from the many women romantic novelists of the late colonial era.

Tantra would seem to represent the most terrifying and yet seductive an-

tipode to the conventional image of femininity in the British imagina-

tion. As Benita Parry has shown, the dual theme of sensuality and reli-

gious fanaticism is one of the most recurrent tropes in women’s writing

of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. As we read in I. A. R.

Wylie’s novel The Daughter of Brahma (1912) , “here in this hell” the

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India’s Darkest Heart

Englishman feels that he is assaulted by some “diabolical force directed

against his race and against civilization. The dreaming woman amongst

the lotus-flowers was the personification of a bloodthirsty heathenism—

a religion replete with hideous cruelty.”16 As the most perverse union of

sexuality with mystical ecstasy, Tantra was thus the epitome of this dark

seductive world. Far from the model of chaste moderation within the

bounds of legal marriage, Tantra presents a vision of unbridled feminine

sexuality and transgressive antisocial relations. Thus, F. E. F. Penny—an

evangelical Christian and wife of a famous missionary—recounts these

hideous rites in her novel The Swami’s Curse: the Tantric “seeks to kill

desire by an unlimited indulgence which brings satiety. . . . The indul-

gence is enjoined by his so-called religion; and his depravity is commended

as a great virtue.”17

One of the most vivid descriptions of the depraved rites of the Tantras

appears in Elizabeth Sharpe’s novel The Secrets of the Kaula Circle. Nar-

rated by a French woman, Mary de la Mont—“who now [has] naught

of shame”—it is the story of a young woman seduced by a Tibetan Tantric

lama and driven to the depths of corruption by his insidious rituals. The

narrator begins her tale by lamenting that the rites of the Tantras have

already become widespread in the West and that it is her moral obliga-

tion to reveal their terrible secrets: “The cult of the Circle is already in

vogue in Europe in secret places; and I must tell the world of it all.”18

Married to her lama at age twenty-six, she is just one “among the many

thousands of deluded women who prostrate before Lamas.” Like so many

naive Western women, she was seduced by the mystery, power, and erotic

allure of the Tantric master:

I saw the Lama’s eyes flash with interest the first time he caught sight of me,

a white woman so different to the others. From that day onwards I saw

him daily; he deprived me of much: beauty, ideals and money. . . . I gave

him all I had to give. . . . I shuddered often at his ugliness, his crudity, and

his strength, but I submitted to his wishes all the same. . . . He placed me

under a spell, bewildered me with the glamour of power. . . . Indian and

Tibetan alike spoke of my husband with hushed breath: a Mahatma, a man

of superhuman power. I too thought that through him I might reach god-

hood. . . . He said that I was the greatest Yogini of any world. . . . He said

that my beauty had driven him mad. He assured me I would gain super-

human powers by the union. . . . Something weak in me made me yield my

body unresistingly to this man of an alien land.19

The core of Sharpe’s novel, and the darkest depth of her narrator’s

descent into iniquity, is the secret ritual of the Kaula circle or cakra pÜjà.

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The most secret and sinister ritual of the left-hand Tantrics, the Kaula

circle is the ultimate excuse for the unrestrained gratification of all de-

sires: incest, drunkenness, gluttony, and every imaginable sexual per-

version here become the holiest sacraments:

The Kaula circle is the circle of the worshipers of the left-hand path, whose

secrets none but they of the circle have known till now. In this circle the

woman is the mother—but all desires are fulfilled—that is the vow. Few

woman come through the ordeal unstained. . . . The outer circle of the

temple of the goddess was heaped with raw flesh, fish and these with wine,

were given to those of the outer circle. Man after man . . . passed by me

singing, reeling and dead drunk. Later on they would be forced to drink

the forty-two bottles of wine prescribed by the rules of the ceremony: eat,

drink and be merry and die: for their doom—poor fools—was already

on them. . . . [S]tark naked men and women, who . . . with excruciating

yells, leapt to their feet, shaking their heads. . . . A voice would then cry

out . . . “Let their desires be satisfied,” and there would be a perfect orgy

of bestiality.20

One of the most fascinating characters in Sharpe’s novel, however, is

not an Indian devotee of the tantra s, but an Englishman who has turned

to Tantric worship in order to satisfy his own dark desires. Like many

Europeans, he is drawn to the secrets of Tantra in the hope of acquiring

some dark awesome power; indeed, “It is for secrets like these we of Eu-

rope come to seek wisdom.” It seems almost certain that this strangely

handsome but frightening individual is modeled after a real person, the

infamous “Great Beast 666,” Aleister Crowley, who did in fact travel in

India and appears to have learned something of the secrets of Tantra.21

Sharpe tells us that he “calls himself by a number,” the satanic number

666, and that he engages in magical ceremonies that sound a great deal

like those of Crowley’s esoteric order, the Ordo Templi Orientis:

I met a European who was one of X.Y.Z.’s pupils. He called himself by a

number. In the beginning he was extremely handsome, afterwards he grew

gross. . . . He had many women at his disposal. . . . He learnt many magical

processes by which he drew into his circle great phantoms. . . . He had with

him a pupil, a thin, long-nosed boy. . . . I wondered why he had followed

the man whose number was 666. . . . 666 wore a ceremonial robe, had a

pentacle, a wand a sword and a cup. . . . I watched that day the spirits he

evoked with the help of the Lamas. . . . I saw 666 fall to the ground froth-

ing at the mouth.22

Such, it would seem, is the inevitable fate of any Westerner who is seduced

into the black rites of Tantra: he can only end in utter self-destruction.

After her descent into debauchery and sin, however, Sharpe’s heroine does

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have some hope of redemption. She is finally saved, not by the obscene

rites of the Tantras, but by her eventual return to Christianity. Having

washed her Tantric sins in the blood of the Lamb, she finds the light of

salvation back in the pure faith of the Christian church: “Hope came to

me again. I knew then that God lives in the sweet, tender simple things

of life—and He is the resurrected man, the Christ.”23

The Law of the Threshold: Mindless Violence

and Mysterious Sexuality in the Works of Flora Annie Steel

Kali-Ma . . . symbolises the ultimate mystery in life—

the mystery of Sex.

That Mai Kali will get the blood for which She asks

unless quick action be taken . . . this is certain. Who

governs India as a whole must govern by power.

Flora Annie Steel, The Law of the Threshold (1924)

Perhaps the most imaginative of these fictional accounts appears in the

work of the widely read Victorian novelist Flora Annie Steel (1847–1929).

Born near London, Flora was a pious Christian, raised Presbyterian, who

later converted to the Church of England. After marrying a civil engineer

who was called to serve in the subcontinent, she arrived in Calcutta in

1868 and lived in India until 1889. Unlike many Victorian novelists, she

seems to have genuinely tried to immerse herself in the Indian world and

to learn as much as possible about its culture and religion; yet she still

held fast to the belief in the moral superiority of the British and the need

to rule this potentially dangerous people with a firm hand. For India is

“a land stubbornly immutable, the peoples are slaves of custom . . . in a

frozen social structure, in terror of their gods . . . but these same cowed

people have as a crowd a terrifying propensity to savagery and can be

aroused to violence through their superstitious religious beliefs.”24

Steel’s ambivalence toward India is mirrored by her equally ambiva-

lent attitudes toward sexuality and the role of women. On the one hand,

she was an outspoken suffragette who participated in the British cam-

paign for women’s rights; remarkably bold, she enjoyed camp life in In-

dia and found great satisfaction in riding with her husband; she cut her

hair short, wore knickerbockers, and generally shunned “the formalities

that structured colonial life.”25 Yet, Steel’s brand of feminism was

markedly austere, imitating the ideal of dispassion and strict control of

desire that was the ideal of a strong male Englishman in India. As Nancy

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Paxton comments in her study of Steel and other colonial women writ-

ers, “Steel’s individualist understanding of feminism encouraged her to

recommend that English women in India adopt the same masochistic sto-

icism valorized by upper class men. . . . Steel unsexes herself and identifies

female sexuality as the force that has the power to destroy civilization.”26

Indeed, Paxton suggests that Steel’s works reveal a kind of “gynopho-

bia and fear of female sexuality.” This sexual ambivalence becomes par-

ticularly clear in many of her Indian-based novels.

Steel is best known today as a novelist of the India Mutiny, whose On

the Face of the Waters was a huge commercial success. However, she is

also the author of an array of other popular novels and stories, many of

which contain vivid accounts of the insidious rituals of the Tantras. For

example, her short story “A Maiden’s Prayer” centers around a young In-

dian woman named Parbutti, the daughter of a Kulin Brahman family who

is soon to be married to a young student of suitable caste. Each day, Par-

butti goes to the shrine of Mother Kàlí, where she bows and recites a de-

votional and patriotic prayer, “In Thy Heaven Kali Mai!—Thou who lovest

the flesh of man—By this blood I pray thee ban—Aliens in Hindustan.”27

In the course of her devotions, however, Parbutti accidentally discovers

that her husband-to-be is actually a member of a secret revolutionary

group, dedicated to the making of bombs for terrorist acts against the

British. She secretly witnesses them conceal explosives inside an image

of the Goddess. As Steel describes this dangerous mixture of Tantric oc-

cultism and political agitation, “it was a sad farrago of nonsense; West-

ern individualism dished up by professional agitators in a garb of East-

ern mysticism.”28 Tragically, on the very day of the wedding, her husband

is arrested and soon after commits suicide. Beside herself with grief and

despair, Parbutti goes to Kàlí’s shrine dressed in her bridal clothes, ig-

nites the explosives, and so offers herself as the supreme sacrificial vic-

tim to the Mother.

However, the most influential, and at times wildly imaginative, of

Steel’s portrayals of Tantra appears in The Law of the Threshold. The

opening scene of the book is a graphic description of a chilling blood

sacrifice to the goddess Kàlí, as a wild crowd of devotees writhe and

scream in a temple splattered with congealed gore:

The vast crowd . . . ankle-deep in fast-clotting blood, was shouting itself

hoarse in praise of the Dread Mother, Kali-Ma, who . . . symbolises the ul-

timate mystery in life—the mystery of Sex. The blood of Birth, the Blood

of death! These two pivots of the Great Wheel, blended, had brought men,

women and children in their thousands, to kill some miserable lambling . . .

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India’s Darkest Heart

on the temple steps in honour of the Goddess Kali, in Atonement for their

sins. . . . For Kali as the feminine principle of life is pre-eminent in Hindu

mythology. . . . Her worship, full of horrors, is all but universal.29

The story centers around an American convert to Tantra named Nigel

Blennerhasset and his companion, Maya Day, a lovely Indian girl who

has been brought up and educated in the United States. Interestingly

enough, the character of Nigel appear to be loosely modeled on the no-

torious Dr. Pierre Arnold Bernard (a.k.a. “the Omnipotent Oom”), who

traveled to India to study the secrets of Tantra and then returned to the

United States to found the first Tantrik order in America, in San Fran-

cisco and New York, in 1906. Nigel, in fact, proudly claims to be an ini-

tiated member of the “Third Tantrik Order in America,” the headquar-

ters of which is in San Francisco. During a conversation with a skeptical

Englishman, who has heard only of the horrible licentiousness of Tantra,

Nigel feels obliged to defend his Tantric faith. As his critic cynically re-

marks, “the old faith [the Hindus] taught wasn’t so bad, so long as it

stayed pure nature worship . . . but nowadays, Tantra-ism is horribly de-

grading! . . . I should very much like to know what teaching underlies the

farrago of black magic and immorality called the Tantras.” In response,

Blennerhasset angrily bursts out in defense of the Tantric tradition: “The

fifth Veda, called the Tantras . . . is the key to the others. It is the life and

soul of modern Hinduism, for it holds the Dogma of the whole World.”30

Other scenes, however, portray Nigel in rather ridiculous terms, as he

parades about in his Tantric robes, adorned with cryptic symbols, like a

bogus black magician: “There was Nigel Blennerhasset attired in the

white robes of a kaula rite preceptor of the Third Tantrik Order in San

Francisco. White robes covered with occult symbols in black and want-

ing only a stuffed cat on the shoulder to be the fancy dress of a witch!”31

The principle message of the Tantrik order is also a rather silly doctrine

of universal love, centered around the Great Mother though mingled with

deeper sexual undertones:

Love, Eternal, Creative as manifested in the one great Mother whose earthly

emblem was Woman divine, immortal, was the one power in the world.

The love of good, of country, of mother, of wife, the Love of which poets

sang . . . the Love which gave the tie of kindred thought to the great Brother-

hood of those who sought the highest.32

Unknown to Blennerhasset, however, his Tantric cult is secretly being ma-

nipulated: in fact, it has been subverted and exploited by two Jewish Bol-

shevist agents who are working with Indian nationalists, using the secret

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117

network of the Tantrik order to overthrow British rule. As the Bolshevist

exclaims, “The Tantrik cult is the finest nidus [source] in the world for

our purpose—a secret society ready-made.”33 By appealing to the Indian

people’s natural proclivity toward religious fanaticism, perversion, and

superstition, they hope to use the Tantric cult in order to arouse wide-

spread violence and thereby achieve (using Bakunin’s anarchist phrase)

“the destruction of law and Order and the unchaining of evil passions.”

According to their nefarious plot, “If it only enables us to touch the fifty-

five millions of Tantriks in Bengal, that will be something; but if it is prop-

erly engineered it may touch all India; and then—the deluge.”34

In sum, Steel and her fellow British novelists continue many of the

Orientalist tendencies we have explored in the previous chapters. As

Benita Parry argues, most of the romantic-era women writers had little

actual knowledge of India, but simply elaborated upon the fragments of

Orientalist accounts, projecting their own fears and fantasies into the nar-

rative. Steel, however, had a deeper knowledge of the world of India. She

believed that a thorough understanding of the darkest, most disturbing

aspects of the Indian mind is crucial to maintain British rule over this in-

herently passionate and potentially dangerous land: “The British are

chided for their ignorance about India, and India is unveiled to show the

odd, the grotesque and gruesome. . . . Knowing India is redefined as es-

sential and useful knowledge to facilitate permanent British rule.”35 Yet

the presence of Tantra also represents something that remains funda-

mentally unknowable, unfathomable, and uncontrollable in the Indian

world, something that continually subverts the desire for permanent rule

or rational control. If the great novels of the empire typically reinforce

the ideal of the nation and its just rule over the colonies, these novels that

deal with the violence and scandal of Tantra reveal a frightening element

of subversion that undermines and undoes the ideal of a coherent, tightly

controlled nation or colony.

As such, these literary descriptions of the terrifying but seductive

Tantras reflect as much the British subconscious as they do the “Indian

mind.” As Wurgaft argues, they are an example of the “mechanism that

psychologists call projection: the displacement of one’s own deep-seated

wishes and fears onto some external object.”36 For British novelists writ-

ing in India, the image of Tantra was often a powerful projection of their

own repressed desires and anxieties, objectified in the mirror of an ex-

otic Other. Parry observes, “The repressed thoughts of these irre-

proachable matrons were brought to the surface by India and were pro-

jected onto Indians as proof of their depravity. . . . They were repelled

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India’s Darkest Heart

because they saw their society’s taboos violated and were involved in the

betrayal, they were allured by the forbidden on shameless display.”37

As the characters Mary de la Mont, the mysterious 666, and Nigel

Blennerhassett discovered, this Tantric world reeks with the mingled per-

fume of sex and religion. These novelists reveal not only a loathing for

the violent licentiousness of Tantra, but also a secret longing and repressed

desire for it. Through their vivid accounts of the sexual goddess Kàlí and

the unrestrained worship of her Tantric devotees, these authors express

a shameful desire for the carnal, passionate underworld of India, a land

that threatens to seduce and corrupt the colonizers themselves.

t h e l u r e o f t h e f o r b i d d e n :

t a n t r a i n t h e i n d i a n l i t e r a r y i m a g i n a t i o n

On this path of maithuna, there is firm restraint at the

beginning—but in the end, the desire for maithuna is

aimed at gratification.

Pramod Kumàr Caååopàdhyày,

Tantràbhilàãír SàdhusaGga (1963)

Surely the British novelists were not the only ones to imagine vivid, ter-

rifying narratives of lascivious tàntrika s and bloody worship of the dark

mother Kàlí. At the same time, there was a growing body of Indian ver-

nacular literature, which continued many of the themes already present

in traditional Sanskrit literature—such as the horrific tales of Kàpàlikas

in Sanskrit drama—and combined them with the new fears and fantasies

about Tantra that emerged during the colonial era. And if the English

fiction of the nineteenth century was a crucial part of the imagining of

the British as a colonizing power, so too the Indian literature of this period

was a crucial element in the reimagining of Indian identity.

For example, one popular genre that emerged in Bengali literature is

the semifictional travel narrative, often with a religious theme. Among

the more widely read and colorful of these is Pramod Kumàr Caååopàd-

hyày’s Tantràbhilàãír SàdhusaGga, which recounts the spiritual wander-

ings of a young man between 1911 and 1918. After leaving his home in

Calcutta, the narrator goes in search of tàntrika s and other sàdhu s

throughout north India, delving as far as possible into these mysterious

cults. In Caååopàdhyày’s fertile imagination, Tantra was a dark, fright-

ening tradition, comprised mainly of “depraved licentious women, fallen

from society.” Thus he recounts his conversation with another Bengali

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119

regarding the Tantric ritual of cakra-pÜjà, held in utmost secrecy in a cre-

mation ground late at night:

I asked: “Why is the gathering held in such darkness?”

Pundàrik said, “You know that the preferred place of the tàntrika s is in

darkness; everything they do is very secret.”

I asked further: “So have you ever been present at their cakra? ”

Pundàrik: “No. I’ve heard these things from outside; I’ve never entered

the cakra. I don’t like all these things. I don’t care for their trickery or their

reckless behavior. All the things they do, righteous people say, cannot be

understood as dharma. They’re all wicked. And spiritual practice involving

women—Oh!”38

Overcome with curiosity about this tantalizing Tantric world, the nar-

rator pays a secret visit to the cakra-pÜjà, sneaking up and hiding in the

bushes around the lonely cremation ground in the dead of night. Presided

over by a frightening Aghorí (“one without fear”) and his Bhairaví (fe-

male Tantric) consort, the cakra consists of a circle of naked men and

women drawn from all castes, from Brahmans to untouchables, where

all the normal restraints of class and status are ignored.39 As the wind

howls and lightning flashes all around him, the narrator secretly witnesses

the most awesome rites of the cakra: the infamous five M’s. The narra-

tor sees the first four of the awesome five M’s; but mysteriously, just be-

fore he witnesses the performance of the fifth and final rite—the most

transgressive act of maithuna, or sexual intercourse in violation of caste—

a strange darkness comes over his mind, and he falls unconscious: “sud-

denly with the sharp light of a powerful lightning bolt, my memory and

consciousness were lost.”40

In sum, within the Indian popular imagination, Tantra seems to be

something frightening, dangerous, and yet strangely alluring. On the for-

bidden margins of society, far beyond the regulated boundaries of the

imperial center in Calcutta, Tantra is an awesome power, tied to the forces

of sexuality, death, and ecstasy, which continues to escape the rational

control of both the British government and the Hindu reformers.

Skull-Bearers and Sannyàsí Rebels: Kàpàlikas, Tàntrikas, and Other

Nefarious Characters in the Works of Bankim Chandra Chatterjee

Whose magic is this? or am I under a delusion. These

words indicate danger, but danger of what? Tantriks

can accomplish everything. . . . Where am I to flee to?

Caååopàdhyày, KapàlakuJjalà

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The colonial era gave birth not only to a new genre of British fiction, but

also to the Indian novel as a literary form in its own right. Expressed

through vernacular languages like Bengali and Hindi, the novel emerged

as one of the most popular literary forms of the nineteenth century, a

medium for the expression of both aesthetic values and political ideals.

Like British novels of this period, the Indian novel became a crucial lit-

erary space for reflection on India’s own cultural identity under colonial

rule, and also for the imagining of its emerging national identity. This is

particularly true in the case of Bengal, where language, literature, and

national identity became increasingly intertwined during the colonial and

postcolonial eras. As Firdous Azim comments in The Colonial Rise of

the Novel, “The nation’s commitment to Bengali manifests itself as a

search for authenticity, for the motherland created by the mother

tongue.”41 And like British novels, Indian novels often used the tropes

of Tantra and the terrible goddess Kàlí as ways of thinking through this

complex, shifting identity.

One of the most influential figures in the modern Indian imagining of

Tantra was also the first major novelist in the Bengali language, Bankim

Chandra Chatterjee (or Bankimcandra Caååopàdhyày, 1838–94). Ban-

kim was surely one of the most conflicted and ambivalent characters in

nineteenth-century Bengal, who held extremely complex attitudes to-

ward India, nationalism, British colonial rule, and the nature of Hin-

duism, including the tantra s.42 Born to a Kulin Brahman family that

had lost its pure status, Bankim was one of the first graduates of the

newly founded Calcutta University; upon his graduation in 1858, he

held the office of deputy collector for the British government until his

retirement.

Given his complex background—a fallen Brahman working for the

British government—it is not surprising that Bankim held many conflict-

ing attitudes toward his country, his culture, and his British masters. On

the one hand, as Tapan Raychaudhuri observes, Bankim was deeply pa-

triotic man, whose passionate nationalism “informed the bulk of his cre-

ative writing and social effort and was the mainspring of emotive life”;

on the other, Bankim was a believer in the beneficence of British rule. He

seems to have resigned himself to the fact that the British would be there

for a long time to come and that independence could only be achieved

by sustained effort at national integration over a long time.43 Even in his

powerful assertion of Hindu nationalism, Bankim internalized many

Western ideals of national identity and independence, based on the British

model of physical and worldly attainment. “India must look to its for-

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eign lords, the British, in order to obtain . . . proficiency in this domain

which is indispensable for the . . . securing of India’s own national

strength and autonomy.”44 In short, Bankim seems to have believed that

India could Westernize without losing her soul.

Like many other Westernized elites of his day, Bankim inherited Ori-

entalist attitudes toward Indian religion and culture, including views of

Tantra. Like Ràmmohun before him, Bankim basically accepted the Ori-

entalist critique of modern popular Hinduism, which was seen as idola-

trous, irrational, and degenerate. “It is no exaggeration to say,” he

lamented, “that there is greater affinity between Muhammadism and

Christianity than between the Shaktism of the Tantras and the Vaish-

navism of Caitanya.”45 Thus he imagined the rebirth of a noble, purified

Hinduism that would strip away all the polytheistic superstition and cen-

ter instead around a single deity like the “incarnate deity,” God made

flesh, Trí KKãJa. “The ‘truly’ religious elements of Hinduism had to be . . .

separated from the multifarious forms of superstition, from local and pop-

ular cults. Such a purified Hinduism . . . could be placed above Islam and

Christianity.”46

Perhaps Bankim’s greatest romance is KapàlakuJjalà, a love story

about a woman named KapàlakuJjalà, after the mendicant in Bhavab-

hÜti’s Màlatí-Màdhava. The story begins with the hero, Nabakumàr, lost

at sea and washing up on the shore of an unknown land. There he encoun-

ters both the ravishing young beauty KapàlakuJjalà and the terrible tàn-

trika, a Kàpàlika ascetic, who has raised KapàlakuJjalà from infancy

for the carnal demands of his dark religion. Nabakumàr’s first meeting

with the Kàpàlika is described in particularly vivid and gruesome im-

agery: building on the imagery of the Kàpàlikas in earlier Sanskrit drama

and combining it with colonial fantasies of the horrors of Tantra, Bankim

portrays the cruel tàntrika seated in a cremation ground, surrounded by

human bones, and performing the secret rite of Mava-sàdhana, medita-

tion on a human corpse:

From his waist to his knees he was covered with a tiger skin. Around his

throat was a necklace of rudràkãa seeds, and the broad circle of his face

with surrounded with matted hair and beard. . . . Nabakumàr could smell

a terrible stench. . . . The form with matted hair was seated on a headless

putrid corpse. With even greater fear he saw that a human skull lay before

him, and inside it was some red liquid. On all sides bones were strewn. . . .

He knew that this person must be a terrible Kàpàlika.47

When the naive Nabakumàr strays into the dense forest that is the tàn-

trika’s lair, the Kàpàlika takes him as a godsend that will allow him to

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complete the requisite number of sacrifices according to the black rites

of the tantra s:

The Kàpàlika seated Nabakumàr and KapàlakuJjalà in a fitting place

on a bed of kusa grass and began his worship according to the rites of the

tantra s. Holding KapàlakuJjalà by the hand, Nabakumàr led her across

the burning ground to bathe her. Bones began sticking to their feet. . . .

Wild animals were roaming in all directions eating the corpses.48

Out of her intense devotion and self-sacrificing nature, however, Kapà-

lakuJjalà decides to offer herself as the victim in Nabakumàr’s place:

“KapàlakuJjalà was at heart a tàntrika’s child. Just as a tàntrika is not

afraid to take another’s life out of desire for Kàlikà’s grace, so KapàlakuJ-

jalà was ready to sacrifice her own life out of the same desire.”49 Yet in

the dramatic end to the scene, a great wave suddenly rises up and washes

the cruel Kàpàlika away.

In sum, the terrible, ghoulish Kàpàlika in this tale not only reflects the

fantastic image of Tantra that had emerged in both the Indian and British

imaginations of the nineteenth century; it also reflects that dark, degen-

erate, idolatrous, and superstitious side of the Hindu tradition that

Bankim, as a nationalist and reformer strongly influenced by Western sci-

ence and morality, saw as the greatest obstacle to India’s self-assertion

and independence.

But the most important of Bankim’s novels for modern imagining of

Tantra—particularly in its violent, politicized forms—is Änandamaåh

(The abbey of bliss), which we have already encountered in chapter 2.

Originally published in serial form in the journal BaGgadarMan (the last

installment was on May 1882), the story was first published in book form

in December 1882.50 As we saw earlier, Änandamaåh was to become the

single most important text for the radical nationalist movement in Ben-

gal in the early twentieth century. For revolutionaries like Aurobindo,

this text was a manifesto for anticolonial insurgency and its author the

prophet of Indian nationalism. Yet Bankim’s original intention in writ-

ing this book is by no means clear. With his own dedication to nation-

alism and his ambivalent attitude toward British rule, Bankim leaves us

with the lingering question of whether this book should be read as an

anticolonial, revolutionary text, or as a procolonial defense of benign

British rule.

The novel centers around the historically actual Sannyàsí rebellion of

1772, when a group of renunciants led a major revolt against the Mus-

lim ruler in north Bengal. Afflicted by the severe famine that swept Ben-

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gal in 1770 and the oppressive taxation of their rapacious landlords, the

Sannyàsís in this novel gather in a secret temple dedicated to the

Mother—the Great Mother, who is at once the divine Takti and the phys-

ical land of Bengal. Hence Bankim’s Sannyàsís are a very odd sort of re-

ligious sect: for they are said to be VaiãJavas, devotees of the generally

non-Tantric god ViãJu; yet at the same time, Bankim has transformed

them into disciples of the Goddess in her most awesome, seemingly

“Tantric” form. As the Sannyàsí Bhavànanda declares, “Motherland is

superior to heaven. . . . We have only one Mother—richly watered, richly

fruited . . . with green fields”; and the Sannyàsís are devoted to the lib-

eration of the Mother from her bondage under oppressive rule. Making

a secret oath in the name of the Goddess, the Sannyàsís vow to forsake

all worldly pleasures, to forget caste distinctions, and never to retreat

from the battlefield. (As Sisir Kumar Das observes, it is likely that this

oath draws not only on Tantric traditions, but also on European secret

societies like the Carbonari, which influenced Aurobindo and Tagore.)51

Inside the Sannyàsís’ secret temple in Bankim’s novel, as we saw in

chapter 2, the Goddess is manifest in three forms, each embodying one

of three historical periods in Bengal: first, as the goddess Jagaddhatri, as

she was in her glory during the pre-Muslim age of Hindu sovereignty;

second, her terrible bloodthirsty form during the dark age of foreign mis-

rule as the black Tantric Mother, Kàlí; and finally, the radiant Mother

of an independent nation, where we see “on all sides . . . the enemy tram-

pled under her feet and the lion engaged in killing her foes.”52 In each of

these three forms, however, the Goddess is a powerful embodiment of

the Indian nation as Bankim imagines it, and as he immortalized it in his

classic song “Bande Mataram”:

Who hath said thou art weak in thy lands

When the sword flashes out in the seventy million hands

And seventy million voices roar

Thy dreadful name from shore to shore?

With many strengths who art mighty and stored,

To thee I call Mother and Lord!

Thou who savest, arise and save!

To her I cry who ever her foeman drove

Back from plain and sea

And shook herself free.53

Yet, strangely, despite the volatile context in which the novel was

published—in 1882, in the lingering aftermath of the Indian Mutiny and

just three years before the founding of the Indian National Congress—

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Änandamaåh reflects an extremely ambivalent attitude toward British rule

and Indian nationalism. Bankim himself appears to have been insecure

about the reception of the novel. In the serialized version of the novel,

Bankim’s rebels call for an attack upon both the English and the Mus-

lims; yet in the first published edition, this was modified to exclude the

British and to portray instead a primarily anti-Muslim uprising.54 This

ambivalence becomes all the more striking in the final chapter of the book,

when Bankim expresses what seems to be a powerful pro-British senti-

ment. A mysterious healer appears in the final pages and argues that the

British are the real saviors of India, without whom the nation cannot

overcome its own ignorance or regain its true strength. For though In-

dia may possess spiritual knowledge, it still needs the superior physical

knowledge and scientific advances of the West:

There is no hope of a revival of the True Faith if the English be not our

rulers. . . . The True Faith does not consist in the worship of 330 million

deities; that is only a base religion of the masses. Under its influence, the

True Faith . . . disappeared. . . . The True Hinduism is based on knowledge

and not on action. . . . [O]bjective knowledge has disappeared for our coun-

try. . . . [O]bjective knowledge must be imported from elsewhere. The En-

glish are great in objective sciences. . . . Therefore the English must be made

our sovereign. Imbued with a knowledge of objective sciences by English

education our people will be able to comprehend subjective truths . . . till

the Hindus are great again in knowledge virtue and power, then English

rule will remain undisturbed. . . . Desist from fighting with the English. . . .

The rebellion was raised only that the English might be initiated into

sovereignty. . . . Where is the enemy now? There is none. The English are a

friendly power, and no one had the power to come off victorious in a fight

with the English.55

Bankim’s forword to the first edition states this pro-British and antire-

bellion attitude even more clearly: “Social revolution is often suicidal,”

Bankim concludes, “but the rebels defeat themselves. . . . The English

have redeemed Bengal from anarchy.”56

Thus it is not surprising that since the novel was first published there

have been a wide array of conflicting interpretations of its political im-

plications. On one side, many argue that Bankim was a realist who also

admired many aspects of European culture and accepted British rule as

a necessary transitional stage until India was strong enough to rule her-

self. Some critics go even further, arguing that Bankim was an “antirev-

olutionary” and a loyal subject, who used this book as a way of con-

demning violent insurgency, particularly when mixed with religion:

“[The revolutionaries] are half-baked monks who play with the idea of

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revolution and are defeated in the end. Their revolution is bogged up in

love and . . . mysticism.”57 A few even see him as an ardent champion of

just British law, which has at last brought order to this violent, chaotic

land: “He hails British rule with enthusiasm . . . for having put an end

to Muslim oppression and anarchy.”58

Yet on the other end of the spectrum, many recent authors see Bankim

as a man with markedly anticolonial sentiments, which he expressed

covertly throughout Änandamaåh but which he was forced to conceal in

actual life. As Das observes, Bankim’s portrayal of the Sannyàsís is gen-

erally quite positive, as they appear to be noble, patriotic heroes strug-

gling to redeem the motherland; meanwhile, apart from the odd conclud-

ing chapter of the book, the British are often portrayed negatively, and

in many cases “subjected to mortification, insults and unsavory jokes.”59

Bankim also edited numerous parts of the original text—replacing, for

example, “English” with yavana (Muslim) and eliminating the sexual ex-

ploits of the English Captain Thomas among the Santal girls. Moreover,

the book was published just five years after another Bengali author, Up-

endranàth Dàs, had been prosecuted for the apparently anti-British sen-

timents in his play Surendra Binodiní. As Raychaudhuri suggests, it is likely

that Bankim censored his originally revolutionary opinions for pragmatic

reasons of self-protection:

As a government servant he was forced to modify his initial statements into

which an anti-British . . . sentiment was quite correctly read. Bankim’s prag-

matism in trying to retain his job . . . illustrates the predicament of a colo-

nial intelligentsia and suggests that his positive assessment of British should

not always be taken at face value. There is plentiful evidence that he saw

that rule as painful bondage.60

Bankim himself later cryptically remarked that the meaning of the rev-

olutionary anthem “Bande Mataram” would only be understood by a

future generation. As Raychaudhuri observes, “‘Bande Mataram’ became

the slogan of Indian nationalism and Anandamath the bible of armed

revolutionaries. One has the feeling that their creator had almost expected

such a result.”61

We may never know with certainty what Bankim’s original intention

was in writing Änandamaåh; nor, probably, will we ever know whether

he changed his views from anti-British revolutionary to pro-British loy-

alist, or whether he simply censored his real opinions for reasons of po-

litical expedience. In any case, I would argue, Bankim’s work and the

different interpretations of its political significance are acute examples

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of the changing attitudes toward both Tantra and Indian nationalism dur-

ing the colonial era. The question that Bankim’s work raises is one that

faced many Indian elites of his day: should the transgressive power of

Tantra and the irrational terror of the Goddess be unleashed in order to

inspire revolution? Or should it be contained and suppressed in sub-

mission to the stable rule of the British? This is a question that runs

throughout the late colonial era, haunting both the Indian literary imag-

ination and the larger Indian political unconscious, finally bursting into

the violence of the revolutionary nationalist movement.

The Mother’s Day Is Past:

The Failure of Revolutionary Nationalism in Tagore’s Fiction

The mother’s day is past. . . . All duties have become

as shadows: all rules and restraints have snapped their

bonds.

Rabindranath Tagore, The Home and the World (1926)

Another important figure in the literary imagining of Tantra is also among

the most chief figures in modern Indian literature: the Bengali poet, nov-

elist, and Nobel Prize winner Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941). Tagore’s

work dramatically portrays the intense violence and despair that followed

the politicization of Tàkta Tantra in Bengal, in the aftermath of the rev-

olutionary nationalist movement.

Born to an affluent Calcutta family, Tagore turned from his youthful

concentration in the arts to an increasing concern with public affairs and

the political life of Bengal. As Kopf argues, Tagore has so often been sub-

ject to hagiography and aesthetic idealization that it is often forgotten

that he was also deeply involved in nationalist politics.62 Indeed, Tagore

played an important role in the history of the revolutionary politics of

Bengal in the early years of struggle against the British. In the years up

to 1907, Tagore was an active participant in the nationalist movement

and helped to form the Swadeshi Samàj, for which he wrote fiery pam-

phlets and composed patriotic songs that swept Bengal. Yet he later grew

disillusioned with the movement, which proved to be both fundamen-

tally elitist, run by the educated landowning classes, and increasingly vi-

olent. Disturbed by the schisms and violence within the movement, he

withdrew from the center of action and began to turn increasingly to-

ward his more private spiritual and poetic life, spending most of his time

at his school in Shantiniketan and at his country home. As he wrote to

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C. F. Andrews, “I do not belong to the present age, the age of conflict-

ing parties. . . . I must share in the life of the present world, though I do

not believe in its cry. . . . I try to listen . . . to the murmur of the stream

carrying its limpid waters to the sea.”63

Retreating from the active world of nationalism to the inner realm of

spirituality, art, and culture, Tagore shifted his ideal for society from an

explicitly political one to a vision of a new humanism and universalism,

rooted in a nonsectarian religion of man. This was in part the reason for

his ambivalent involvement in the Bràhmo Samàj, which he had hoped

might realize his humanist and universalist ideals. Although he was crit-

ical of the more narrow-minded and reactionary tendencies within the

movement, he believed that the true spirit of the Bràhmo Samàj repre-

sented the revival of the most noble elements of the Hindu tradition.

Tagore also hoped that this new humanism might help undo the dehu-

manization of man that was the result of industrialization and material-

ism in the West. Against the fragmented impersonal character of the West,

with its rampant nationalism and intolerance, he sought a vision of the

simplicity and freedom of all human beings: “the world—especially the

West—urgently needed the universal humanism of the Brahmo faith. . . .

It was the key role of the Brahmo Samaj to help in saving the world from

the ‘madness of Nationalism.’”64

This profound disillusionment with the violence of the nationalist

movement and the retreat into a more passive, private sphere of art and

spirituality is poignantly expressed in his novel The Home and the World

(Ghare bàire). One of Tagore’s darkest works, it is a story set during

and after the terrorist violence of 1907, concluding with scenes of Hindu-

Muslim riots and armed robbery. However, it actually was written dur-

ing Tagore’s own personal crisis and descent into severe depression in

1914. Condemned by Western critics like Georg Lukacs as “a petit bour-

geois yarn of the shoddiest kind,” and by E. M. Forster as “a boarding

house flirtation that masks itself in patriotic talk,” the novel has also been

attacked by Indian readers who thought it betrayed Tagore’s insincerity

in fighting colonial rule.65 Recent critics, however, have praised it as one

of Tagore’s greatest works, a profound reflection of a man torn by

conflicting forces during the tumultuous years of the nationalist move-

ment: “The ‘home’ and the ‘world’ referred to his own mind divided

against itself, to himself versus his school . . . to Bengal versus India, to

India versus Britain, to the East versus the West.”66

The novel features a triad of characters, symbolically charged with

the various conflicting forces of Bengal in the early twentieth century.

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The primary protagonist is Nikhil, a wealthy landowner who is altruis-

tic, benevolent, rational, and Westernized in his ideas. A humanist, Nikhil

faces isolation and ridicule because of his opposition to the violent means

employed by the charismatic but unscrupulous revolutionaries. In stark

opposition to Nikhil’s conservative figure is Sandip, a revolutionary ded-

icated to independence, who stops at nothing, neither robbery nor mur-

der, to achieve his ends. Like the Takti-worshiping, Tantric-influenced

revolutionaries of the Jugantar movement, Sandip is fanatically dedicated

to the liberation of the Mother in her most terrible and bloody form. The

novel is in many ways the dramatization of the tension between these

two, the clash between conservative and revolutionary.

Bimala, Nikhil’s wife, is especially torn between these two powerful

forces. In a sense, Bimala is an icon of Bengal, the motherland, which is

caught between tradition and change, rational adherence to colonial law

and bloody revolution. As Anita Desai observes, “She is referred to fre-

quently as Mother . . . suggesting that she is Durgà, the mother goddess

and favorite deity of Bengal. Her husband offers her gold and tender love;

Sandip offers her worship, and revolutionaries . . . touch her feet in obei-

sance.”67 Seduced by Sandip’s fanatical charisma, Bimala betrays her hus-

band and throws herself into the Swadeshi movement. Nikhil, however,

refuses to banish Sandip but insists that Bimala must freely choose be-

tween the two of them herself. The novel finally ends in horrific violence,

as Bimala at last realizes that Sandip’s path is evil and withdraws from

it; but she does so too late to avert the inevitable violence that comes

with fanatical nationalism.

Tagore’s narrative is thus a fictional representation of the drama that

had unfolded in colonial Bengal—namely, the rise of the extremist wing

of the nationalist movement and its use of religious imagery drawn from

Tàkta Tantra and the Tantric goddess. As Kopf comments, Tagore’s nar-

rative “blasted the justification for extremism and terrorism in the

Swadeshi period,” and particularly the use of Tàkta Tantra in the ser-

vice of revolution: “The book is revealing not merely as a critique of

nationalism in fictional form, but . . . as condemnation of a concrete

revolutionary tradition in twentieth century Bengal. Terrorism inspired

by neo-Taktism was the target. It came at the very time of the ‘Tantric

revival.’”68

The character of Sandip is a clear embodiment of the radical Bengali

youth, cleaving to the ideal of the self-sacrificing warrior who lays down

his life as he takes the life of a white goat in an offering to the Goddess.

In Sandip’s eyes, the gods of India are tired and outdated; India now needs

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to modernize and refashion its gods to meet the challenge of the West:

“Evolution is at work amongst the gods as well. . . . The grandson has

to remodel the gods created by the grandfather to suit his own taste, or

else he is left an atheist. It is my mission to modernize the ancient deities.

I am born the savior of the gods, to emancipate them from the thraldom

of the past.”69

Sandip sees the image of the Goddess—particularly in her most vio-

lent forms—as the ideal means to move the spirits of the ordinary people,

to awaken them from their submissive slumber into revolutionary action.

For it is precisely this kind of mythic image, deeply rooted in the popu-

lar imagination, that can be used as a political tool to arouse a nation-

alist spirit:

True patriotism will never be roused in our countrymen unless they can

visualize the motherland. We must make a goddess of her. . . . We must get

one of the current images accepted as representing the country—the worship

of the people must flow toward it along the deep-cut grooves of custom. . . .

Illusions are necessary for lesser minds . . . and to this class the greater

portion of the world belongs. This is why divinities are set up in every

country to keep up the illusion of their weakness. . . . For them who can

truly believe . . . her image will do duty for the truth. With our nature and

our traditions we are unable to realize our country as she is, but we can

easily bring ourselves to believe in her image.70

For even though she is an illusion created for the ignorant masses, this

goddess is the very embodiment of the power that can rouse men to po-

litical action—above all, when she appears in her terrible Tantric forms

as Kàlí and Durgà, as she is worshiped in Bengal:

Just look at the worship of Durga which Bengal has carried to such

heights. . . . Durga is a political Goddess and was conceived as the image

of the Shakti of patriotism in the days when Bengal was praying to be de-

livered from the Mussulman domination. What other province of India

has succeeded in giving such wonderful visual expression to the ideal of

its quest?71

For Sandip, India is now in an urgent situation, which means that all

traditional morality and humanitarian values must be sacrificed to lib-

erate the oppressed nation. Extreme situations call for extreme measures,

including what seem to be utterly ruthless, violent, and brutal acts, so

long as they are carried out in the just name of the Goddess:

This is not the time for nice scruples. We must be unswervingly, unreason-

ingly brutal. We must give our women red sandal paste with which to anoint

our sin. . . . Down with righteousness which cannot smilingly bring rack

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and ruin. . . . Give to us indomitable courage to go to the bottom of Ruin

itself. Impart grace to all that is baneful.72

This means that the Indian must learn to use the dangerous, often im-

moral power of the West—to employ Western nationalist ideals, science,

and military strength in the service of the higher spiritual cause of In-

dian liberation. “We must have our religion and also our nationalism. . . .

I want the Western military style to prevail, not the Indian. We shall then

not be ashamed of the flag of our passion, which mother nature has sent

with us . . . into the battlefield of life.”73

Yet, by the end of the novel, Sandip’s ideal of revolutionary nation-

alism, steeped as it is in the violence of Tantra and the goddess Takti, has

ended in disastrous failure. Much like Aurobindo and the members of

the secret Jugantar movement, Sandip ultimately discovers that even this

powerful image of the Goddess cannot succeed in bringing about gen-

uine political liberation; for this projection of the Goddess as the spirit

of the nation, and this quasi-magical attempt to draw upon her power

through Tantric rites and blood sacrifices, is after all only an illusion. As

Nikhil cynically remarks, the Marathas and the Sikhs took up real arms

and fought with real strength against their oppressors during the Mus-

lim era; but the Bengali, instead of taking real action, retreats into mys-

tical superstition: “Maratha and Sikh turned revolutionary and got state-

hood, but the Bengali contented himself with placing weapons in the

hands of his goddess, and muttering incantations to her . . . and as his

country did not really happen to be a goddess, the only fruit he got was

the lopped off heads of the goats of the sacrifice.”74

Sandip has abandoned his once firm belief in the power of the god-

dess of “Bande Mataram,” turning instead to a kind of nihilistic despair,

in which all previous values are meaningless, and descending into an

emptiness without hope for redemption:

My watchword . . . is no longer Bande Mataram. . . . The mother’s day is

past. . . . All duties have become as shadows: all rules and restraints have

snapped their bonds. . . . I could set fire to all the world outside this land

on which you have set your feet and dance in mad revel over them. . . .

My devotion to you has made me cruel; my worship of you has lighted

the raging flame of destruction within me. . . . I have no beliefs.75

Tagore eloquently narrates here the sudden rise and tragic failure of rev-

olutionary nationalism, along with its attempt to use the violent power

of Tantra in the service of political ends. Like Aurobindo, Tagore’s char-

acters realized that the dangerous power unleashed by Tantra can indeed

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arouse intense revolutionary hopes; yet the violence and bloodshed it

brings can lead only to despair and a loss of hope in overt political ac-

tion. As both Aurobindo and Tagore ultimately concluded, the only so-

lution would be to abandon the terrible power represented by the bloody

Tantric goddess, to withdraw from the political realm, and to retreat into

the inner domain of spirituality and the arts.

t h e “ p r e c a r i o u s n e s s o f p o w e r ” :

i m a g i n i n g a n d s u b v e r t i n g t h e n a t i o n

Kill for the love of killing! Kill lest ye be killed your-

selves! Kill for the love of Kali! Kill, Kill, Kill!

Priest of Kàlí (Eduardo Cianelli),

in the film version of Gunga Din (1939)

Narration occurs to confirm the precariousness of

power.

Sara Suleri, The Rhetoric of English India (1992)

In sum, the image of Tantra in British and Indian fiction played a criti-

cal role in the decades of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

For it was a key element in the reimagining of the Indian nation during

the confusing, often violent decline of colonial rule. As Bhabha and others

suggest, the genre of the novel played a crucial role in the rise of nation-

alism, both in Europe and in the colonies, throughout the modern period.

Just as the novel emerged as a complex, composite, yet unified and

bounded narrative, so too, the modern nation emerged as a complex,

unified, imagined community, with a coherent narrative of its inception

and development: “The rise of the modern nation-state . . . is insepara-

ble from the forms and subjects of imaginative literature. . . . It was es-

pecially the novel as a composite but clearly bordered work of art that

was crucial in defining the nation as an ‘imagined community.’”76

And yet, the “nation” can surely never be the seamless, bounded, co-

herent, and unified entity imagined by literary narratives. On the con-

trary, as Bhabha observes, the nation will always be in a profound sense

fragmented, splintered, and hopelessly plural: “Dissemination, ambiva-

lence, hybridity and heterogeneity constantly disrupt the narratives of

social, cohesion, holism and homogeneity.”77 Hence, the narratives of

nationalism must always in some sense be fabricated illusions of unity,

created in the desperate attempt to cover this ambivalent hybridity: “Na-

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tionalism is not what it seems, and above all not what it seems to itself. . . .

The cultural shreds and patches used by nationalism are often arbitrary

historical inventions.”78 As Sara Suleri put it in her study of British colo-

nial literature, the narratives created by the colonizers always in some

way betray their own deep insecurity, their own fears of disorder and

subversion. They reveal the fundamental “precariousness of power.” But

this could be said equally of the colonized peoples themselves, as they

attempt to imagine narratives for their own emerging national identities—

narratives that also reveal their own precariousness and insecurity. Thus,

the fiction of the colonial era does not reflect a static, unchanging, imag-

inal representation of the exotic Orient, but rather a complex and dy-

namic “vision of India which is . . . nuanced, contradictory, and subject

to changing historical and political circumstances.”79

As we have seen throughout the British and Indian fiction of the colo-

nial era, Tantra emerges as one of the most frightening symbols of this

very precariousness and a subversive threat to the nation. Embodied in

the terrible goddess Kàlí, Tantra continually rises up as a dangerous

“otherness”—not just the otherness lurking in the Indian underworld,

but also the even more disturbing otherness that has begun to appear

within Western culture itself. “It is for secrets like these we of Europe

come to seek wisdom,” as Sharpe put it in her Secrets of the Kaula Cir-

cle. In the form of Nigel Blennerhasset, the Great Beast 666, Mary de la

Mont, and other white devotees of the Goddess, Tantra is a seductive

power that threatens to infiltrate and pervert the colonial world. For “the

other is never outside or beyond us; it emerges forcefully within cultural

discourse, when we think we speak most intimately. . . ‘between our-

selves.’”80 Yet at the same time, Tantra is a terrible power within the In-

dian community, threatening to undermine India’s own emerging hopes

for national identity. As both Bankim and Tagore remind us, the Takti of

Tantra is an awesome force that promises transgressive liberation, sensual

gratification, and material power, but also often leads to self-destruction,

explosive violence, and the ultimate shattering of the very idea of a unified

nation.

Of course, these fictional imaginings of Tantra—so colorful and vivid,

at times humorous, at times terrible—were by no means limited to the

genre of novel or even to the colonial era. Later in the twentieth century

they would be taken up by a number of British novelists, such as John

Masters in his tale of the Thuggee, The Deceivers. 81 And they were used

as well in American Hollywood films, such as Gunga Din, a remarkable,

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double-order, doubly-distorted representation: an American imagining

of the British imagining of India, centering around a Kàlí-worshiping

Thuggee cult (whose priest is played by an Italian American) and a faith-

ful Indian water-bearer (played by a Jewish American). Even those of us

in the ostensibly politically correct, postcolonial world still enjoy old-

fashioned Orientalist films, like Stephen Spielberg’s Indiana Jones and

the Temple of Doom—a reworking of the Gunga Din motif, featuring

one of the most horrific (and strikingly un-Indian) Kàlí images ever con-

ceived. And, of course, such popular imagining of Tantra has long since

been taken up by Bollywood, as well. One of my own favorite Indian

pop films, mentioned in the introduction, is Shaitan Tantrik, a movie

clearly influenced by Temple of Doom, which features a diabolical mad

Tantric priest who bears a suspicious resemblance to the priest of Kàlí

in Spielberg’s film.

The fictional representation of Tantra continues to be a key part of

the imagining of both Indian and Western identity in the postcolonial

era. As the frightening, insidious Other within, it forms a crucial element

in remembering the dark side of India’s colonial past and in representa-

tions of its conflicted, contested present.

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c h a p t e r 4

Deodorized Tantra

Sex, Scandal, Secrecy, and Censorship

in the Works of John Woodroffe and

Swami Vivekananda

I protest and have always protested against unjust aspersions

upon the civilization of India. . . . The Tantra Tàstra is not,

as some seem to suppose, a petty Tàstra of no account. . . .

It is on the contrary, with Veda, SmKti and PuràJa, one of

the foremost important Tàstras in India, governing in various

degrees . . . the temple and household ritual of the whole of

India . . . for centuries past.

Sir John Woodroffe, Shakti and Shàkta (1918)

This form of practice must never even be mentioned in the

Math. Ruin shall seize the wicked man, both here and here-

after, who would introduce vile Vamachara into His fold.

Swami Vivekananda to members of Alambazar Math

(27 April 1896)

By the dawn of the twentieth century, Tantra had come to represent a

troubling, sometimes threatening, and often quite embarrassing prob-

lem for Indian and Western authors. Already widely regarded as repre-

senting the most primitive, idolatrous, and immoral side of the Indian

mind, it had also become increasingly associated with religious fanati-

cism, terrorist violence, and the failure of the revolutionary nationalist

movement. It is not surprising therefore to see various efforts on both the

Indian and colonial sides to suppress, control, or eliminate the danger-

ous practices of the tantra s. What is more surprising, however, is that we

also find an attempt on the part of more sympathetic figures to defend,

revalorize, and purify the Tantric tradition, cleansing it of the taint of li-

134

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Deodorized Tantra

135

centious immorality and redefining it as a noble philosophical tradition.

As Sumit Sarkar observes, “Tantric traditions were being made more re-

spectable through excisions, and at times . . . suppressed altogether . . .

as stricter ideas about gentility developed in the shadow of ‘Victorian’

norms.”1

We have already seen at least one major attempt to purify or sanitize

the Tantras, in the strange case of the MahànirvàJa Tantra and its com-

plex relations to the reforms of the Bràhmo Samàj. But this process of

sanitization would only intensify in the early decades of the twentieth

century, in the face of rising nationalism, political agitation, and a new

desire to reimagine Hinduism in response to the Western world. If Hin-

duism and the Indian nation were to be defended as strong, autonomous,

and independent of Western control, then the foul stench of Tantra would

have to be “deodorized,” as it were—either by rationalization and

purification, or by concealment and denial.

Two of the most important figures in this process were Sir John

Woodroffe (1865–1936), otherwise known as Arthur Avalon, the father

of modern Tantric studies in the West; and Swami Vivekananda (1863–

1902), born Narendra Nath Datta, one of the greatest spiritual leaders

of modern India.2 A High Court judge in Calcutta, Woodroffe surely

stands out as one of the most remarkable and enigmatic figures in the

entire history of British India. While maintaining his public profile as a

judge and scholar of British Indian law, Woodroffe was also a private

student of the tantra s, who published a huge body of texts and transla-

tions and thus pioneered the modern academic study of Tantra in the West.

Yet Woodroffe was also an apologist, seeming to have bent over back-

ward to defend the Tantras against their many critics and to prove that

they represent a noble, pure, and ethical philosophical system in basic

accord with the Vedas and Vedànta.

Vivekananda, conversely, was the chief disciple of the great modern

Bengali saint Sri Ramakrishna ParamahaFsa—a man who was deeply

influenced by the teachings and practices of the Màkta tantra s. Yet

Vivekananda would reinterpret, transform, and adapt Ramakrishna’s

teachings to his own neo-Hindu and nationalist agendas, turning this ec-

static devotee of the violent Tantric goddess Kàlí into an avatàr of highly

abstract, philosophical Advaita Vedànta and Hindu nationalism.3 For

Vivekananda and his followers, the Tantric practices of Ramakrishna

would become a source of scandal and embarrassment, a dark secret that

remained a disturbing presence throughout the later tradition.

Yet both Woodroffe and Vivekananda shared several common agen-

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Deodorized Tantra

das: first, they each sought to redefine and reinterpret Tantra from a mod-

ern perspective informed by the encounter between India and the West

during the colonial era. And they each re-presented Tantra in a form

that was—like so much of twentieth-century neo-Hinduism, as Halbfass

argues4—heavily influenced by modern Western paradigms of morality,

science, and rationality. Second and more important, however, they both

subjected Tantra to a profound form of censorship; that is, they each in

different ways suppressed, edited, and covered over those aspects of Tan-

tra that were considered most offensive to both Western and Indian au-

diences. As Sue Curry Jansen argues, censorship is in many ways one of

the key “knots” in the social fabric, a knot that “binds knowledge and

power.” For if knowledge is power—the power to define, categorize, and

control our perception of the “way things are”—then those who hold

or seek power must be able to silence views that threaten their ideal of

the way things ought to be.5 For both Woodroffe and Vivekananda, Tan-

tra was something that was very much in need of censorship and reform—

either (for the former) a moralizing sanitization, or else (for the latter) a

form of suppression and denial.

t h e “ r e f o r m ” o f t a n t r a :

s i r j o h n w o o d r o f f e a n d t h e d e f e n s e ,

r a t i o n a l i z a t i o n , a n d s a n i t i z a t i o n o f t a n t r a

Tàntrikism in its real sense is nothing but the Vedic

religion struggling with wonderful success to reassert

itself amidst all those new problems of religious life . . .

which historical events have thrust upon it.

Woodroffe, Shakti and Shàkta

See some Lama and understand from him what your

beliefs are. It is so extraordinary to us Europeans that

you Buddhists and Hindus or everyone of you do not

understand your own religions. . . . I speak particularly

of the Tantric doctrines.

Woodroffe to Lama Kazi Dawasamdup (15 June 1917)

Although his scholarship is now considered rather biased and flawed, Sir

John Woodroffe (figure 8) must be acknowledged as a remarkable pio-

neer and even as the father of the modern study of the Tantras. Ironi-

cally, Woodroffe himself did not care to use the term “Tantrism,” argu-

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137

Figure 8. Sir John Woodroffe, at the Konark temple in Orissa.

From Woodroffe, Introduction to Tantra Tàstra (1913; reprint,

Madras: Ganesh, 1973).

ing that it was a mistaken Western imposition; yet today, Woodroffe more

than any other scholar has become identified with the term.

Woodroffe appears to have led a kind of dual life, working publicly as

a respected British judge and studying privately as a scholar of the tantra s.

After serving as a barrister at the High Court of Calcutta beginning in

1890, Woodroffe was a judge from 1904 to 1922. When he returned to

England from India, he became the All Souls Reader in Indian Law at Ox-

ford University until 1930, and then retired to France where he died in

Beausoleil. A well-known author of many texts on British-Indian law,

Woodroffe was an Indophile and art connoisseur who belonged to the

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Deodorized Tantra

circle around the Tagores. Yet in his private life as a scholar of the tantra s,

Woodroffe would publish a vast corpus of writings, translations, and

commentaries. As Kathleen Taylor summarizes Woodroffe’s remarkable,

somewhat schizoid persona, he seems to have maintained two separate

identities: “One identity is public, British and official: the Judge, the schol-

arly Orientalist. . . . The other is secret, Indian and Tantric.”6

As Taylor has argued, it seems fairly clear Woodroffe was involved

with a circle of disciples who had gathered around a popular Tantric

teacher named Tiva Candra VidyàrJarva Bhaååàcàrya. Originally from

East Bengal, Tiva Candra attracted a number of educated bhadralok s in

Calcutta, along with a few interested Westerners, one of whom was John

Woodroffe. Although Woodroffe never acknowledged any direct partic-

ipation in Tantra, many believe that he was initiated by Tiva Candra; in

fact, an account of this initiation was later published by another disci-

ple in the 1960s.7

Whatever may have been his personal involvement in Tantric prac-

tice, Woodroffe was a key member of a small group called the Ägamànu-

sandhana Samiti (Agama Research Society), an organization created to

publish Tantric texts.8 Yet the editor of this society was identified, not as

John Woodroffe, but as a mysterious character named Arthur Avalon

(taken from an idyllic island of British mythology, the last resting place

of King Arthur). While most scholars have long assumed that Avalon was

a simple pseudonym for Woodroffe himself, Taylor has argued persua-

sively that Avalon is a much more complicated figure. Rather than

Woodroffe alone, “Avalon” was more likely a composite identity, a dual

being, comprised of both Woodroffe and the unnamed Bengali who ac-

tually did most of the translations. Based on his correspondence with his

collaborators, Lama Kazi Dawasamdup and Atal Behari Ghose, it seems

fairly clear that Woodroffe was not particularly competent at Sanskrit.

In fact, some Indian linguists have asserted that Woodroffe could not even

read the script accurately.9 As Taylor argues, Woodroffe relied heavily

on the aid of his Bengali friend Atal Behari Ghose, the secret other half

of his Avalon-self.10 Woodroffe more or less admits this in the preface to

Shakti and Shàkta, the first of his Tantric works published under his own

name: the earlier work, he notes, had appeared under the name of Avalon

“to denote that they have been written with the direct cooperation of

others and in particular with the assistance of one of my friends who will

not permit his name to be mentioned.”11

In any case, Woodroffe seems to have taken it upon himself to defend

the tradition of the tantra s, fighting valiantly to rescue them from the at-

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139

tacks of the European Orientalists and colonial administrators. While

his fellow Englishmen denounced Tantra as a “weltering chaos of terror,

darkness and uncertainty. . . the most childishly superstitious ani-

mism . . . a pit of abomination as far set from God as the mind can go,”

Woodroffe set out to show that this tradition is “so reasonable” that it

cannot be misconstrued as the “absurd and altogether immoral thing

which some have supposed it to be.”12 As Woodroffe points out, most

of the authors who so fiercely attack the tantra s actually have very little

idea what “Tantrism” is or how it should be defined. Thus he cites one

amusing legal case in which an Indian author was prosecuted for hav-

ing published one of these allegedly immoral and indecent tantra s. Yet

the deputy magistrate himself was quite incapable of defining precisely

what a tantra is or why exactly it should be such a criminal offense to

publish its contents: “An Indian Deputy Magistrate who had advised the

prosecution and who claimed to be an orthodox Hindu stated . . . in the

witness box that he could not define what the TantraMàstra was or state

whether it was a Hindu scripture of the Kali age or whether a well-known

particular Màstra shown to him was one of the tantras.” 13 It was precisely

to combat this absurd ignorance that Woodroffe set out to defend the

tradition of the tantra s. Unfortunately, as many authors have pointed out,

Woodroffe often went far in the opposite direction.

Woodroffe seems to have inherited much of this reformist attitude from

his master, the Bengali Tantric pundit Tiva Candra, whose massive

Tantratattva was published (by “Arthur Avalon”) under the title The Prin-

ciples of Tantra. As Avalon explains in the preface to the book, Tiva Can-

dra’s work is in many ways a highly conservative defense of Hindu or-

thodoxy against the onslaughts of modernism and secularization. Far

from a radical or transgressive teaching, The Principles of Tantra pre-

sents a reactionary defense of authentic Hindu tradition in the face of a

rapidly changing, increasingly desacralized modern world. Avalon even

compares it to the defense of traditional Catholicism against the threat

of modernism in the early twentieth century:

The present work is a defense of the Tantra . . . undertaken in the interests

of Hindu orthodoxy in its Tàntrika form against Secularism . . . and various

reforming movements. . . . The book reads like an orthodox Catholic protest

against “modernism” and is interesting as showing how many principles

are common to all orthodox belief, East or West.14

According to Woodroffe’s reformed version of Tantra, which he adapts

in part from Tiva Candra, this tradition is by no means opposed to the

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Deodorized Tantra

teachings of the Veda and the Upaniãads; on the contrary, it contains “doc-

trines of a lofty speculation” that form the innermost essence and con-

tinuation of the orthodox tradition.15 The religion of India, he believes,

is not the chaotic plurality of beliefs that it is often imagined to be. Rather,

it forms a coherent, unified, systematic whole, a single bhàrata dharma,

or Aryan religion:

To the Western, Indian Religion seems a jungle of contradictory beliefs

amidst which he is lost. . . . It has been asserted that there is no such thing

as Indian religion, though there are many Religions in India. This is not

so. . . . There is a common Indian Religion . . . Bhàrata Dharma, an Aryan

Religion held by all Aryas.16

The Tantras form an integral part of this greater “Aryan religion,” in di-

rect continuity with the teachings of the Vedas and Vedànta. “The

Vedànta is the final authority and basis for the doctrines set forth in the

Tantras,” Woodroffe concludes; for “the Tantra Tàstra . . . has been for

centuries past one of the recognized scriptures of Hinduism, and every

form of Hinduism is based on Veda and Vedànta.”17 The Tantras are noth-

ing other than the practical application of the teachings of the Vedànta

(which, for Woodroffe, is the essence of Indian philosophy):

The Tàkta Tantra simply present the Vedàntik teachings in a symbolic

form for the worshipper, to whom it prescribes the means whereby they

may be realized in fact.

Vedànta in its various forms has for centuries constituted the reli-

gious notions of India, and the Ägamas . . . are its practical expression

in worship.18

Here we find a profound reversal of the typical Orientalist and reformed

Hindu rhetoric: far from being the worst degeneration from the Golden

Age of the Veda, Tantra is now the true fulfillment of the noble philos-

ophy revealed in the Vedas and cultivated in the Vedànta.

Science for a New Age: Reuniting Spirit and Matter, East and West

Tantra is scientific discovery not revelation.

Sir John Woodroffe, Bharata Shakti (1921)

Not only are the Tantras in continuity with the most noble traditions of

the Vedas, Woodroffe suggests, but they are also in basic agreement with

the latest discoveries in modern European science, and “in conformity

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141

with the most advanced scientific and philosophic thought of the West.”19

Like modern science, Tantra is also an eminently practical and experi-

mental form of knowledge, “a philosophy one not merely argues but ex-

periments.”20 As such, many of Woodroffe’s interpretations involve an

odd mixture of Western scientific terminology (evolution, matter, energy,

etc.) and Sanskrit philosophical language. With the findings of modern

science, the tantra s agree that all matter and all energy is essentially one,

and that there is ultimately no duality between the physical and the sup-

raphysical worlds:

This oneness of origin that underlies all forms in creation is a fact of spir-

itual experience which is being increasingly corroborated by the results

of . . . Science. The Cartesian dualism of mind and matter no longer

holds. . . . The missing links pertain only to the superfices of the pro-

cess of Evolution and, probed deeper, the universe reveals an unbroken

Continuum over all the tiers of existence.21

The tantra s, moreover, describe the “evolution” of the world by means

of the goddess Takti, who is the driving power of energy and matter. The

aim of this cosmic evolution is the birth of the highest man, the self-re-

alized yogi, who has discovered his own unity with all things: “In the

highest man evolution on the material plane ends. Evolution takes place

through the Power of God which is always transforming itself into higher

forms in order that Spirit may be freed of the bonds of Mind and Mat-

ter. . . . This is the Eternal Rhythm of the Divine Mother as Substance-

Energy.”22

Ultimately, as a religious path that weds spirit and matter, body and

mind, Tantra forms the ideal bridge between modern Western science and

ancient Indian metaphysics. As the power that is the foundation of both

matter and spirit, body and consciousness, the Takti of the tantra s would

seem to offer the ideal solution to the apparent dichotomy of East and

West. Rather ironically, Woodroffe asserts the ultimate superiority of the

spiritual East over the material West, while using the larger (seemingly

Western) paradigm of science as the most authoritative source of knowl-

edge about reality.

Deodorizing Tantra: Eliminating the “Foul Stench” of Tantric Practice

There is nothing “foul” in them except for people to

whom all erotic phenomena are foul.

Woodroffe, Shakti and Shàkta

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Deodorized Tantra

However, in order to prove that the tantra s contained noble philosoph-

ical teachings, in line with both Vedànta and with Western science, Wood-

roffe was forced to go to great lengths to rationalize, explain, or excise

the more offensive aspects of this tradition. Above all, Woodroffe had to

rationalize the Tantric use of substances that are normally forbidden in

Hindu society—especially the pañcatattva, or “five M’s,” meat (màFsa),

fish (matsya), wine (madya), parched grain (mudrà), and sexual inter-

course (maithuna), which were seen as the defining features of Tantra in

most Orientalist discourse. The secret rites of the Tantra, he explains,

are strictly closed to the ordinary paMu, or bestial man; they can only be

revealed to the true víra, the hero or spiritually evolved man, who can

fathom their deeper spiritual meaning. In their highest understanding,

the meaning of these practices is not literal or physical, but rather “of a

purely mental and spiritual character.” Thus madya represents the “in-

toxicating knowledge acquired by yoga; meat is not any fleshy thing but

the act whereby the sàdhaka consigns all his acts to [God]; matsya is that

knowledge by which the worshipper sympathizes with the pleasure and

pain of all beings. Mudrà is the act of relinquishing all association with

evil . . . and Maithuna is the union of Takti KuJjaliní with Tiva in the

body of the worshipper.”23 In fact, Woodroffe goes so far as to argue

that the Tantras may be considered in many respects even more “ethi-

cal” in their sexual attitudes than many of his own, often hypocritical,

countrymen:

There is nothing “foul” in them except for people to whom all erotic

phenomena are foul. . . . [T]he ancient East was purer in these matters

than the modern West, where, under cover of a pruriently modest exte-

rior . . . extraordinarily varied psychopathic filth may flow. This was not

so in earlier days . . . when a spade was called a spade and not a horticul-

tural instrument.24

It is no accident that Woodroffe believed the most noble of all tantra s

to be the curious and suspicious text of the MahànirvàJa Tantra. As we

saw in chapter 1, the MahànirvàJa is an extremely unusual work, one

that many suspect was composed in the late eighteenth century as part

of an attempt to bring the tantra s into harmony with the new system of

British Indian law. Not only does this text present a highly Vedàntic vi-

sion of the supreme Brahman; and not only does it contain an enormous

amount of material on orthodox laws of caste, marriage, inheritance, and

other legal concerns; but it also strongly downplays the more objec-

tionable erotic aspects of Tantric practice, mentioning them only by means

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143

of “great euphemisms.” As Woodroffe himself acknowledged, this

“woman’s Tantra” was generally less popular among many tàntrika s than

it was among Hindu reformers and Western scholars, precisely because

“certain of its provisions appear to display unnecessary timidity” and

even a “puritanical” outlook.25 Nonetheless, in Woodroffe’s mind, this

idiosyncratic and probably intentionally “deodorized” text is the most

noble exemplar of the Tantric tradition.

Far from being depraved licentious rituals, the practices of the tantras

are, for Woodroffe, no different in essence from the rituals of the Chris-

tian tradition. Not only does Woodroffe wish to find parallels between

the tantras and modern science, but he also seems to have a persistent

desire to find parallels with the traditions of the Catholic Church. Like

the ancient and carefully guarded liturgy of the Church, he suggests, the

tantras have preserved throughout the ages an elaborate ritual tradition,

whose true aim is not to incite the physical senses, but rather to awaken

higher spiritual ideals. In the following, rather remarkable passage,

Woodroffe goes so far as to compare the Catholic liturgy, point for point,

with a Tantric ritual, identifying specific ritual elements with corre-

sponding Sanskrit terms:

So, as the Council of Trent declared, the Catholic Church, rich with the

experiences of ages and clothed with their splendor, has introduced mystic

benediction (mantra), incense (dhÜpa), water (àcamana), lights (dípa), bells (ghaJåà), flowers (puãpa), vestments and all the magnificence of ceremonies

in order to excite the spirit of religion to the contemplation of the profound

mysteries which they reveal. As are its faithful, the Church is composed of

both body (deha) and soul (àtma). It renders to the lord (íMvara) a double worship, external (bàhyapÜjà) and interior (mànasapÜjà), the latter being

the prayer (vandana) of the faithful.26

Here, in Woodroffe’s reformulation, Tantra has become the precise op-

posite of the scandalous cult of perverse ritual and black magic described

by the early Orientalists; on the contrary, Tantra is now a rich spiritual

tradition comparable to the highest ceremonial of Tridentine Catholicism.

Ironically, whereas earlier scholars like Waddell had attacked and ridiculed

Tantra because of its “popish” ritualism and seemingly “Catholized” idol-

atry, Woodroffe has turned these features into a supreme virtue.

The Religion of Power: Tantra as Spiritual and Political Power

What India wanted at present was the Religion of Power.

Woodroffe, Bharata Shakti

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Deodorized Tantra

Writing in the early decades of the twentieth century, surrounded by the

violence of the nationalist movement and the increasing association of

Tantra with political dissidence in the popular imagination, Woodroffe

could not help but be aware of the political dimension of Tantra. Yet this

political dimension remains one of the most complex and ambivalent as-

pects of his life and work.

As a High Court judge serving in Calcutta, Woodroffe was confronted

with a number of cases directly related to the political violence and revolu-

tionary unrest of the radical nationalist movement in Bengal. As Taylor

notes, he was serving in the midst of the bloody violence and contro-

versy generated by secret groups like the Jugantar movement, with their

explicit use of Tantra and the goddess Kàlí in the service of political sub-

version: “The whole of Woodroffe’s career on the bench was governed

by what was called ‘the Indian unrest.’ Soon after he became a judge a

period of revolutionary ferment began.”27At least in his capacity as a

judge in the service of the empire, Woodroffe appears to have been quite

unsympathetic to the revolutionaries. In 1912, he created a furor among

the nationalists throughout Bengal when he passed a controversial rul-

ing against the radicals and in favor of the British authorities:

Woodroffe as a British judge drawn to Tantrism might seem then to have

been in a particularly ambiguous position. Yet, paradoxically—perhaps—

Woodroffe was not a judge who was . . . sympathetic to those accused of

“extremism” in court—on the contrary, the opposite was the case; and

most of the time Woodroffe supported the British authorities rather more

enthusiastically than did some other British judges.28

Yet, in his private life as a scholar of the tantra s and an exponent of

Indian culture, Woodroffe was often severely critical of Western values

and defensive of India’s spiritual and national identity. Like Bankim Chan-

dra and Aurobindo, Woodroffe clearly had inherited the rhetoric of the

“spiritual East and the material West,” praising India as the land of philo-

sophical wisdom and ancient religious tradition, while identifying the

West as a land of material strength and technological superiority but also

of spiritual emptiness and moral decay. “The East and particularly India

possesses that which is of the highest value. I wish to see this possessed

for the mutual benefit of East and West”; for “India possesses a won-

derful solvent—a solvent of irreligion and materialism.”29 Woodroffe is

often severely critical of the West, which he sees as a civilization based

on greed and consumption, seeking material prosperity alone without

any higher spiritual concerns: “some of the grossest urges are to be found

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in what we call advanced civilization.”30 “Our Western civilization is a

great eater. We consume. What is called a ‘higher standard of life’ has

meant that we consume more and more. Industrialization instead of sat-

isfying has increased our Western needs. We want more wants.”31

The all-consuming materialism of the West now threatens to destroy

the ancient spiritual civilization of India. Ironically, whereas so many Ori-

entalists had used the metaphor of the “disease” of Tantra—that invasive

illness that had weakened and corrupted Hinduism in modern times—

Woodroffe uses the same metaphor to describe the potentially destructive

invasion of modern materialism, which now threatens to corrupt both

East and West alike: “Is Indian civilization about to be renewed or bro-

ken up in another instance of that disintegration which has followed the

introduction of Western civilization amongst Eastern peoples? Its poison

does not harm the snake but it is death to others. . . . [T]he coming as-

sault on Hindu civilization will be the greatest it has ever had to endure.”32

In the face of this threat of Western materialism and the social ills that

it bears in its wake, India now more than ever needs Makti—power, in

both its spiritual and material forms. For now, in the early decades of

the twentieth century, this ancient civilization is being thrust into the mael-

strom of global politics, suddenly confronted with economic and cultural

forces that it has never seen before.

India is now approaching the most momentous epoch in its history. . . .

The country will be subject to the play of monster economic forces. . . .

For the first time in her history she will be thrown into the world-vortex,

political, economic, cultural and social, from which her past form of Gov-

ernment has (I believe providentially) preserved her. Will she have the

strength to keep her feet in it? I hope she may.33

The world of India should be strong, enduring, massive, adamant to

wrongful assault, but beneficent—the kind of massive power suggested

by the figure of Kapila carved on the rock of Ceylon.34

It is in this sense that TantraMàstra—the way of power in all its manifes-

tations—is the religion most suited to this most dangerous era in Indian

history. For it is the Tantric path alone that weds material power with

spiritual power, physical force with intellectual and moral might: “What

India wanted at present was the Religion of Power. . . . By power I do not

mean only physical force. Material force was necessary and serviceable

in its way, but it must be backed by mental and spiritual force.”35

What, then, are we to make of statements like these in light of Wood-

roffe’s far more conservative, antirevolutionary official stance as a High

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Deodorized Tantra

Court judge? Was he simply inconsistent and contradictory? Or was he

maintaining some kind of delicate “double life,” with an outward facade

of conformity to British rule, while holding to more subversive ideals in

his inner secret life as a tàntrika? The answer to these questions may never

really be known, but what seems most likely is that all of this is only an-

other illustration of Woodroffe’s own complex, multifaceted, and in many

ways conflicted personality.36 Above all, it illustrates his own inner

conflicts over the problem of Tantra—a tradition long associated in the

European imagination with sex, violence, and subversion, but which

Woodroffe struggled so much to defend. Tantra, for Woodroffe, could

not be associated with violence and revolutionary dissent, any more than

it could be associated with black magic or hedonistic excess. In Wood-

roffe’s eyes, those radicals who invoked the Tantric goddess in the ser-

vice of revolutionary dissent had misunderstood the true essence of Tan-

tra every bit as much as had the Orientalists who attacked it as idolatrous

and immoral. And yet, as we see from the above quotation, this “reli-

gion of power” remained a troubling problem for Woodroffe; for it is a

power that can lift India to its deserved place beside the West but that

potentially can foster real unrest, bloodshed, and violence.

In sum, the works of Woodroffe present us with a complex and am-

bivalent attempt to reimagine Tantra for a new era. While defending the

philosophical and intellectual side of the tradition, Woodroffe also sub-

mits it to a significant form of deodorization, censoring those practices

that might be offensive to a Western audience. Yet at the same time, it is

clear that Woodroffe was responding to a particular historical situation;

the political context had much to do with how he approached his sub-

ject. In Woodroffe’s hands, Tantra became a double-edged weapon, de-

fending the purity of Hindu culture against its Western critics and against

the destructive materialism of the modern West. Despite the many flaws

and contradictions running throughout his work, Woodroffe’s reformed

version of Tantra continues to have a profound impact on the modern

imagining of Tantra in both India and the West.

Woodroffe himself seems to have anticipated the profound impact that

Tantra would have on the modern West: above all, he believed that the

Tantric reverence for the feminine principle had the potential to meld

with and transform the Western world, serving as the inspiration for a

more egalitarian, democratic, and gender-equal social order:

The full inclusion of the feminine element in public life will be the great fight

of the immediate future, together with the uprising of a complete democ-

racy . . . based on the equal rights . . . of men and women. . . . These circums-

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147

tances, and the manner in which they are capable of being met by the Tantra

Tàstra, give another ground for the belief that some of the . . . principles of

this ancient scripture will become one of the religious influences in modern

life, not . . . superseding Christianity, but in an interaction through which the

Tàkta Tàstra will help as an irritant . . . in the great oyster of Western . . . reli-

gion, to produce the Mother-pearl of a complete and true religious exegesis.37

As we will see in chapter 6, when we explore contemporary American

appropriations of Tantra, Woodroffe’s prediction would perhaps be re-

alized in a form he might never have imagined.

s h a m e , d i s g u s t , a n d f e a r : t a n t r a i n t h e

r a m a k r i s h n a - v i v e k a n a n d a t r a d i t i o n

Shame, disgust, fear—these three must not remain.

Mahendranàth Gupta,

TríMríràmakKãJakathàmKta (1902)

The path of the Vedas is not meant for the Kali yuga.

The path of Tantra is efficacious. . . . Do you mean to

say that one cannot follow the path of Tantra? That

which is Brahman is also Takti, Kàlí.

“Knowing the secret that Kàlí is one with the highest

Brahman, I have discarded once and for all, both righ-

teousness and sin.”

Swami Nikhilananda, trans.,

The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna (1942)

In Woodroffe’s strategy to censor and cover up the more scandalous, im-

moral aspects of the tantra s, while emphasizing their loftier philosophi-

cal dimensions, we find a rather different kind of censorship at work in

the teachings of neo-Hindu authors like Swami Vivekananda. As a dis-

ciple of the enigmatic Tàkta mystic and mad “child of Kàlí,” Sri Ra-

makrishna, yet also embarrassed by much of his master’s erratic behav-

ior, Vivekananda held a far more ambivalent attitude toward the tantra s.

Like Woodroffe, Vivekananda was a defender of Hindu culture against

the West’s criticisms as well as a severe critic of the West. And he too de-

veloped a strategy of “censorship,” which he applied above all to the

often scandalous, embarrassing teachings of the tantra s. Yet his censor-

ing strategy was not aimed so much at trying to purify Tantra, but in-

stead at glossing over the Tantric elements within his own tradition.

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The Secret Back-Door or Latrine Entrance of the Tantric Path:

Ramakrishna’s Ambivalent Relation to the Tantra s

That very thing about which it has been said in the

Vedas and PuràJas, “don’t do this, that would be bad

behavior,” in the tantra s has been called good.

Gupta, TríMríràmakKãJakathàmKta

Sakti-sadhana is no joke. There are very strenuous

and dangerous practices in it. I passed two years as the

Mother’s “hand-maid” and “friend.” Mine, however,

is the mood of the “child,” and to me the breasts of

any women are like unto my mother’s.

Sri Ramakrishna, Sayings of Sri Ramakrishna (1949)

Hailed today as a national hero and as an avatàr for the modern age,

revered worldwide by disciples of virtually every nationality, Sri Rama-

krishna (figure 9) is surely one of the most important holy men of the

modern world and one of the most enigmatic figures in modern Indian

history. Born Gadàdhara Caååopàdhyày to a poor Brahman family in

1836, Ramakrishna spent most of his life as a priest of Kàlí at the tem-

ple of Daksineswar, north of Calcutta. An intense visionary mystic, who

reported a series of remarkable spiritual encounters with the dark

mother Kàlí and with a host of other divine beings, Ramakrishna came

to be regarded by his disciples not merely as a charismatic holy man;

rather, he was progressively identified as an avatàr, a divine incarnation

for this most dangerous of eras in the Kali yuga of India under colonial

rule.

Today, Ramakrishna is most widely regarded as a spokesman of reli-

gious universalism and tolerance. All religious traditions, according to the

usual interpretation of Ramakrishna’s teachings, are so many paths lead-

ing to the same summit, to one supreme truth embracing all human be-

ings, cultures, and religious views. Ramakrishna has thus been revered by

both Indian and European authors as a prophet of religious harmony, who

was as comfortable worshiping Jesus or Muhammad as he was praising

KKãJa, and who saw the inner unity of all religions in the encompassing

vision of Hindu Vedànta.38 However, as a variety of recent scholars have

argued, this usual interpretation of Ramakrishna is at best simplistic and

at worst deeply colored by the views of Vivekananda and other disciples.

Kripal, for example, argues that Ramakrishna’s teachings are much less

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Figure 9. Sri Ramakrishna. From Swami Nikhilananda, trans.,

The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna (New York: Ramakrishna-

Vivekananda Center, 1942).

about the highly abstract and intellectual system of Advaita Vedànta than

about a profoundly sensual, mystical encounter with the terrible Mother

Kàlí, in her most frighteningly sexual and violent forms.39

One of the most troubling and controversial aspects of Ramakrishna’s

personality is his relation to Tantra. “Everything about a tàntrika is se-

cret,” the master warned, “that’s why not everyone understands a tàn-

trika [tàntriker sab gopan. tài tàntrikke sab bojhà jày nài].” 40 Ramakrishna

was from the beginning a devotee of Kàlí in her most terrifying forms;

his rich visionary life was filled with often violent and erotic images of

the Dark Mother. He was, moreover, introduced to many of the most

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esoteric Tantric rites, particularly during his period of study with the mys-

terious female guru Bhairaví BràhmaJí. Under Bhairaví’s guidance, from

1861 to 1863, Ramakrishna was initiated into at least the first four of

the five M’s, engaging in such transgressive acts as eating fish cooked in

a human skull and tasting rotten human flesh. “Having heard that the

Divine Mother sometimes assumes the form of Tiva, and that dogs are

the bearers of Bhairava, he ate the leftovers of dogs as if they were pure”

(LP 1.206). Elsewhere he declared, “I saw with my own eyes [God]

dwelling in the vagina. I saw [God] in the sexual intercourse of a dog

and a bitch.”41 Many of Ramakrishna’s intense visions were colored by

his Tantric experience:

Sri Ramakrishna set himself to the task of practicing the disciplines of Tan-

tra; and at the bidding of the Divine Mother he accepted Brahmani as his

Guru. . . . He practiced all the disciplines of the sixty-four principal Tantra

books. . . . After the observance of a few preliminary rites, he would be

overwhelmed with a strange divine fervor and would go into samàdhi. . . .

Evil ceased to exist for him. The word “carnal” lost its meaning. The whole

world and everything in it appeared as the lílà, the sport of Tiva and Takti.

He beheld everywhere manifest the power and beauty of the Mother.42

Initially, Ramakrishna was very suspicious of the dark powerful rites

of the tantra s; yet he gradually came to accept them as one possible—

albeit dangerous and potentially destructive—path to the divine. Hence

he compares the Tantric path to entering a house through the “latrine

door,” instead of through the front door: it is a way to reach God, but

a path by which one “gets very filthy”:

This too is a path for reaching God—

But this path is a very filthy [noGgrà] one.

Just as there are various doors for entering a house,

by some doors one enters the front room;

and by some doors one can enter the inner chambers,

but there is a separate door for the Sweeper [methar, i.e., the latrine door].43

In any case, this period of practicing the “filthy path” of the Tantras rep-

resented a pivotal moment in the saint’s spiritual life, a moment in which

he realized the all-pervasive power of the Goddess in all things, pure or

impure—what he described as a “fundamental transformation of his en-

tire nature (pÜrva svabhàver àmÜla parivartana)” (LP 1.212).

Indeed, Kripal has gone so far as to argue that Ramakrishna’s life and

teachings not only are influenced by, but are fundamentally rooted in and

shaped by, the powerful, frightening world of Tantra: “Ramakrishna was

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a Tàntrika,” with his feet planted firmly in Tantric soil, Kripal concludes;

yet at the same time, the saint himself felt intense ambivalence, shame,

and embarrassment about his Tantric background and denied his own

Tantric tendencies: “Tantra for Ramakrishna was . . . a grave and omi-

nous tradition of teachings and techniques that haunted him, that

horrified him, and yet somehow formed who he was. Tantra was Ra-

makrishna’s secret.”44 Above all, Ramakrishna was particularly am-

bivalent about the infamous fifth M, maithuna, or sexual union, in which

he ultimately refused to engage and which he always seems to have re-

garded as a particularly dangerous practice.

Narendra: “Isn’t it true that the Tantra prescribes spiritual discipline in the

company of women?”

Master: “That is not desirable. It is a very difficult path and often causes

the aspirant’s downfall.”45

Even in his intimate practice with Bhairaví, the saint remained ever chaste

and unsullied by the taint of sexual contact. He seems to have been quite

terrified by the idea of actual sexual relations with a woman, choosing

instead the attitude of a “child toward its mother”: “Just as my attitude

towards all women, that of a child towards its mother, remained un-

shaken during the long period of practice according to the tantra s”

(LP 1.206).46

Yet even the chaste and pure Ramakrishna seems to have felt power-

fully conflicted, attracted by sensual lust and yet terrified of union with

a female body: “it should not be supposed that his self control was an

easy matter. . . . Ramakrishna frankly admitted that he was attacked by

lust.”47 As Kripal argues, this profound ambivalence about the trans-

gressive power of Tantric sexuality is embedded in the saint’s psyche and

lies at the heart of much of his visionary life:

There are good historical reasons why Tantra has been overlooked for so

long, not the least of which is Ramakrishna’s own profound ambivalence

toward the tradition. If he consistently associated Tantra with the latrine, it

was because he himself . . . was disgusted with the dark abusive side of the

tradition. All these emotional reactions . . . made Tantra for Ramakrishna

a thing of almost limitless and so terrifying power.48

Going still further, however, Kripal makes the more daring argument

that much of the root of the saint’s intense ambivalence about Tantric

sexuality was his conflicted feeling about his own sexual orientation—

specifically, the homoerotic impulses and desires which, Kripal suggests,

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recurred throughout the saint’s life and manifested themselves vividly in

his intense mystical experiences. For while Tantric practice requires that

the sàdhaka become a masculine hero and engage in ritual sexual inter-

course, “for a homoerotic saint like Ramakrishna, such a . . . ritual ne-

cessity led to serious conflict and emotional pain.”49

Kripal’s rereading of Ramakrishna’s life from a Tantric perspective

has not, however, gone unchallenged. On the contrary, at the same time

that it has been praised by the academic community and granted a ma-

jor award from the American Academy of Religion, it has also generated

intense controversy and furor within the Indian community. In a full-

page review in Calcutta’s major English paper, The Statesman, Naras-

ingha Sil decried Kripal as a sloppy, sensationalist, and scandal-mongering

scholar with a perverse imagination, who has ransacked another culture

and produced a work that is, in short, “plain shit” (this review has since

generated more reader mail, against Kripal’s book, than any printed in

the two-hundred-year history of the paper).

Kripal’s enterprise is a classic example of what happens when an author’s

clever use of dictionary, index card and intelligence without an understand-

ing of the . . . culture of people other than his ethnic group but with a pre-

tension to insider’s knowledge . . . produces a psychoanalysis of the . . .

experience of a saint from another religion.50

The book has thus been attacked by some Indian intellectuals as an in-

sidious form of neocolonialism and the exploitation of exoticized Indian

religious traditions in the form of slickly produced paperbacks. Much of

this controversy, it would seem, has arisen precisely because Kripal

pointed to the deeply embarrassing problem of Ramakrishna’s Tantric

past and his ties to the troubling world of transgressive sexuality. And

as a consequence, Kripal’s own book—not unlike the Tantric life of Ra-

makrishna itself—has now been subjected to a powerful form of cen-

sorship and silencing, ironically now itself “becoming a secret.”51

If Tantra was a matter of ambivalence and discomfort for Rama-

krishna, then it seems to have been an even more embarrassing problem

for his disciples. Indeed, it appears that the dominant tradition within

the Ramakrishna Mission has made a consistent effort to censor, cover

up, and conceal much of the saint’s troubling Tantric past. As Kripal

and others have pointed out, the Bengali text of the TríMríràmakKã-

JakathàmKta was in many ways profoundly bowdlerized, edited, and san-

itized in its English translation, The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, by Swami

Nikhilananda; most of the objectionable sexual references either were

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153

concealed with innocuous euphemisms or deleted altogether. “A highly

cultivated individual in charge of one of the largest RàmakKãJa missions

in the United States . . . Nikhilànanda frequently excised RàmakKãJa’s

vulgar expressions with explicitly sexual connotations.”52 In the process,

Ramakrishna—this intense, ecstatic, devotee of Kàlí—was progressively

transformed into a prophet of philosophical monism, religious univer-

salism, and Hindu nationalism.

Still more striking, however, is the fact that there are other early biog-

raphies of the saint, which were later ignored, marginalized, and sup-

pressed by the mainstream tradition. The oldest known biography of the

saint is Ramàcandra Datta’s TríMríràmakKãJa ParamahaFsadever Jívan-

avKttànta (1890)—a text that offers a more explicitly Tàkta Tantric view

of the saint’s life, largely ignoring Vivekananda’s neo-Vedàntic inter-

pretation (it does not mention Vivekananda at all).53 Not surprisingly,

this text was severely criticized and angrily dismissed by Vivekananda

and his followers: “I am simply ashamed of the Bengali book,” the Swami

declared, dubbing it “bosh and rot.” 54 As Kripal concludes, there has

been intense debate within the movement from the outset, much of it

centering around Ramakrishna’s troubling sexual life: “From the very

first biography, attempts to represent the historical Ramakrishna have

been contested, argued over and rejected. . . . [O]ne of the central themes

of this debate has been . . . the nature and religious importance of Rama-

krishna’s secret sexuality.”55 So too, the intense furor and scandal over

Kripal’s own book only proves that the saint’s Tantric past remains a

painful source of embarrassment for the later tradition. Regardless of the

ultimate truth or falsehood of Kripal’s thesis, it is obvious that the very

suggestion that Ramakrishna—this national hero and avatàr for the age

of darkness—might have had a sordid Tantric past has touched a deep,

unhealed wound that lies buried at the innermost heart of the tradition.

Swami Vivekananda and the Transformation of Tantric Madness

into Neo-Hindu Religious Nationalism

It is not only that we must revive our own country. . . .

[M]y idea is the conquest of the whole world by the

Hindu race. . . .

[W]e must conquer the world through our spiritual-

ity . . . we must do it or die. The only condition of . . .

awakened and vigorous national life is the conquest of

the world by Indian thought.

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As our country is poor in social virtues, this country

[America] is lacking in spirituality. I give them spiritu-

ality, and they give me money.

Swami Vivekananda to Ramakrishnananda (19 March 1894)

Surely the most influential of Ramakrishna’s disciples, and also the one

most deeply troubled by his master’s Tantric past, was the great neo-

Hindu leader and religious nationalist Swami Vivekananda.56 Born

Narendra Nath Datta to a comfortable middle-class family, Vivekananda

is today best known as the first great missionary of Hinduism to the West.

With his famous address at the World Parliament of Religions at Chicago

in 1893, Vivekananda began to spread his version of Vedànta through-

out America and England. The most aggressive of Ramakrishna’s early

devotees, Vivekananda would emerge as the man whom Paul Hacker calls

“the most influential shaper and propagandist of the Neo-Hindu spirit,”

and the most powerful exponent of Hindu self-representation vis-à-vis

the West.57 Yet Vivekananda was also an instrumental figure in the trans-

formation of Ramakrishna from a detached visionary mystic and devo-

tee of the Goddess into a national hero and divine avatàr for this dark

age of India under foreign rule. For Vivekananda, Ramakrishna was

the culmination of all Hindu scriptures and revelations, embodying all

the inherited wisdom of the Vedas, Upaniãads, Tàstras, and newly re-

vealing them for this darkest moment in history; “with his birth the golden

Age, the Age of truth had dawned once again.”58 As Vivekananda pro-

claimed, “The time was ripe, it was necessary that such a man should be

born. . . . Sri Ramakrishna [is] the fulfillment of the India sages, the sage

for the time, one whose teaching is just now . . . most beneficial.”59 And

Vivekananda would be the one to receive this avatàr’s divine message

and transform it into a source of national awakening. In the words of

his British disciple Sister Nivedita, “Just as Sri Ramakrishna . . . with-

out knowing any books, had been a living exemplar of the Vedanta, so

was Vivekananda of the national life.”60

Yet Vivekananda’s ideal seems to have been a very different one from

that of his master. In striking contrast to Ramakrishna’s Tantric ten-

dencies, erotic visionary experiences, and childlike devotion to the Dark

Mother, Vivekananda promoted a strong, virile, and masculine ideal of

a reformed Hinduism that could meet the challenge of the West. “Re-

jecting such feminine states, Narendra the Lion begins to preach the

virtues of spiritual manliness and renunciation. . . . Narendra’s songs of

manly renunciation, of Tiva and TaGkara, begin to replace those of

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Kàlí . . . so dear to Ramakrishna.”61 Embarrassed by the image of the

effete babu so ridiculed by the British, Vivekananda advocated an ag-

gressive model of Hindu identity, ready to meet the challenge of the West.

“What our country now wants are muscles of iron and nerves of steel,

gigantic wills which nothing can resist,” the swami admonished his dis-

ciples.62 If India is to realize a new national awakening and take pride

in itself as an independent power, it must overcome its debilitating pas-

sivity and assume a more muscular stance toward the West. “Say brother,

this soil of India is my highest heaven, the good of India is my good. . . .

O thou Mother of the universe, vouchsafe manliness unto me, O thou

Mother of strength, take away my weakness, take away my unmanliness

and make me a Man!”63

Vivekananda’s goal seems to have been nothing less than a spiritual

conquest of the West—what we might call a form of “reverse colonial-

ism” or “spiritual imperialism.” For just as England has conquered and

colonized India through its military might, so now India will conquer

the West through its superior morality: “Vivekananda described the

worldwide propagation of spirituality in militant terms—propagation as

a form of conquest. . . . Armed with the spirituality of Advaita Vedanta,

young Hindu men are given the mission of conquering the world and

reestablishing the power of their own nation.”64 As Narasingha Sil ob-

serves, Vivekananda could thus be described as an “ambitious, idealis-

tic militant monk,” who envisioned a “global spiritual conquest in the

manner of Napoleonic imperialism.”65

Perhaps even more fiercely than Sri Aurobindo or any other twentieth-

century neo-Hindu reformers, Vivekananda constructed a sharp duality

between the cultural worlds of the Occident and Orient—between the

“material West” and “the spiritual East.”66 Throughout his writings, the

West is portrayed as a fundamentally materialistic and shallow world, a

civilization based on wealth and death-dealing weapons, spiritual empti-

ness and the oppression of other countries. With their one-sided materi-

alism, secularism, and rationalism, the Western nations are ruled by the

pursuit of profit, the desire to control, and the “ideal of eating and drink-

ing.” They are “degraded by political ambitions and social schem-

ing. . . . [I]n spite of the sparkle and glitter of Western civilization, in spite

of all its . . . marvelous manifestation of power . . . I tell them to their

face that it is all vain.”67 “You Americans worship what? The dollar. In

the mad rush for gold, you forget the spiritual until you have become a

nation of materialists.”68 India, conversely, is a culture founded on eter-

nal tradition and religion. The timeless Hindu tradition is not only an-

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terior and superior to all other religions of the world, but even the foun-

dation of every other major spiritual tradition. With its supreme philos-

ophy of Advaita Vedànta, Hinduism is also the culmination of all the

world’s religions, which encompasses them all in its universal vision.69

Appropriating the Aryan narrative of the Orientalists— but turning it

completely on its head—Vivekananda even claims that the Hindus are

the purest form of the Aryan race, the most noble, beautiful, and civi-

lized of all the Indo-European peoples. The modern Europeans, con-

versely, represent a kind of degeneration from this pristine Aryan stalk:

To the great tablelands of the high Himalaya mountains first came the

Aryans and there to this day abides the pure type of Brahman, a people

which [the Westerners] can but dream of. Pure in thought, deed and ac-

tion. . . . Their features are regular, their eyes dark and the skin the color

which would be produced by the drops which fell from a pricked finger

into a glass of milk.70

In contrast to this pure Aryan spirit, the English of today are addicted

to alcohol, money, and violence, using their savage strength to bully and

conquer more peaceful, spiritual peoples: “You look about India, what

has the Hindoo left? Wonderful temples everywhere. . . . What has the

Englishman left? Nothing but mounds of broken brandy bottles!”71 “Ah,

the English only just a little while ago were savages, the vermin crawled

on the ladies’ bodices . . . and they scented themselves to disguise the

abominable odor of their persons. . . . They are quite savage. . . . They

only think to kill.”72 Indeed, Vivekananda even goes so far as to suggest

that the Europeans are themselves left-hand tàntrika s of a sort—for they

too worship power (Makti) in its grossest, most physical form, the reli-

gion of force and strength as a brutal end in itself: “Their religion is Sakti

Puja: it is a form of Vamacara—except for the last elements of the five

Ma-karas.”73

Thus Ramakrishna was for Vivekananda the divine incarnation for

this dark age of Western domination, when the evils of materialism had

overrun the earth. Heralding the rebirth of the Golden Age, Ramakrishna

embodied the culmination of the whole long history of Hindu tradition,

now bursting forth to meet the threat of Western domination: this divine

avatàr “came to save the Indians from the spell of the worldly glamour

of Western culture.”74

Yet at the same time, as Halbfass argues, Vivekananda’s thought was

itself very much informed by Western values, ideals, and modes of rea-

soning. He denounced the West largely by using the tools and lenses of

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modern Western criticism: “He adopts Western motifs of self-criticism . . .

and transforms them into aspects of Hindu self-assertion. . . . [H]e demon-

strates the extent to which the Neo-Hindu dialogue with the West em-

ploys or presupposes Western means of self-reflection and self-critique.”75

As King points out, Vivekananda assimilated many Western stereotypes

of India—above all, the image of India as land of mysticism, spiritual-

ity, and otherworldliness, in contrast to the science, technology, and ma-

terial wealth of West.76 However, the swami also actively attempted to

incorporate and adapt certain key Western values. This is particularly

evident in Vivekananda’s ideal of a kind of “practical Vedànta”—that is,

a form of Vedànta that would also incorporate the positive Western val-

ues of social action, work ethics, charity, and social mobility: “The Hindu

should make the organizational abilities, the pragmatic orientation, the

work ethic, the social virtues and the scientific power of Europe . . . their

own. They should overcome their lethargy and advance to new vigor and

self-confidence.”77

At the same time, Vivekananda adopted many of the structures and

strategies of one of his foremost rivals in the spiritual marketplace—

the Christian missionaries. Armed with his “gospel of Ramakrishna,”

Vivekananda established his own Ramakrishna Mission and aggressively

proselytized his message using many tactics appropriated from the Bap-

tist Missionary Society and other Christian groups working in Bengal:

“What I want is a band of fiery missionaries,” the swami declared; for

“the monk . . . is the soldier of God.”78 In sum, it would seem that even

as he attacked the evils of the West and asserted the superiority of Ad-

vaita Vedànta, Vivekananda already had assimilated a largely Western

ideology, which informs much of his construction of Hinduism and In-

dian culture: “He is not willing or able to see how far he has removed

himself from the position of TaGkara and how much he has yielded to

those Western means of orientation against which he desires to assert

Hinduism.”79

“Sex-Love and Creation”:

The Ambivalence and Embarrassment of Tantra

Sex-love and creation! These are at the root of most

religions. . . . How few have dared to worship Death or

Kali! Let us embrace the Terrible, because it is terrible,

not asking that it be toned down.

Swami Vivekananda, “Sayings and Utterances” (1926)

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Given his commitment to the defense of Hinduism and the strength of the

Indian nation, it is not surprising that Vivekananda should have been par-

ticularly embarrassed by the transgressive practices of the tantra s. Vive-

kananda was even more ambivalent than his master had been about the

dark power of Tantra and Mother Kàlí. The swami clearly inherited many

of the biases of the European Orientalists, often identifying Tantra as the

worst example of everything that was wrong with Indian religion and

everything most in need of reform if India were to achieve this new self-

definition and this spiritual conquest of the Western world. Like Ràm-

mohun before him, he laments that the pristine vision of the Vedas and

Upaniãads gradually has been perverted, corrupted, and displaced by the

vulgar superstition of the tantra s: “Vivekananda deplores that the truly

authoritative Veda is eclipsed . . . by the Puranas and Tantras, documents

of an increasing historical degeneration.”80 And like many other Hindu

authors of his day, he located the origins of this crippling Tantric disease,

not within the Hindu tradition or India itself, but in the barbarous foreign

lands of central Asia and in the licentious rites of the Buddhists of Tibet.

From central Asia the cruel barbarians came, having established their terri-

ble practices in their own land; in order to attract the ignorant barbarians

the true path took on the form of the Tantras and Mantras; and that is why

when they became misunderstood, weakened and corrupt . . . they resulted

in the terrible abominations of Vamacara and barbaric practices.81

The Tantrick practices of Tibet . . . came to India during the final stages of

the Buddhist religion . . . the Buddhists were the origin and essence of

all the Tantras which are now current among us. . . . And when Buddhism

became impotent because of this kind of immorality, they were driven out

by Kumarila Bhatta.82

Hence the swami makes it clear that left-hand Tantra is absolutely forbid-

den for the monks of the Ramakrishna mission; indeed, they are explicitly

warned not even to speak of such horrible rites, on threat of expulsion

from the order:

The Vamachara form of practice . . . should on no account be practised at

the Math. Anyone demuring to this must step out of this Order. This form

of practice must never even be mentioned in the Math. Ruin shall seize the

wicked man, both here and hereafter, who would introduce vile Vamachara

into His fold.83

As Agehananda Bharati comments, Vivekananda was thus at the van-

guard of the reformist attempt to purify Hinduism of its unsavory erotic

elements. In doing so, however, he also imbibed many of the puritanical

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values of the Christian missionaries whom he so reviled: “Vivekananda

was the first who, fighting the Christian missionary, adopted the latter’s

denigration of Eros, and began to unsex the Hindu pantheon.”84

Religious Nationalism, Anticolonialism, and the Problem of Tantra

Give up this filthy Vamachara that is killing your

country.

Swami Vivekananda,

“The Vedanta in All Its Phases” (1926)

Much of Vivekananda’s ambivalent attitude toward Tantra seems to be

closely tied to his unique form of religious nationalism and his attempts

to rebuild India’s self-respect as a strong, powerful nation. For “his was

a message of national awakening. The message was one of activity and

strength, as well as of conscious action for the masses.”85 As Partha Chat-

terjee suggests, a key part of this nationalism was the creation of a new

narrative of Indian history that retold the story of India’s past and as-

serted the strength and autonomy of the Indian people as shapers of their

own destiny: “the call sent out by Bankimchandra—We have no history,

We must have a history!—implied an exhortation to launch the struggle

of power, because in this mode of recalling the past, the power to repre-

sent oneself is nothing other than political power itself.”86 However, much

of this narrative was borrowed from the European Orientalists—namely,

the Orientalist narrative of a pristine Golden Age, a period of medieval

decline, and finally a rejuvenation or renaissance in the modern era: “For

Indian nationalists . . . the pattern of classical glory, medieval decline and

modern renaissance appeared as one that was . . . approved for India.

What was needed was to claim for the Indian nation the historical agency

for completing the project of modernity.”87

At the same time, this imagining of the Indian nation—the construc-

tion of a singular, unified, imagined community out of the bewildering di-

versity of ethnicities, cultures, and languages that comprise the peoples of

the subcontinent—went hand-in-hand with the imagining of Hinduism—

the construction of singular, unified, “imagined religion” out of the be-

wildering diversity of rituals, beliefs, deities, and traditions that comprise

the living practice of India. As King points out, the Hindu nationalists,

who fought so valiantly against European political domination, ironi-

cally adapted the European model of both the nation-state and the “world

religion” in their constructions of Hinduism and the Indian nation:

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The invention of Hinduism as a single world religion was accompanied

by the rise of a nationalist consciousness in India. . . . The modern nation-

state . . . is a product of European socio-political and economic develop-

ments . . . and the introduction of the nationalist model into Asia is a

further legacy of European imperialism. . . . It is somewhat ironic to find

that the very Hindu nationalists who fought so vehemently against British

imperialist rule themselves accepted the homogenizing concepts of nation-

hood and Hinduism which ultimately derived from their imperial rulers.88

For Hindu reformers like Vivekananda, the tantra s became an impor-

tant part of this new imagining of both the Indian nation and the Hindu

tradition as a singular great “world religion.” For the tantra s were pre-

cisely the debilitating disease that had weakened the noble Hindu spirit,

leading to its medieval decline and opening the door for the Muslim in-

vasion. It is the lingering illness of left-hand Tantra that has allowed the

British to penetrate and dominate this weakened country; and therefore,

it is only by eradicating this insidious Tantric influence that the nation

can regain her original strength and be restored to her rightful auton-

omy. To this day, degenerate Vàmàcàra Tantra pervades the very “mar-

row” of the body politic, emasculating the nation and sapping its vital

strength. Only by purging this demoralizing parasite can India recover

its virile, masculine power:

Just look to your own province and see how this Vamachara (immoral

practices) of the Tantras has entered into your very marrow. Even modern

Vaishnavism . . . is saturated with Vamachara! We must stem the tide of

this Vamachara which is contrary to the spirit of the Vedas.89

Give up this filthy Vamachara that is killing your country. . . . When I

see how much the Vamachara has entered into our society, I find it a most

disgraceful place with all its boast of culture. These Vamachara secrets are

honeycombing our society in Bengal. . . . The Bengali Shastras are the Vama-

chara shastras. They are published by the cartload and you poison the

minds of your children with them. . . . Fathers of Calcutta, do you not feel

ashamed that such horrible stuff as these Vamachara Tantras . . . should be

put into the hands of your boys and girls, and their minds poisoned, and

that they should be brought up with the idea that these are the Shastras of

the Hindus? If you are ashamed, take them away from your children and

let them read the true Shastras, the Vedas, the Gita and the Upanishads.90

The category of Tantra might thus be said to have functioned in relation

to the imagining of the Indian nation in much the same way that it func-

tioned in relation to the imagining of Hinduism as a whole: it represented

the dark underbelly, the corrupt, degenerate side of the tradition, and the

antithesis or parodic inversion against which the nation defined itself.

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161

The Embarrassment of Tantra and the Problem of Ramakrishna

For fear of the Tantras, for fear of the mob, in his at-

tempt to cure a boil, he amputated the very arm itself!

Swami Vivekananda to Akhandananda (1890)

Despite his fierce criticisms of Tantra, Vivekananda’s attitude toward it

was in fact quite ambivalent. After all, he was born into a Bengali world

that was saturated with traditions commonly identified as “Tantric,” such

as bloody worship of the violent goddesses Kàlí and Durgà, and he was

the disciple of the enigmatic Ramakrishna, a man whose visions were

filled with highly erotic Tàkta imagery. “There are . . . symptomatic

changes and ambiguities in his attitude towards Tantrism which he often

condemned publicly and yet accepted . . . as an essential ingredient of

his . . . Bengali identity.”91 Hence, he often speaks more sympathetically

of the Tantras, acknowledging that they too are rooted in the Vedas, as

a kind of practical adaptation of Vedic ritual, which is the common form

of practice for most Hindus today:

Barring some of the abominable things in the Tantras . . . they are not so bad

as people are inclined to think. There are many high and sublime Vedantic

thoughts in them. . . . All the forms of our worship and the ceremonials of

the present day, comprising the Karma Kanda, are observed in accordance

with the Tantras.92

At times, the swami speaks quite apologetically for the tantra s, suggest-

ing that they are in their original spirit essentially valid Hindu scriptures

that were only later corrupted by degenerate Buddhism and the obscene

rites of the left-hand (Vàmàcàra) path:

I denounced only the present corrupted form of Vamachara of the Tantras.

I did not denounce the Mother worship of the Tantras. . . . The purport of

the Tantras is to worship women in a spirit of Divinity. During the down-

fall of Buddhism, the Vamachara became very much corrupted, and that

corrupted form obtains to the present. . . . I denounced only these corrupt . . .

practices.93

Vivekananda’s ambivalence toward Tantra is particularly obvious when

it comes to the mysterious life of his master, Ramakrishna. Even upon

his first meetings with the master, when he was a college student, Naren-

dra was “scandalized by the bizarre behavior of the ‘madman’ of Dakãi-

neMvar.”94 Throughout his life, Vivekananda seemed disturbed by the

saint’s odd, at times openly erotic, behavior, and he went to some lengths

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to assert that his master was not in fact one of these scandalous, trans-

gressive tàntrika s: “Some are saying that Ramakrishna was a Tantrika

and a Kaula . . . but do not listen to such one-sided estimates.”95 Instead,

the swami constructed an image of his master as a living icon of Advaita

Vedànta, an embodiment of lofty speculations and the universal ideal of

TaGkara’s absolute nondualism. Written as they were within a particu-

lar social context (colonial Bengal at the turn of the century) for a specific

audience (middle-class Bengalis strongly influenced by the West), Viveka-

nanda’s comments on Ramakrishna might be said to “fail miserably to

meet the standards of historical accuracy and scholarly objectivity.” For

“like so many of the photographs we have of the saint, Ramakrishna’s

image has been ‘touched up’ in their writings, even painted over, in or-

der to cover up some of his more troubling wrinkles and undesirable

features.”96

In fact, it seems that Vivekananda tried in various ways to conceal his

master’s strange sexual visions and involvement in the dark realm of Tan-

tra. He decided that it was best not to speak much about his master be-

fore Western audiences during his trips to England and America, for fear

that they would only misunderstand Ramakrishna’s more disturbing

Tantric side. As Thomas Bryson observes, “Vivekananda was hesitant to

present the life of his Guru . . . to Westerners because Ramakrishna’s life

was so extraordinary and alien to Western understanding”; and when

he did speak of him, it was surely not as a tàntrika but as a “great teacher,

saint and prophet,” and as a spokesman for Advaita Vedànta.97 Thus

he explicitly instructed his disciples to be circumspect in their portrayal

of the master, making sure not to reveal any of the more embarrassing

aspects of his (at times scandalous) life: “he warned his followers that in

writing Ramakrishna’s life for a Western audience, they must ‘avoid all

irregular indecent expositions about sex.’”98 They were not to speak of

anything that touched too closely upon the sexual content of the mas-

ter’s teachings, which would be misunderstood easily and were “quite

unsuitable for young minds.”99

Vivekananda seems to be aware that there was some discrepancy be-

tween the master’s own life and his representation of it—for even Ra-

makrishna had not understood himself, and it was left to his disciples to

interpret the meaning of his intense life and experiences: “He did not un-

derstand himself. He knew nothing of England or the English. . . . But

he lived a great life and I read the meaning. He knew nothing of Vedànta,

nothing of theories! He was contented to live that great life, and let others

explain!”100

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163

Thus it would seem that Vivekananda subjected his own master to a

form of censorship, covering over those troubling Tantric elements that

lingered in the saint’s complex personality. One might well impute to

Vivekananda the sort of behavior that he himself once identified in the

Vedànta sage TaGkara: that he attacked and rejected a darker religious

practice, Buddhism, for fear its degenerate Tantric element would infect

the Hindu tradition: “For fear of the Tantras . . . in his attempt to cure

a boil, he amputated the very arm itself!”

In sum, Tantra was for Vivekananda—and for many reformers of the

early twentieth century—a crucial element in the reimagining of both the

Hindu religion and the Indian nation. It was a shameful reminder of all

that was most embarrassing about India’s past and that stood in the way

of her strength, autonomy, and independence. As we can see in the case

of Sri Ramakrishna, the avatàr for a new age of Hindu renaissance, the

tantra s would remain a dark secret at the very heart of the tradition. Never

fully suppressed or censored, the tantra s continue to plague the domi-

nant tradition as its embarrassing secret, a troubling reminder of the sen-

suality, violence, and scandal that lies beneath the surface of the most

rational philosophical abstractions and the noblest political aspirations.

“ m e n m i s u n d e r s t a n d o n e a n o t h e r e v e r y w h e r e ”

Unfortunately . . . [the Tantras’] intentions have been

so grossly misrepresented in our days that the very name

of Tantra shocks our nerves; yet two thirds of our reli-

gious rites are Tantrik, and almost half our medicine

is Tantrik.

K. C. Chakravarti, Lectures on the Hindu Religion (1893)

I think it is possible that Hindus may have misunder-

stood Buddhists and Buddhists Hindus. Men misunder-

stand one another everywhere.

Woodroffe to Lama Kazi Dawasamdup (26 May 1919)

Together, the works of Woodroffe and Vivekananda represent two si-

multaneous, highly influential, yet ultimately unsuccessful attempts to

reform the depiction of Tantra in the modern imagination. Each in his

own way subjected Tantra to a kind of censorship—in Woodroffe’s case,

by covering over its more transgressive and immoral aspects, and in

Vivekananda’s case, by attacking the left-hand side of the tradition and

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trying to conceal the embarrassing aspects of his own master’s Tantric

practice.

For both authors, moreover, this sanitization of Tantra was tied to a

specific political agenda: namely, the construction of a new Indian na-

tional and cultural identity in the face of two centuries of British colo-

nialism. In their dichotomy of the spiritual East and material West, Tan-

tra was a troubling presence—a part of the spiritual East that seemed

disturbingly “material” and frighteningly sensual. It had to be sanitized

and spiritualized, therefore, or else suppressed.

Yet neither of these attempts at censorship and sanitization would

prove very successful in the end. As Kripal’s controversial work has made

clear, the dark side of Ramakrishna’s Tantric past remains a source of

embarrassment for the Ramakrishna Mission and for the Hindu tradi-

tion as whole. Neither Woodroffe nor Vivekananda succeeded in puri-

fying Tantra or in excising it from the Hindu tradition; if anything, their

work has only fanned the fires, piquing the interests of later generations

in a tradition that was a source of such titillating scandal and agonizing

debate.

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c h a p t e r 5

Religion for the

Age of Darkness

Tantra and the History of Religions

in the Twentieth Century

The Tantra may be regarded as the religious experience most

appropriate to the present condition of man—to life in the

kali yuga, the age of darkness. . . . Humanity is fallen: it is

now a case of swimming against the stream. . . . The tàntrika

does not renounce the world; he tries to overcome it while

enjoying perfect freedom.

Mircea Eliade,

Myths, Dreams, and Mysteries (1960)

Following in the wake of John Woodroffe’s heroic defense of Tantra, a

new wave of scholars began to take an active interest in, and often a

strange preoccupation with, the teachings of the Tantras. Many of the

greatest European Indologists and scholars of comparative religion, such

as Mircea Eliade, Agehananda Bharati, and even C. G. Jung, were ex-

tremely interested in Tantra and in some cases saw it as the very essence

of Eastern spirituality.1 At the same time, a new generation of Indian

scholars also began to take an interest in Tantra, which they saw as one

of the most primordial forms of Indian religions. Thus D. N. Bose and

Hiralal Haldar praise Tantra as a tradition deeply rooted in the Vedas

and as the “standard bearer of Aryan culture.”2 Thus, whereas some au-

thors have lamented the neglect of Tantra in modern discourse, I would

argue, on the contrary, that we might even speak of a “Tantrocentrism”

at the heart of the history of religions. This is a trend that runs parallel

to what Steven Wasserstrom calls the “esocentrism” of the modern study

of religion, or the preoccupation with the mystical, interior side of reli-

165

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gion, to the neglect of its more mundane, practical, and social dimen-

sions. Similarly, the modern study of Eastern religions has often been

characterized by a central preoccupation with Tantra, as the most erotic

and alluring aspect of the exotic Orient itself.3

For both Indian and European authors, moreover, the scholarly imag-

ining of Tantra has had profound political implications, tied to the cul-

tural, economic, and nationalist interests of those who studied it. Indeed,

the history of scholarship on Tantra is in many ways a political history

of the history of religions as an academic discipline; for it has been tied

from its inception to larger questions, not just of colonialism and nation-

alism, but also to the re-formation of political identities in the aftermath

of imperialism and in the decades of the Cold War.4

In what follows, I will examine five exemplary figures, three Europeans

and two Indians. On the European side, surely among the three most in-

fluential modern scholars of religion were also among the most widely

read authors on the subject of Tantra: Heinrich Zimmer, Julius Evola,

and Mircea Eliade. These three have had a formative impact on the fields

of Indology (in the case of Zimmer), esotericism and right-wing politics

(Evola), and comparative religions (Eliade). And all three felt a strong

attraction to Tantra, a tradition that they defined as the culmination of all

Indian thought: the most radical form of spirituality and the archaic heart

of aboriginal India. There are, of course, other important scholars who

could be mentioned here, such as the Italian Buddhologist Giuseppe Tucci

and the Austrian convert to Hinduism Agehananda Bharati, both of whom

played important roles in the study of Tantra. However, because these

two have been discussed by others (most notably by Gustavo Benevides

and Jeffrey Kripal), I only mention them in passing in this chapter.5

But why this special preoccupation with the sexy, steamy world of

Tantra among the most influential modern scholars of religions? As I will

argue, each of these three regarded Tantra as the ideal religion for the mod-

ern era. In what they described as this modern “age of darkness,” they

felt an intense sense of dislocation and a longing for an idyllic traditional

past. As Benevides has argued in his study of Giuseppe Tucci, this feel-

ing of loss and nostalgia was true of many European intellectuals in the

early decades of this century, who shared a profound disillusionment with

the rapid changes of modernity and the “dislocations that took place in

Europe as a result of industrialization and urbanization.” As Europe

shifted from a stable, traditional agrarian world to the changing, uprooted

world of the modern city, many felt a longing for “a world not touched

by the icy winds of modernity.”6 Some would try to return to a more tra-

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167

ditional religious spirit; some would turn to right-wing political move-

ments; and some would turn to the still fixed, unmodernized, “Tradi-

tional” world of the Orient.

Long imagined to be the most exotic of all forms of Eastern religions,

and the one most opposed to the modern West, Tantra seemed to provide

an ideal solution to modern man’s spiritual crises. It appeared to offer a

means of affirming this material world, in all its sensuality and passion,

while at the same time transforming this world into a means to spiritual

liberation. Still more strikingly, Zimmer, Eliade, and Evola all saw Tan-

tra as the most transgressive and violent path to the sacred—beyond good

and evil, in violation of conventional law. This fact is all the more note-

worthy when we recall that each of these authors underwent intense

personal transformation during the violent years of the two world wars.

Having encountered the horror, violence, and amorality of war, they

each turned to Tantra as the most appropriate—perhaps unavoidable—

religion for this darkest, most violent of epochs.

Simultaneously, Tantra began to play a central role in modern Indian

scholarship. In India, too, the imagining of Tantra was intimately tied to

the shifting political landscape in the decades after independence. For some,

like Gopinath Kaviraj, Tantra was not only the culminating synthesis of

Indian philosophy, but even the most needed solution to the crises of the

modern age; indeed, it is the means to achieve a kind of collective liber-

ation for all humanity. For others, like Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya, Tan-

tra could be interpreted from a more explicitly political perspective,

through the lens of Marxist theory. Thus Tantra becomes for Bhatta-

charyya the religion of the oppressed masses, rooted in a kind of primi-

tive socialism and the precapitalist ideals of agrarian labor and matriarchy.

The “age of darkness” in this case is a world dominated by economic

exploitation and the alienation of the masses. Tantra thus emerges as an

ideological weapon and instrument of critique, as evidence of a primi-

tive communal mode of life that is more basic to human existence than

class divisions or private property.

t h e p a t h o f p o w e r a n d t h e d a r k a g e o f m o d e r n i t y :

t w e n t i e t h - c e n t u r y e u r o p e a n s c h o l a r s h i p o n t a n t r a

Tantrism, like yoga and Vedànta . . . could be respect-

able even in the Western world, provided that the tra-

dition of solid scholarship, of learning and of intellec-

tual effort . . . did accompany their migration into the

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occidental world. Without these, I regard them as

fraudulent.

Agehananda Bharati, The Tantric Tradition (1970)

The modern imagining of Tantra was born in large part out of the dialec-

tical interplay between two very different ways of conceptualizing it—

at one extreme, the denigration of Tantra by the European Orientalists,

and at the other, the rationalization and purification of Tantra by John

Woodroffe. It is this dual inheritance that informs the work of many his-

torians of religions of the twentieth century, particularly Zimmer, Evola,

and Eliade. As Bharati predicted, Tantra first entered the West, not

through spiritual proselytizers, but through scholars and intellectuals,

who saw in Tantra an alternative worldview to that of the modern West.

Each of these three scholars in some sense accepted the Orientalist as-

sumption that Tantra embodies, in all its Otherness, the most extreme

aspect of the Indian mind. But at the same time, they also turned the Ori-

entalist model on its head, praising Tantra as a much-needed affirmation

of the human body and sexuality. “In the Tantra,” as Zimmer put it, “the

manner of approach is not that of Nay but of Yea . . . the world attitude

is affirmative. . . . [M]an must approach through and by means of na-

ture, not by rejection of nature.”7

Tantra was a central element, not only in the academic writings of

Zimmer, Evola, and Eliade, but also in the personal lives and the schol-

arly method of each of these authors. Yet despite their agreement as to

the centrality of Tantra, each would offer very different interpretations

in light of their own personal and political interests: Zimmer, as a lib-

eral fleeing Nazi Germany with his Jewish wife; Evola, as an unrepen-

tant fascist; and Eliade, as a complex and conflicted figure who fled his

own fascist history in order to profess an allegedly “apolitical” (though

perhaps not untainted) ideal.

Imagining India: Heinrich Zimmer and the Tantric Imagination

The world no longer possesses a sheltering womb where

one could be perfectly safe. . . . In Europe everywhere,

a new breed of man has been concocted. . . . Now man

will tear to pieces the body of his mother, Nature, and

will quarry her for new and different forms of power.

Heinrich Zimmer,

“Indische Mythen als Symbole: Zwei Vorträge” (1934)

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169

An irrepressible romantic and dreamy idealist, Heinrich Zimmer remains

to this day one of the widely read, even if not always the most reliable,

Indologists of the twentieth century. His vision of Tantra—which he con-

ceived as both the most profound aspect of Indian thought and the most

sophisticated aesthetic tradition—has been formative in contemporary

Indology. Born in Greifswald in 1890, the son of a respected scholar of

Vedic culture, Zimmer studied German and comparative philology in

Berlin. During the First World War, Zimmer fought in the trenches of the

front lines, an event that appears to have left a deep mark on his psyche

and played a formative role in his later life and work. From 1924 to 1938,

Zimmer held the chair of Indian philology in Heidelberg, a post he then

lost with the rise of fascist government because of his marriage to Chris-

tine von Hofmannsthal, a woman of partial Jewish descent. At the invi-

tation of the British government, Zimmer emigrated to Oxford, and then

later to the United States, where he would die in 1943.8

Throughout his career, Zimmer’s life and scholarship were intimately

related: as his daughter recalls, his spiritual vision and his object of study

were inseparable, fueling one another in a prolific search for meaning:

“life and learning for him were never separated. All his work was part

of his life and his life part of his work. The answers he found in dealing

with religion were valid for himself.”9 For Zimmer, the study of myths

and sacred images is far more than an academic exercise; it is a personal

and transformative experience, in which the scholar realizes the “mythic

heart of his own being” and sees the world through the lens of the sa-

cred image. “Only after myth is . . . comprehended as a timeless way of

relating to the world, only when the mythic heart of our own being is

stirred, do we begin to start experiencing its meaning.”10

Zimmer’s interest in India was intimately tied to his own sense of dis-

enchantment and disgust with the Christian tradition in which he had

been raised. Tired of the stale, lifeless world that surrounded him, he

turned to the exotic, erotic mysterious land of India:

What made me abandon Western studies . . . and set forth on the quest for

the East? I could not stand the stale . . . atmosphere of pseudo-romantic

Western medievalism: this rotten and degenerated mixture of Old and New

Testament, classic humanism, German folklore, degraded and diluted for

high school teacher consumption. . . .

Imagining India, its dense deep fragrance in my nostrils, the jungle be-

fore me, unknown, perhaps unknowable, I thought of this southern sky. . .

studded with strange stars and bewildering asterisms. . . . [Y]et many civi-

lizations steered their boats . . . orienting themselves from this totally dif-

ferent pattern.11

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Ironically, although he tried to do so three times, Zimmer would never

actually travel to India. Despite his love of its culture and religion, “Ewiges

Indien,” would remain for him always a land of idealization—“a coun-

try Zimmer never visited except in his imagination.”12

As Zimmer recounts, one of the definitive events in his early life was

his experience in World War I. It was the violence of the war that shocked

him out of his “academic straitjacket” and thrust him into the terrifying

realities of death and suffering. War was for Zimmer nothing short of an

intense “initiatory ordeal.” “I went into war: four years of human, sub-

and super-human experience, initiation in the trenches . . . the initiation

of Life (including death) playing its symphony with the fullest possible

orchestration.”13 It was this “initiation by violence” that liberated him

from the oppression of his elders, freeing him to search for truth within

himself:

The only benefit which I derived from my participation in the war was a

complete liberation from the authority of the older generation who had

managed the war. . . . I said to myself, “ . . . henceforth I shall decide what

I take seriously. . . . I offered my life for the ideals . . . of the community

and did it naively, willingly. With this life I brought back, I am free to do

what I decide to do. . . . They have no claim upon me anymore.”14

It was the war, moreover, that made Zimmer realize that modern West-

ern civilization had reached a terrible spiritual crisis: modern man had

destroyed his religious faith, slain all his gods, and was now waiting for

a new source of faith to fill his spiritual void. “People in our day and age

have just come to the edge of the shore of the sea of tears and suffering

they have yet to cross. . . . A fate we cannot transform into meaning will

crush us.” Since we have slain all the external gods, Zimmer continues,

we must search for the divine within us: we each bear our gods within

ourselves, in the depths of our consciousness, in the creative powers of

our imaginations: “We are ourselves the meaning that gives life; our

breath, our vision . . . creates patterns of meaning. . . . If our imagina-

tion . . . our most profound faculty, is crippled—then we are lost and

will plunge like Icarus as he soared toward the sun.”15 It was for this rea-

son that Zimmer was drawn to the works of Jung and the new science

of depth psychology. If modern man can no longer find the gods outside

himself in the heavens, he must turn inward to recover them within his

own soul. “In this dark age, we cannot grasp the great symbols that have

lived in other times. We must accept what is available to us: depth psy-

chology, which transforms cosmology into psychology.”16

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171

The Hero’s Path: The Godlike Power of the Tantric Imagination

The Tantric hero goes directly through the sphere of

greatest danger . . . and rises through and by means of

nature, not by the rejection of nature.

Heinrich Zimmer, Philosophies of India (1956)

But it was in the religions of India, and specifically in the meditative dis-

ciplines of Tantric yoga, that Zimmer found the most sophisticated sci-

ence of the human psyche and the most developed techniques of creative

imagination. In the Tantric tradition, as Zimmer describes it, the creative

imagination is the most effective instrument of liberation: the Godhead

lies within us, not without, and it is through techniques of meditative vi-

sion that we can project it outward. This, for Zimmer, is the essence of

both Indian yogic practice and artistic traditions, which use the powers

of creative vision to awaken the divine forces within us. Through the use

of yantras and maJjalas, the Tantric initiate draws forth the gods and

demons, heavens and hells, all from the depths of his own imagination.

Thus he realizes his own godlike creative power, his ability to conceive,

destroy, and reabsorb the cosmos: “The adept in possession of super-sen-

sual vision can experience in the mundane apparatus the divine energy

itself. . . . The worshipper projects within himself a vision of the divine

reality; to project the worship of the divine is to become oneself divine.”17

Here we find the meeting point of Zimmer’s personal and scholarly pur-

suits: the power of creative imagining is both his object of study and his

means for recovering the sacred within the secularized world of the mod-

ern West.

Yet the most compelling aspect of Tantra, for Zimmer, lies not solely

in the power of creative imagination, but in its this-worldly, life-affirm-

ing attitude. In the tantras, with their “vigorous affirmation of the world

of flux and time,” man can discover the gods not only in his imagina-

tion, but also in his own body and sexual powers. If the modern West

had become sterile, cerebral, bloodless, and cold, then the solution to the

maladies of our age lay in the sensuous religion of Tantra. Derived from

the most archaic stratum of human civilization—the ancient matriarchal

culture of goddess worship—Tantra is the antidote to the patriarchal,

life-denying Christian tradition. Whereas Christianity has repressed the

power of the body and sex, Tantra represents the greatest affirmation of

embodied existence: “The tidal flood of Tantric literature reflects the last

commanding vision of the world in which the very spirit of India . . .

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magnificently manifested before the Western world which, in following

its Christian positivist bias . . . destroyed the fiber of its being.”18 “The

ideal of Tantrism is to achieve illumination precisely by means of those

objects which earlier sages sought to banish from their consciousness. . . .

[T]he world attitude is affirmative, as in the Veda, but the gods are now

addressed as dwelling in the microcosm.”19

In the final pages of his Philosophies of India, Zimmer makes it clear

that Tantra is at once the most archaic substratum of aboriginal India

and also the final fruition of the entire history of Indian thought. Char-

acteristically Hegelian, Zimmer depicts the history of India as a dialec-

tical unfolding, proceeding from the largely unconscious strata of pre-

Aryan India, to the world-denying asceticism of Brahmanical culture, to

the unifying synthesis of Tantra, which achieves the final integration of

these two opposing forces.

Brahman philosophy produced a last synthesizing statement in the coura-

geous esotericism of the Tantras . . . where the old Aryan frenzy for non-

dualism . . . fruitfully combined with the archaic matrilineal world-feeling

of the aboriginal civilization of India. What the Vedic sages had recognized

in the heavens . . . the Tantric adept felt dwelling bodily within him.20

With its ideal of self-divinization, realizing the gods within one’s own

body and imagination, Tantra provides the needed antidote to the life-

denying, hyperintellectualized world of the Judeo-Christian West. Thus,

in the final paragraph of The Philosophies of India, we find Zimmer’s

self-realized, godlike Tantric hero starkly contrasted with the weak, self-

effacing, humble, and all-too-human figure of Job in the Hebrew Bible:

“In contrast to the attitude of Job who cried out to Yahweh, ‘what is man

that thou shouldst magnify him?’ the Indian . . . equates himself with

God, transcends God and is at peace in the knowledge of himself as

Brahman.”21 Here we find the final culmination of Zimmer’s unusual life

and works. Having passed through the violent initiatory ordeal of war-

torn Europe, Zimmer left behind the sterile world of the modern West,

to discover the gods within his own heart, revealed through the power

of the creative imagination and the sensual body itself.

Riding the Tiger: Julius Evola and the Fascist Uses of Tantra

We have now reached the last era, the dark age or Kali

Yuga, which is a period of dissolution. . . . According

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to Tantra, the path most suitable for such circumstances

is one characterized in the directive “Ride the Tiger.” . . .

Rather than avoid . . . a dangerous force one should

grasp and hold it tight with the idea of getting the bet-

ter of it. The arrival of the Kali Yuga cancels the bond

which at other times imposed secrecy regarding the

doctrines and practices of the way of the Left Hand

because of their perilous nature. . . . The fundamental

principle of the secret teaching . . . is the transforma-

tion of poison into nectar, of the very forces that have

led . . . to man’s fall and perdition.

Julius Evola, The Metaphysics of Sex (1969)

If Zimmer shows us the close interaction between personal experience

and scholarly method in the study of Tantra, Julius Evola reveals the

most extreme appropriation of Tantra in the service of a full-blown ide-

ological stance and political agenda. And if Zimmer—a man who mar-

ried a Jewish woman and fled Nazi Germany—shows a more “liberal”

interpretation of Tantra as an alternative to the violence of the modern

West, then Evola—an outspoken fascist—shows the manipulation of

Tantra in the service of right-wing violence. To this day, Evola remains

one of the most enigmatic, poorly understood, and yet influential figures

in the scholarship and politics of modern Europe. Not only has he been

described as “arguably the most important thinker of the right radical

Neo-Fascist revisionists,” and even the “guru of the counterculture

right,” but he has also been very influential in the development of the

history of religions. Along with many other enigmatic aspects of Evola’s

life, his role in shaping the modern image of Tantra remains largely

unexplored.22

Born in Rome in 1898 to a noble Sicilian family, Baron Giulio

Alessandro Evola (later to take the name Julius, or Julius Cesare) was

from his youth drawn to the heroic, aristocratic, and dramatic side of

life. After joining the army at age nineteen and fighting as a mountain

artillery officer, Evola began a spiritual quest for absolute transcendence

and liberation. With a Nietzschean contempt for what is “all too

human,” he went in search of a higher value, “beyond the ethical lim-

itations of bourgeois prejudices” that he felt ruled modern Judeo-Chris-

tian Europe.23 This quest led him to experiment in a variety of avant-

garde practices, such as hallucinogenic drugs and the art of Dada and

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Surrealism. While studying engineering from 1923 to 1927, Evola read

widely in philosophy, particularly the works of Schopenhauer and Nietz-

sche, and developed an interest in the occult traditions of Hermeticism

and alchemy. Advocating a Nietzschean will to power, Evola’s foremost

imperative was tu diventare Dio, “you must become God.”24 In a world

where God is dead, the true superman must take his rightful place as

God-maker and as God himself. At the same time, as an anti-Christian,

pagan fascist, Evola idealized the martial glory of ancient Rome in op-

position to the effete Catholic virtues of humility and compassion. Call-

ing for a return to a true “aristocracy of spirit,” Evola imagined the

birth of an elite spiritual nobility—and perhaps even a secret military

brotherhood—who could regenerate the decaying world of modern

Europe.25

Not surprisingly Evola found welcome company among the most ex-

treme movements in Italy in the years before and after World War II, soon

becoming one of Europe’s most influential proponents of fascism. Al-

though he never joined the Fascist Party, he was a strong supporter of

Mussolini and was honored by Il Duce’s endorsement of his Synthesis of

the Doctrine of Race (1941). Evola’s fascism, however, was different from

the Nazi ideology in Hitler’s Germany: in contrast to the biological racism

of the Nazis—what Evola called a “Romantic telluric Dionysianism”—

Evola’s was a “spiritual” and Apollonian fascism.26 During the Second

World War, however, Evola had a falling out with Mussolini, and in 1943

joined a group of dissident intellectuals to meet with Hitler to discuss

the formation of the Fascist Republic of Salò. After narrowly escaping

arrest by the Americans in 1944, Evola fled to Vienna, where he was hit

by a shell and left permanently crippled. His fascist work continued, how-

ever, and he was arrested in 1951 on charges of attempting to revive fas-

cism. Today, Evola is regarded as one of the most influential figures in the

various neofascist movements of Europe, praised as the “spiritual mas-

ter of the new Right” and the leading thinker of groups like the terror-

ist Nuova Destra.27

Revolt against the Modern World: Tantra and the Age of Darkness

Tantrism may lead the way for a Western elite which

does not want to become the victim of these experi-

ences whereby an entire civilization is on the verge of

being submerged.

The main characteristics of Tantric deities must be

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175

considered as symbols of destroying forces, nude and

free, superior to all laws.

Julius Evola, “What Tantrism Means

to Modern Western Civilization” (1950)

While Zimmer and other European intellectuals had been generally pes-

simistic in their attitudes toward the modern West, with its secularism and

loss of tradition, Evola is surely one of its most scathing and merciless

critics. His agenda is nothing less than a wholesale “revolt against the mod-

ern world.” For the modern West marks the lowest point in the down-

ward spiral of the Kali yuga, the darkest moment in this darkest of cos-

mic eras. “The modern point of view . . . [is] typical of the most advanced

phase of the dark age.”28 Not only has it lost its traditional spirit, but the

modern West has been corrupted by the deluded ideals of democracy (in

contrast to the aristocratic, hierarchical society of traditional man), the

unhealthy, life-denying ideals of Christianity (with its rejection of the body

and sex), and the twisted psycho-babble of Freudian psychoanalysis (with

its gross misunderstanding and “turbid repression” of sexuality).29

One of the most conspicuous themes in Evola’s works is his radically

antidemocratic, aristocratic, and elitist vision of society. In strict oppo-

sition to modern ideals of democracy, Evola’s model of civilization is one

of strong hierarchy, in which the nobility or truly “spiritual” elites would

rule the ordinary, unskilled, “somatic,” or “physical” masses of ordinary

humankind. “Evola always harbored an aristocratic contempt for the hoi

polloi,” Guido Stucco comments, “racism was for Evola an opportunity

to proclaim his anti-egalitarian and anti-rationalist views.”30 Thus Evola

predicts the coming of a new “counter-revolution,” a revolt against the

flaccid democracy of the modern West, and a return to the “traditional”

ethics of spiritual nobility. He foresees “an authentic counter-revolution”

that will be “radically opposed to democracy and socialism” and will

provide the “foundation necessary to begin . . . a work endowed with a

metaphysical, transcendent, ethical and social character.”31

Given that we live in the darkest, antitraditional age, the only solu-

tion for us is to turn to the most extreme and violent spiritual means.

There can be no going back, no retreat from the modern world into the

premodern past. Rather, our only hope is to “ride the tiger,” as it were—

to accept, embrace, and harness the most destructive impulses in human

nature as they have now been unleashed by modernity, turning them to

the service of liberation. This, for Evola, is the essence of the Tantric path:

to grab the snake by the throat and to transform his poison into am-

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brosia, to embrace the forces of violence and lust and transmute them

into forces of freedom and transcendence:

The teachings . . . that would have been viable in the first age . . . are no

longer fit for people living in the following ages, especially in the last age,

the dark age. . . . Mankind in these later ages may find knowledge . . . not

in the Vedas, but rather in the Tantras. . . . Only Tantric practices based on

shakti . . . are efficacious in our contemporary age.

During the Kali Yuga . . . the traditional law is wavering, reduced to

a shadow of its former self . . . during the last age, elementary, infernal

and abyssal forces are untrammeled. The immediate task consists in facing

and absorbing these forces, in taking the risk of riding the tiger . . . or to

transforming the poison into medicine.32

This is the age of sex and the body, the age in which nothing can mo-

tivate man apart from sensual pleasure: thus it is to the bodily, sexual,

path of Tantra that we must turn in order to liberate degenerate mod-

ern man: “mankind living in this age is strictly connected to the body. . . .

Therefore the only way open is not that of pure detachment . . . but

rather that of knowledge, awakening and mastery over secret energies

trapped in the body.”33 Because sex is the most powerful and “violent”

force in human nature, it is also the most potent impetus to spiritual lib-

eration. Even in its most degraded modern forms, sex retains a distant

vestige of its original spiritual power: “Sex is the greatest magical force

in nature; an impulse acts in it which suggests the Mystery of the One. . . .

The metaphysics of sex survives in those very cases where, in looking

at wretched mankind . . . it is hard to overcome a feeling of disgust and

revolt.”34

Thus Tantra represents the most effective antidote to the “womanly,”

passive, and emasculated character that has come to dominate modern

Western man. The modern West may be perversely preoccupied with sex—

but it is sex of the most “womanly,” effeminate kind, not the truly “mascu-

line” virile sexuality of “traditional” man: “Now we are degraded people,

weak, woman comes before all else—a universal and feverish interest in

sex and woman is a mark of every twilight period. . . . [W]e are living

in a civilization whose predominant interest is neither intellectual, spir-

itual nor heroic. . . . Rather the subpersonal—sex and the belly—are idol-

ized.”35 In contrast to the weak and womanly attitude of the modern

world, Evola found in Tantra a virile, masculine path of action and

strength. This is the way of the víra, “a term with the same Latin root

vir which does not describe an ordinary man but rather an eminent

man . . . a manly and heroic nature.”36 Such a heroic, active path is the

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only means of effecting real change in this present age of passivity: “In

this age of decadence the only way open . . . is one of action.”37

The Destructive Power of the Absolute: Tantra, Heroism, and Violence

This Absolute is a power that on the plane of finite

beings acts in a destructive fashion, almost as Diony-

sius Zagreus brings havoc to all things.

Julius Evola, The Yoga of Power (1968)

As the most extreme and dangerous path, the Tantric way steps outside

the ethical boundaries that confine ordinary human beings to the con-

ventional world. Passing through an intense “destruction of human lim-

itations,” the tàntrika experiences “forms of anomia, beyond good and

evil which are so extreme that they make the Western supporters of the

idea of the superman look like innocuous amateurs.” Because this Kali

yuga is the darkest era, in which existing laws have become either op-

pressive or irrelevant, the true initiate is often compelled to violate even

the most sacred laws in the service of liberation and empowerment.

All ethics of a merely human nature, however elevated, cease to have any

validity. . . .

If a spiritual catastrophe is to be averted man must make himself capa-

ble of developing his own being in a higher dimension—and it is in this

connection that Jünger had announced the . . . watchword of “heroic

realism” and . . . the “absolute person” capable of . . . seizing the highest

meaning of existence in the most destructive experiences, in those actions

wherein the human individual no longer counts: of a man acclimatized to

the most extreme temperature and having behind him the “zero point of

every value.”38

This, in Evola’s reading, is the essence of the Tantric path, the path of

the virile hero who dares to transgress the laws that bind other human

beings. To the tàntrika, there is no good or evil, for he has realized “the

relativity of all moral precepts.” To him, all “passions lose their impure

character once they become absolute”; and henceforth, “the siddha can

do as he pleases, while remaining spiritually invulnerable.”39 For Evola’s

tàntrika hero, even hedonistic excess is by no means an obstacle on the

path to spiritual transformation, but is its necessary condition: “A sid-

dha is one who . . . can do anything he wants . . . he is beyond both

dharma and karma.”40

As such, Tantra is for Evola not a radically “Eastern,” Other form of

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spirituality. Rather, in contrast to the effeminate Christian religion—

which has been infected by Eastern dualism and quietism—Tantra rep-

resents the most authentically Occidental form of spirituality, in the orig-

inal, pre-Christian, pagan sense of that term. For it unites the Western

mastery of material nature and power with the Eastern sense of spirit

and transcendence: “Tantrism in its spirit . . . should be considered dis-

tinctly Western. It is more conspicuously Western than Christian soteri-

ology, which proclaims an ideal of salvation from a world that is looked

upon as a vale of tears. . . . The password of Tantrism is . . . the unity of

spiritual discipline and enjoyment of the world.”41 Thus Tantra is the most

needed path to reinvigorate the decaying post-Christian West—a world

in which former morality has disintegrated and the majority of mankind

is ruled by the law of the belly and the genitals. As the most authenti-

cally “Occidental” form of spirituality, in the original heroic sense, Tan-

tra is the “existential attitude proper to a differentiated human type who

lives in an era of dissolution and in a world in which God is dead. . . .

[T]here are no longer any values left standing, and all the surviving tra-

ditional structures are . . . empty shells.”42

Ultimately, the radical path of Tantra, which transcends all finite con-

ceptions of good and evil, is also the path of the warrior. Like the Tantric

víra, the warrior must overstep the moral boundaries that confine ordi-

nary bestial men. He must act like the hero Arjuna upon the battlefield

of Kurukãetra in the Mahàbhàrata. Even though he risks violating

dharma, the warrior must still, at the command of God, plunge into the

bloodbath; he must transcend and transgress dharma in the service of

the often destructive and amoral Absolute Godhead:

Krishna incites Arjuna to fight and to kill even those friends and relatives

militating on the enemy side, declaring that his actions would not generate

karma so long as they were performed in a detached, impersonal way. . . .

Dharma appears to be limiting the warrior’s way of life. . . . In the end this

limitation is not absolute, especially after Krishna . . . reveals the nature of

the Absolute. This Absolute is a power that . . . acts in a destructive fash-

ion, almost as Dionysius Zagreus brings havoc to all things. The teaching

transmitted to Arjuna culminates with a vision that . . . corresponds to the

destructive and horrifying attributes of Shiva and the Tantric Kali.43

It is not difficult to understand how Evola’s version of Tantra would

have helped him to rationalize a political agenda of fascism, racism, and

violence; or why Evola’s extremist right-wing politics and interpretation

of Tantra have continued to exert influence among European neofascist

movements and certain branches of contemporary esotericism.44 As a path

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179

of transgression, amorality, and power, Tantra is for Evola and his fol-

lowers the most fitting corrective to this dark era, in which impurity and

violence already run rampant.

The Sacred as the Profane: Mircea Eliade, Tantra,

and the Terror of History

The irresistible Tantric advance implies a new victory

for the pre-Aryan popular strata. It is through this chan-

nel that the great underground current of autochtho-

nous . . . spirituality made its way into Hinduism.

Mircea Eliade, Yoga: Immortality and Freedom (1971)

While Zimmer may have been the most poetic of Tantric scholars in the

twentieth century, and while Evola may have been the most radical po-

litical spokesman, Mircea Eliade was surely among the most influential.

We might say that Tantra—with its radical identification of the sacred

with the profane, its call for the most extreme measures in this most ex-

treme historical era—provided both the ideal object and the hermeneu-

tic method for Eliade’s “history of religion” as a whole. However, Eliade

is also complex and ambiguous; his work is strewn with contradictions

and aporias: influenced by both Zimmer and Evola, Eliade seems to em-

body the coincidentia oppositorum of their interpretations of Tantra, lib-

eral and fascist.45

Born in Romania in 1907, Eliade was always a voracious reader with

a lively imagination. An author of creative fiction and scholarly works

from an early age, Eliade read extensively in Romanian, French, and Ger-

man, and later learned Italian and English in order to read Raffaele Pet-

tazzoni and James George Frazer in the original. In 1925, Eliade enrolled

at the University of Bucharest, where he studied philosophy under Nae

Ionescu, a man bound up with the extreme right in Romania, who was

to have a lasting influence on Eliade’s thought. From 1928 to 1931, Eli-

ade fled the growing violence of interwar Romania to travel to India,

where he studied Indian philosophy and yoga, an experience that “left

an indelible mark on him” and “persuaded [him] of the viability of . . .

Oriental spirituality in the Western world.”46 His doctoral thesis, “Yoga:

Essay on the Origins of Indian Mysticism,” was completed in 1932 and

later published as his classic Yoga: Immortality and Freedom.

When Eliade returned to Romania in 1932, he found his homeland

immersed in political upheaval. Dominated by the rise of fascism to the

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west and Soviet communism to the east, Romanian nationalism gave birth

to the Legion of the Archangel Michael, headed by Corneliu Zelea Co-

dreanu. With a fierce nationalist spirit, often leaning toward racism and

xenophobia, the Legionaries posed a radical challenge to the forces of

democracy and modernization, calling for a restoration of Romania’s folk

and religious roots.47 It was to this more radical side of the Romanian

right that Eliade was drawn upon his return from India, as he began to

forge his own unique scholarly and literary styles.

The Terrors of History and the Search for the Archaic

Today the master of us all is the war. . . . It has confis-

cated the whole of contemporary history, the time in

which we are fated to live. . . .

Against the terrors of history there are only two pos-

sibilities of defense: action or contemplation. . . . Our

only solution is to contemplate, that is to escape from

historic Time to find another Time.

Stefan, in Mircea Eliade, The Forbidden Forest (1954)

Surely the most troubling and controversial period of Eliade’s life was

the period before and during World War II, a violent, chaotic period in

Romanian history. Eliade himself would later remark that “the most ter-

rible historical crisis of the modern world” was “the Second World War

and all that has followed from it.”48 Its events haunt Eliade’s fiction, form-

ing the dark backdrop for novels such as Huliganii (1935) and The For-

bidden Forest (1954).

I will not attempt here to resolve the many conflicted arguments sur-

rounding Eliade’s politics—that is, his troubling involvement in the ex-

treme fascist movements of this period and its possible impact on his later

scholarship. These questions have been treated in great detail, by his crit-

ics and by his supporters.49 Here, let it suffice to say that—as even his

most ardent defenders acknowledge—Eliade was a vocal supporter of

the most extreme right-wing, ultraconservative, and traditionalist move-

ments in Romania of the 1930s. Fiercely nationalistic in his politics, he

ardently opposed any ceding of Romanian autonomy to non-Romanian

factions such as the Hungarians, Bulgarians, or Jews, and he contributed

frequently to a number of right-wing publications, such as Vremea, Cu-

vantul, and Credinta. During these years, he maintained close ties with

many leading figures of the radical Romanian right, most notably Nae

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Ionescu, under whose influence he advocated an antimodernist form of

traditionalism, rejecting democracy and calling for a return to the Ro-

manian peasant spirit. Still more striking, however, is his support for the

most active fascist groups in prewar Romania, such as the Legion of the

Archangel Michael and their paramilitary order, the Iron Guard—“a

movement of the extreme right whose members were guilty of violence,

murder and anti-Semitic atrocities.”50 In 1938 Eliade was imprisoned for

four months because of his Iron Guard sympathies. At the start of the

war, he was appointed to the Romanian Legation under the fascist roy-

alist dictatorship of Carol II, serving for nine months in London as attaché

in the department of press and propaganda. Then from 1941 to 1945,

after Carol’s abdication and the rise of Antonescu’s National Legionary

State, Eliade was employed as press secretary at the Romanian legation

in Portugal. After the war, Eliade was unable to return to the newly com-

munist Romania largely because of his connection with the right-wing

Ionescu.51

Whatever the precise nature of Eliade’s political involvement in the

years before and during World War II, there is no doubt that this era had

a critical impact on Eliade’s personal and scholarly life. It appears, for

example, in the apocalyptic anarchism of his novel Huliganii, which cen-

ters around the violent youth groups of interwar Romania. Engaged in

“cruelties and excesses of all sorts,” Eliade’s hooligans turn to the most

radical extremes of destruction and eros in order to burst the bonds of

the world and experience a fleeting kind of transcendence: “these furi-

ous negateurs seek a paradise recovered by the paradoxical weapons of

violence and eroticism.”52 However, following the violence that swept

Romania during the years before World War II and the devastation dur-

ing it, Eliade retreated from the “terrifying” realm of modern history,

turning inward to the timeless world of myth. In place of revolutionary

upheaval and political change, Eliade now sought the transcendent

world of symbolism and the ahistorical life of homo religiosus. His dis-

illusionment with the forces of modern history can be glimpsed in his

protagonist Stefan in The Forbidden Forest, who seems to reflect Eliade’s

own character during these painful years: “He suffered a nervous

shock. . . . History has taken revenge on him. He has a phobia against

history. He has a horror of events. He’d like things to stand still the way

they seemed in the paradise of his childhood.”53

However, as Strenski suggests, Eliade’s early involvement in the tra-

ditionalist movements of the Romanian right wing would provide the

foundation for much of his later scholarship: it profoundly colored his

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vision of “traditional” man, or homo religiosus, his rejection of modern

civilization, and his quest for the primordial Origin beyond the terrify-

ing vicissitudes of history. “The radical traditionalism of the Romanian

right becomes for Eliade not a mere political programme, but a sweep-

ing ontological judgment upon the material secular modern world, as-

serting the value of nostalgia for the archaic, cosmic and telluric.”54

So it is that Eliade—perhaps the most influential spokesman for the

“history of religion” in the United States—is arguably also the “leading

anti-historian of religions.”55 His scholarly method is rarely one of specific

historical analysis, but rather a search for the suprahistorical, transcen-

dent element concealed within material forms. This is his “creative

hermeneutics,” a method that, using the creative imagination, is as much

a work of art as a scholarly endeavor. As Strenski suggests, Eliade’s turn

to the ahistorical method of creative hermeneutics was part of his own

attempt to deal with the real terrors of history in his past, to flee the vi-

olence of time in the timeless realm of myth: “Eliade has chosen to deal

with the disaster of his Romanian past by. . . transvaluing it through

the method of creative hermeneutics.”56

For Eliade, creative hermeneutics is not just a scholarly method that

parallels his method as an author of fantastic fiction: it is a personal mode

of being in the world. In order to encounter the myths and symbols of

other cultures, the scholar must embark on an imaginal journey outside

his own cultural world: he must journey from his known familiar con-

dition “to relive” through his imagination the suprahistorical world of

homo religiosus: “creative hermeneutics changes man; it is more than in-

struction, it also a spiritual technique susceptible of modifying the qual-

ity of existence. . . . A good history of religions book ought to produce

in the reader an action of awakening.”57

However, as Strenksi and others have pointed out, this ideal of a self-

transformation and the birth of a new man sounds disturbingly like cer-

tain ideas championed by the Iron Guard and other extremist groups of

Eliade’s youth. Above all, it resembles the ideal of violent initiation and

the birth of a new being, embodying “traditional” national and religious

values: “The new man as envisaged by Codreanu and others on the radi-

cal right emerges . . . as the new humanism of Eliade’s creative hermeneu-

tic vision. Like the Romanian traditionalist image of the new man, Eli-

ade’s vision of a new humanism embraces the image of man as homo

religiosus, archaic and integrated into personal wholeness.”58 And one

of the most powerful ways of realizing this new man would be the dis-

ciplines of Indian yoga, and above all, the radical path of Tantra.

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The Camouflage of the Sacred

We must . . . rediscover the technique of camouflaging

ourselves, the art of lying and deceiving. . . . [I]t’s dif-

ficult and dangerous . . . to preserve the soul . . . hiber-

nating under a mask. . . . [W]e are faced with the prob-

lem of how to accomplish the preservation of our soul

in the New Dark Age that’s beginning.

Stefan, in The Forbidden Forest

At the heart of Eliade’s creative hermeneutics lies the dialectic between

the sacred and the profane. For Eliade, the human being is first and fore-

most a homo religiosus—an inherently religious creature with an innate

thirst for the sacred as the source of all being, meaning, power, and re-

ality, beyond transience and change. The sacred, however, is continually

masked within, concealed behind and yet partially manifesting itself

within this profane world of history and death. The profane provides the

symbols and disguises through which the sacred reveals itself. And the

task of the historian of religions is to decipher the presence of the sa-

cred hidden within the masks of history; for the history of religions is it-

self nothing less than “a series of messages waiting to be deciphered and

understood.”59

However, if the sacred is always partially veiled to man of “traditional”

or premodern societies, then it has become ever more deeply buried, al-

most entirely opaque to modern Western man. Like Evola, Eliade was

from his earliest publications a severe critic of the modern world. The

modern West is characterized above all by radical secularization, loss of

faith in the traditional myths that form the timeless heritage of homo re-

ligiosus, and the subsequent reduction of man to an historical creature

of meaninglessness and death.

It is only in modern societies of the West that non-religious man has de-

veloped fully. Modern non-religious man . . . regards himself solely as the

subject of history and refuses all appeal to transcendence. . . . Man makes

himself and only makes himself completely in proportion as he desacralizes

himself and the world. The sacred is the prime obstacle to his freedom. . . .

He will not be truly free until he has killed the last god.60

Yet, despite modern man’s efforts to slay all his gods, the sacred can

never be wholly eradicated from human existence. The sacred continues

to survive in the most seemingly profane forms, hidden beneath the dis-

guises of half-forgotten myths and symbols. Because man is homo reli-

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giosus, he always retains the vestiges of the sacred lying secretly within

his dreams and fantasies, in his novels and works of art. Herein lies the

last hope of reawakening the sacred in the context of a secular society.

For “it is the historian of religion who is capable of recognizing and de-

ciphering the religious structures of these . . . imaginary Universes.”61

This attempt to decipher the presence of the sacred concealed in the pro-

fane world is perhaps the essence of Eliade’s whole hermeneutic endeavor,

his lifelong search for the sacred hidden behind the historical form: “His

fascination with the theme of the camouflage of the fantastic in the daily

event frames his whole epistemology. . . . The point is to see how the sa-

cred is symbolized in the world. This, like uncovering a disguise, is a mat-

ter of hermeneutics.”62

Religion for the Age of Darkness:

Tantra and the Sacrality of the Profane

Most of the excesses, cruelties and aberrations referred

to as “Tantric orgies” spring, in the last analysis, from

the same traditional metaphysics.

Eliade, Yoga: Immortality and Freedom

Given Eliade’s antimodernist stance, his ideal of an ahistorical primor-

dial Origin set in opposition to the contemporary ideal of progress, and

his lifelong search for the sacred hidden within the masks of the profane

material world, we can now begin to appreciate his fascination with the

Indian tradition of Tantra. Tantra seemed an ideal solution to all the evils

of the modern Western world. In Eliade’s eyes, Tantra is the most ar-

chaic, primal, and “autochthynous heart of aboriginal India,” the most

ancient layer of the timeless Orient itself. A kind of living remnant of

the deepest stratum of Indian consciousness, Tantra dates back to pre-

Aryan days when popular religion and worship of the Mother Goddess

had not yet been overtaken by the priestly, androcentric Aryans: “Tan-

trism is the expression of the indigenous spirituality, the reaction of the

not-fully Hinduized popular strata.”63 Embodying the “great under-

ground current of autochthonous spirituality,” the “irresistible Tantric

advance in the medieval period implies a new victory of the pre-Aryan

popular strata.”64

Like Evola and Zimmer, Eliade praises Tantra as a much-needed affir-

mation of the powers of the human body and sexuality, and thus as a

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corrective to the repressive world of the modern West. Indeed, for Eliade,

Tantra “reveals an experience that is no longer accessible in a de-

sacralized society—the experience of a sanctified sexual life.”65 With its

radically“anti-ascetic and anti-speculative attitude,” and its affirmation

of the powers of nature, fertility, and sexuality, Tantra marks a return to

the feminine, material side of life: it is thus a “religious rediscovery of the

mystery of woman, for . . . every woman becomes the incarnation of the

Takti. . . . Woman incarnates the mystery of creation and the mystery of

Being, of everything that is, that incomprehensibly becomes and dies and

is reborn.”66

But most importantly, Tantra is for Eliade the clearest instance of the

central dialectic of the religious imagination—the sacred and the pro-

fane. In Tantra, the sacred and the profane are not simply bound in a di-

alectical relationship, the former both concealed and revealed by the lat-

ter; rather, in Tantra we find the ultimate identification of them. For the

Tantric initiate, the profane forms of physical pleasure, meat, wine, and

sexual intercourse become the most rapid, expedient (and dangerous)

path to the sacred. By violating all social laws, he achieves the fullest ex-

perience of freedom, unleashing the “terrifying emotion one feels before

the revelation of the cosmic mystery.”67 As such, Tantra is the most rel-

evant spiritual path for our own age of darkness—it enacts a radically

desacralized world where the sacred is not simply camouflaged behind

the profane, but is actually identified with it: “The ultimate stage of de-

sacralization . . . illustrates the complete camouflage of the sacred, more

precisely, its identification with the profane.”68 The tàntrika is the one

who dares to confront the profane, who can turn the profane to his ad-

vantage, to master and transform it. But to confront this dangerous power

demands the most “heroic” character, who has undergone the most

difficult initiatory ordeal and transcended the bestial level of the profane

masses:

The courage and intelligence needed to confront, defeat and transform this

incandescent irruption of telluric forces into an experience of paroxystic

vitality amounts to a true initiation of a heroic type. While by hundreds of

thousands the profane ( . . . the naive, the immature) let themselves be . . .

consumed by sensual pleasures . . . a minute number of others reach that

level of existence that traditions call heroic.69

In Tantra, the sacred is no longer merely hidden within the profane:

it is the profane—or rather, the two are perfectly merged in Eliade’s fa-

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vorite image of the coincidentia oppositorum, the union of contrary prin-

ciples. The problem of coincidentia oppositorum, Eliade admits, “will

fascinate me till the end of my life,”70 and it remains the key to his entire

complex life and his scholarly method. Embodied in classic symbols like

the androgyne, the golem, or the philosopher’s stone of the alchemists,

the coincidentia oppositorum represents the ideal wedding of male and

female, spirit and matter, and ultimately, sacred and profane. And Tan-

tra above all—with its explicit use of maithuna or sexual intercourse—

is perhaps the most explicitly “biological” and physical expression of this

central mystery.

This conception, in which all contraries are reconciled . . . constitutes what

is the most basic definition of divinity and shows us how utterly different

it is from humanity. . . . The coincidentia oppositorum . . . can be achieved

by man in all sorts of ways. . . . [T]he orgy . . . symbolizes a return to the

amorphous and indistinct where all attributes disappear and contraries are

merged.71

Here is the key to much of Eliade’s complex character, both personal

and scholarly—the relentless search for that mysterious unity existing

beyond or outside of time, transcending the contradictions of history. It

is a unity, however, that can only be achieved by first passing through

the most dangerous acts of violence and transgression.

In any discussion of Eliade’s view of Tantra, we must face the difficult

and troubling question of whether Eliade’s vision was a kind of crypto-

fascism, tainted with the same sorts of repugnant right-wing political in-

terests as Evola’s. I believe that Eliade’s vision of Tantra, like the figure

of Eliade himself, is too ambiguous to be reduced either to a simple “new

humanist” purity or to a malicious fascist agenda. It is true that Eliade

retreated from active political engagement, fleeing the horrors of fascist

Romania and twentieth-century history into the ostensibly “apolitical”

world of myth and scholarship. Yet as Wasserstrom, Strenski, and others

have argued, Eliade’s reactionary, antimodernist ideals were in many ways

carried over into his later scholarship as a troubling shadow that haunts

his entire oeuvre. Nowhere is this more apparent than in Eliade’s con-

ception of Tantra, which inherits both Zimmer’s romantic vision of

Tantric sensuality and Evola’s fascist notion of Tantric violence. But for

this very reason, Eliade offers us a valuable insight into the image of Tan-

tra in the history of religions as a whole—an image that contains the

promise of liberation and power, and yet that is also haunted by the

specters of violence, immorality, cruelty, and terror.

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t h e r e l i g i o n o f l i b e r a t i o n : r e i m a g i n i n g t a n t r a

i n t w e n t i e t h - c e n t u r y i n d i a n s c h o l a r s h i p

Throughout the ages, the Female Principle stood for

the oppressed peoples, symbolizing all the liberating

potentialities in the class divided, patriarchal and au-

thoritarian social set up of India, and this alone explains

why attempts were made . . . to blacken Tàkta-Tantric

ideals.

Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya,

History of the Tàkta Religion (1974)

If Tantra played a crucial role in the political history of the history of re-

ligions in the West, it played no less a role in the political history of In-

dia scholarship in this century. In the aftermath of colonial rule, amid a

new proliferation of competing political, religious, and cultural factions,

Tantra became one of the key elements in the reimagining of Indian iden-

tity. Thus S. B. Dasgupta made the “obscure religious cults” like the Sa-

hajiyàs, Nàths, and other Tantric sects the necessary “background of Ben-

gali literature.”72 And more recent authors, like Ajit Mookerjee, praise

Tantra as the innermost heart of Indian religion, the integration of sen-

suality and spirituality, and thus a path desperately needed in the modern

world.73

Two of the most important figures in the reimagining of Tantra were

Bengali, Gopinath Kaviraj and Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya—though,

as we will see, they arrived at very different interpretations of Tantra and

its significance. While for Kaviraj, Tantra is both the culmination of In-

dian philosophy and the means to a kind of collective salvation for all

humanity, for Bhattacharyya, Tantra provides evidence of an archaic com-

munism and thus a prefiguration of the egalitarian society envisaged by

Marxism. Yet for both, Tantra represents in a sense a religion of “liber-

ation” amid a dark age of suffering and oppression.

The Collective Liberation of Humanity:

Gopinath Kaviraj’s Supreme Integral Yoga

So much of the disharmony and opposition in the

world today, engendering bitterness and strife, is due

to our lack of sympathy and sense of oneness. . . . There

is but one Self which is love and Wisdom eternal, and we

shall share it if we but know it in a proper way. Discord

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and hatred are bound to disappear like mists before

the light of the sun. It will herald the advent of a New

Life in the world, when the central principle of Unity

and Love will reign.

Gopinath Kaviraj, “Mother” (1990)

Although his work is still not widely known in the West, Gopinath Kavi-

raj (1887–1976) must surely be recognized as one of the single most im-

portant figures in the study of Tantra in the twentieth century. Not only

was Kaviraj one of the first to try to synthesize all of the known Tantric

texts and traditions into one integrated Tantric system; but he also de-

veloped a highly original interpretation of Tantric yoga that aimed at col-

lective liberation for all humankind.74

Born to a Brahman family in Dhamrai, East Bengal, Kaviraj received

his early education first in Dhaka and then in Jaipur. Because the na-

tionalist movement had exploded into violence in Bengal and he had lived

his early years in the midst of it, Kaviraj was initially influenced by the

ideas of Aurobindo and the other radicals fighting for independence:

Gopinath could not be left untouched by the strong wave of nationalism

which was then moving in the country. Bengal . . . was agitated by the

partition and a revolutionary movement took birth there. Gopinath was

a regular reader of Sri Aurobindo’s Vande Mataram and engaged in politi-

cal discussions. . . . [T]he search for India’s past came to occupy a prime

place in the intellectual adventure of young Gopinath.75

Yet Kaviraj chose, not the life of the political activist, but rather that of

the scholar and spiritual seeker. After receiving his master’s degree in San-

skrit in Varanasi, he worked as a research scholar placed in charge of the

Saraswati Bhavan Library at the Government Sanskrit College, Varanasi.

By 1917, however, Kaviraj had also come into contact with a number of

sàdhus and was later initiated by a Bengali guru named Trí Trí ViMud-

dhànanda, a master well known for his supernatural powers. Eventually,

Kaviraj would abandon the worldly life altogether, retiring in 1937 to

live as a saint and teacher. So highly regarded was his scholarship that

the government conferred upon him the title of Mahàmahopadhyàya

(Great Teacher) in 1934, followed by the Coronation Medal in 1937 and

the title of PadmavibhÜãaJa (Lotus-Adorned) in 1964. As G. C. Pande

suggests, Kaviraj should be understood as an important figure in the larger

cultural, spiritual, and national awakening of India in the twentieth cen-

tury. Although he retreated from direct political involvement, Kaviraj was

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one of the most important agents in the cultural and religious renaissance

of India:

Bengal . . . took the lead in the Indian Renaissance of the nineteenth century

and produced a memorable galaxy of saints . . . statesmen and revolution-

aries. In the midst of colonial rule . . . they helped to revive India’s sense

of pride in her own past. . . . It is through them that her new national con-

sciousness was fashioned. . . . It meant not only the emergence of a political

movement aiming at the liberation of the country but also a revolution in

its thought and creativity. Gopinath Kaviraj was one of the towering figures

in this revolution.76

Like Woodroffe before him, Kaviraj took it upon himself to defend

and relegitimize the tradition of the tantra s, which had so long been den-

igrated by Indian and European scholars. Whereas most modern Indi-

ans regarded the tantra s as “an abomination . . . because ill-educated

charlatans duped their adherents by obscene matters,” Kaviraj showed

that they are “so stupendous and colossal . . . that it is not possible in

one’s life span to study them, not to speak about their esoteric interpreta-

tion.”77 And like Woodroffe, Kaviraj saw Tantra not in opposition to the

traditions of the Veda and Vedànta, but as their complement, and ultimately

as the culmination of the history of Indian philosophy.78

Profoundly influenced by the Kashmir Taivite schools, Kaviraj under-

took a synthesis of the various Tantric traditions. Not unlike Abhinava-

gupta in his Tantràloka, Kaviraj sought to create an overarching ontologi-

cal system, a hierarchical gradation of teachings that would find a place

for all the many Hindu perspectives: “These relative or fragmentary

truths, or aspects of the Absolute Truth . . . represent varying stages in

the ascending order of the Sadhaka’s journey in quest of self-realization.

When pieced together, and studied in light of the resultant whole, they

will present a sublime picture of synthesis.”79 Kaviraj’s synthesis could

be compared to a vast temple whose foundations are the six systems of

Indian philosophy and whose walls are the traditions of Tàktism, Taivism,

and VaiãJavism. Kaviraj’s own philosophy is thus the Mikhara of the tem-

ple, and his practice of akhaJja mahàyoga is the deity installed in the

shrine.80

Surely the most fascinating and original aspect of Kaviraj’s system is

his new vision of Tantra, which is now conceived as something far more

than a quest for individual liberation. For Kaviraj, Tantra has the poten-

tial to achieve a collective salvation or universal liberation for human-

kind. Through his new ideal of akhaJja mahàyoga, or supreme inte-

gral yoga, Kaviraj imagined Tantra to be a spiritual method of universal

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dimensions, one that could realize the liberation of all beings within his

own lifetime. Seeking a perfect, metaphysical solution to the human suf-

fering he saw around him, Kaviraj might be said to have “sacrificed his

life to find out a solution of that mysterious riddle called Suffering Hu-

manity. ”81 This seems to have been Kaviraj’s own spiritual and meta-

physical solution to the severe crises facing India in the modern era—

this world torn by “disharmony and opposition.” Rather than a social

or political response to collective crisis in the Kali yuga, Kaviraj con-

ceived a spiritual answer that could, in theory, offer perfect liberation

for all:

His concern is for the rest of he world, which he characterizes as humanity

sunk in its ignorance. . . . Considering the far reaching crises of contempo-

rary times, he wonders if there could be any true individual welfare with-

out collective welfare. . . . While others might choose to work socially or

politically for this welfare, Kaviraj dedicated himself to . . . a metaphysical

solution.82

Through the practice of akhaJja mahàyoga, the yogin may not only

realize his own personal self-realization, but then return with full com-

passion and bring this realization back into this world of suffering. Much

like the Mahàyàna Buddhist ideal of the compassionate bodhisattva, who

renounces his own personal nirvàJa in order to help all beings achieve

liberation, the integral guru vows to return out of selfless love in order

to bring the liberating knowledge of the supreme Brahman into this

world. He thus becomes the conduit through which universal grace floods

into and permeates the universe. The supreme yogin aims to realize his

own nature as Tiva—the supreme Self who lies within us all, who is imag-

ined in mythological terms as the deity sleeping blissfully upon the cos-

mic ocean. But rather than simply enjoying the bliss of his identity with

ParamaMiva, the yogin must then strive to awaken the supreme con-

sciousness of the Self, thereby cutting the very root of cosmic delusion

and causing all beings to wake up from the dream of the phenomenal

universe:

The mahàyogin who has attained his own integral Self-realization must

look back compassionately upon all people sunk in their collective igno-

rance and dedicate himself to winning the integral Self-realization of the

entire world. . . . One mahàyogin, working prodigiously within one life-

time, could eventually become identified with paramaMiva as the imperish-

able puruãa sleeping on the supercausal ocean. If this mahàyogin could

then awaken from the world-dream while still holding the physical body,

the root-ignorance in absolute subjectivity would disappear and the new

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kingdom of dynamic consciousness ( caitanya) would be created. . . . The

realm of rebirth would disappear.83

Kaviraj’s system therefore embodies a kind of “eschatological vision”—

an ideal of universal salvation that would, in effect, bring about the

dissolution of the entire cosmos. For the yogin is seeking to “make

mahàpralaya [the cosmic dissolution at the end of the age] to happen

quicker through the control of the perennial source of creation.”84 Once

the integral yogin has brought this supreme consciousness back into this

world, the boundaries between Brahman and saFsàra, absolute reality

and the ignorance of màyà would disappear, and all beings would be free

to enter the single boundless kingdom of divine consciousness: “As world-

redeemer the integral guru must effect a complete ontological recon-

struction, replacing the old Tantric cosmology with its complexity of on-

tic domains with the boundlessness of a single maJjala as the radiant

kingdom of dynamic consciousness where all may attain their integral

self-realization.”85

Kaviraj’s disciples appear to have believed that he had nearly reached

this sublime state of realization and was in the process of completing the

final stages of supreme integral yoga. He had, it is said, been embraced

by MahàMakti, the supreme Mother and the power of the universe her-

self, who was now working through him to begin “the action of total

transformation of the world.”86 Yet, “although Kaviraj believed he was

approaching the realization of his ultimate goal, he was unable to achieve

it in his lifetime.”87 Nonetheless, he left us with a remarkable vision of a

universalized Tantra that seeks the liberation of all. Although he seems to

have given up the possibility of a concrete political solution to the crises

of the modern world, Kaviraj conceived of a radically innovative form of

Tantra as the ideal solution to this age of chaos and suffering, in which

“discord and hatred are bound to disappear like mists before the light

of the sun. It will herald the advent of a New Life in the world, when

the central principle of Unity and Love will reign.”88

The Religion of the Oppressed Masses:

Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya and the Marxist Reading of Tantra

This parallel Tantric tradition . . . was evolving since

time immemorial as the philosophy of the masses.

Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya,

History of the Tantric Religion (1982)

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While for Kaviraj Tantra is interpreted in a fairly apolitical sense, as a

means of a spiritual collective liberation, for many other Indian authors,

Tantra could be used as an explicitly political weapon and as part of a

larger socioeconomic agenda. What is most interesting, however, is that

Tantra in India was taken up most forcefully as a political tool, not by

the more right-wing movements, as it often was in Europe, but rather by

a number of Marxist-influenced scholars. Two of the most important

scholars of Tantra in modern India—Debiprasad Chattopadhyaya and

Narendra Nath Bhattacharrya—both lived and wrote in West Bengal,

one of the major hotbeds of Marxist activity in this century, during the

height of the communists’ rise to power; and both approached the tantra s,

and indeed all of Indian history, from a decidedly materialist and socialist

perspective. Thus, Chattopadhyaya begins his seminal work, Lokàyata,

by quoting Marx and Engels: “the simple fact, hitherto concealed by an

overgrowth of ideology [is] that mankind must first of all eat and drink,

have shelter and clothing, before it can pursue politics, science, art, re-

ligion, etc.” And he describes his own work as a “systematic effort to

study ancient Indian philosophy from the materialistic point of view,”

adopting an explicitly Marxist perspective that looks first and foremost

“at the material roots of each phenomenon.”89

The origin of the Communist Party in India (CPI) is usually dated to

1925. However, its roots go back as far as the early 1920s, when Ben-

gali intellectuals like M. N. Roy (1887–1954) began to forge ties with

the Third Communist International (Comintern). Disappointed by the

failure of the communist revolts in Europe, Lenin and his colleagues be-

gan to turn their attention to revolutionary possibilities in Asia, choos-

ing Roy as their premier organizer for India. In contrast to Lenin, how-

ever, Roy was critical of the mainstream Indian nationalist movement

and opposed Gandhi’s conservative social ideals. Rejecting the dominant

nationalist movement as the expression of petty-bourgeois interests, Roy

saw India’s hope in the proletariat masses, who were moved primarily

by economic forces and material needs.90 Having broken with the Con-

gress Party in 1929, the CPI would reject India’s independence as a

chimera that benefited primarily the bourgeoisie and neglected the poor;

instead they called for the more radical goal of a people’s democracy, a

form of politics that combined socialism and democracy.

By the 1950s, however, a split had emerged within the party. The con-

tending factions differed largely over the question of how the party should

view the national bourgeoisie (and by extension the dominant Congress

Party) and how far it should work within the existing Indian constitu-

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tion. Finally, in 1964, there was a formal split between the official CPI,

centered in Bombay, and the more radical group in Calcutta, later

known as the CPI (M), which rooted itself in Marxist-Leninism and a

more militant view of the economic and political milieu.91

From the beginning, West Bengal has been one of the primary centers

of communist activity—particularly in its more extreme forms. Because

West Bengal opposed the Congress Party’s apparent acquiescence to the

partition of Bengal after independence and its neglect of state problems,

West Bengal gave strong support to the CPI. Then, dismayed by the of-

ficial CPI’s apparent accommodation to the Congress, the overwhelm-

ing majority of the party’s members sided with the CPI (M) after the

party’s split. After the partition of Bengal in 1947, the state was faced

with mounting economic and social deprivation, compounded by a dra-

matic increase in population, particularly in the rapidly expanding ur-

ban center of Calcutta. Voicing the Bengali people’s resentment at the

seeming chronic neglect of the state’s difficulties, the CPI (M) drew new

support from the impoverished rural peasantry and laborers in urban

areas, and so finally assumed power in 1977. Since the 1980s, however,

a growing number of Bengalis have grown disaffected with the party, dis-

illusioned by its apparent failure to offer a viable solution to the stagger-

ing social and economic problems in urban areas like Calcutta.92

Born in Chinsurah (Hooghly district, West Bengal) in 1934, Naren-

dra Nath Bhattacharyya was raised in the midst of the often violent po-

litical turmoil of Bengal in the aftermath of partition and independence.

Born to a Brahman family, Bhattacharyya received his undergraduate

degree from Hooghly College and then studied ancient Indian history

at Calcutta University. His father was descended from a Tàkta lineage.

Though he had no personal involvement in any religious movement, Bhat-

tacharyya was drawn from an early age to the study of Tàkta Tantra.

Having read Frazer’s Golden Bough and Robert Briffault’s The Mothers

as a college student, Bhattacharyya later worked as the research assis-

tant to Debiprasad Chattopadhyaya (whom he considered his guru).93

Inspired by Chattopadhyaya’s Marxist interpretation of Indian history

and Tantra, Bhattacharyya went on to write his doctoral thesis on the

Indian Mother Goddess (1965, later published in 1971).

In marked contrast to Kaviraj, Bhattacharyya was never personally

drawn to Tantra; he was suspicious of religion throughout his life.

Nonetheless, like the European scholars, Bhattacharyya’s work was

closely tied to his life experience and political commitments. Like many

Bengali intellectuals of his time, Bhattacharyya was strongly influenced

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by Marxist theory. During the mid-1950s, after the events of Poland and

Hungary, Bhattacharyya discovered the work of M. N. Roy and was par-

ticularly drawn to Roy’s critical version of Marxism. Significantly, how-

ever, Bhattacharyya was not a supporter of the communist parties; on

the contrary, he appears to have felt a “tremendous hatred for the In-

dian Communists for their anti-national activities and denunciation of

Indian culture.” Instead, he describes himself as a “keen student of clas-

sical Marxism and not its distorted version as propagated by Lenin.”94

Most of Bhattacharyya’s early work, we will see, bears the distinct im-

print of fundamental Marxist ideas—for example, a dialectical, materi-

alist view of history; the belief that social changes are caused by economic

changes; and the assumption that religious ideas have socioeconomic

background. Yet in his later work, Bhattacharyya would grow increas-

ingly disillusioned with the role of Marxism in India—particularly in its

political forms in the CPI and CPI (M)—and would eventually tone down

his stronger Marxist rhetoric.

Throughout his work, Bhattacharyya makes it clear that he sees the

kinds of deities worshiped in a given society, its various symbols and rit-

uals, as closely tied to the society’s material circumstances and economic

structure. Although Bhattacharyya is not nearly as explicit as his prede-

cessor Chattopadhyaya in invoking the work of Marx and Engels, it is

clear that he is working out of a basically Marxist model: “The material

mode of life of a people ordinarily provides the rationale for the type of

deity and the manner of worship prevalent in a given society.”95

Bhattacharyya also assumes that there is a common evolutionary de-

velopment among most civilizations of the ancient world. And here he

seems to draw both on a Marxist dialectical model of history and on

nineteenth-century European scholarship on the “Great Mother” and

“mother right” in primitive cultures (J. J. Bachofen, E. O. James, etc.).

Like Eliade, Bhattacharyya traces the origins of Tantra to an archaic ma-

triarchal society based on agriculture and fertility cults. The primitive

peoples of India, like those of the ancient Near East, Egypt, and other

parts of the ancient world, are thus imagined to have been a goddess-

centered culture, focused on the reproductive powers of nature: “The

primitive . . . belief in the equation of earth and woman, of natural and

human fertility, forming the infrastructure of numerous agricultural

rites . . . connects the mystery of nature with that of the human body.”96

This, Bhattacharyya thinks, is the basis of Tantra: a primitive worship

of the reproductive power of the Earth, imagined in a female form, which

is tied to the powers of sexuality. Like Eliade, he identifies this matriar-

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chal sex-based religion with the earliest known inhabitants of India—

the Indus Valley civilization—which he in turn associates with the Dra-

vidian cultures of south India and with the tribal groups that survive

throughout India today. Yet he also believes that this sex-based religion

was associated with sexual rituals throughout the ancient world, such

as the cult of Cybele or the worship of Isis, both of which referred to the

vegetative cycle of the Great Goddess.97

In the course of history, this archaic, goddess-centered culture was pro-

gressively overtaken by a masculine, patriarchal civilization. In the West-

ern world, this was marked by the rise of the patriarchal traditions of

Judaism and Christianity; and in India, it was marked by the Aryan in-

vasion and conquest of the Indus Valley:

Historically . . . Tantric ideas and practices are rooted in primitive sex rites

based on the magical association of natural and human fertility. . . . Such

primitive sex rites contributed everywhere to the evolution of human thought

as a whole. . . . [T]he Tantric . . . rites associated with earlier existing religious

system sank into oblivion.98

In India, the matriarchal traditions of the Indus Valley were supplanted

by the patriarchal Aryan Vedic culture, with its hierarchical, class-divided

social structure. With the triumph of the Aryans, India witnessed a “stu-

pendous social transformation, the growth of class society with all its

ugliness, the rise of state power as an organization of plundering and op-

pressing the people and . . . the ruthless extermination of the ancient

moral values.”99

Yet the archaic belief in the powers of woman and sexuality could never

fully be eradicated. On the contrary, it would persist throughout India

in the many, never fully-Hinduized tribal cultures that still survive; and

it would also evolve into the more elaborate traditions of Tàkta Tantra.

Thus Tantra represents a parallel secret tradition that can never be fully

“hushed up” by the repressive patriarchal and class-based Vedic culture:

Even [in the Vedic period] the evidences relating to the sexual rituals and

their connection with the cult of the mother Goddess could not completely

be hushed up. . . . Many rituals of the other traditions . . . became the visi-

ble portion of the Tantric iceberg, the significance of which were denied . . .

by subsequent generations.100

Tàkta Tantra is thus a continuation of the most archaic traditions of the

ancient world—above all, the worship of the female body and the fem-

inized earth as incarnations of divine creative power, Makti. Perhaps it is

the clearest single vestige of the originally female-dominated worldview

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held by most peoples of the ancient world: “Tàktism . . . is a direct off-

shoot of the primitive Mother Goddess cult which was so prominent a

feature of the religion of the agricultural peoples who based their social

system on the principle of mother right.”101

Not only does Tantra reflect a social order in which women have equal

power to men, but it also embodies a social vision that is classless and

egalitarian, in which MÜdra s have status equal to the twice-born. Tantra

is for Bhattacharyya a working man’s religion, a religion of the labor-

ers, and this explains its popularity among the masses. It thus embodies

a kind of primitive communism, which runs counter to the dominant so-

cial order expressed in the orthodox Hindu tradition: “Its intimate as-

sociation with the practical aspects of life is proven by the emphasis it

attached to the arts of agriculture, metallurgy, manual and technical la-

bor. . . . The sociological viewpoints expressed in the Tantras were in op-

position to those upheld by the Smarta-PuràJic tradition.”102 In contrast

to the abstract, philosophical vision expressed in the Upaniãads, Tantra

represents a far more practical, concrete, and material worldview. Its pri-

mary concern is not with otherworldly speculation, but with the more

pragmatic matters of labor, fertility, and agricultural production. This

explains the central focus on sexuality and the female body in Tantra—

all of which, Bhattacharyya argues, is rooted in primitive fertility rites

aimed at the enhancement of human and natural reproduction:

Because of its original association with the simpler peoples, popular cults . . .

became an integral part of the Tantric way of life. This brought the cult of

the Mother Goddess and the fertility rites . . . into close relationship with

Tantra. The magical rites performed to obtain greater fertility of land . . .

really underlay elaborate Tantric rituals. . . .

To the working people Tantra meant more than a religious system . . .

knowledge meant worldly knowledge, which guided them in their . . . pro-

ductive works.103

In sum, Bhattacharyya finds in Tantra evidence for the existence of an

archaic class-free society, based on matriarchy and the power of the labor-

ing classes—a system that would eventually be displaced by Brahminical

Hinduism and its patriarchal, class-based social order.

Rather ingeniously, then, Bhattacharyya has turned the usual Orien-

talist narrative on its head. No longer is Tantra a corrupting disease that

has crippled the once noble Hindu tradition; instead, the patriarchal,

class-based Vedic culture is what has destroyed the originally egalitarian

worldview embodied in Tàkta Tantra. And over the course of history, Tan-

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tra itself would become infected by the class divisions and hierarchies of

patriarchal Aryan culture. Eventually, its once noble egalitarian vision

as a religion of the masses would be corrupted by socioeconomic divi-

sions and the power of the wealthy elites:

Tantra . . . has nothing to do with the caste system but in the later Tantras

caste elements are pronounced. . . . [A]lthough most of our known Tantric

teachers were non-Brahmans . . . belonging to the lower and despised classes,

almost all of the known authors of Tantric treatises were Brahmans who

could not give up their caste prejudices.104

Finally, the materialist, practical view of Tantra would be polluted by

the elitist, otherworldly speculations of schools like Advaita Vedànta: “Al-

though Tantra in its earlier stage opposed the Vedàntic philosophy of il-

lusion and admitted the reality of the world and its evolution out of a

material principle . . . the superimposed elements brought it into line with

Vedànta.”105

Though most critical readers today would probably find it problem-

atic, Bhattacharyya’s version of Indian history is a remarkably bold

attempt to invert the conventional narrative constructed by the Orien-

talists and Hindu reformers. Rather than being the worst example of the

degeneration of modern Hinduism, Tantra in Bhattacharyya’s view is the

embodiment of the most archaic, pure substratum of Indian culture,

which has been progressively corrupted by classical Hinduism.

Tantric Radicalism and the Failure of Modern Hindu Nationalism

The success of Tàktism could not be checked because it

had its root among the masses.

Bhattacharyya, History of the Tàkta Religion

As the “religion of the oppressed,” as Bhattacharyys calls it, Tantra has

always contained a pronounced streak of radicalism and revolutionary

potential. Despite its later corruptions, Tantra always preserved some vi-

sion of a classless, matriarchal society rooted in the material strength of

the masses. As the mythic image of power, the goddess Takti embodies

the oppressed masses’ dream of rising up against their unjust rulers:

From the beginning of the Christian era the priestly and ruling classes, the

landlords and big traders, enjoyed surplus of social production and those

on whose labour rested this social structure were mostly MÜdra s . . . leading

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miserable lives marked by endless oppression . . . and agonizing humilia-

tion. The Deví’s fight against the demons served as a cathartic dream to

which the toiling masses, struggling against the intolerable conditions of

life, eagerly responded but which remained out of reach.106

But the role of Tantra was not simply a wish-fulfillment. Throughout In-

dian history, Bhattacharyya suggests, Tantra also had the potential to play

a more active role in the attempt to fight economic oppression, reform

the social order, and regain the rights of the lower orders: “In the me-

dieval age many. . . Tantric sects launched religious reform movements.

They fought for the religious rights of the MÜdra s and women, preached

their doctrines among the hill tribes and tried to bring back the converted

Muslims.”107

The role of Tàkta Tantra would become especially crucial in the nine-

teenth and twentieth centuries, in the face of colonial rule and the Hindu

reform movements. While the Hindu reforms were geared primarily to

the educated upper and middle classes, the masses needed a much more

concrete and material source of liberation:

Since all these reform movements were confined only among the English-

educated intelligentsia, they had very little access among the greater sec-

tion of the people. . . . The followers of the reformist sects . . . kept them-

selves aloof from the masses while the orthodox section lived in the world

of exaggerated notions. But the common people needed an ideology in their

struggle for existence, an ideology that would serve the practical purposes

of life and . . . overcome the . . . spiritual crisis of the age.108

Hence, the toiling classes would find a more persuasive symbol of empow-

erment and liberation in the image of the Great Mother—particularly in

her most awesome, powerful, and terrible forms as Durgà and Kàlí: “The

conception of the country in the form of the Divine Mother was of a gen-

eral character acceptable to all irrespective of caste and creed, and it . . .

enhanced the patriotic feeling of the Indians. . . . Secret societies were

started in order to propagate revolutionary ideas, collect arms and rise

in rebellion.”109 Yet despite the failure of the revolutionary nationalist

movement, the power of the Goddess could never be fully suppressed.

She remains an eternal symbol of the oppressed masses, the power of the

land, and the common laborers, which continually returns to fight the

injustice of class and economic exploitation:

Throughout the ages, the Female Principle stood for the oppressed peoples,

symbolising all the liberating potentialities in the class divided, patriar-

chal and authoritarian social set up of India. . . . Chronic insistence upon

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the authoritarian . . . values by the writers of the smKti s and their violent

enforcement in social life by the ruling class contributed to the develop-

ment of another set of values quite opposite in character . . . but the suc-

cess of Tàktism could not be checked because it had its root among the

masses.110

Yet, ironically, Bhattacharyya eventually lost faith in Tantra and in the

power of an overt political movement in Bengal.

The Hopes and the Failures of the “Religion of the Oppressed”

The recognition of this proto-materialism has its im-

portance . . . for the modern materialist and this im-

portance can be compared to that of the recognition

of primitive communism by the scientific socialist. He

lays stress on it not because he dreams of returning to

it; his purpose rather is to show that human relations

based on private ownership and class-exploitation are

not without a beginning and end.

Debiprasad Cattopadhyaya, Lokàyata (1959)

Given his early Marxist commitments and his assumption of a material

basis of all culture and religion, the question remains: why would a

scholar like Bhattacharyya have been so interested in Tantra and in por-

traying it as a form of primitive socialism and a “religion of the op-

pressed”? Surely he is not holding Tantra up as an exemplar of a future,

ideal society or as a viable prototype of an egalitarian society. If he was

essentially critical of religion throughout his career, why would Bhat-

tacharyya have gone to such trouble to describe and often champion the

religion of the Tantras?

Bhattacharyya himself does not appear to give us an answer to this.

However, if we look to the work of his Marxist predecessor, Cattopad-

hyaya, we do perhaps find a compelling reason. The “proto-materialism”

that he sees in Tantra is by no means held up as an ideal to be emulated;

rather, it functions in much the same way that “primitive communism”

did for Marx and Engels. The existence of a form of primitive commu-

nism is, for Marx and Engels, proof that the present system of class hi-

erarchy is neither natural nor inevitable: it had a specific historical be-

ginning and it will have a specific end. This primitive communism is

proof that human beings could live in ways other than bourgeois capi-

talism, even as it bears the seeds of a future, truly egalitarian, and com-

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munist society. In much the same way, Chattopadhyaya argues, primi-

tive materialist traditions like Tantra give us evidence that private prop-

erty and class divisions are not permanent or immutable, but that they

had their origin in a particular historical formation and will one day be

overturned.

But what is the significance of the recognition of the primitive proto-

materialism . . . ? Its value is comparable to the recognition of primitive

communism in Marxism. The Marxists emphasise the importance of

primitive communism not because they dream of a return to it. The pur-

pose is rather to show that private property and the state machinery are

not eternal adjuncts to human existence. . . . Similarly the primitive proto-

materialism is discussed not for the purpose of a glorification of it. . . . [I]t

has its value by way of showing that the spiritualistic outlook is not innate

in man. It, too, will be washed away as inevitably as it arose at an earlier

stage.111

Though Bhattacharyya never articulated it quite this way himself, it

would seem that he was drawn to Tantra for similar reasons.

Like many Indian intellectuals, however, Bhattacharyya would grow

increasingly disillusioned with the political role of Marxism in Bengal

and the party politics of the CPI (M). Confronted with the Communist

Party’s chronic failure to improve the real material situation, along with

its increasing fragmentation, internal dissent, and concessions to inter-

ests of the political right, many Bengali intellectuals would distance them-

selves from the CPI (M) and Marxism. Though he remained sympathetic

to Marxism throughout his life, Bhattacharrya was drawn to the later

work of M. N. Roy, who adopted a more critical Marxist stance, reject-

ing the communists’ devaluation of the individual and advocating instead

a kind of radical humanism.112 In his later work, Bhattacharyya would

tone down much of his early Marxist rhetoric. For example, his Reli-

gious Culture of North-Eastern India (1995) contains little materialist

rhetoric or Marxist historical narrative. And if we compare the later edi-

tions of his early books, we can see that he backed away from many of

his materialist interpretations of Indian history. In the 1999 edition of

History of the Tantric Religion, sections like “Class-Orientation of Tan-

tra” are renamed or replaced; and, significantly, the 1996 edition of His-

tory of the Tàkta Religion simply deletes the entire final paragraph of the

1974 edition, which had praised Tàktism as the religion of “the oppressed

peoples, symbolising all the liberating potentialities in the class di-

vided . . . social set up of India.”113 Now modern Tàktism appears sim-

ply as the failure of yet another ideology.

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201

In sum, Bhattacharyya seems to have seen in Tàkta Tantra the hope,

however vain and futile, for some kind of liberation from the age of

darkness—from the class-divided, exploitative system that characterizes

both premodern and modern India. A kind of primitive communism,

Tantra offered a vision of a class-free, gender-equal social order rooted

in material needs and the interests of the oppressed masses. Yet Bhat-

tacharyya seems to have held fundamental reservations about both Tan-

tra and Marxism as real political solutions. For all its emphasis on egal-

itarianism and the power of the lower classes, Tantra remained bound

to a mystifying religious system; and Marxism, for all its utopian aspi-

rations, was all too easily co-opted by the interests of party factions and

political corruption. Though both offered a hope for liberation from the

age of darkness, both seemed to Bhattacharyya ultimately doomed by

their own internal contradictions.

a n e x t r e m e r e l i g i o n f o r a n a g e o f e x t r e m e s

The historical study of Tantrism has been handicapped,

complicated and conditioned by the preoccupation of

those working in the field.

Bhattacharyya , History of the Tantric Religion

The history of discourse about “Tantra,” it turns out, is also a political

history of the academic study of religions in the twentieth century: a his-

tory arising out of the most racist and exploitative era of colonial rule

and bursting into the most violent debates of twentieth-century Euro-

pean and Indian politics. By no means neglected or ignored in modern

scholarship, Tantra has been central to modern discourse on Indian cul-

ture and a key part of the reimagining of both European and Indian iden-

tity in the modern era. I have only scratched the surface of modern schol-

arship on Tantra here, as I also could have explored the work of art

historians such as Philip Rawson and Ajit Mookerjee, Jungians such as

Erich Neumann (and Jung himself ), and other important scholars such

as Bharati, Tucci, and Guenther.114 Not only has Tantra been taken up

by depth psychologists and art historians, but it has also been transmit-

ted to a wider public through the work of neo-Jungian mythographers

like Joseph Campbell. As Campbell suggests, it is the dark presence of

the Tantric Mother, Kàlí, that runs throughout the whole long history

of Indian religion itself: “In the end (and in fact secretly throughout) the

enduring power has always been the same old dark goddess of the long

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red tongue who turns everything into her own everlasting awesome, yet

finally somewhat tedious, self.”115

Yet Tantra has by no means been a singular or static category in mod-

ern scholarship: rather, its history is one of contradictions, transforma-

tions, and inversions. Whereas more liberal scholars like Zimmer saw

Tantra as an alternative to the violence of the war-torn modern West,

fascists like Evola saw it as the inevitable, violent solution to a degener-

ate civilization. Finally, the more complex and contradictory Eliade saw

Tantra as both the primordial heart of the ancient Orient and the reli-

gious form most appropriate to the modern West. As the spiritual path

that explicitly identifies the sacred with the profane, using the secular

forms of history to experience the transcendent truths of the sacred, Tan-

tra is one of the few paths still accessible to fallen modern man. Yet for

each of these scholars, Tantra seemed the ideal solution to an age of dark-

ness in which the reassuring structures and traditional hierarchies of the

old regime were rapidly crumbling.

In marked contrast to the more individualistic interpretations sug-

gested by the European scholars, both Kaviraj and Bhattacharyya found

in Tantra an ideal of collective liberation. For Kaviraj, this was largely a

spiritual ideal, a liberation that will bring about a universal, even es-

chatological transformation. For Bhattacharyya, the roots of Tantra have

always been much more material and socioeconomic. As a primitive form

of egalitarian, communal society, grounded in the power of the laboring

classes, Tàkta Tantra has always carried with it the hope of genuine po-

litical liberation. Though he would later back away from his early Marx-

ist enthusiasm, Bhattacharyya seems to have seen in Tantra the utopian

hope for a more egalitarian, nonhierarchal community, and as a kind of

primitive, albeit now inadequate and illusory, alternative to a class-based,

exploitative socioeconomic order.

Yet despite their wide diversity of interpretations, all of these schol-

ars found in Tantra a potent response to the age of darkness that seemed

to be reigning in the war-torn, politically and socially divided modern

world.

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c h a p t e r 6

The Cult of Ecstasy

Meldings of East and West

in a New Age of Tantra

What I tell you must be kept with great secrecy. This must

not be given to just anyone. It must only be given to a devoted

disciple. It will be death to any others.

If liberation could be attained simply by having intercourse

with a Makti [female partner], then all living beings in the world

would be liberated just by having intercourse with women.

KulàrJava Tantra (KT 2.4, 2.117)

Because the science of Tantra was developed thousands of

years ago . . . many of the techniques are not relevant to the

needs of the contemporary Western lover. . . . I see no need

for repetition of long Sanskrit mantras . . . or the strict ritu-

alization of lovemaking. . . . So while I have retained the

Tantric goal of sexual ecstasy, I’ve developed new approaches

to make this experience accessible to people today. High Sex

weaves together the disciplines of sexology and humanistic

psychology to give the Western lover the experience of sexual

ecstasy taught by Tantra but using contemporary tools.

Margo Anand, The Art of Sexual Ecstasy (1989)

Inspired by the new valorizations of Tantra by Eliade, Zimmer, and more

popular authors like Joseph Campbell, Tantra began to enter in full force

into the Western popular imagination of the twentieth century. Already

in the early 1900s we find the foundation of the first “Tantrik Order in

America”—an extremely scandalous, controversial affair, much sensa-

tionalized by the American media—and by the 1960s and 1970s, Tantra

had become a chic fashion for Western pop stars, as Jimi Hendrix began

203

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The Cult of Ecstasy

Figure 10. American Tantra, “New Millennium Flag Bearer,”

from the Third Millennium Magic web site (http://www

.3mmagic.com/at_main.html). Courtesy of Third Millennium

Magic, Inc. © www.3mmagic.com 1999.

displaying yantras on his guitar and Mick Jagger produced a psychedelic

film, Tantra, depicting the five M’s. Taking Eliade’s positive reinterpre-

tation a step further, Tantra is now celebrated as a “cult of ecstasy”: an

ideal wedding of sexuality and spirituality that provides a much needed

corrective to the prudish, repressive, modern West. In the process, it has

also spawned a variety of new spiritual forms, such as American Tantra,

neo-Tantra, and even the Church of Tantra (figure 10). At the same time,

these transformed versions of Tantra have been reappropriated by In-

dian authors. In a complex cross-cultural exchange or “curry effect” be-

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The Cult of Ecstasy205

tween India and the West, we not only find neo-Tantric gurus like Osho-

Rajneesh, but even a heavy-metal band in Calcutta called “Tantra.” Amid

the ever increasing circulation of material and spiritual capital through-

out the global marketplace, it seems that Tantra has been exported to

the West, where it has been processed, commodified, and reimported by

the East in a new form.

An examination of the history of Tantra and its contemporary mani-

festations shows that it has undergone profound transformations in the

course of its long, convoluted “journey to the West” and back. For most

contemporary American readers, Tantra is basically “spiritual sex,” the

“exotic art of prolonging your passion play” to achieve “nooky nir-

vana.”1 This would seem to be an image of Tantra that is very different

from that in most Indian traditions, where sex often plays a fairly mi-

nor, “unsexy” role and there is typically far more emphasis on guarded

initiation, esoteric knowledge, and elaborate ritual detail. At present

there is a profound shift in the imagining of Tantra—a shift from Tan-

tra conceived as dangerous power and secrecy to Tantra conceived as

healthy pleasure and liberated openness. This shift is exemplified by the

two epigraphs for this chapter. The first, the quote from the KulàrJava

Tantra, warns of the perils of revealing secrets to the uninitiated masses.

Kula practice, it is true, involves rites of sexual intercourse and con-

sumption of wine, but these must occur only in strictly guarded eso-

teric contexts; in the hands of the uninitiated masses, they would lead

to moral ruin and depravity. The contemporary neo- tàntrika, however,

takes the opposite position. Jettisoning the old ritual trappings as out-

dated and irrelevant, the neo- tàntrika takes only the most expedient

elements of these age-old techniques, mixes them with contemporary

self-help advice, and adapts them to a uniquely late-capitalist consumer

audience.

Since at least the time of Agehananda Bharati, most Western scholars

have been severely critical of these new forms of pop Tantra or neo-

Tantra. This “California Tantra,” as Georg Feuerstein calls it, is “based

on a profound misunderstanding of the Tantric path. Their main error

is to confuse Tantric bliss . . . with ordinary orgasmic pleasure.”2 My own

view, however, is that “neo” or “California” Tantra is not “wrong” or

“false,” any more than the Tantra of the MahànirvàJa or other tradi-

tions; it is simply a different interpretation for a specific historical situ-

ation. As such, the historian of religions must take it very seriously as an

example of a new adaptation of a religious form to a new social and po-

litical context.

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The Cult of Ecstasy

Above all, the popular fascination with Tantra as “spiritual sex” is

closely related to the larger preoccupation with sexuality in contempo-

rary culture as a whole, which is now filled with sexual discourse, im-

agery, and advertising. As Angus McLaren comments, “Today ’s media,

while claiming to be shocked by the subversiveness of carnal desires, del-

uge the public with explicit sexual imagery to sell everything from Calvin

Klein jeans to Black and Decker power drills. Sexuality. . . has invaded

every aspect of public life. Sexual identity has become a key defining cat-

egory in the twentieth century.”3 Yet, as Foucault argues, it is a common

misconception to suppose that the history of sex in the West is a pro-

gressive narrative of liberation from Victorian prudery. Just as the Vic-

torian age was not simply an era of repression and silence, our own age

is perhaps not the age of sexual revolution that we commonly imagine

it to be. Our sexual liberation has been accompanied by new forms of

regulation, backlash, and conservatism. What has happened, however,

is that we have produced an incredible body of discourse on the subject,

a kind of “over-knowledge” or “hyper-development of discourse about

sexuality.”4 Thus it is more useful to think of sexuality as a constructed

and contested category, whose boundaries have been renegotiated in each

generation. The category of “sexuality” is itself a recent invention, a

product of the late nineteenth century, by no means static—ever imag-

ined anew in the changing political contexts of the past one hundred

years.5

As I will argue in this chapter, the contemporary preoccupation with

Tantra has been part and parcel of our larger preoccupation with and

anxieties about sexuality, a source of both titillating fascination and mor-

alizing censorship. I will examine three transformations in the trans-

mission of Tantra to the United States: the founding of the scandalous

Tantrik Order in America by Pierre Bernard; the “sex magick” of Aleis-

ter Crowley and his followers; and the equation of Tantra with sexual

liberation during the countercultural revolution of the 1960s and 1970s.

But this preoccupation with Tantric sex has also been reimported by In-

dia via a complex feedback loop, through such figures as Osho-Rajneesh,

Chogyam Trungpa, and Swami Muktananda. Finally, as we can see in

the rapidly proliferating web sites, Tantra appears to have shattered the

boundaries between the “spiritual East and the material West.” Today,

anyone with a fast modem and Internet access may attend the Church

of Tantra, sample the Sensual Spiritual Software System, and discover

Ecstasy Online.

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These new forms of Tantra are in many ways well suited to our

unique socioeconomic context. With its apparent union of spirituality

and sexuality, sacred transcendence and material enjoy ment, Tantra

might well be said to be the ideal religion for contemporary consumer

culture—what I would call, adapting Fredric Jameson’s phrase, “the

spiritual logic of late capitalism.” Using some insights of Jameson and

others, I will argue that there is an intimate relationship between the

recent fascination with Tantra and the current socioeconomic situa-

tion, which has been variously described as late capitalism, postindus-

trial capitalism, or disorganized capitalism. It is precisely this kind of

“fit” with late-capitalist society—a fit not unlike that of Weber’s Prot-

estant ethic and early capitalism—that characterizes many new ap-

propriations of Tantra. Indeed, Tantra might be said to represent the

quintessential religion for consumer capitalist society at the turn of the

millennium.

t a n t r a , a m e r i c a n - s t y l e :

f r o m t h e p a t h o f p o w e r t o t h e y o g a o f s e x

Where can tantra happen? It can only happen in Ameri-

can and Western Europe. . . . Tantrism may happen

here and maybe it has started right here in Boulder,

Colorado, 80302.

Agehananda Bharati,

“The Future (if Any) of Tantrism” (1975)

In 1975, at the peak of the New Age movement and when the Naropa

Institute was a burgeoning Mecca for Tantric spirituality, Agehananda

Bharati made the qualified prediction that the United States might be-

come the new center for the revival of Tantra. India, he believed, had

become so morally repressive that it could no longer provide any space

for Tantra; the affluent West alone had the openness and freedom to ac-

commodate Tantra in the modern world. Yet he also warned of the real

dangers of this transmission of Tantra to the United States, where it could

be (and in his day already was being) all too easily misinterpreted as a

simple excuse for self-gratification and hedonism:

It is conceivable that the more affluent . . . of the West, particularly

Western Europe and north America, might espouse some form of tan-

trism. . . . Some steps have been made, but probably in the wrong direc-

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tions: the frustrated middle aged North American lusting for the myste-

rious has opened a door for tantrism to enter. However, I feel that this

entry is dangerous and . . . that it would have havoc out of tantrism.6

It would seem that both Bharati’s prediction and his warning have been

realized. The West, particularly America, has indeed become a fertile new

land for the spread of Tantra, yet it has also offered new opportunities

for its gross misinterpretation and reckless abuse.

The Western appropriation of Tantra had already begun in the late

nineteenth century, with the Theosophical Society and Madame Blavat-

sky’s descriptions of the mysterious “masters” who dwell in forbidden

Tibet, the heartland of Vajrayàna Buddhism. The massive text of her Se-

cret Doctrine is alleged to be based on a mysterious Tibetan text dis-

covered by Blavatsky. What is most striking, however, is that Blavatsky

did not identify Tibetan Buddhism as “Tantra”; on the contrary, influ-

enced by Orientalist attitudes, she went to some pains to distinguish it

from the disreputable tradition of black magic and hedonism known as

Tantra. While Tantra could be understood in a spiritual sense as a form

of “white magic,” most of its modern forms are degenerate “necro-

mancy” and “invocations to the demon,” comparable to Western black

magic: “The Tantras . . . are the embodiment of ceremonial black magic

of the darkest dye. A Tantrika . . . is synonymous with ‘Sorcerer.’ . . .

[T]hose Kabalists who dabble in the ceremonial magic described . . . by

Eliphas Levi are as full blown Tantrikas as those of Bengal.”7

It was not until the beginning of this century, and particularly in the

United States, that Tantra was newly appropriated in a positive form in

the Western popular imagination. No longer conceived as a religion of

black magic and occult power, Tantra began to be identified more and

more with the pursuit of sensual pleasure and erotic bliss. This was above

all the case following Richard Burton’s scandalous translation of the clas-

sic Indian erotic manual, the Kàma SÜtra, a text that was originally pub-

lished in 1883 only for private circulation but that was soon pirated and

sold widely throughout Europe. The Kàma SÜtra itself, of course, really

has nothing to do with “Tantra.” In the Victorian imagination, however,

the dark secrets of the Tantras and the tantalizing secrets of the Kàma

SÜtra would soon blend together and take on a variety of new forms.8

And three of the most interesting of these new forms were perhaps the

founding of the first Tantrik Order in America, the spread of Crowleyian

“sex magick,” and the “yoga of sex” that emerged with the countercul-

ture of the 1960s and 1970s.

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The Omnipotent Oom:

Pierre Arnold Bernard and the Tantrik Order in America

Wily con man, yogi, athlete, bank president, founder of

the Tantrik Order in America . . . the remarkable “Doc-

tor” Bernard was all of these. He was also the Omnipo-

tent Oom, whose devoted followers included some of

the most famous names in America.

Charles Boswell,

“The Great Fuss and Fume over the Omnipotent Oom”

I’m a curious combination of the businessman and the

religious scholar.

Pierre Arnold Bernard

Not only was he the first man to bring Tantra to America, but Pierre

Bernard was also surely one of the most colorful and controversial figures

in early-twentieth-century American history. Described as “both a prophet

and showman,” Bernard was a man “who could lecture on religion with

singular penetration and with equal facility stage a big circus, manage a

winning ball team or put on an exhibition of magic which rivaled Hou-

dini.”9 Infamous in the press as “the Omnipotent Oom,” Bernard claimed

to have traveled to the mystic Orient in order to bring the secret teach-

ings of Tantra to this country and to found the first “Tantrik Order in

America,” in 1906. Surrounded by controversy and slander regarding

the sexual freedom he and his largely female followers were said to en-

joy, Bernard is in many ways an epitome of Tantra in its uniquely Ameri-

can incarnations.

Virtually nothing is known about Bernard’s early life; in fact, he seems

to have gone to some lengths to conceal his real background behind a

veil of fictitious identities and false biography, often using the persona

of “Peter Coons” from Iowa.10 Probably born in 1875 to a middle-class

family from California, Bernard left home in his teens to work his way

to India in order to study the “ancient Sanskrit writings and age old meth-

ods of curing diseases of mind and body.” After studying in Kashmir and

Bengal, he won the title “Shastri” and was supposedly initiated into the

mysteries of Tantric practice. Returning to America, and now introduc-

ing himself with the title of “Doctor,” he worked at various odd jobs in

California and began to study hypnotism. By 1900, he had become mod-

erately famous as a master of self-hypnosis who could use yogic tech-

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Figure 11. Pierre Bernard, demonstrating the Kàlí mudrà, or simulation of death.

From International Journal of the Tantrik Order 5, no. 1 (1906).

niques to place himself in a state simulating death (figure 11). It is also

likely that Bernard received instruction in Tantric practice from one

Swami Ram Tirath, an Indian yogi who had come to California in the

early 1900s, who praised Bernard as a man of “profound learning,” com-

parable to “the Tantrik High Priests of India.”11

In 1904, Bernard established a clinic in San Francisco where he taught

his own versions of self-hypnosis and yoga; the clinic eventually became

known as the Bacchante Academy. Even by then, Bernard had become

something of a scandal in the California press, who charged that the acad-

emy “catered to young women interested in learning hypnotism and soul

charming—by which they meant the mysteries of the relations between

the sexes.”12 Sometime in the years 1906–7, Bernard founded the first

Tantrik Order in America, with an accompanying journal—the Interna-

tional Journal of the Tantrik Order—whose charter document for initi-

ation reads as follows:

As a tear from heaven he has been dropped into the Ocean of the tantrik

brotherhood upon earth and is moored forevermore in the harbor of

contentment, at the door to the temple of wisdom wherein are experienced

all things; and to him will be unveiled the knowledge of the Most High. . . .

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The Cult of Ecstasy211

Armed with the key to the sanctuary of divine symbolism wherein are

stored the secrets of wisdom and power, he . . . has proven himself worthy

to be entrusted with the knowledge . . . to soar above the world and look

down upon it; to exalt the passions and quicken the imagination . . . to

treat all things with indifference; to know that religion is the worship of

man’s invisible power . . . to enjoy well-being, generosity, and popular-

ity. . . . He has learned to love life and know death.13

After the San Francisco earthquake in 1906, Bernard left California

and relocated in New York City, where he opened his “Oriental Sanc-

tum” in 1910. Teaching haåha yoga downstairs and offering secret Tantric

initiation upstairs, the Oriental Sanctum quickly became an object of

scandal in the New York press: the notorious “Omnipotent Oom” was

charged with kidnapping and was briefly imprisoned, though the charges

were later dropped. “I cannot tell you how Bernard got control over me,”

said one of the alleged kidnappees, Zella Hopp. “He is the most won-

derful man in the world. No women seem able to resist him.”14 Similar

controversy surrounded the “New York Sanskrit College,” which Bernard

founded a few years later. The press reported “wild Oriental music and

women’s cries, but not those of distress.”15

By 1918 Bernard and his followers had moved out to a seventy-two-

acre estate in Upper Nyack, New York—a former girls’ academy that he

renamed the Clarkstown Country Club, making it the site of his own

“utopian Tantric community.” A sumptuous property with a thirty-room

Georgian mansion, the club was designed to be “a place where the philoso-

pher may dance, and the fool be provided with a thinking cap!”16 Even-

tually, he would also purchase a huge property known as the Mooring

and then later open a chain of Tantric clinics, including centers in Cleve-

land, Philadelphia, Chicago, and New York City, as well as a Tantric sum-

mer camp for men in Long Island. His clinics were well known for at-

tracting the most affluent clients—“mostly professional and business men

and women from New York,” including Ann Vanderbilt, Sir Paul Dukes,

composer Cyril Scott, and conductor Leopold Stokowski, among others.17

According to Town and Country magazine of 1941, “Every hour of the

day limousines and taxies drove up to the entrance of the Doctor’s New

York clinic. In the marble foyer behind the wrought-iron portal of 16 East

53rd Street, a pretty secretary handled appointments.”18 Hence, it is not

surprising that Bernard quickly achieved a remarkable degree of wealth,

fame, and status: “Almost overnight, Oom found himself showered with

more money than he had ever dreamed of and chieftain of a tribe of both

male and female followers. . . . This tribe . . . would number well over 200,

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and would carry on its roster some of the best-known names in Amer-

ica.”19 And much of the appeal of Bernard’s teachings, as well as the scan-

dal they generated, centered around his views of sexuality.

Sex, Secrecy, Slander, and Censorship: Bernard’s Tantric Teachings

and Their Reception in the American Popular Imagination

Love, a manifestation of sexual instinct, is the animat-

ing spirit of the world.

Pierre Bernard,

“Tantrik Worship: The Basis of Religion” (1906)

Many of Bernard’s Tantric teachings appear to have been surrounded

with an aura of secrecy, considered so profound and potentially dan-

gerous that they had to be reserved for the initiated few. Thus the Inter-

national Journal of the Tantrik Order warns that “whoever has been ini-

tiated, no matter what may be the degree to which he may belong, and

shall reveal the sacred formulae, shall be put to death.”20 According to

the police reports from a raid on Bernard’s clinic, entry involved a secret

signal and complex series of taps on the bell. There also seems to have

been a certain hierarchy of disciples, with the lower-level initiates perform-

ing physical exercises downstairs, while the “inner circle”—the “Secret

Order of Tantriks”—engaged in the more esoteric rituals upstairs:

Downstairs, they found a bare room where Oom’s physical culture clients,

paying $100 bite, toiled through exercises designed to produce the body

beautiful. Upstairs . . . on canvas-covered mattresses, Oom’s inner-circle

clients participated in secret rites. . . . [T]he upstairs customers, following

physical examinations, had to pay large sums and then sign their names

in blood before they could be initiated into the cult.21

The popular press offered some vivid and probably somewhat fictional

accounts of Bernard’s secret Tantric rituals, occult initiations, and arcane

esoteric techniques.

During Tantrik ceremonies, Oom sat on his throne wearing a turban, a

silken robe and baggy Turkish pants, and flourished a scepter. While so

engaged, he invariably smoked one of the long black cigars to which he

was addicted. . . .

A frequent Tantrik ceremony involved the initiation of new members.

“To join the order,” an Oomite later disclosed, “the novitiate must first

have confessed all sins, all secret desires, all inner thoughts; must then prom-

ise to abide by Doctor Bernard’s orders and . . . take the Tantrik vow.”

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The Cult of Ecstasy213

The novitiate looks upon Doctor Bernard as a high priest—indeed, as a

sort of man-god. He kneels before Doctor Bernard and recites: “Be to me a

living guru; be a loving Tantrik guru.” Then all present bow their heads as

though in church and repeat in unison: “Oom man na padma Oom.” It is

sung over and over in a chanting monotone, like the beating of drums in

a forest, and is supposed . . . to induce a state of ecstasy.22

There does appear to have been some real need for the secrecy in

Bernard’s Tantric practice—particularly in the moral environs of early-

twentieth-century America. According to the accounts that came out of

Bernard’s Nyack Country Club, much of the spiritual practice there cen-

tered around full enjoyment of the physical body and complete liberation

of sexual pleasure. As we read in the International Journal of the Tantrik

Order, the human body is the supreme creation in this universe and the

most perfect place of worship —a truly embodied, sensual worship that

requires no priesthood or churches of stone: “The trained imagination

no longer worships before the shrines of churches, pagodas and mosques

or there would be blaspheming of the greatest, grandest and most sub-

lime temple in the universe, the miracle of miracles, the human body.”23

Like dance and yoga, sex is thus a spiritual discipline, a means of ex-

periencing the divine within the physical body. “The secret of Bernard’s

powers,” one observer comments, was “to give his followers a new con-

ception of love. . . . Bernard’s aims are . . . to teach men and women to

love, and make women feel like queens.”24 (Thus, in his Tantrik journal,

Bernard even spells the word tantra in devanàgarí characters comprised

of tiny hearts.) As we read in his article “Tantrik Worship,” the sex drive

is in fact “the animating spirit of the world.”

The animating impulse of all organic life is the sexual instinct. It is that

which underlies the struggle for existence in the animal world and is the

source of all human endeavor. . . . That affinity which draws the two sexes

together for the . . . production of a new being, that overmastering univer-

sal impulse, is the most powerful factor in the human race and has ever been

the cause of man’s most exalted thought.25

Yet in modern Western culture, the mysteries of sexual love have been

stupidly repressed, relegated by self-righteous prudes to the realm of de-

pravity. Today, “matters pertaining to the sexes are generally avoided,

and we are taught that the sexual appetite is an animal craving that should

be concealed,” such that most Americans now “are blind to the vast im-

portance of the sexual nature” and fail to realize that it is in fact the “well-

spring of human life and happiness.”26 According to one disciple’s ac-

count, Bernard was one of the only teachers of that time who recognized

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the natural beauty and power of sex, which is nothing other than an ex-

pression of our union with the divine: “He teaches the Oriental view of

love as opposed to the restrained Western idea. Love . . . is akin to mu-

sic and poetry. It unites men and women with the infinite.”27

Bernard’s wife, Blanche de Vries, also became a teacher of Oriental

dance and haåha yoga. She would eventually develop her own sort of

“Tantric health system,” which she marketed very profitably to the

wealthy New York upper-class society, who were increasingly obsessed

by matters of physical health and beauty. Among her more affluent pa-

trons, for example, was Mrs. Ogden L. Mills, a stepdaughter of the Van-

derbilt family. As Mrs. Bernard commented, the Tantric teaching of love

is the most-needed remedy to modern America’s social ills, most of which

derive from repression, prudery, and self-denial: “Half the domestic

tragedies . . . and not a few suicides and murders in America are due to

the inherent stupidity of the average Anglo-Saxon man or woman on the

subject of love. We will teach them, and make our adventure a great suc-

cess.”28 Apparently, Bernard also believed that for certain individuals

(particularly overly repressed women of the Victorian era) more drastic,

surgical measures might be needed to liberate their sexual potential. Sex-

ually unresponsive or “desensitized women” could be helped by a form of

partial circumcision, in which the clitoral hood was surgically removed—

an operation believed to improve female receptivity by exposing the cli-

toral gland to direct stimulation.29

Not surprisingly, the popular press of the day took no end of delight in

sensationalizing Bernard’s scandalous Tantric practices and soon dubbed

him the “Loving Guru.” Bernard’s clinics represented something terribly

shocking yet also tantalizing in the American imagination—something

deliciously transgressive, in a world where sex for the sake of procre-

ation within heterosexual marriage was the unassailable pillar of decent

society: “The rites are grossly licentious and . . . a couple skilled in the

rites . . . are supposedly able to make love hour after hour without dimi-

nution of male potency and female desire.”30

It seems inevitable that Bernard’s Tantric clinics would have elicited

some complaints from his neighbors and attracted the attention of the

authorities. One F. H. Gans, who occupied an apartment across the way,

summed up the neighborhood grievance: “What my wife and I have seen

through the windows of that place is scandalous. We saw men and women

in various stages of dishabille. Women’s screams mingled with wild Ori-

ental music.”31 In Nyack, where Bernard was a respected citizen, the

authorities received a host of complaints about this scandalous Tantric

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The Cult of Ecstasy215

clinic; reluctantly, the state police investigated, and riding into the estate

on horseback:

Nyack concluded Oom was running a love cult. The local prudes clucked

and gasped their alarm. Oom, obviously, was a danger to the young of the

community and would have to be run out of town.

But the Nyack police refused to act. Oom was a big taxpayer. So the

prudes complained to the New York State Police, then a recently formed,

eager-beaver organization. . . . The night they received the complaint, a

squad of troopers galloped to Oom’s estate and swung down from their

saddles near the main building.32

After his rise to celebrity, soon followed by his rapid descent into scan-

dal, Bernard seems to have retired into a relatively quiet later life. En-

joying an affluent lifestyle, Bernard was known for his lavish wedding

celebrations, his generous patronage of professional baseball and box-

ing, and his investment in sporting venues like baseball stadiums and dog

tracks. Eventually he assumed a more respectable position in Nyack so-

ciety, becoming president of the State Bank of Pearl River in 1931. With

a fondness for collecting fine automobiles, such as Rolls-Royces, Stutzes,

and Lincolns, Bernard is said to have been worth over twelve million dol-

lars at his peak. Remembered as a “curious combination of the busi-

nessman and the religious scholar,” he died in New York City in 1955,

at the age of 80.

In sum, we might say that the enigmatic and colorful character of Pierre

Bernard is important to the history of Tantra for three reasons. First, he

was a bold pioneer in the transmission of Tantra to America, where it

quickly took root and flourished; second, he was one of the first figures

in the larger reinterpretation of Tantra as something primarily concerned

with sex and physical pleasure; and finally, like so many later American

Tantric gurus, he generated intense scandal and slander from the sur-

rounding society, foreshadowing Tantra’s role in the American imagina-

tion as something wonderfully tantalizing and transgressive. As such,

Oom’s popular brand of Tantra would help lay the foundation for the

new synthesis of Tantra and Western sex magic that later emerged.

“Do What Thou Wilt!” Sex Magick, Tantra,

and Modern Western Esotericism

True Sex-power is God-power.

Paschal Beverly Randolph,

The Ansairetic Mystery (ca. 1873)

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Mankind must learn that the sexual instinct is . . .

ennobling. The shocking evils which we all deplore

are due to perversions produced by suppressions. The

feeling that it is shameful and the sense of sin cause

concealment . . . creates neurosis and ends in explo-

sion. We produce an abscess and wonder . . . why

it bursts in stench and corruption. . . . The Book of

the Law solves the sexual problem completely. Each

individual has an absolute right to satisfy his sexual

instinct.

Aleister Crowley, The Confessions of Aleister Crowley (1968)

Once the seeds of Tantra had been sown in this country, they soon be-

gan to proliferate wildly in the fertile soil of the American imagination,

mingling with a number of existing Western esoteric traditions. Most

modern forms of sexual magic, I would argue, are largely the fusion of

Indian Tantric techniques, as reinterpreted by figures like Bernard and

by Western occult movements emerging from the Masonic, Rosicrucian,

and Kabbalistic traditions.

Sex, magic, and secrecy had long been associated in the Western imag-

ination. From the early Gnostics to the Knights Templar and the Cathars

of late medieval Europe, esoteric orders had been accused of using sexual

rituals as part of their secret magical arts.33 However, perhaps the first

evidence of a sophisticated use of sexual magical techniques appears in

the mid-nineteenth century, with the mysterious figure of Paschal Beverly

Randolph (1825–75). Born to a wealthy Virginian father and a slave from

Madagascar, Randolph was raised a poor, self-taught, free black in New

York City. After running away from home at age sixteen, he traveled the

world, wandering through Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. In the

course of his travels, Randolph encountered a wide variety of esoteric

traditions—not just European Spiritualist and Rosicrucian orders, but

also a number of Sufi lineages. He claims to have derived much of his

knowledge from a group of fakirs in the area of Jerusalem, which may

have been a branch of the Muslim order of the Nusa’iri—a group long

persecuted by orthodox Islam because of its alleged Gnostic sexual rit-

uals.34 Eventually Randolph would emerge as one of the leading fig-

ures in nineteenth-century Spiritualism and the most famous scryer of

his time.

However, Randolph is most famous as an exponent of spiritual eroti-

cism, or Affectional Alchemy, a form of sexual magic that would have a

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The Cult of Ecstasy217

profound impact on later Western esotericism. In sexual love, “he saw

the greatest hope for the regeneration of the world, the key to personal

fulfillment as well as social transformation and the basis of a non-re-

pressive civilization.”35 For Randolph, orgasm is the critical moment in

human consciousness and the key to magical power. It is the instant when

life is infused from the divine realm into the material realm, as the soul

is suddenly opened to the spiritual energies of the cosmos: “at the in-

stant of intense mutual orgasm the souls of the partners are opened to

the powers of the cosmos and anything then truly willed is accom-

plished.”36 As such, the experience of sexual climax has the potential to

lead the soul either upward or downward, to higher states of transcen-

dence or to depraved states of corruption: “The moment when a man

discharges his seed—his essential self—into a . . . womb is the most

solemn, energetic and powerful moment he can ever know on earth; if

under the influence of mere lust it be done, the discharge is suicidal.”37

If one can harness the creative energy of orgasm, he or she can deploy it

for a wide range of uses, to realize virtually any worldly or otherworldly

goal. Not only can we achieve the spiritual aims of divine insight, but we

can also attain physical health, financial success, or regain the passions

of a straying lover.38

One of the most striking features of Randolph’s sexual magic, how-

ever, is his insistence that both male and female partners must have an

active role in the process; in fact, both must achieve orgasm—ideally a

simultaneous orgasm—for the magical operation to successful: “The

woman’s orgasms should coincide with man’s emission, for only in this

way will the magic be fulfilled.”39 The resulting pleasure that both part-

ners feel in this union is nothing less than the overflowing joy of the di-

vine emanating from above: “The joy. . . is diffused over both beings

and each is based in the celestial and divine aura—the breath of God,

suffusing both bodies, refreshing both souls!”40

Although Randolph seems to have no direct connection to Indian sex-

ual practices, his teachings were to have a formative impact on later West-

ern occult traditions, “releasing the genie” of sexual magic.41 And they

would soon become mingled with the sexual traditions now being im-

ported form the Orient, including the titillating erotica of the Kàma SÜtra

and the esoteric mysteries of Tantra.

While it seems unlikely that Randolph had any knowledge of Tantra,

it is more plausible that several later Western occultists did—in particu-

lar, the organizers of the highly esoteric movement of the Ordo Templi

Orientis. Founded in the late nineteenth century by Karl Kellner (1861–

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1905) and Theodor Reuss (1855–1923), the OTO became the main con-

duit through which Western sexual magic began to merge with a (some-

what deformed) version of Indian Tantra. A wealthy Austrian chemist

and industrialist, Kellner claims to have been initiated into Indian sex-

ual techniques in the course of his Oriental travels, citing three masters—

one Sufi and two yogis, one of whom may have been a Bengali tàntrika.

Reuss, too, seems to have had some knowledge of left-hand Tantra, which

he cites in his work.42 However, others suggest that Kellner’s inspiration

may have been Randolph, whose sexual magic had been spread to Eu-

rope by a group of disciples in the late nineteenth century.43

Whatever their origins, much of the OTO ritual appears to have cen-

tered around the “inner kernel” of sexual magic—a quite different one

from the more conservative system of Randolph. As the OTO proclaimed

in 1912 in the Masonic journal Oriflamme:

One of the secrets which our order possesses in its highest grades is that

it gives members the means to re-erect the temple of Solomon in men, to

refind the lost Word. . . . Our Order possesses the Key which unlocks all

Masonic and Hermetic secrets, it is the teaching of sexual magic and this

teaching explains all the riddles of nature, all Masonic symbolism and all

religious systems.44

The OTO developed a system of nine degrees (later expanded to eleven),

the first six of which were more conventional Masonic initiations. The

seventh, eight, and ninth, however, focused respectively upon the theory

of sex magic and on the techniques of auto- and heterosexual magic. Ho-

mosexual intercourse also appears to have played a central role in the

rituals.45 Through the magical act of intercourse, by focusing all of one’s

will on a desired goal at the moment of orgasm, one can accomplish any

occult operation, from the invocation of a god to the finding of hidden

treasure. One may, for example, use these techniques to empower a tal-

isman or another magical object: by focusing one’s will on the desired

object during auto- or heterosexual orgasm, and afterward anointing that

object with the semen, one can use the empowered object to achieve vir-

tually any desired end. Similarly, the power of sex can be used to incar-

nate a god within one’s own consciousness, by concentrating on the de-

ity at the moment of orgasm and so “blending their [man’s and god’s]

personalities into one.”46

Surely the most infamous member of the OTO was the notorious ma-

gician and self-proclaimed “Great Beast 666,” Aleister Crowley (1875–

1947; figure 12). Crowley’s practice is the clearest example of Western

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Figure 12. Aleister Crowley, costumed as an Eastern sage for a publicity photo

to attract students (ca. 1936). Courtesy of Ordo Templi Orientis, Berlin.

sexual magic combined (and perhaps hopelessly confused) with Indian

Tantra. The son of a preacher in the puritanical Plymouth Brethren sect,

Crowley is in many ways an exemplar of the Victorian age—raised in a

prudishly repressive environment and turning later to extremes of sex-

ual excess. Following Nietszche in his fierce rejection of Christianity as

emasculated and weak, he “declared that all orthodox religions are rub-

bish and that the sole true gods are the sun and his vice-regent, the pe-

nis.”47 A poet, novelist, and accomplished mountain climber, Crowley

would also become one of the most reviled characters of the twentieth

century. Known in the press as “the wickedest man on earth,” Crowley

was vilified as a “vicious Satanist who employed illicit drugs and per-

verted sex to enliven the weary charade of his blasphemous ‘magick.’”48

Much like Bernard’s infamy and scandals, Crowley’s were mostly about

his sexual practices.

His most recent biographer, Lawrence Sutin, suggests that Crowley may

have first learned Tantric practices in Ceylon as early as 1901, while study-

ing Buddhism; yet he seems to have been initially quite repulsed by them,

dismissing them as “follies of Vamacharya (debauchery).”49 His attitudes

toward such rituals appear to have changed in the next few years, how-

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ever, when he began to experiment in his own sexual magic. Already in

1902, Crowley and his partner Rose had begun to engage in a series of

“secret rites, of a sexual nature (and related to Tantric practices, such as

the emulation of the passive Shiva in cosmic coupling with the mounted

energetic Shakti).”50 Other authors think Crowley may have been even

more deeply involved in left-hand Tantric rites during his travels in In-

dia. We have already considered Elizabeth Sharpe’s semifictional account

Secrets of the Kaula Circle, which describes a mysterious Englishman call-

ing himself by the number 666. Once handsome, but later gross, 666 uses

various magical processes, pentangles, and swords to draw phantoms into

his circles with the help of Tantric lamas; yet he later falls to the ground

frothing at the mouth, the victim of his own decadent black magic. Nik

Douglas concludes that this is clearly a reference to Crowley and pro-

vides evidence that he had extensive knowledge of Tantra (though it seems

equally likely that Sharpe has worked the infamous Beast 666 as a

fictional character into her narrative).51

Yet whatever their origin, sexual practices clearly formed an integral

part of Crowley’s magical repertoire. “Sex is a sacrament,” as the Great

Beast put it in his Book of Lies. These practices became particularly cen-

tral during the years of his involvement with the OTO. After reading his

Book of Lies in 1912, Theodor Reuss allegedly contacted Crowley and

accused him of revealing the innermost secret of the OTO: the secret of

sexual magic. Though Crowley had done so unintentionally, the story

goes, he was named the Sovereign Grand Master General of Ireland,

Ioana, and all the Britains. In his Confessions, Crowley discusses the nine

degrees of the OTO’s initiations, together with the two he later added,

and also points to the kernel of sexual magic at the center of the higher

degrees:

If this secret [of sexual magic] which is a scientific secret were perfectly

understood, as it is not by me after more than twelve years’ almost con-

stant study and experiment, there would be nothing which the human

imagination can conceive that could not be realized in practice. . . . If it

were desired to have an element of atomic weight six times that of ura-

nium that element could be produced.52

Thus in his magical rites, Crowley calls not for any ascetic withdrawal

or denial of the flesh, but rather for the fullest celebration of the body,

with all its desires, in the ceremony of love:

Then comes the call of the Great Goddess, Nuit, Lady of the Starry

Heaven. . . . “Come forth, O children under the stars and take your fill

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of love! I am above you and in you. My ecstasy is in yours. . . . Is ours

the gloomy asceticism of the Christian . . . ? Are we walking in eternal

fear lest some ‘sin’ should cut us off from ‘grace’? By no means. . . . Dress

ye all in fine apparel, eat rich foods and drink sweet wines that foam! Also

take your fill of and will of love as ye will when, where and with whom

ye will!”53

Crowley’s most intense period of experimentation in sexual magic ap-

pears to have begun in 1914, during his “Paris workings.” Together with

his homosexual lover, the poet Victor Neuberg, Crowley engaged in a

variety of sexual rites intended to achieve both spiritual and material

ends—both the primary goal of “invoking the gods Jupiter and Mercury

and the secondary one of getting these gods to supply Crowley and Neu-

berg with money.”54 As Julius Evola suggests, Crowley saw in orgasm

(as in drug experience) a means to create “openings or breakages of con-

sciousness” that give the soul access to supersensual and ecstatic states.55

However, as others point out, Crowley was perhaps more often concerned

with the efficacy of sexual techniques for “obtaining wealth or anything

else the magician might desire.”56 For example, Crowley suggests that

one might use sexual magic to “perform an operation to have $20,000.”

By totally focusing one’s will upon an object at the moment of orgasm,

one can powerfully influence the course of events and achieve the desired

goal: “The purpose of these operations of High Magick Art was to obtain

priestly power and, on a lower plane, money.”57

However, the ultimate goal that Crowley sought through his sexual

magical practices seems to have gone far beyond the mundane desire for

material wealth; in his most exalted moments, Crowley believed that he

could achieve the birth of a divine child—a spiritual, immortal, godlike

being, who would transcend the moral failings of the body born of mere

woman. This goal of creating an inner immortal fetus, Crowley suggests,

lies at the heart of many esoteric traditions, from ancient Mesopotamia

to India to the Arab world:

This is the great idea of magicians in all times—To obtain a Messiah by

some adaptation of the sexual process. In Assyria they tried incest . . .

Greeks and Syrians mostly bestiality. This idea came from India. . . . The

Mohammedans tried homosexuality; medieval philosophers tried to pro-

duce homunculi by making chemical experiments with semen. But the root

idea is that any form of procreation other than normal is likely to produce

results of a magical character.58

Now, if it is possible that Crowley had some contact with Indian Tan-

tra and drew some of his sexual practice from Eastern sources, it would

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seem that he also creatively reinterpreted them through his own occult

system. Much of Crowley’s magic, for example, involved homosexual

intercourse—something almost never found in Tantric rituals. More im-

portantly, Crowley was not content simply to achieve a spiritual union

of the divine male and female principles; rather, he sought nothing less

than the conception of a magical fetus or spiritual child—a kind of golem

like that of the Kabbalistic and alchemical tradition:

The principal difference between Crowley’s sexual magic and traditional

Tantric techniques now becomes clear. For Crowley, the object of the rit-

ual was not limited to mystic union with the goddess . . . but could further

involve the creation of a new spiritual form—a magical child. . . . This

magical child could be . . . any form of concentrated inspiration, or it

could manifest physically as a talisman or even within a human being—

as in a newborn baby or a newly spiritually transformed adult man.59

Thus, we might say that the magical and sexual career of Aleister Crow-

ley was in many ways parallel to that of Pierre Arnold Bernard. In fact,

the two briefly met. Not only do many of Crowley’s teachings seem to

bear some resemblance to those of Bernard’s American Tantra, but it

would seem that Crowley also had direct contact with the members of

the Tantrik Order in the 1920s. Crowley was first introduced to his in-

famous “Scarlet woman,” Leah Hirsig, in New York in 1918 by her sis-

ter Alma, who was an ardent disciple of Bernard in his Tantrik Order in

New York. Alma would later publish her expose of Bernard’s group, un-

der the pseudonym of Marion Dockerill, entitled My Life in a Love Cult:

A Warning to All Young Girls (1928). As Sutin observes, “There are . . .

obvious parallels in the paths of Alma as High Priestess and Leah as Scar-

let Woman.”60 This parallel between the sister-consorts of Crowley and

Bernard is quite fitting: after all, both Crowley and Bernard were to be-

come notorious in the American popular imagination as high priests of

secret Tantric rituals; and both would soon face intense scandal and me-

dia attack, largely because of their illicit sexual practices.

Crowley and Bernard were instrumental in three ways in the trans-

mission and transformation of Tantra in the West. First, they were both

key figures in the sensationalization of Tantra in the popular imagina-

tion, as it became an increasing object of scandal and media exploita-

tion during the early twentieth century. Second, both were key figures in

the reinterpretation of Tantra, as it was transformed from a tradition con-

cerned primarily with secrecy and power to one focused on the opti-

mization of sexual orgasm. Finally, the combined influence of Crowley

and Bernard led to the increasing fusion of Western esoteric traditions

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with Indian Tantra. Today, one need only browse the shelves of any New

Age bookstore to find a range of magazines, videos, and texts bearing ti-

tles like Tantra without Tears; Sex, Magic, Tantra, and Tarot; and Secrets

of Western Tantra—most of which are based on the fundamental equa-

tion of Indian Tantric techniques and Crowleyian-style sexual magic.61

The Yoga of Sex: Tantra, Counterculture, and “Sexual Liberation”

Tantra is . . . not withdrawal from life but the fullest

possible acceptance of one’s desires, feelings and situa-

tions as a human being. . . . Explore the fascination of

desire, love and lust to its limit. . . . Thus the follower

of the Tantric way plunges himself into just those things

which the ascetic renounces: sexuality, food and drink,

and all the involvements of worldly life.

Alan Watts, “Tantra” (1976)

Although Tantra had begun to emerge in the early twentieth century as

something scandalous, shocking, and yet also terribly interesting, it didn’t

burst into popular culture as a full-blown “cult of ecstasy” or “yoga of

sex” until the 1960s. Now mingled with the erotica of the Kàma SÜtra,

Pierre Bernard’s sex scandals, and the magick of the Great Beast 666, Tan-

tra fit in nicely with the American counterculture and the so-called sex-

ual revolution. As critics like Jeffrey Weeks and others argue, the period

of the 1960s and 1970s represent something more complex than a sim-

ple liberation of the Western libido from its prudish Victorian shackles;

for the freedom of sex in the age of promiscuity also came with all sorts

of new oppressions and bonds. Nonetheless, it seems clear that this period

witnessed an unprecedented proliferation of discussion and debate about

sex, along with new fears about the growing promiscuity among young

people. “Violence, drugs and sex, three major preoccupations of the 1960s

and 70s blended symbolically in the image of youth in revolt.”62

The literature on Tantra was a key element in this new proliferation

of discourse about sexual freedom. Thus, in 1964, we see the publica-

tion of Omar Garrison’s widely read Tantra: The Yoga of Sex, which ad-

vocates Tantric techniques as the surest means to achieve extended or-

gasm and optimal sexual pleasure: “Through . . . the principles of Tantra

Yoga, man can achieve the sexual potency which enables him to extend

the ecstasy crowning sexual union for an hour or more, rather than the

brief seconds he now knows.” Fighting against the repressive prudery of

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Christianity, which has for centuries “equated sex with sin,” Garrison

sees in Tantra a much needed cure for the Western world, bearing with

it “the discovery that sexual union . . . can open the way to a new di-

mension in life.”63 As one contemporary Tantric teacher observes, “The

radical no-nonsense nature of Tantric teachings made them very attrac-

tive to the sixties generation. Psychedelic mind-expanding drugs, unin-

hibited sex, and the quest for spiritual experiences took on new mean-

ing. . . . Tantra helped legitimize the sixties experience, helped give it

spiritual and political meaning.”64

At the same time, Tantra began to enter into the Western popular imag-

ination in a huge way, as entertainers, musicians, and poets began to take

an active interest in this exotic brand of Eastern spirituality. This process

had already begun with the Beat poets like Allen Ginsberg, who saw Tan-

tra as a means of breaking through the repressive morality of middle-

class American society. One of the first hippies to journey to India in

search of enlightenment, intense spiritual experiences, and/or cheap

drugs, Ginsberg would later become a disciple of Chogyam Trungpa’s

radical brand of Tantric Buddhism. Tantra is for Ginsberg categorized

with other methods of “organized experiment in consciousness,” such

as “jazz ecstasy” and drugs as a means of altering mental states and achiev-

ing “increased depth of perception on the nonverbal-nonconceptual

level.”65 For Ginsberg, India represents the complete opposite of mod-

ern America: whereas America is sexually repressed, uptight, and overly

rational, India is the land of unrepressed, spontaneous sexuality. And

Tantric sexuality, embodied in the violent, terrifying goddess Kàlí, is a

liberating alternative to the oppressive prudery of Cold War America:

Fuck Kali

Fuck all Hindu Goddesses

Because they are all prostitutes

[I like to fuck]

. . . . . . . .

Fuck Ma Kali

Mary is not a prostitute because

She was a virgin

Christians don’t

Worship prostitutes

Like the Hindus.66

Not only is Kàlí an intense image of sexual liberation, but she also serves

as a powerful political symbol. In a wonderfully ironic use of images, Gins-

berg superimposes the terrible mother Kàlí onto the figure of the Statue

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of Liberty, combining the violently sexual Tantric goddess with the icon

of American identity. In the Beat poet’s inverted vision, the skulls around

Kàlí’s neck become the world’s great leaders—American presidents, fas-

cist dictators, and Soviet leaders alike—while the Terrible Mother stands

atop the prostrate corpse of Uncle Sam:

The skulls that hang on Kali’s neck, Geo Washington with eyes rolled up

& tongue hanging out of his mouth like a fish, N. Lenin upside down, Ein-

stein’s hairy white cranium. Hitler with his mustache . . . Roosevelt with

grey eyeballs; Stalin grinning; Mussolini with a broken jaw . . . Mao Tze

Tung & Chang Kai Shek shaking at the bottom of the chain, balls with eyes

and noses jiggled in the Cosmic Dance. . . . A huge bottomless throat and

a great roar of machinery chewing on these Hydrogen Bombs like bubble

gums & bursting all over its mouth as big as the Lincoln Memorial. . . .

The Vajra Hand balancing a high Rolls Royce on end, fenders sticking up

into the empty night heavens—battleships dangling from an arm. . . .

Her foot is standing on the godlike corpse of Uncle Sam who’s crush-

ing down John Bull, bloated himself over the Holy Roman Emperor &

Mohammed’s illiterate belly.67

In sum, for Ginsberg and other voices of the American countercul-

ture, Tantric imagery is turned into a powerful weapon to criticize the

dominant sociopolitical order, which is perceived as repressive, bankrupt,

and corrupt. With its emphasis on the terrible, erotic Mother Kàlí, Tan-

tra seemed to offer a much needed antidote to a hypercerebral Western

world that had lost touch with the powers of sex, femininity, and dark-

ness. In the words of Alan Watts, an ex-Anglican priest who became a

Zen master and a psychedelic guru of the Beat generation,

Tantra is therefore a marvelous and welcome corrective to certain excesses

of Western civilization. We over-accentuate the positive, think of the nega-

tive as “bad” and thus live in a frantic terror . . . which renders us inca-

pable of “playing” life with an air of . . . joyous detachment. . . . But through

understanding the creative power of the female, the negative . . . we may at

last become completely alive in the present.68

Religion for the Age of Aquarius: Tantra and the New Age

To all those Tantra souls of the New Age who are lead-

ing the world into a Kingdom of perfect love.

Dedication in Howard Zitko, New Age Tantra Yoga (1974)

By the 1970s, this American version of Tantra would become one of the

most important elements in the proliferation of a new wave of alterna-

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tive religious movements, collectively known, ratherly vaguely, as New

Age—a category that is, of course, every bit as amorphous and polyva-

lent as “Tantra” itself. Most often, “New Age” refers to an enormous

heterogeneity of different spiritual movements, lifestyles, and consumer

products—“a blend of pagan religions, Eastern philosophies and occult-

psychic phenomena,” drawn from “the Euro-American metaphysical tra-

dition and the counterculture of the 1960s.”69 Yet as Paul Heelas has re-

cently argued, beneath the tremendous diversity, there are some basic

unifying themes that pervade the many phenomena we label New Age.

Above all, he suggests, the dominant tropes include “the celebration of

the Self and the sacralization of Modernity”—that is, the fundamental

belief in the inherent divinity of the individual self and an affirmation of

many basic values of Western modernity, such as “freedom, authentic-

ity, self-responsibility, self-reliance, self determinism, equality, and above

all the self as a value in and of itself.”70

In more recent years, there has been a growing movement within the

New Age toward a sanctification, not only of the self and modernity, but

also of material prosperity, financial success, and capitalism. In contrast

to the 1960s countercultural rejection of materialism, more recent New

Agers have shifted to an affirmation of material wealth, searching for a

harmonious union of spirituality and prosperity, religious transcendence

and success in capitalist business: “God is unlimited. Shopping can be

unlimited,” according to Sondra Ray, best selling author of How to Be

Chic, Fabulous, and Live Forever. 71 Since at least the early 1970s, this

“world-affirming” side of the New Age had begun to emerge in move-

ments like EST, Scientology, and the Human Potential Movement; and

it came into full bloom during the power generation of the 1980s, with

Shirley MacLaine, Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, and a wide array of gurus

promoting the union of spirituality and financial success through books

and videos such as Money Is My Friend or Prosperity Consciousness.

For this more worldly side of the New Age, “the more spiritual you are

the more you deserve prosperity,” for “being wealthy is a function of en-

lightenment.”72 The “New Age” has itself become a highly marketable

phenomenon, a catch-all label with which to sell a vast array of consumer

products: books, videos, health foods, diet supplements, crystals, incense,

clothing, ritual implements, workshops, classes, seminars, and so on. As

Heelas comments, “Today. . . we have New Age leaders praising capi-

talism and teaching that it is fine to work and succeed within the sys-

tem . . . teaching that there is nothing wrong with materialistic con-

sumption . . . and providing training to engage managerial efficacy.”73

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It is hardly surprising that many New Age practitioners have turned

to Tantra—a form of spirituality that seemingly affirms the essential di-

vinity of the human self and seeks the union of sensuality with spiritu-

ality, material enjoyment with otherworldly bliss. No longer imagined

as the religion for the age of darkness, Tantra has reemerged as one of

the most powerful “religions for the Age of Aquarius.” For it seems to

embody both the countercultural revolt against prevailing Christian val-

ues and the celebration of the body and sensual ecstasy. Now mingled

with various occult movements like Crowleyian sex magic and traced

back to ancient Egypt and the lost city of Atlantis, Tantra has entered

fully into the Western imagination:

Tantra, the dual yoga of sexual rejuvenation by spiritual ritual . . . has

been suppressed, censored and ridiculed. . . . This is the period of history

wherein . . . nothing shall be hidden; all shall be known. It is in this spirit

of revelation that this work is added to that growing number which is

opening the New Age to whosoever will contemplate the future of Man-

kind Two, the inheritors of the New World . . . of the 21st century.74

For many of this generation, the Tantric wedding of spirituality with sen-

suality, otherworldly transcendence with this-worldly ecstasy, seemed to

represent the very essence of the dawning Age of Aquarius. But Tantra

would also undergo some changes in the course of its rebirth: no longer

a dangerous esoteric cult centered on transgressive power, Tantra has

reemerged as a life-affirming, celebratory, “pop religion,” a sensual spir-

ituality for the masses:

As the New Age manifested, traditional Tantra was transformed into a

Tantra for the masses, a neo-Tantric cult of sensual pleasure with a spiri-

tual flavor. . . . In the 21st century Tantra will . . . bless those prepared

to deal with the new spiritual reality . . . in the flowering of the Age of

Aquarius which commenced in 1962.75

One of the most interesting developments in the rise of this “New Age

Tantra” has been Nik Douglas’s revival of Pierre Bernard’s Tantrik Or-

der. Now promoting the “New Tantric Order in America,” Douglas has

created a revised version of the Omnipotent Oom’s Westernized spiri-

tual sex, reconstituted for a new millennium. Offering online initiations

into the “secret” teachings of his New Tantric Order, Douglas has drafted

an “Updated New Tantric Order Document” (1996), which brings

Bernard’s own 1906 document more in line with contemporary Amer-

ican concerns: “TantraWorks (tm) offers membership in the ‘New Tantric

Order,’ which will offer participants the opportunity to advance through

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personalized Tantra initiations and allow access to all the Tantra data-

bases on this Web Site.”76 For Douglas, Tantra is now a movement of

truly revolutionary potential, one that will reunite the realms of sex and

spirit, so long dichotomized by the Western mind:

It’s wondrous, exhilarating and true; you can use sexual pleasure as a

guide to spiritual fulfillment. Not only is the sensual path enriching and

joyful, but it’s delightfully accessible with Tantra. . . . A revolutionary move-

ment sure to be a watershed . . . in the coming millennium, spiritual sex

celebrates the mystical aspects of sexuality while revealing the secrets that

allow men and women to reach a zenith of ecstasy.77

Rather significantly, Douglas’s New Tantric Order does not seem to have

generated any of the scandal or moral outrage that surrounded Bernard’s

original Tantrik Order; on the contrary, its brand of sacred sexuality

seems to be remarkably at home in American consumer culture at the

start of the millennium.

We Neo-Victorians: Tantra and the Narrative of Sexual Liberation

People are suffering from a wound. Sex has become

a wound; it needs to be healed.

Osho,

Autobiography of a Spiritually Incorrect Mystic (2000)

Tantra has thus far been glimpsed in the West only

in its most vulgar and debased forms, promulgated

by unscrupulous scoundrels who equate sex with

superconsciousness.

Robert E. Svoboda,

Aghora: At the Left Hand of God (1986)

Tantra, it would seem, has undergone a series of transformations in the

course of its tangled journey to the West. Most importantly, we can see

two phenomena at play in the transmission of Tantra to America and its

embrace by the New Age. The first is the more or less complete identifi-

cation of Tantra with “sacred sex.” Tantra has increasingly been associ-

ated and often hopelessly confused, not only with the Indian erotic arts

like those of the Kàma SÜtra, but also with Western erotic-occult prac-

tices like those of Crowley and the OTO. In the process, the focus has

shifted more and more to the power of sexual orgasm as the essence of

Tantric magic. As we read, for example, in Christopher Hyatt’s Secrets of

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Western Tantra, “Unlike most forms of Tantric practice, orgasm is not only

allowed but essential to create the desired results. . . . Many forms of Tan-

tra are restricting . . . focusing on holding back. . . . Western Tantra is com-

pletely different. . . . [C]omplete Orgasm is freeing and energizing.”78

The second phenomenon is the appropriation of Tantra in this larger

narrative of “liberation.” By the end of the twentieth century, Tantra had

come to be synonymous with freedom on every level—sexual, spiritual,

social, and political. According to a common narrative, repeated through-

out New Age and alternative spiritual literature, our natural sexual in-

stincts have long been repressed by the distorted morality of Western so-

ciety and Christianity. “For centuries organized religions have used guilt

about sex as a subtle way of exploiting people and the recent liberaliza-

tion of sexuality has not yet succeeded in erasing this cruel legacy.”79 Thus,

Tantra is the most needed spiritual path for our age, the means to liber-

ate our repressed sexuality and reintegrate our physical and spiritual

selves: “Sexual liberation implies the liberation of the whole being: body,

mind and spirit.”80

Not surprisingly, Tantra has been taken up in the service of a variety

of calls for social and sexual liberation. Since at least the 1970s, the ag-

gressive Tantric goddesses Takti and Kàlí have been appropriated by a

number of feminists in search of a radical symbol of empowerment. Thus

we find the rise of the “Shakti woman,” with her “new female shaman-

ism,” along with the birth of the “Erotic Champion,” holding a power

that “far exceeds the claims of any woman’s liberation movement.”81

More recently, the seemingly quite heterosexual practices of Tantra also

have been adapted in the service of gay and lesbian calls to liberation.

Like the sexual secrets of Tantra, many gay-rights advocates claim, ho-

mosexuality has been suppressed by Western religion for two millennia,

and Tantra can be employed as a tool for their liberation as well.82

Yet both of these imaginings of Tantra—as sex magic and as liberation—

would seem to have much less to do with any particular Indian tradition

than they do with the peculiar obsessions, fantasies, and repressed de-

sires of the modern West. It is, I would argue, an extreme example of the

larger role of sexuality in contemporary Western culture. As Foucault

observes, it may not be entirely true that we in the modern West have

“liberated” sexuality in some radical way; but it does seem that our gen-

eration has taken sex to the furthest possible extremes—to extremes of

transgression and excess, not resting until we have shattered every law,

violated every taboo: “We have not in the least liberated sexuality, though

we have . . . carried it to its limits: the limit of consciousness, because it

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ultimately dictates the only possible reading of our unconscious; the limit

of the law, since it seems the sole substance of universal taboos.”83 It is

precisely this relentless search for the limit that seems to drive the char-

acteristically American style of Tantra.

g u r u s , g o d - m e n , a n d g l o b a l i z a t i o n :

t a n t r i c m a s t e r s , f r o m e a s t t o w e s t a n d b a c k a g a i n

Of all emotions man suffers from, . . . sex and sex-

oriented emotions demand the most vital sacrifice. It is

the most demanding . . . of emotions; it is also the most

self-centered. . . . It adores the self most and hates to

share its joy and consummation. It is wanted the most;

it is regretted the most. It is creative, it is destructive. It

is joy; it is sorrow. Bow to sex, the hlàdiní [the power

of delight].

Brajamadhava Bhattacharya, The World of Tantra (1988)

The sex act has more names in America than anything

else. . . . The problem is that not only are they obsessed

with sex, they’re making the rest of the world equally

crazy.

Anurag Mathur, The Inscrutable Americans (1999)

If Swami Vivekananda worked hard to cover over the Tantric nature of

his master’s teachings, and even wholly to censor this dimension of the

Hindu tradition, a variety of new gurus arrived in America in the 1970s

who would do just the opposite. Beginning with the notorious neo-Tantric

masters Osho-Rajneesh and Chogyam Trungpa, a number of Hindu and

Buddhist teachers would make the journey to the West, openly pro-

claiming Tantra as the most powerful means to liberation. At the same

time, these Tantric masters have been influenced by Western ideas and

obsessions—perhaps above all, the preoccupation with sex and its libera-

tion. “Sex has become an obsession, a disease, a perversion,” as Rajneesh

observed in 1971.84 Indian gurus, too, seem to have accepted the iden-

tification of Tantra with sex and to have taught a largely “sexo-centric”

brand of Tantra marketed as the most exciting path to enlightenment.

As such, they are powerful examples of the feedback loop between East

and West, as Tantra has been exported, imported, and reexported for a

new age of consumers.

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The Danger, Power, and Madness of Tantric Wisdom:

Chogyam Trungpa and the Lightning Bolt of Tantra

Many people in America have heard about Tantra

as the “sudden path”—the quick way to enlighten-

ment. . . . Exotic ideas about Tantra are not just mis-

conceptions; they could be destructive. It is danger-

ous . . . to practice Tantra without establishing a firm

ground in Buddhist teachings.

Chogyam Trungpa, Journey without Goal (1985)

All the monsters of the Tibetan Book of the Dead might

come out and get everybody to take LSD! . . . The Pan-

dora’s Box of the Bardo Thodol has been opened by the

arrival in America of one of the masters of the secrets

of the Tibetan Book of the Dead.

Allen Ginsberg, quoted in Barry Miles, Allen Ginsberg (1989)

Born in Tibet in 1939 and dying in the United States fifty years later,

Chogyam Trungpa stands out as one of the most controversial Tantric

gurus in the late twentieth century. As he recounts in his autobiography,

Trungpa led an amazing life of adventure, tragedy, fame, and scandal.85

Born in a small tent village in the Tibetan mountains, he was identified

by Buddhist monks at eighteen months as the reincarnation of the ab-

bot of Surmang monastery. Thus named the eleventh Trungpa of the

Karma Kargyupa tradition, he took monastic vows at age eight and led

a rigorous life of study, meditative discipline, and ritual practice. In 1959,

he fled the new communist regime, leading three hundred Tibetans

through the mountains to refuge in India. Having taught himself English,

he traveled to Oxford in 1963. Finally, after being injured in a car acci-

dent and paralyzed on his left side, he came to the United States in 1970,

at the height of the countercultural revolution’s search for alternative

realities through drugs, Eastern mysticism, and other intense psychic or

physical experiences.

When he arrived, however, Trungpa was far from what most Ameri-

cans expected in a Tibetan lama. Caring little for asceticism, Trungpa

dressed and lived lavishly, freely partaking of food, alcohol, drugs, and

the pleasures of a wealthy life. He was known for wearing expensive suits,

riding in a chauffeured Mercedes, retaining servants, and living in the finest

suites of expensive hotels. “He ate what he liked, consumed any quan-

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tity of alcohol, smoked and freely joined . . . ingesting psychedelics. . . .

He understood his own crazy-wise conduct as a counter-point to the wide-

spread disease of spiritual materialism.”86

Nonetheless, this behavior did not prevent Trungpa from establishing

a large and powerful following of eager American adepts in Boulder, Col-

orado, where he founded the Naropa Institute in the 1970s.87 A Mecca

for alternative spirituality and new meldings of Eastern and Western

thought, Naropa quickly attracted a wide array of dropouts, hippies, and

students, and a number well-known poets, musicians, and countercultural

leaders, like Alan Watts, W. S. Merwin, Gregory Bateson, and Agehananda

Bharati. Trungpa’s American disciples appear not to have been repulsed

by, but rather to have relished his bizarre and erratic behavior, worship-

ing Trungpa as the ideal crazy-wisdom guru who could shock them out

of their comfort and complacency in the bourgeois capitalist West. Act-

ing in a consistently unpredictable and incorrigible manner, Trungpa was

regularly late for his own lectures, often arriving inebriated and sometimes

downing a few beers in the course of his teachings. “During meditation

he was occasionally seen to nod off, but on other occasions he would sneak

up on unsuspecting meditators to squirt water at them with a toy pistol.”88

In order to shock his disciples out of their “spiritual materialism”—that

is, the overattachment to religion, which the ego tends to turn into yet an-

other object of pride—Trungpa would break up his meditations with rau-

cous parties, bouts of drunken abandon, or orgies. “Trungpa had disci-

ples carry him around naked at a party, broke antennas off cars . . . spent

days speaking in spoonerisms. Assuming that the ego . . . will subvert any

material it is given . . . these masters attempt to wake people through ex-

treme behavior which challenges their everyday behavior.”89

All this seeming hedonism and madness, Trungpa explained, was only

part of his radical and direct spiritual method. His was the way of the

Tiger—a quick, direct, but also dangerous and potentially deadly path

to liberation:

Here comes Chogyam disguised as a hailstorm

no one can confront him

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

He cannot be defeated

Chogyam is a tiger with whiskers and a confident smile

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

He escaped from the jaws of the lion.90

This tiger-guru was therefore not afraid of using the most violent and

shocking tactics to liberate his disciples. Anything is permissible for the

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guru, as long as it is for the ultimate good of his devotee: “What if you

feel the necessity for a violent act in order ultimately to do good for a

person? You just do it.”91

This, for Trungpa, is the very essence of Tantra. As the lightning-bolt

path, Tantra is both the quickest and the deadliest, the easiest and the

most easily abused of spiritual means: it is a path that attempts, not to

repress the lower impulses of passion, sensuality, and violence, but to

harness these darker energies as the most potent fuel propelling us to lib-

eration: “Passion, aggression and ignorance, the source of human suf-

fering, are also the wellspring of enlightenment. . . . They can be trans-

formed into Buddha-mind.”92 On the Vajrayàna path, one must attempt

to drink the poison of desire and to transform it into divinizing ambrosia.

And perhaps most potent of all is the energy of sexual desire:

In Trungpa’s teaching style, sexual passion was accepted as a reflection of

our basic goodness and could be a way of experiencing enlightenment. His

favorite metaphor for giving in to the dharma was having an orgasm. “You

just do it . . . all at once.” He referred to arousing bodhicitta as tickling the

clitoris of the heart. . . . Trungpa and Tendzin were both notorious for the

number of their sexual partners or consorts.93

Not surprisingly the Tantric path is also a potentially deadly one—a

path demanding that the disciple surrender his entire self to the power of

the guru, who alone can guide him through this dangerous ordeal: “work-

ing with the energy of Vajrayàna is like working with a live electric wire,”

he warns. “It is better not to get into Tantra, but if we must get into it,

we had better surrender. . . . We surrender to the fact that we cannot hold

on to our ego.”94 The guru must be accepted as the absolute, unquestioned

authority, and in fact as the supreme deity who will shatter the false ego

of the disciple and lead him or her to liberation. As Trungpa put it in one

lecture to his students, “Thank you for accepting me as your friend,

teacher, dictator.” And as Butterfield reflects on his own experience,

Trungpa . . . seemed bent on stoking the agony by acting so bizarre that

I wondered if he was capable of ordering us all to commit suicide. On the

night of the Vajrayana transmission he rambled from subject to subject in

a series of blazing non sequiturs . . . waited until we were dozing off and

then shouted “Fat!” or “Fuck You!” into the microphone loud enough to

burst our eardrums.95

When we look more closely at the complex history of Trungpa’s fol-

lowing in Boulder, however, we might begin to wonder whether he heeded

his own advice as to the danger of his Tantric teachings. For the history

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of his life and community is a disturbing story of turmoil, emotional vi-

olence, and scandal. Trungpa’s socially objectionable behavior had be-

gun to be made public as early as 1975, when a poet, W. S. Merwin, and

his wife attended an intensive three-month seminar with Trungpa. At the

beginning of the course on Vajrayàna Buddhism, Trungpa suddenly in-

terrupted the seminar with a raucous Halloween party. Arriving quite

late and intoxicated, Trungpa began to ask people to undress, then took

off his own clothes and had himself carried around naked on the shoul-

ders of his students. Merwin and his wife soon decided that the party

had gotten out of control and went to their rooms to pack their bags.

When the couple repeatedly refused Trungpa’s order that they join the

party, locking themselves inside their room, a band of drunken disciples

kicked in their windows and dragged them forcibly before the master.

Trungpa then proceeded to insult Merwin’s Oriental wife with racist re-

marks, threw a glass of sake in the poet’s face, and had the pair stripped

in front of everyone. One student was apparently courageous enough to

oppose the mob mentality, but his pleading was rewarded only by a punch

in the face from Trungpa.96

Even more disturbing events surrounded Trungpa’s American disciple

Thomas Rich, renamed Osel Tendzin, who was appointed his successor

in 1976. An alcoholic like Trungpa, Tendzin was also known to have had

sexual relations with female students—even after he was diagnosed with

AIDS, and so infected at least one of his many disciple-lovers with the

virus. As such, Butterfield suggests, he is a striking embodiment of the

very real danger of the spiritual “poison” of the Tantric path: “The Tantric

Buddhist way of handling passion may lead to disaster . . . no matter how

great a master we become the danger never disappears.”97

Most of this shocking and outrageous behavior, however, was not

mentioned by Trungpa’s disciples. In accordance with the Tantric in-

junction to keep such powerful, dangerous, potentially misunderstood

teachings hidden from the eyes of the masses, such events were kept

strictly secret among the inner circle of closest initiates.

To be part of Trungpa’s inner circle you had to take a vow never to re-

veal . . . some of the things he did. This co-personal secrecy is common

with gurus. . . . It is also common in the dysfunctional family systems of

alcoholics and sexual abusers. The inner circle puts up an almost insur-

mountable barrier to a healthily skeptical mind.98

As Butterfield reflects on his own experience with Trungpa’s radical brand

of Tantra, it was indeed, as the master had often said, much like the ex-

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perience of sexual intercourse—an intense, shocking, yet also potentially

damaging and emotionally crippling encounter: “It was like jumping

from a cliff into a quarry pool. . . . You just do it, he said, ‘like having an

orgasm’—an image that had uncomfortable associations with getting

screwed.”99

Rather remarkably, in the years since his death, Trungpa’s scandalous

crazy-wisdom tactics appear to have been forgiven and largely forgot-

ten by most of his disciples. Many see his radical behavior and contro-

versial teachings as a part of his “skillful means” (upàya). Thus Allen

Ginsberg defended Trungpa as one of those great spiritual masters, who,

like the radical poets of the 1960s and 1970s, had the “right to shit on

anybody they wanted to. . . . Burroughs commits murder, Gregory

Corso . . . shoots up drugs for twenty years . . . but poor old Trungpa,

who has been suffering since he was two years old to teach the dharma,

isn’t allowed to wave his frankfurter.” Trungpa’s crazy-wisdom tactics,

even his alcoholism and sexual misconduct, were but so many skillful

“tricks” designed to jolt his deluded, brain-dead disciples into awaken-

ing.100 Today, Trungpa is still venerated as one of the greatest pioneers

in the transmission of Buddhism to America and one of the most inno-

vative masters of Tantra in the last century.

From Sex Guru to Guru of the Rich:

The Neo-Tantrism of Osho-Rajneesh

Tantra is a dangerous philosophy, it is a dangerous reli-

gion. It has not yet been tried on a larger scale, man

has not yet been courageous enough to try it on a larger

scale because the society does not allow it. . . . [T]he

society thinks this is absolute sin. . . . Tantra believes

in joy because joy is God.

Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, The Tantric Transformation (1978)

I sell happiness. I sell enlightenment.

Rajneesh, interview with Mike Wallace on 60 Minutes (1985)

The second American Tantric guru I want to examine here is one who

represents a good complement, comparative contrast, and striking juxta-

position to Dr. Pierre Bernard—namely, the infamous sex guru and guru

of the rich known in his early years as Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and in

his later life simply as Osho (figure 13). If Bernard was among the first

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Figure 13. Osho in Poona, 1988. Copyright © Osho

International Foundation, www.osho.com.

Americans to travel to India and bring Tantra to this country, Osho-

Rajneesh was one of the first Indians to travel to America and import his

own brand of “neo-Tantrism,” marketed to late-twentieth-century Ameri-

can consumer culture. Whereas Bernard’s version of Tantra represents a

kind of sexualization and scandalization of Tantra, Osho-Rajneesh’s ver-

sion is a commodification and commercialization of the tradition.

In this sense Osho-Rajneesh is an embodiment of a larger shift in West-

ern attitudes toward sexuality in the latter half of the twentieth century.

As Weeks argues, the late twentieth century was characterized not so

much by a radical sexual revolution or liberation of sex, but by a “com-

modification of sex” as part of the larger socioeconomic process of the

expansion of capitalism to all domains of modern culture: “Sex had long

been something you were. By the 1950s it was also something you could

buy, not just in the traditional form of prostitution, but in the form of

glossily marketed fantasy. . . . Not only was sex an area that could be

colonized by capitalism, it was also one that could expand ever more ex-

otically.”101 This is much the same kind of commodification of ecstasy

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that we see in the case of Osho-Rajneesh, the most notorious sex guru

of the twentieth century. “Rajneesh offered everything Westerners imag-

ined Tantra to be: a free love cult promising enlightenment, an exciting

radical community. . . . Rajneesh slipped comfortably into the role of

‘Tantra Messiah.’ . . . Largely because of Rajneesh, Tantra reemerged as

a New Age Cult in the 1970s and 80s.”102

Born in 1931 in the village of Kuchwada, Madhya Pradesh, to a fam-

ily of twelve, Rajneesh Chandra Mohan’s parents died when he was

small, and he was raised by his grandparents, a wealthy Jain couple.

From an early age, Rajneesh reports having had various ecstatic expe-

riences, finally achieving “full enlightenment” at age twenty-one. While

at college at Jabalpur, Rajneesh suffered a traumatic period of depres-

sion and anorexia, and he attempted suicide; yet he emerged from his

crisis with an intense spiritual breakthrough to self-realization—“an in-

ner explosion,” as he put it, in which he left his body and realized his

true inner nature.103

After receiving his master’s degree in 1957, Rajneesh taught philoso-

phy for nine years at the University of Jabalpur. In 1967, however, he de-

cided he could no longer keep his enlightened knowledge to himself, and

so left the academic world to gather disciples and teach the spiritual life.

His rather radical teachings quickly aroused enormous controversy in

the Indian community, as he urged his disciples to indulge all their physi-

cal desires, even as he viciously attacked national heroes like Mahatma

Gandhi (whom he ridiculed as a masochistic chauvinist pervert).104 By

1971, Rajneesh had begun to call himself “Bhagwan”—Blessed One, or

God—and had built himself an ashram in Poona, where he hoped to be-

gin a new utopian community as the seed of a new civilization. Bhag-

wan’s highly lucrative new civilization, however, soon ran into financial

and legal problems with the Indian government. In 1981, Bhagwan and

his devotees were forced to flee the country, trailed by some five million

dollars in debts and a host of police and tax collectors.

Announcing himself as “the Messiah America has been waiting for,”

Rajneesh took refuge in the United States—the land, as he described it,

of freedom, opportunity, and unfettered capitalism.105 After a brief stay

in a New Jersey mansion, he and his now large following bought a sixty-

four-thousand-acre ranch in Antelope, Oregon, which they dubbed their

own new city and ideal society, “Rajneeshpuram.” Quickly growing into

a remarkably lucrative financial complex, Rajneeshpuram amassed some

120 million dollars in revenues in its four-year existence. Meanwhile,

Rajneesh’s following had spread throughout the United States, Europe,

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and India, having over twenty-five thousand members at its peak and

growing into an enormously diverse, multifaceted, international business

complex.106

The group soon, however, came into conflict with its American neigh-

bors. They clashed first with the local residents of Antelope’s peaceful

retirement community, whom they attempted to displace and push out,

using terrorist tactics like dumping animal parts on the lawns of local

officials and reportedly distributing salmonella bacteria in local restau-

rants and grocery stores. By 1985, however, the community had also come

under serious investigation by the U.S. government, specifically around

the issue of the interlock of the Rajneesh Church and the city of Raj-

neeshpuram, and its claim to tax-exempt status. Finally, in 1986, the

state attorney general decided that Rajneeshpuram violated the church-

state separation clause of the Constitution. Rajneesh and his disciples,

meanwhile, had also come under investigation for their various criminal

activities—which included, among other charges, counts of electronic

eavesdropping, immigration conspiracy, lying to federal officials, har-

boring fugitives, criminal conspiracy, first-degree assault, attempted

murder, burglary, racketeering, and arson. The movement, the state at-

torney general concluded, had become “sociopathic.”107 Deported from

the United States and refused entry into virtually every country to which

he applied, Rajneesh finally returned to his Poona ashram in 1987.

Neo-Tantrism and Religionless Religion: Rajneesh’s Early Teachings

Yoga is suppression with awareness; Tantra is indulgence

with awareness.

Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, Tantra Spirituality and Sex (1983)

Tantra is not revolutionary; it is rebellious. Rebellion

means individual . . . it is just going beyond society. . . .

It is for freedom—freedom to be

Rajneesh, The Tantric Transformation

In itself, Rajneesh’s early philosophy was not terribly original; rather, it

was an ingenious synthesis of philosophical and religious ideas drawn

from an enormous array of sources. Bhagwan’s vast body of writings is

itself a kind of postmodern pastiche: a wild hodgepodge of ideas drawn

from a remarkable range of sources, from Plato to TaGkara to Lao Tzu

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to Sartre—though he had a special fondness for the more radical figures

like Nietzsche, Gurdjieff, and Crowley. His teachings are, as one observer

put it, an eclectic “potpourri of counter-culturalist ideas: strive for love

and freedom, live for the moment, self is important, you are okay . . .

the fun ethic, God is within.”108 An explicitly self-parodying, self-de-

constructing guru, Rajneesh claimed that his entire teaching was itself

nothing more than a joke, farce, or game—the ultimate game: “Noth-

ing is serious. Even your disappointments are laughable. To become a

Sannyasin is to enter the ultimate game. . . . [I]t is a play . . . it is the ul-

timate game. . . . You have played at being a husband, wife, mother, be-

ing rich, poor. . . . This is the last game. Only you are left.”109

Rather than promoting a religion in the conventional sense, Rajneesh

taught a radically iconoclastic brand of spirituality—“an antinomian phi-

losophy and moral anarchism.”110 As a “religionless” religion, or antire-

ligion, his was a path beyond conventional morality, beyond good and

evil, and founded on the explicit rejection of all traditions, doctrines, and

values. “Morality is a false coin, it deceives people,” he warns. “A man

of real understanding is neither good nor bad. He transcends both.”111

For Rajneesh, the cause of all our suffering is the distorting socialization

or “programming” of cultural institutions, such as family, school, reli-

gion, and government. All metanarratives or overarching theories about

the universe are only so many fictions, imaginary creations used by those

in power to dominate the masses. True freedom can be achieved only by

deconstructing all such narratives, liberating oneself from the confining

structures of the past. One must be deprogrammed and dehypnotized:

“You are programmed by family, acquaintances, institutions. Your mind

is like a blackboard on which rules are written. Bhagwan writes new rules

on the blackboard. He tells you one thing is true and next the opposite is

true. He writes and writes on the blackboard of your mind until it is a

whiteboard. Then you have no programming left.”112

In order to help his disciples achieve this state of deprogramming and

liberation, Rajneesh advocated a variety of yogic, meditative, and other

psycho-physical disciplines. Most of these, we might note, came at a sig-

nificant cost; at the Oregon ranch, prices ranged from fifty dollars for a

one-day introduction to Rajneesh meditation, to seventy-five hundred dol-

lars for a complete three-month rebalancing program. But perhaps the

most important of these techniques was Rajneesh’s unique brand of “neo-

Tantrism.” As he defines it, Tantra is the ultimate nonreligion or antire-

ligion, a spiritual practice that does not demand rigorous ritual or moral-

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ity but instead frees the individual from all such constraints. “Tantra is

freedom—freedom from all mind-constructs, from all mind-games. . . .

Tantra is liberation. Tantra is not a religion. . . . Religion is a mind-

game. . . . Tantra takes all disciplines away.”113 In this sense, Tantra is

the ideal form of rebellion for an age in which political revolution is no

longer practical or relevant; it is not the rebellion of the masses against

the state, but rather of the individual against modern society:

Tantra is a rebellion. I don’t call it revolutionary because it has no politics

in it. . . . It is individual rebellion. It is one individual slipping out of the

structures and slavery. . . . The future is very hopeful. Tantra will become

more and more important. . . . [N]o political revolution has proved revo-

lutionary. All political revolutions finally turn into anti-revolutions. . . .

Rebellion means individual. . . . It is for freedom—freedom to be.114

In strongest contrast to established social institutions, Tantra does not

deny life or the body; rather, it is the ultimate affirmation of passion,

physicality, and pleasure. It is the supreme “Just do it!” religion, cele-

brating life in all its transience and contingency: “Tantra accepts every-

thing, lives everything,” Rajneesh declares. “This is what Tantra says:

the Royal Way—behave like a king, not like a soldier. . . . Why bother

about tomorrow? This moment is enough. Live it!”115 Even the sinful

and perverse side of life, even the most selfish and immoral sides of the

human ego must be accepted as innately divine. Far from imposing moral

restraints, Tantra celebrates human nature in all its most flawed, weak,

even seemingly “evil” dimensions: “Tantra says—If you are greedy, be

greedy; don’t bother about greed.”

Tantric acceptance is total, it doesn’t split you. All the religions of the

world except Tantra have created split personalities, have create schizo-

phrenia. . . . They say the good has to be achieved and the bad denied, the

devil has to be denied and God accepted. . . . Tantra says a transformation

is possible. . . . Transformation comes when you accept your total being.

The anger is absorbed, the greed is absorbed.116

Above all, Tantra centers around the power of sex—a power that is at

once the most intense force in human nature and also the one most se-

verely distorted by Western society. Because the traditional Christian West

has suppressed sexuality, Rajneesh argues, it is sexuality that must be lib-

erated if modern students are to fully actualize their innermost self:

Christian repression has made many locks in man where energy has be-

come coiled up within itself, has become stagnant, is no longer flowing.

The society is against sex: it has created a block, just near the sex center.

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Whenever sex arises you feel restless, you feel guilty, you feel afraid. . . .

That’s why I teach dynamic methods: they will melt your blocks.117

In opposition to this life-denying Western attitude, Tantra is the path that

accepts everything, above all, the sexual impulse. As the strongest power

in human nature, sex also becomes the strongest spiritual force when it

is fully integrated and absorbed. “Tantra says everything has to be ab-

sorbed, everything! . . . Sex has to be absorbed, then it becomes a tremen-

dous force in you. A Buddha . . . a Jesus, they have such a magnetic force

around—what is that? Sex absorbed.”118 Thus many of Rajneesh’s prac-

tices involved group sex—“therapy intensives,” as he called them—which

were “designed to bring about a catharsis followed by transformation

of consciousness.”119

The ultimate aim of Tantric practice is precisely to achieve this full

self-acceptance, to love ourselves wholly and completely, with all our sin,

vice, greed, and sensual desires, and to realize that we already are “per-

fect.” Once we accept our sensual, desiring nature, once we release the

pent-up sexual side of ourselves, we discover that we are already divine.

We already possess truth, freedom, and infinite power within ourselves.

We already are “God.” “This is the most fundamental thing in Tantra,

that it says you are already perfect. . . . Perfection does not have to be

achieved. It simply has to be realized that it is there. Tantra offers you

enlightenment right here and now—no time, no postponement.”120 “Ec-

stasy is your very nature. You are truth. You are love. You are freedom. . . .

You are already there. . . . If you can stop all doing for a single moment

the energy converges and explodes. . . . Then you become a god.” 121 It is

not difficult to see why Rajneesh’s version of Tantra was so appealing to

a large American following. Promising absolute freedom and instant

deification, even while allowing physical indulgence and sensual plea-

sure, neo-Tantra seemed to be a spiritual expression of the “Me genera-

tion” of the 1970s and the “Power generation” of the 1980s.

Osho: The Apotheosis of a Fallen Tantric Guru

Why do I contradict myself? I am not teaching a

philosophy here. The philosopher has to be very

consistent—flawless, logical, rational. . . . I am not

a philosopher. I am not here giving you a consistent

dogma to which you can cling. My whole effort is

to give you a no-mind.

Osho, quoted on the osho.com web site (2001)

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Perhaps the most surprising aspect of the Rajneesh phenomenon lies not

so much in his scandalous career in America, but in his remarkable apo-

theosis and rebirth upon his return to India. A truly global Tantric guru,

Rajneesh made the journey from India to America and back to India

again, finally achieving even more success in his homeland, perhaps in

large part because of his status as a figure who had a massive U.S. and

European following. Rather incredibly, his followers were not only able

to rationalize the disastrous scandal in the United States, but even to make

Rajneesh a heroic martyr who had been unjustly persecuted by the op-

pressive imperialist U.S. government: “[The Ranch] was crushed from

without by the Attorney General’s office . . . like the marines in Lebanon,

the Ranch was hit by hardball opposition and driven out.”122

As part of his transfiguration in India, he would also reject his former

Hindu title, Bhagwan, which had asserted his divine, god-man status.

“Enough is enough! The joke is over,” he declared.123 Instead he adopted

the more universal title Osho—a term which, according to some, derives

from the Japanese term for master, and according to others, from the

“oceanic experience” described by William James in his writings on mys-

ticism. His message, too, became increasingly universal and marketed to

a global consumer audience. “My message is too new. India is too old,

ancient, traditional. . . . In fact, I am not an Indian. . . . I belong to no

nation. My message is universal.”124 Osho also downplayed the more

objectionable sexual elements, transforming his radical brand of neo-

Tantrism into a kind of universal global religion of love. Thus his Auto-

biography of a Spiritually Incorrect Mystic makes only brief reference to

Tantra or sexual practices, and even then only in the most defensive terms:

“I have never taught ‘free sex.’ What I have been teaching is the sacred-

ness of sex. . . . This is the idiotic Indian yellow journalism that has

confined my whole philosophy to two words. . . . What they have been

doing all along is misinforming people.”125

Osho died in 1990, after just a few years back in Poona. According

to many devotees, he had actually been “poisoned in Ronald Reagan’s

America” (given thallium during his period of incarceration in the Amer-

ican prisons) because of his radical and subversive teachings.126 Rather

remarkably, however, Osho seems to have become only more popular

since his death. Indeed, he has published perhaps more books and re-

ceived more acclaim as a disembodied photograph or video image than

he ever did while still incarnate. The Poona center, meanwhile, has grown

into a surprisingly successful and globalized spiritual organization, the

Osho Commune International. Linked through its Global Connections

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Department, the commune runs an intricate network of centers and ac-

tivities worldwide, including Osho International in New York, which ad-

ministers the rights to Osho’s works. Describing itself as the “Esalen of

the East,” the Osho Multiversity in Poona teaches a dizzying array of

spiritual techniques drawn from a smorgasbord of traditions: astrology

training, Feldenkrais body work, crystal energy, acupuncture, neo-Zen,

and other New Age activities. With an explicitly universal religious vi-

sion, the new Osho commune has combined Rajneesh’s neo-Tantric “re-

ligionless religion” with a host of more generic New Age ideals, and mar-

keted it to a global audience of spiritual consumers. As we read in an

advertisement for the commune:

Osho Commune International . . . continues to attract thousands of visi-

tors per year from more than one hundred different countries around the

world. . . . The resort meditation programs are based in Osho’s vision of

a qualitatively new kind of human being who is able to participate joyously

in everyday life and to relax into silence. Most programs take place in mod-

ern air-conditioned facilities and include everything from short to extended

meditation courses, creative art, holistic health treatments, personal growth

and the “Zen” approach to sports and recreation.127

In sum, the character of Rajneesh has undergone an incredible trans-

mutation, particularly since his death: from a shocking, scandalous

Tantric sex guru into an international icon for a high-tech global move-

ment and business enterprise.

A Tantric Guru among the Scholars:

Muktananda and the Scandal of Siddha Yoga

The purity of a guru should always uplift his disciples.

Some people become gurus . . . and lead a completely

wanton life, without self-control or discipline. A seeker

should evaluate such teachers. . . . An incomplete teacher

who is pure and ethical and who puts his knowledge

into practice is far better than an undisciplined person

who poses as a perfect Guru.

Swami Muktananda, Secret of the Siddhas (1994)

Swami Muktananda (1908–82) is a guru who offers an even more ex-

plicit example of the complex dialectical exchange between India and the

West in the late twentieth century. As the most important and most contro-

versial leader of the widespread Siddha Yoga Dham of America (SYDA),

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Muktananda has surely been one of the key figures in the transmission

of both Tantric ideas and Tantric sexual scandals to America. Above all,

the case of Muktananda is a poignant illustration of the ways in which

scholars often become intertwined with the Tantric traditions they study.

Not unlike Ramakrishna, Muktananda has become a tremendous source

of embarrassment, largely because of his alleged sexual practices, which,

many claim, drew naive young women into esoteric Tantric rituals. And

not unlike Ramakrishna, Muktananda has a host of disciples who have

attempted to use scholarship in order to justify, validate—or, as some

have charged, cover over and conceal—his life and teachings.128

Born to a wealthy family near Mangalore, Karnataka, Muktananda

began his spiritual searching at the age of fifteen. However, he did not

find his true guru until 1947, at thirty-nine, when he met his master,

Nityananda, in Ganeshpuri near Bombay. An ecstatic, mostly silent re-

nunciant, Nityananda claimed to have been born a siddha and to have

had no physical guru of his own. When Nityananda died in 1960, he

passed the Siddha mantle on to Muktananda. Yet Muktananda’s true rise

to fame occurred in 1970, when he arrived in the United States teaching

the message of Siddha Yoga. His mission was, as he put it, nothing less

than to create a “meditation revolution,” based not on nationalist poli-

tics but on widespread realization of the universal self. “This meditation

revolution does not violate the laws of any government. . . . It is not

against any caste or social class. . . . It does not argue with either the good

or bad qualities of any country.”129 Enormously popular in the United

States, Siddha Yoga has attracted at various times Jerry Brown, Werner

Erhard, John Denver, James Taylor, Carly Simon, and even former Black

Panther leader Erika Huggins. Today, SYDA has become a vast and re-

markably successful spiritual organization, maintaining some 550 medita-

tion centers and ten ashrams around the world and generating enormous

revenues through its various spiritual services.

Although the roots of Siddha Yoga lie in a wide range of traditional In-

dian philosophies and practices—from classical yoga to Kashmir Taivism

to Advaita Vedànta—it is most accurately described, according to Doug-

las Brooks, as a kind of “right-handed Tantra.” While it uses sexual and

transgressive imagery, it does so only symbolically to describe the rela-

tionship between the self and the Absolute; and while it asserts the ability

of the Siddha to transcend all social laws, it insists on strict ethical purity

in the everyday world: “the Right Current gurus may still baffle or amaze

disciples . . . but they do not intend to use concealment or defiance from

social norms as a mode of teaching freedom.”130 In fact, its advocates claim,

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the Siddha Yoga path is hyperethical, for it insists on the absolute purity

of the guru as the exemplar of the highest morality. In Muktananda’s

words, a true guru “does not indulge in sense pleasures. He neither keeps

bad company nor becomes ensnared in addictions. He is free of conflicts,

desires and thoughts. He is disciplined and possesses self-control, and he

also makes his disciples observe discipline.”131 Above all, the Siddha guru

was supposed to be restrained with regard to sexual desire, sublimating

all his physical lust into spiritual energy: “I don’t have sex for the same

reason you do: because it feels so good,” Muktananda declared.132 Ac-

cording to Brooks, this moral purity is what distinguishes Siddha Yoga from

the more radical, antimonian left-hand Tantric sects like the Kaulas. On

the Siddha path, “there is no compromise when it comes to ethical ideals.”

The Siddha Yoga gurus are unambiguous in their affirmation of ethically

pure practice and in this way set themselves apart from . . . Tantrics of the

“Left-Current” (vàmàcàrin), that is, siddhas who indulge in explicitly an-

tinomian rituals that might include the use of intoxicants, non-vegetarian

foods or illicit sexual pleasures. Swami Muktananda rejects these behaviors

whether they are performed inside or outside the ritual context.133

In his autobiography, Muktananda describes in some detail his own

struggle with sensual desire and the sexual maladies that plague most of

us in the modern age. Most people today, he suggests, suffer from a kind

of sexual sickness, squandering their spiritual energy through the vain

pursuit of sensual pleasure and physical enjoyment:

I would look closely at them—pallid, restless, sick,—rich but still not sat-

isfied. There was no strength and energy in them, only more and more new

sicknesses. I realized that the cause of it all was waste of sexual fluid, sen-

suality. . . . Man thinks he is fortunate if he can experience sensual enjoy-

ments. He deludes himself by thinking that he is going to enjoy pleasures. . . .

In the end he becomes the victim of all sorts of sickness.134

And Muktananda himself appears to have undergone an intense period

of sexual conflict, torn by the lusts of the body and overwhelmed by sen-

sual desires. Overcome by sexual urges, his own spiritual practice was

for a time totally eclipsed by carnal desire:

My Guru worship and the mantra Guru Om, Guru Om disappeared.

Instead in their place came a powerful sexual desire. . . . It completely

possessed me. I was amazed at the uncontrollable strength in my sex

organ. . . . Now everything was directed toward, toward sex, sex, sex.

I could think of nothing but sex! My whole body boiled with lust and

I cannot describe the agony of my sexual organ.135

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Yet it was through his spiritual practice, Muktananda claims, that he was

able to redirect and transform his sexual urges into spiritual power. His

period of intense sexual conflict would culminate in a vision of the naked

goddess, Takti KuJjaliní, the spiritual transformation of his own sexual

desire. In fact, his intense sexual drives seem to have been the raw ma-

terial or fuel that gave birth to his spiritual energy as a guru and a wielder

of Makti: “I understood that the onset of sexual desire was connected with

the process of becoming an urdhareta, from which one gets the power

to give Shaktipat.”136 As the naked siddha Zipruanna explained to the

young Muktananda, his carnal lust had been alchemically transformed

into divine love:

Don’t underestimate the generative organ. It is the organ that generates all

beings. . . . When it digs into the navel and remains there . . . all the semi-

nal fluid in the testicles starts to flow upward toward the heart. It is heated

in the gastric fire and passes right up to the brain. . . .

All your agonies of lust were in fact the great Shakti Kundalini expelling

your previous sexual appetites from you. Now instead of lust, love will surge

within you.137

Thus the Siddha guru is the very embodiment of sexual power that has

been alchemically transmuted into pure, spiritual love. Perfectly “free

of sense pleasure . . . desires and thoughts,” absolutely “disciplined self-

controlled,” he transmits these same high ideals to his disciples.138

Given this insistence on the ethical standards and purity of the Sid-

dha Yoga gurus, it is particularly ironic that Muktananda and his suc-

cessors have been accused of a host of shocking sexual scandals and moral

violations. Despite his insistence on chastity, Muktananda has been crit-

icized by many ex-devotees for having engaged in a variety of clandes-

tine sexual activities. Already in 1981, an ex-devotee named Stan Trout

had distributed a letter in which he accused the then 73-year-old guru

of betraying the trust of young women of the ashram by extracting sex-

ual favors from them in the name of spiritual enlightenment.139 Shortly

afterward, in 1983, an article appeared in the “CoEvolution Quarterly”

that included interviews with some twenty-five members of SYDA and

offered detailed discussions of Muktananada’s alleged sexual escapades.

As William Rodarmor charged:

In his teachings Muktananda put a lot of emphasis on sex—most of it

negative. Curbing the sex drive released the kundalini energy. . . . The

swami himself claimed to be completely celibate. Members of the guru’s

inner circle, however, say Muktananda regularly had sex with his female

devotees. . . . [T]he guru’s sexual exploits were common knowledge in

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the ashram. “It was supposed to be Muktananda’s big secret,” said [an

ex-disciple], “but since many of the girls were in their early to middle teens,

it was hard to keep it secret.”140

Rodarmar cited one female devotee, “Mary,” who was told that she was

being initiated into the inner secrets of Tantric practice—though she later

found that these secrets were primarily about simple sex, in its most phys-

ical form: “On the first night, Muktananda tried to convince Mary she

was being initiated into tantric yoga. . . . The next night, he didn’t bother.

It was like ‘Okay, you’re here, take off your clothes. Get on the table and

let’s do it.’ Just very straight, hard, cold sex.”141

In her eye-opening article published in The New Yorker in 1994,

journalist Lis Harris included a number of interviews with former Sid-

dha Yoga devotees that provide fairly graphic details about Mukta-

nanda’s sexual practices. According to one female ex-devotee, Mukta-

nanda regularly engaged in acts that involved inserting his penis into a

virgin partner’s vagina for hours at a time, yet without either erection

or ejaculation:

He asked me to lie down on a table. He stood close to me and placed him-

self inside of me. We stayed for about one and a half hours in that position.

During the whole period he never had an erection or ejaculation. He never

even moved. . . . He joked a lot and told me stories about his childhood. At

a certain moment he said: “whatever happens now cannot be understood

with the mind. Don’t think about it a lot. . . . Just know that this is the great-

est day of your life.” It was a very extraordinary experience. . . . I was in a

state of total ecstasy, and whatever happened it had nothing to do with sex.142

Many speculate that these quasi-sexual encounters, involving long pe-

riods of penetration without ejaculation, may have been a form of Tantric

practice, specifically vajrolí mudrà. A very old technique described in

the Haåha Yoga Pradípikà, the vajrolí mudrà is a way to suck the vagi-

nal fluids out of the female body through the penis. Through this “foun-

tain pen technique,” the fluids are drawn back into the male body, where

they are transformed into a powerful source of spiritual energy. As Sarah

Caldwell suggests, “It was for extracting power from these young vir-

gin girls so that he could live. He was living off their energy, sucking

them dry.”143

Years after Muktananda’s death, the scandals surrounding Siddha

Yoga have by no means abated; on the contrary, they seem to have in-

tensified in manifold ways. There appears to have been a violent split

within the movement, caused by a dispute between the two successors

of Muktananda, the brother-sister pair Nityananda and Gurumayi (Sri

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Chidvilasananda). Although Nityananda was originally named by Muk-

tananda as his successor, a brief six months later Gurumayi was named

his cosuccessor. Shortly after that, Nityananda was embroiled in a se-

ries of scandals of his own. Having admitted that he had broken his vows

of celibacy and had sexual encounters with several disciples, Nityananda

stepped down from leadership in 1985. However, he claims that he was

not only pressured into leaving by his sister’s faction, but had been

beaten and assaulted by Siddha Yoga disciples throughout the years that

followed.144

The controversy surrounding Siddha Yoga has by no means been an

affair solely of the media or American pop culture; in the past few years,

it also has become a central issue in the academic study of religion. Al-

ready in 1994, Dr. Robert Thurman, a specialist in Tibetan Buddhism at

Columbia University, had spoken critically of the movement and its sex-

ual scandals: “This kind of behavior should not be legitimized by call-

ing it Tantra.”145

At the same time, however, a number of respected South Asianists and

historians of religions have become devoted members of the Siddha Yoga

movement. In 1997, several of them collaborated to publish a major vol-

ume on Siddha theology and practice, entitled Meditation Revolution.

Yet any reader of this text is immediately struck by its rather incredible

omissions and silences. In light of the intense scandal and controversy

surrounding Siddha Yoga, it seems quite astonishing that a group of highly

trained, respected scholars should have completely ignored the serious

charges leveled at this tradition. This absence is all the more striking,

given that several of the articles (such as the Brooks articles cited above)

go to great lengths to assert the ethical, pure chastity and strict moral-

ity of the Siddha gurus.

As Jeffrey Kripal remarks in his review of Meditation Revolution, it

is disappointing that these scholars, who have such intimate personal in-

volvement with the tradition, should produce a work pervaded by these

haunting silences, without any open discussion of the troubling questions

surrounding Siddha Yoga. This is above all the case with regard to Muk-

tananda’s alleged sexual activities: “I am sure that Brooks is right about

reading the published and official literature of the lineage as ‘right-

handed’ in its orientation . . . but what about the unpublished and

unofficial traditions, both written and oral?”146 In sum, these scholar/

disciples of Siddha Yoga are an acute example of both the potential and

the pitfalls of the “insider” approach to the study of Tantra; they show

us the advantages and disadvantages of studying an esoteric tradition as

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a devotee, an activity that brings about unique new insights along with

strange new kinds of dissimulation.147

More recently, yet another ex-disciple—this time a trained scholar of

Tantra—has come forth with further revealing evidence. Sarah Caldwell,

a former member of the community who has since gone on to study the

Tantric traditions of Kerala, has brought forth still more controversial

material on Muktananda and his followers. Caldwell argues that there

is a “secret Tantric heart within the Siddha Yoga movement which has

been censored and suppressed by later tradition.” Muktananda, she

thinks, modeled his private life after the great Kashmir Taivite master

Abhinavagupta, including his most esoteric sexual practices. Thus Cald-

well hypothesizes that he “was indeed an initiated kaula practitioner, that

he aspired to model himself after Abhinavagupta and that he revered the

secret teachings of the Kula path as the inner core of his power.” Yet this

Tantric core was a secret that had to be carefully covered over, concealed

beneath intricate layers: “The events of Siddha Yoga’s unwritten history

replicate a pattern of poorly kept secrecy and multiple religious identi-

ties that can be traced back to the tenth century.”148

Finally, at the 1999 meeting of the American Academy of Religions,

a panel was held on the topic “Who Speaks for Siddha Yoga?” which in-

volved both committed defenders of the tradition, like Brooks, and more

suspicious critics, like Kripal and Caldwell. Although many of these trou-

bling questions were raised, there appears to have been little rap-

prochement between the “insider-devotees” and the “outsider-skeptics.”

On the contrary, it only pointed to the conflicted nature of Tantra itself,

which always seems partially concealed and partially unmasked, always

the object of both embarrassment and tantalizing allure.

It is not my place here to judge the truth or falsehood of the charges

brought against Muktananda; nor do I wish to accuse or acquit his

disciple/scholars of censoring his more embarrassing sexual life. I sim-

ply want to point to the case of Muktananda as a striking illustration of

two of the most important themes running throughout this book: (1) the

increasingly close association in the modern imagination, both Indian

and American, between Tantra, transgressive sexuality, scandal, and cen-

sorship; and (2) the complex, often deeply tangled relationship between

scholars of Tantra and their objects of study. Muktananda’s is a case in

which scholars of Tantra actually seem to be implicated in—or at least

accused of, right or wrongly— censoring and concealing the dark secrets

of their own guru. In short, the narrative of sexual liberation through

Tantra has been accompanied always by its seemingly inevitable coun-

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terpart: the narrative of scandal, censorship, violation, and betrayal that

lingers behind the most progressive ideals of sexual freedom.

t a n t r a . c o m : e c s t a s y o n l i n e

a n d t h e s p i r i t u a l l o g i c o f l a t e c a p i t a l i s m

Well, the magic millennium is upon us. Yes, the year

2000 is finally here and the revitalization of an old

religion, namely Tantra, may prove to be our world’s

only saving grace.

Dax Michaels,

“The Future of Tantra,” www.tantricmassage.com (2001)

Tantra is like the Internet—expanding exponentially,

links everywhere, innovative, cross-cultural, knowing

no boundaries, and changing day by day. Information

on Tantra . . . is everywhere now. . . . Surf the net . . .

check out the scene, and ask yourself, “Isn’t this truly

a most exciting time? All the barriers are down. Initia-

tion could be but a few clicks away!”

Nik Douglas, Spiritual Sex (1997)

If neo-Tantric gurus like Osho and Trungpa embody a remarkable cross-

cultural circuit from East to West and back again, then we seem to be

witnessing the dissolution of all such geographic boundaries with the ad-

vent of new information technologies and the World Wide Web. Amid

the ever expanding digital spaces of the Internet, where images and texts

circle the globe at mind-boggling speed, the very categories East and West

might appear to be collapsing and dissipating into the weird vacuous ether

of cyber space. Circulating through a new network of spiritual veins

( nadí s) and energy centers ( cakra s) comprised of telephone cables and

computer terminals, the Makti of Tantra is “woven” and “spread out” in

a new form through the electronic energy of the World Wide Web. As

Douglas put it, Tantra, like the Internet, seems to be “expanding expo-

nentially. . . cross-cultural, knowing no boundaries.”

The role of technology in general, and the World Wide Web in particu-

lar, is still one of the most poorly understood aspects of contemporary

religions. Indeed, the New Age and New Religious movements appear

to have capitalized upon the possibilities of the Internet in ways that will

take the rest of us decades to catch up to. As a variety of observers have

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commented, the Internet, like technology in general, opens up vast new

possibilities for both oppression and liberation, capitalist exploitation

and personal empowerment. “Digital reality contains alternative possi-

bilities towards emancipation and domination.”149 On the one hand,

there is no doubt that it is increasingly being used as yet another exten-

sion of consumer capitalism, advertising, and big business to all points

of the globe and all aspects of human consciousness. At least as it func-

tions today, as we see in the growing proliferation of online superstores

like Amazon.com, the primary use of the World Wide Web seems to be

for advertising and commercial enterprise rather than for social or spir-

itual liberation. On the other hand, the Internet and all technology can

be used in many creative and subversive ways never imagined by its cre-

ators. The Internet, which was originally designed for U.S. military use,

is now one of the primary vehicles for the spread of New Age spiritual-

ity and the seemingly “subversive” teachings of the Tantras. With its gen-

eral anonymity, offering the possibility of logging on without any indi-

cation of one’s gender, race, or physical appearance, the Internet opens

remarkable new possibilities for the imagining and reimagining of the

self.150

So too, with its ability to unite individuals from all points of the globe,

irrespective of geographic boundaries, age, sex, or race, it also holds the

potential to create new virtual communities, alternative social groups,

and even ritual gatherings or new kinds of sacred space in the cyber

sphere. Already, we can now enter a wide array of “virtual temples,” to

experience online ritual encounters with a host of cyber deities. We can

even become members of virtual churches, covens, and other alternative

communities, allegedly free of the hierarchies and other authority struc-

tures that confine mainline religions.

The Tantric cyber surfers have been among the first to exploit the new

possibilities of the Internet. As Amy Lavine observes in her study of the

changing face of Tibetan Buddhism in America, Vajrayàna Buddhists have

skillfully “capitalize[d] on the premium placed on the swift retrieval of

information and the constantly moving and relocating nature of Amer-

ican culture,” by providing a vast exotic world of sounds, graphics, and

icons that allow a “level of access and a vicarious experience of partici-

pation unheard of in traditional Tibet.”151 As Rachel McDermott sug-

gests in her study of Kàlí, we are witnessing a remarkable global inter-

play between Indian and Western imaginations, ancient traditions and

contemporary surfers of the Internet, mediated by the strange new world

of cyber space.152 In the last few years, the teachings and rituals of Tan-

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tra have become among the most widespread of the various alternative

spiritualities available online, transmitting what one author calls the

“cybernetics of sex and love.”153 Through the seemingly egalitarian

medium of the Internet, they profess to offer a more accessible, nonelit-

ist brand of Tantrism, a form of Tantric sex available to anyone regard-

less of status or education. One need only enter the word “tantra” into

any good search engine to generate several hundred sites, bearing titles

such as “Sacred Sex: Karessa, Tantra, and Sex Magic,” “Extended Or-

gasm: A Sexual Training Class,” “Oceanic Tantra,” or “Ceremonial Sen-

sual Pleasuring.”

The enormous variety of sexual-fantasy scenarios offered in the media,

over the phone, and on the Internet tells us that nowadays nothing is off

limits. . . . Using the information superhighway we can get on with finding

out . . . what our sexual fantasies really are and how we want to live them

out. We can do this interactively. . . irrespective of country borders. . . .

Tantra data on the information superhighway will lead spiritual travelers

directly to their goal.154

Thus we find a proliferation of new ritual spaces, in which individu-

als disconnected in physical space can enter virtual temples and partici-

pate in online pÜjà s (worship). A visitor to the “Kali Mandir,” for example,

is invited to experience a kind of cyber darMan (a “visual encounter” with

a particular deity), and to perform a virtual pÜjà, by offering fruits and

flowers at the computer screen. One of the most remarkable of these new

virtual spaces is the Third Millennium Magic web site, which offers an

explicitly late-twentieth-century form of “American Tantra,” adapted for

a postmodern, globalized, online audience: “American Tantra (tm) is a

fresh eclectic weaving of sacred sexual philosophies drawn . . . from

around the world, both ancient and modern. . . . In American Tantra (tm)

it is vital to embrace our sexuality. . . and celebrate it in every aspect of

our daily life.”155

Ultimately, its advocates claim, the cyber-sexual encounters of the In-

ternet offer truly transformative, even utopian possibilities. As Douglas

suggests, they help “reprogram our biocomputer with the spiritual soft-

ware that tantra offers,” rewriting the damaged psychic software of in-

dividuals who have been sexually misprogrammed by Western society:

“Our bodily ‘hardware’ is desperately in need of spiritual ‘software,’ of

new spiritual programming. Tantra can best be viewed as an extremely

well-tested spiritual software designed specifically for this time, software

that, when correctly implanted, imparts world happiness and spiritual

liberation in this lifetime.”156

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The goal of this spiritual reprogramming is nothing less than a com-

pletely mind-blowing experience of ultimate orgasm—a hyper-real, cy-

borgasm that utterly transcends the limited sensual pleasure we achieve

in ordinary human intercourse. According to an article called “Sexual

Energy Ecstasy,” reproduced on tantra.com:

Real Tantric sex blows your mind completely because it takes you beyond

all our conceptions of everyday reality. . . . It rips your mind off. . . . The

point of Tantric sex is that it will take you out of your head and down into

your body. . . . Tantra is about learning to let of go of the mind and discover

your supreme self hidden in the heart.157

Ultimately, as the American Tantra web site says, the human body itself

becomes a kind of terminal in this World Wide Web of flowing energy,

a virtual temple of erotic ecstasy, bursting with a “new frequency of liv-

ing love and light”:

Understanding that our bodies are temples for expressing divinity we

can . . . expand, celebrate and share vibrational engorgement in

every cell of our body . . . blending sex and spirit. . . . The benefits we have

experienced include: more vitality, physical and spiritual health, positivity

and pleasure! (Juice it up, way up!)158

Ironically, it is precisely through the Internet, by participating in online

ecstasy via modem, mouse, and video screen, that we are said to achieve

the ultimate physical experience, to achieve the full realization of our bod-

ily and sexual nature.

Perhaps we are witnessing here the birth of a new vision of the human

body itself, reconfigured for the digital era. This would seem to be the ul-

timate fantasy of creating an incorporeal spiritual body, a new cyber self,

in which telephone wires become the nàjí s of a virtual subtle corpus, com-

puter terminals become the new cakra s or nodes of energy, and the flow

of vital pràJa becomes the infinite stream of information transmitted by

digital code. As Arthur Kroker suggests, this is perhaps the digital gener-

ation’s version of the age-old struggle between body and spirit, between

the corruptible flesh and the dream of an incorruptible otherworld: “Not

something new, digital reality continues anew a very ancient story: the

struggle between two irreconcilable elements in the human drama—the

unwanted reality of the decay of the flesh and the long-dreamed prom-

ised land of escape from the body organic of the pre-technological

body. . . . [T]hat’s the utopia . . . of digital reality.”159 Yet unlike pes-

simistic, world-denying cyber movements such as Heaven’s Gate, the cy-

ber tàntrika seeks a kind of ecstasy that would unite both the digital and

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the physical realms—a cyborgasm that combines the incorruptibility of

cyber space with the most this-worldly sensual pleasure in the flesh.

Tantra and the Spiritual Logic of Late Capitalism

The days of the nations are over, the days of divisions

are over, the days of the politicians are over. We are

moving in a tremendously new world, a new phase of

humanity—and the phase is that there can only be one

world now, only one single humanity. And then there

will be a tremendous release of energies.

Osho, Autobiography

The Market is becoming the first truly world religion,

binding all corners of the globe more and more tightly

into a world view and set of values whose religious

role we overlook because we insist on seeing them as

“secular.”

David Loy, “The Religion of the Market” (1997)

Our venture into Tantric cyber space has brought us full circle. We have

retraced what Max Müller long ago called “that world-wide circle

through which, like an electric current, Oriental thought could run to

the West and Western thought return to the East.”160 For we have jour-

neyed from the American appropriation of Tantra, with its redefinition

of Tantra as “spiritual sex,” to the exportation of “neo-Tantra,” which

has been packaged anew for a global marketplace and reappropriated

by a wide array of spiritual consumers in both the East and the West. In

the process, Tantra has undergone a series of important transformations;

no longer an esoteric path aimed at the acquisition of power, Tantra not

only has been publicized widely, but also sexualized and sensationalized—

that is, identified with radically liberating, hyperorgasmic, and often de-

liciously scandalous sex.

At least as it is portrayed in contemporary popular discourse, Tantra

would seem in many ways the ideal religion of and for consumer capi-

talist society at the start of the millennium. It suggests a remarkable fit

with the particular cultural and economic formation that has been var-

iously dubbed “post-industrialism” (Bell), “post-Fordism” (Harvey), or

“disorganized capitalism” (Offe).161 Yet whatever its name, most ob-

servers agree, the contemporary global economic system is by no means

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postcapitalist. On the contrary, it is hypercapitalist, or, in Ernest Man-

del’s terms, a purer form of capitalism than any seen before, one which

allows for the most powerful and successful application of capitalist prin-

ciples to all aspects of human life. Since the early 1970s and, above all,

since the abandonment of the gold standard and the subsequent “de-

materialization” of money, there has been a shift from the “Fordist” eco-

nomics of modern industrial capitalism to a more pervasive process of

“flexible accumulation.” In the global marketplace of postmodernity,

funds can be transferred and exchanged instantaneously, from any point

on the planet, through a network of constantly shifting, increasingly flex-

ible corporate structures and modes of consumption.162

At the same time, late capitalism has been accompanied by a series of

marked shifts on the cultural level. As Fredric Jameson summarizes it,

the “cultural logic of late capitalism” is characterized by a general loss

of faith in any grand, unifying view of the world or human history (a

death of “metanarratives,” to use Lyotard’s phrase) and a concomitant

sense of intense fragmentation, pluralism, or “heteroglossia,” which mir-

rors the bewildering diversification in consumer society itself.163 Instead

of the construction of any unifying metanarrative, the dominant logic of

late capitalism is “pastiche” and “bricolage”—the freewheeling syn-

cretism of diverse elements drawn from disparate historical and cultural

eras, patched together solely by the whim of the individual consumer.

Today, we “no longer produce monumental works of the modernist type

but ceaselessly reshuffle the fragments . . . of older cultural productions,

in some new . . . bricolage: metabooks which cannibalize other books.”164

And instead of the ideal of unity, order, or harmony, the late-capitalist

aesthetic is one of physical intensity, shock value, immediate gratification,

and ecstatic experience. As Terry Eagleton observes, “Its stance toward

cultural tradition is one of irreverent pastiche and its contrived depth-

lessness undermines all metaphysical solemnities . . . by a brutal aesthetics

of squalor and shock.”165

Perhaps the most obvious aspect of late capitalism, however, is the pro-

gressive extension of the logic of the marketplace to all aspects of cul-

ture. In the “market-like conditions of modern life,” as Jürgen Haber-

mas puts it, everything tends to become a commodity that may be bought

and sold, from art to politics to religion itself.166 Now forced to compete

in the marketplace alongside other secular businesses, religion tends to

become yet another consumer product within the supermarket of values.

The believer, meanwhile, is free to choose from a wide array of religious

options, to piece together his or her personalized spiritual pastiche:

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Max Weber’s metaphor . . . of religion striding into the marketplace of

worldly affairs and slamming the monastery door behind, becomes further

transformed in modern society with religion placed very much in the con-

sumer marketplace. . . . Individuals [are] able to select form a plurality of

suitably packaged bodies of knowledge in the super-market of lifestyles. . . .

The tendency in modern societies is for religion to become a private leisure

pursuit purchased in the market like any other consumer lifestyle.167

Finally, as the logic of the marketplace has spread to all facets of human

life, it has also brought about fundamental shifts in our attitudes toward

the body, physical pleasure, and desire. As Featherstone, Turner, and

others suggest, there has been a basic shift from the early capitalist atti-

tude based on the Protestant work ethic, thriftiness, and innerworldly

asceticism, to a late-capitalist attitude based on mass consumption, phys-

ical pleasure, and hedonistic enjoyment. In consumer culture the body

ceases to be a vessel of sin or an unruly vessel of desires that must be dis-

ciplined and mastered—rather, the body is proclaimed as the ultimate

source of gratification, enjoyment, and fulfillment: “In the growth of a

consumer society with its emphasis on the athletic/beautiful body we see

a major transformation of values from an emphasis on the control of the

body for ascetic reasons to the manipulation of the body for aesthetic

purposes.”168

All of these general cultural aspects of late capitalism, I would argue,

appear in striking form in the various popular appropriations of Tantra.

First, as an avowedly “religionless religion” or antireligion, neo-Tantrism

rejects all traditional metanarratives and established ideologies, openly

embracing the radical pluralism, heteroglossia, and freewheeling pastiche

of consumer culture. As Rajneesh explains, Tantra is not an ideology or

a grand narrative about the universe: on the contrary it is a nonreligion,

an antiphilosophy, whose aim is precisely to deconstruct the ideologies

and institutions that bind us to this world: “The Tantric attitude . . . is

not an attitude because . . . it has no concepts, it is not a philosophy. It

is not a religion, it has no theology. It doesn’t believe in words, theories,

doctrines. It wants to look at life without any philosophy, without any

theory. . . . [I]t is a no-attitude.”169 Or, to quote another popular Tantric

guru, Bubba Free John (alias Da Love Ananda or Adi Da), even the teach-

ings of the guru are ultimately empty and worthless. They too are so much

“garbage,” whose sole aim is to reveal to us the futility of all truths, the

emptiness of all spiritual and moral doctrines: “Everything the guru gives

you is garbage, and he expects you to throw it away, but you meditate

on it. All these precious experiences, all this philosophy. . . none of them

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The Cult of Ecstasy257

is the Divine. They are garbage.” “The enlightened person . . . is a se-

ducer, a madman, a hoax, a libertine, a fool, a moralist, a sayer of

truths . . . a god. He demonstrates the futility of all things.”170

Instead of an ideology or master narrative, Tantra is presented as a

noninstitutional, universal tradition drawn from the sacred heritage of

all cultures. This was already apparent in the early Naropa Institute in

Boulder, where Tibetan Tantra mingled freely with Sufi dance, T’ai Ch’i,

and the psychology of Gregory Bateson.171 And it has become even more

apparent in recent New Age versions of Tantra, which incorporate every-

thing from ancient Greece and Rome, to Egypt and Mesopotamia, to Na-

tive American spirituality and Hebrew Kabbalah. As “simple non-de-

nominational sacred sex for everyday folks,” designed for “open-minded

sensual beings irrespective of race, gender or faith,” Tantra is thus “a

way of life drawing inspiration from the realizations of the Enlightened

of all traditions.”172 So it is that most neo-tantric authors feel free to draw

eclectically from all variety of sacred and secular teachings, creating their

own spiritual-sexual pastiche to fit the tastes of their consumers. “The

essence of Tantra . . . is not specifically Indian or Tibetan, Hindu or Bud-

dhist. . . . [I]t is as native to the Bronx as to Bengal. . . . [T]here is a Path

of Excess which . . . can lead to the heights rather than the depths.”173

Second, as an offspring of the late-capitalist era, neo-Tantra centers

around an aesthetics of intensity, hedonism, and shock. According to

Trungpa, Rajneesh, and other neo-Tantric gurus, the ordinary human be-

ing is trapped in the dysfunctional patterns of socialization created by

mainstream education, politics, and religion: the only way to free us from

these destructive patterns is through the intense shock tactics of Tantra—

the explicit violation of moral laws through illicit sexuality, indulgence

in food, drugs, and wild parties. Their aim is to shatter our usual ways

of conceptualizing reality and to project us into the ultimate state of ec-

stasy beyond all worldly constraints. As Da Love Ananda put it in his

characteristically irreverent style,

The Guru’s function is to undermine all this, to make the world show itself.

He makes the Goddess pull down her pants and then you see her asshole.

What do I know? . . . No one agrees with me. . . . They all tell me I’m

mad. . . . The Goddess used to say, “Yield to me,” and I fucked her brains

loose. I never listened to anyone.174

The aim of Tantra is not to fill our minds with moral codes, rituals, or

institutional structures. Rather, it is meant to break down all confining

structures through the sheer intensity of physical pleasure, to realize our

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true selves beyond all moral or institutional restraints: “sex magic is . . .

as individual as the persons involved. There are no rules for sex magic.

However, there has to be good sex. . . . The idea of ‘To thine own self be

true’ is essential.”175

Tantra, in these accounts, is thus the only spiritual path that actu-

ally accepts and affirms human beings as the creatures they truly are—

pleasure-seeking, desiring, sensual creatures, who need to satisfy their

hedonistic urges in order to be self-realized and fulfilled individuals: “Tan-

tra is a great yea-sayer,” as Rajneesh puts it, “it says yes to everything.”176

Or as another neo-Tantric guru, Swami Nostradamus Virato, proclaims,

“The art of Tantra . . . could be called spiritual hedonism, which says

‘eat drink and be merry’ but with full awareness. . . . Tantra says yes to

sex! . . . do it now! Life!”177

Thus, one of the most common themes throughout much recent lit-

erature on Tantra is the “Be all that you can be” ethic—the idea that Tan-

tra provides the means of enjoying life to the fullest, of achieving worldly

goals, pleasure, and success, as well as spiritual growth. As Alan Watts

put it, “Explore the fascination of desire, love and lust to the limit. Ac-

cept and enjoy without reservation the ego that you seem to be.”178 As

another, more recent New Age tàntrika declares, when we embrace the

Tantric path we discover our own innermost self, and we realize that our

very self is divine: “Tantra wants me to awaken all my potential, to un-

fold my personality as a whole. . . . [T]he aim of Tantra is total ecstasy. ”179

Perhaps most strikingly, Tantra also appears to have become the ideal

religion for late-capitalist society as a specifically consumer religion—a

form of spirituality that does not deny but actually embraces our mate-

rial impulses for wealth, financial success, and power. As a variety of ob-

servers have noted, the New Age as a whole tends to foster a kind of

“consumer approach to religion,” offering a wide array of religious prod-

ucts, as readily available as the products on the shelves of Walmart, em-

phasizing the freedom of the individual spiritual shopper, and champi-

oning the union of spiritual realization with material enjoyment. As

Feuerstein comments, “the contemporary scene [is] a spiritual super-

market” that caters to the dominant “quick fix consumer mentality” and

the desire for instant spiritual and material gratification.180 As the per-

fect wedding of mukti and bhukti, liberation and pleasure, Tantra seems

to fit perfectly with this consumer mentality.

As we have seen in the case of Crowley and his disciples, Tantric sex

can be used as a practical technique to generate money and financial pros-

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The Cult of Ecstasy259

perity. And this use of Tantric sex magic has become an increasingly pop-

ular technique in many current forms of neo-Tantra. When we explore

the “Tantra: Sex Magic” link on the tantra.com web site, we find that

Tantric sex can be used to achieve the most worldly of aims. By focus-

ing the power of orgasm through ritual sex, we can use that awesome

sexo-spiritual force to realize any worldly desire:

The SMRCP [Sex Magic Reality Creation Process] is about maintaining one’s

focus during orgasm and channeling the energy into creating reality, any

reality, whether it’s creating a new job, car, experience, relationships, etc.

See, hear, taste, smell and feel the creation as if it’s real. . . . What is your

life like when you earn $85,000? What does it feel like? Make it big, in

Technicolor. . . . Do whatever brings you to orgasm . . . masturbation or

sex with a supportive partner.181

Perhaps the most explicitly consumer-oriented of all the modern Tantric

masters was Osho-Rajneesh. Rajneesh made it quite clear that his ideal

of the self-realized human being or “Superman” was by no means some

otherworldly ascetic, but rather what he called “Zorba the Buddha”—

one who combines the healthy materialism of Zorba the Greek with the

spiritual realization of the Buddha: “I teach a sensuous religion. I want

Gautama the Buddha and Zorba the Greek to come closer and closer;

my disciple has to be Zorba-the-Buddha. Man is body-soul together. Both

have to be satisfied.”182 Not only was he unopposed to economic suc-

cess, but he was an open advocate of consumer capitalism. Particularly

in its American variety, capitalism is for Rajneesh the natural condition

of the human being, for it is the triumph of the powerful few, who are

willing to struggle and succeed, over the weak masses, who remain jeal-

ous and lazy: “the creation of wealth is the task of genius. . . . Socialism

is the jealously of the masses, of the have-nots against the few who suc-

ceed in doing something for mankind.”183 As Rajneesh put it, in his typ-

ically unapologetic style, “I don’t condemn wealth. Wealth is a perfect

means which can enhance people in every way and make life rich in all

ways. The materially poor can never become spiritual.” “People are un-

equal and a fair world has to give people full freedom to be unequal.

Capitalism has grown out of freedom. It is a natural phenomenon.”184

During his years in the United States, Rajneesh was quite successful in

realizing this wedding of capitalism and spirituality, financial prosperity

and otherworldly transcendence. And rather remarkably, the newly reborn

Osho community in India has become perhaps more successful still, emerg-

ing as a universal spiritual enterprise for a new global world order. No

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small part of the appeal, it would seem, is Osho’s blending of spirituality

with material prosperity. As he later explained his taste in expensive au-

tomobiles and his collection of Rolls-Royces, “People are sad, jealous and

thinking that Rolls-Royces don’t fit with spirituality. I don’t see that there

is any contradiction. . . . In fact, sitting in a bullock cart it is very difficult

to be meditative; a Rolls-Royce is the best for spiritual growth.”185

Not surprisingly, the “Just do it” religion of Tantra also comes with

a certain price tag. Participation in the art of Tantric loving appears to

demand a fairly affluent consumer, who can afford the wide range of

books, videos, workshops, and therapies, not to mention the wide line

of spiritual-sexual accessories. Thus, online at “Tantra Gift Shop” or at

“E-Sensuals Catalogue,” one can choose from vast array of Tantric com-

modities, including books, videos, artworks, herbs, vitamins, incense,

aphrodisiacs, and other sexual aids, such as the Goddess Spot G-Spot

Stimulator ($49), Lust Dust ($22), Hawaiian Goddess Tantric Massage

Oil ($13), Bawdy Butter ($8.50), and even the full Tantric Pleasuring

Package ($198).186

“ a f t e r t h e o r g y ”

I have a vision for the future where all the necessary sex

education will be available for everyone. . . . No one will

ever go hungry for sex because there will be sex kitchens

all over town serving sex instead of soup. . . . We will

learn how to use orgasm to cure disease as some of the

ancient Tantrics and Taoists did. . . . In the future, every-

body will be so sexually satisfied, there’ll be an end to

violence, rape and war. We will establish contact with

extra-terrestrials and they will be very sexy.

Annie Sprinkle (1996)

If it were necessary to characterize the state of things

I would say that it is after the orgy. The orgy is . . . the

explosive moment of modernity, that of liberation in

all domains. Political liberation, sexual liberation, lib-

eration of productive forces, liberation of destructive

forces. . . . Today everything is liberated . . . we find

ourselves before the question: what are we to do

after the orgy?

Jean Baudrillard, The Transparency of Evil (1993)

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The Cult of Ecstasy261

This chapter has only scratched the surface of contemporary appropri-

ations of Tantra in the popular imagination. If space allowed, I could

have explored a variety of other neo-Tantric phenomena, such as Robert

Svoboda’s popular series based on the life and teachings of a modern

Aghorí; firsthand accounts by Westerners who have “gone Tantric,” like

June Campbell and Daniel Odier; Tantra-practicing rock stars (and even

bands, in both India and the United States, who call themselves “Tan-

tric”); the rapidly expanding realms of S&M Tantra and gay Tantra (that

even claim as advocates respected Tantric scholars like Jeffrey Hopkins);

not to mention the various attempts to wed Tantra with Native Ameri-

can, neopagan, and even Christian spiritual practices.187

But even from this brief overview, it is not difficult to see why Tantra

has become so popular in contemporary popular culture. Nor is it hard

to imagine why Tantra has been celebrated as what Nik Douglas calls

the “Science of the Future,” and even as the “Engine of Political Change”

that will reunite humankind during this millennium in a “new spiritual

democracy”: “The Future of Tantra is like Woman’s best Orgasm. . . . It

is without limits. . . . Tantra is a vast spiritual experience, oceanic, won-

drous and unpredictable.”188 Tantra is a brand of spirituality that can

magically unite hedonism and transcendence, self-realization and this-

worldly prosperity. As the most radical and transgressive form of spiri-

tuality, Tantra (not unlike capitalism itself ) oversteps every taboo and

shatters every social restriction. Thus performance artists like the noto-

rious Annie Sprinkle—a self-proclaimed “post-porn modernist”—uses

her live performances of Tantric sex as a vehicle for liberation from all

forms of sexual containment or social taboo.189 As one Indian American

author, Hakim Bey, explains, Tantra is thus the most appropriate path

for our own age of radical sexuality, violence, transgression, and power

in the Kali yuga of modernity:

Her age must contain horrors. . . . To go thru chaos, to ride it like a tiger,

to embrace it (even sexually) & absorb its shakti . . . this is the faith of the

Kali yuga. Creative nihilism. For those who follow it she promises enlight-

enment & even wealth, a share of her temporal power. The sexuality &

violence serve as metaphors in a poem which acts directly on conscious-

ness. . . . [T]hey can be openly deployed & imbued with a sense of the holi-

ness of every thing from ecstasy & wine to garbage & corpses.190

As such, this new image of Tantra also fits in well with contemporary

attitudes toward sexuality and its liberation—what Jean Baudrillard has

aptly dubbed the “culture of premature ejaculation.” This is a culture

rooted in an imagined dialectic of “repression” and “liberation,” or the

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belief that our sexuality has been suppressed and denied by prudish Victo-

rian values and that we must now free our sexuality through hedonistic

enjoyment:

Ours is a culture of premature ejaculation. More and more, all seduc-

tion . . . disappears behind the naturalized sexual imperative calling for

an immediate relation of a desire. . . .

Nowadays one no longer says: “You’ve got a soul and you must save

it,” but “You’ve got a sexual nature and you must learn how to use it

well.” . . . “You’ve got a libido and you must learn how to spend it.”191

Yet this leaves us with the troubling question of just what is there left to

do “after the orgy”—after every taboo has been violated, every prohi-

bition transgressed, and every desire satiated.

I would suggest that the investigation of the contemporary imagining

of Tantra has much broader comparative implications. The popular ap-

propriations of Tantra give us some important insights into the many

ways in which traditional religions are being adapted, transformed, and

exploited in the strange new world of late capitalism. We might also com-

pare, for example, the appropriations of Native American spirituality,

Afro-Brazilian movements like Santeria, and even traditional Jewish tra-

ditions like Kabbalah (which now claims popular entertainers like

Roseanne Barr among its disciples). In each of these cases, we find an-

cient religious traditions entering more and more into the ever expand-

ing web of global capitalism and consumerism. This process could, of

course, be seen as a good and healthy phenomenon, contributing to our

awareness of other cultures and leading the way to a more diverse, plu-

ralistic, and tolerant global community. But it could also be seen as quite

negative, and even as a form of neocolonialism and cultural imperial-

ism, yet another example of the West’s exploitation of the sacred arti-

facts of other peoples. As Torgovnick points out in her discussion of the

fascination with the “primitive” in modern culture, the popular cele-

bration of globalism and pluralism as a carnivalesque liberation is rather

naive, to say the least. For it masks the deeper socioeconomic disparity

that continues to structure relations between East and West, between First

World and Third World; it ignores the forces of neocolonialism and cul-

tural exploitation that continue to rule much of the late-capitalist global

marketplace:

There is a common problematic view in discussions of global culture. . . .

The problem is one of carnivalesque rejoicing . . . of believing that contact

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The Cult of Ecstasy263

and polyphony are inherently liberating. . . . But carnivals do not last. . . .

Behind the festivities are social and economic facts we should not forget.

The problem with the carnival idea . . . is that it ignores the real social

and economic cost of the global village. . . . It may sound a discordant

note at the carnival, but that note is still heard—daily—in the ghettos and

shantytowns of the urban jungle.192

However we wish to interpret this phenomenon, it would seem that

in this age of increasing pluralism in the late-capitalist world order, we

need to practice relentless self-consciousness and self-criticism. We need

always to ask ourselves whether we are working toward a genuinely

postimperial, pluralistic global community, or whether we are merely ab-

sorbing all other, even previously uncolonized, peoples’ cultures into the

ever expanding network of global capitalism (which some would describe

as an even more insidious form of neocolonialism). In other words, to

quote Chogyam Trungpa in his work on the widespread disease of “spir-

itual materialism,” we need to ask whether or not “we have simply

created a shop, an antique shop.”193

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Conclusion

Reimagining Tantra

in Contemporary Discourse

This warning has been given hundreds of times: Don’t

get into Tantra just like that. . . . It’s dangerous. . . . Every

Tantric text . . . begins with that warning: Be careful, think

twice . . . don’t take this carelessly. But interestingly, the more

you put students off, the more interested they become.

Chogyam Trungpa, Journey without Goal (1985)

The twentieth century will undoubtedly have discovered

the related categories of exhaustion, excess, the limit and

transgression—the strange and unyielding form of these ir-

revocable movements which consume and consummate us.

Michel Foucault, “A Preface to Transgression,” (1963)

At this point, I need to try to tie together the many loose ends and dan-

gling strands that constitute my own genealogy of the tangled threads

of Tantra. Obviously, this book cannot claim to be comprehensive or

complete. Concerned primarily with the imagining of “Tantra” as a

modern category, I have not tried to undertake the far more difficult

task of narrating the actual historical development of those particular

texts, traditions, practices, and peoples who would later be identified

as Tantric. Moreover, as I quickly realized when I began to delve into

the contemporary popular literature on Tantra, this is a topic that is

too vast for a single book. Thus I have had to leave out an enormous

amount of very interesting material. I have not attempted by any means

to write a definitive history of Tantra, but rather to tease out and retrace

a few of the most important threads that have been woven, tangled, and

264

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Conclusion

265

matted together into the complex snarl that we now call the Tantric

traditions.

The imagining of Tantra, it would seem, has turned out to be some-

thing more complicated, much more messy, and yet also more interest-

ing than the simple history of an indigenous Indian category or the simple

imposition of a Western category onto the passive surface of the exotic

Orient. By no means a predictable Saidian narrative of Orientalism, this

genealogy of Tantra offers a real challenge to much of the contemporary

scholarship in postcolonial and subaltern studies. For Tantra has emerged

as a conflicted, contested, and contradictory category, passed back and

forth between Indian and Western imaginations, undergoing new trans-

formations in each new historical encounter. It is in this sense that Tan-

tra seems to be analogous, on a conceptual level, to Benjamin’s notion

of the “dialectical image,” as a “critical constellation of past and

present,” composed not of smooth historical continuities, but rather of

“rough and jagged places at which the continuity of the tradition breaks

down.”1 As a dialectical category, Tantra is not singular or stable; it is

something that is “non-homogeneous” and “fragmented,” “which on ac-

count of its awkwardness of fit, cracks, and violent juxtapositionings can

actively embody both a presentation and counter-presentation of his-

torical time.”2 Rather than a “history” of Tantra, this book has been

more like a genealogy (in Foucault’s sense) of these many shifting di-

alectical images of Tantra—an attempt to work backward from our con-

temporary imagining of Tantra, to retrace the many “accidents, minute

deviations, the complete reversals” that have given shape to this complex

category in the present.

In simplest form, the imagining of Tantra could be outlined as in fig-

ure 14, which is adapted loosely from Benjamin’s analysis of the dialec-

tical nature of the commodity.3 Tantra thus lies at the nexus of a series

of conflicting extremes—the archaic past and the modern age of dark-

ness; sexual liberation and sexual depravity; political freedom and

political violence—each of which is seized upon in different historical

moments.

Perhaps most importantly, we have found that the image of Tantra has

progressively shifted from a tradition associated with secrecy, danger, and

occult power to one associated primarily with sexual liberation and phys-

ical pleasure. At either extreme of this dialectic we have seen, on one hand,

the Orientalists’ and reformers’ horror at Tantric licentiousness and, on

the other, the contemporary celebration of Tantric freedom and empow-

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Conclusion

Personal or collective

empowerment

Political violence

Sexual freedom

Archaic, autochthonous,

Modern age of darkness/

Tant ra

pre-Aryan past

new age of liberation

Sexual immorality

Class-free, egalitarian society

Black magic, occult power

Figure 14. The imagining of Tantra.

erment. As such, this genealogy of Tantra also has turned out to be a po-

litical history of the history of religions; for the construction of Tantra

has been intimately tied from the outset to particular power formations

and political interests—to colonialism and anticolonial revolt; to na-

tionalism and postcolonial identity; to the political investments of schol-

ars of religions; and finally to the global capitalist economy at the turn

of the millennium. As an extreme form of Otherness or radical alterity,

it has formed a dark mirror against which both Indian and Western au-

thors have imagined their own cultural, religious, and political identities.

“Tantra Yoga: The Practice Everyone’s Talking About!”

Tantra, Sex, and Neocolonial Angst in Contemporary Rishikesh

Tantra is a very bad practice. It is a dirty, filthy path.

You will never get to heaven by the Tantric path. The

tàntrika seeks power in this world—he wants Makti and

he also wants money—but he will not go to heaven.

Nàga Sannyàsí, interviewed in Rishikesh (22 March 2001)

To illustrate some of my concluding thoughts on the strange, contem-

porary, cross-cultural imagining of Tantra, I will relate some of my ob-

servations from my time in Rishikesh, one of the most important holy

sites of north India. Although I had spent a good deal of time at various

Tantric sites in India and Nepal—such as Tàràpíåh in West Bengal, Kà-

màkhyà in Assam, and Kathmandu in Nepal—I found Rishikesh to be

one of the most remarkable, because of the weird intersection of East-

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267

Figure 15. An Aghorí and tàntrika s in Rishikesh, July 2000. Photo by the author.

ern and Western cultures and the resulting new forms of Tantra.4 Situ-

ated along the Ganges at the base of the Himalayan foothills, Rishikesh

has long been a favorite haven for sàdhu s from all over India. And since

the 1960s, with the visit of the Beatles, Donovan, and Mia Farrow to

Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s Transcendental Meditation Ashram, it has also

become a Mecca for white hippies and spiritual seekers from all over Eu-

rope and North America, for Indian sàdhu s and for white travelers in

search of enlightenment and/or cheap hashish (figure 15). For many

young American and European travelers, the sàdhu s—and particularly

the radical sàdhu s like the Aghorís, Nàths, and tàntrika s—represent the

highest ideals of freedom, self-discovery, and experimental drug use.

Tantra has become one of the most important, yet also controversial,

spiritual topics in this ancient holy site. Shortly after my arrival, I was

intrigued to see a flyer advertising courses—“Tantra Yoga: The Practice

Everyone’s Talking About!”—plastered all over town, a little ironic, given

the esoteric nature of most Indian Tantric traditions. During my time in

Rishikesh, I had the opportunity to interview a wide range of sàdhu s—

both Indian yogis and the new breed of white sàdhu—and came upon a

tremendous diversity of opinions regarding Tantra. Thus I met with sev-

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eral Nàth yogis who proudly identified themselves as tàntrika s and

claimed Tantra to be the highest spiritual path, integrating yoga and

bhoga, spiritual transcendence and this-worldly enjoyment. Interestingly

enough, both the Nàths and the Aghorís with whom I spoke clearly dis-

tinguished the tàntrika path from the aghora path. In contrast to most

Western observers, who often identify the Aghorí as the quintessential

tàntrika, most of these sàdhu s identified Tantra as a more restrained path

and aghora as a more radical, transgressive path (often distinguished as

“right hand” from “left hand”). “Aghora is the most direct path,” one

black-clad sàdhu explained to me, “Tantra is still an indirect path. For

the Aghorí, there are no restraints, there is nothing in-between.”

Perhaps the majority of sàdhu s with whom I spoke, however, were

generally critical and suspicious of the tàntrika path. Thus, one of the

older nàga (naked) sannyàsí s whom I met spoke disparagingly of Tantra

as a “filthy path,” concerned primarily with the acquisition of worldly

power and wealth: “they sleep in urine, they eat anything, they see noth-

ing as unclean.” But they will never get to heaven, he assured me. Play-

ing ironically off the usual definition of Tantra as “yoga and bhoga, ” an-

other older nàga defined Tantra simply as “yoga-bhoga-roga”—that is,

spiritual practice, sensual pleasure, and addiction or disease.

But surely the most intriguing phenomenon in contemporary Rishikesh

is the birth of a wholly new kind of tàntrika—what we might call the

“white sàdhu” or the “passport sàdhu. ” Bearing rudràkãa-màlà s (rosaries) in one hand and guitars in the other, the white sàdhu s are young Americans and Europeans who wear their hair in long, tangled dreadlocks,

dress in the colored robes of sannyàsí s, and blend Rastafarianism and

drugs with the Kàma SÜtra and Tantric yoga. A strange mixture of Dead

Heads and wandering Bàuls, these white sàdhu s travel from holy site to

holy site, clutching their Lonely Planet guide next to their Bhagavad Gítà,

some in search of enlightenment, some merely in search of cheap hashish.

For many of the ones I met in Rishikesh, Tantra was the epitome of every-

thing they sought in India and the opposite of everything they had left

behind in the West: freedom in every sense of the word and a kind of

bliss that is at once transcendent and yet utterly physical. The Indian san-

nyàsí s in Rishikesh seemed to have mixed reactions to these white sàd-

hu s: most viewed them with mild curiosity and guarded interest; some

regarded them with utter disdain and reproach; and some actually sought

to attract them to live in their ashrams, as a kind of cross-cultural sta-

tus symbol and emblem of spiritual power.

Probably because of my own long hair and beard, and my female com-

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269

panion, I was occasionally taken to be a white tàntrika—and not always

in a positive sense. Once as my friend and I were crossing the Lakshman

Jhula bridge, a young Ramakrishna monk angrily approached us and,

with no apparent provocation, began to verbally abuse us, accusing us

of sexual immorality. He proceeded to complain loudly and at great length

about the troupes of young Westerners invading India along with their

loose sexuality; in his eyes this is simply a new form of colonialism, which

only continues the worst kind of imperialism from which India had strug-

gled so long to free itself. No sooner had India driven out the British,

who exploited the land economically and politically, then a whole new

wave of Western colonizers invaded, who now exploit India’s spiritual

traditions. He assured us, however, that India would soon be closing its

doors to all foreign tourists, with their corrupting immorality, and that

the matter was at that very moment being discussed in Parliament.

In sum, what one finds at key spiritual-tourist centers like Rishikesh

is a striking example of the dialectical imagining of Tantra—a complex,

contradictory figure that lies at the critical intersection between East and

West, materialism and spirituality, sexuality and transcendence, cross-

cultural dialogue and neo-Orientalist misrepresentation.

Reimagining Tantra: Embodied Tantra and Corporeal Spirituality

The Supreme Reality has the form of bliss and

exists within the human body.

Thus the wise offer the gods the flesh of their

own bodies.

Yoginí Tantra (1.6.53)

The idea that in order to get clear about the meaning

of a general term one had to find the common element

in all its applications has shackled philosophical investi-

gations; for it had not only led to no result, but also

made the philosopher dismiss as irrelevant the concrete

cases which alone could have helped him to understand

the usage of the general term.

Ludwig Wittgenstein, The Blue and Brown Books (1958)

If it is true that Tantra is an imaginary construction, to a large degree a

result of the encounter between Indian and Western imaginations over

the last two hundred years, a few questions arise: How can we now (or

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indeed should we even try to) reimagine Tantra in a more useful way in

contemporary discourse? Should we abandon the term altogether (as some

have proposed we abandon the equally problematic terms “Hinduism”

and “religion”), substituting a plurality of more genuinely “indigenous”

terms? Or is it still possible to use the term in a more sophisticated, or

at least less problematic, form?

There have, of course, been a number of attempts to reimagine Tan-

tra in the past few decades, in both the scholarly and popular imagina-

tions. In American popular culture, as we saw in the last chapter, most

authors have presented a form of Tantra that is stripped down and sim-

plified for a contemporary audience—or a form of Tantra divested of

the excess baggage that burdens its traditional Indian forms. Most of the

neo- tàntrika s argue that it is possible to cull the ecstatic, sensual dimen-

sions of Tantric practice, while jettisoning most of the elaborate ritual,

hierarchies of knowledge, and the often unsavory elitism and sexism that

accompany many traditional forms of Tantra.5

This revisioning of Tantra for a popular Western audience has not been

limited to popular New Age authors, but has been suggested even by

some of the most respected scholars in the academy. Thus Jeffrey Hop-

kins, one of the foremost authorities on Tibetan Buddhism, has recently

come out of the closet and published a gay interpretation of a Tibetan

sexual manual. Taking the explicitly heterosexual manual, the Tibetan Arts

of Love, by Gedun Chopel, he has published his own translation of the

text from an explicitly homosexual perspective; thus we find masculine

pronouns substituted for feminine, and male anatomy for female. For Hop-

kins, Tantric Buddhism is not only a spiritual path that is “sex friendly,”

making positive use of sexual pleasure “to gain insight into the reality be-

hind appearances,” but Tantric techniques can also be adapted in the ser-

vice of gay spirituality.6 As Hopkins explains, “Since gay persons need care,

support and encouragement from their own community, I felt that in ad-

dition to translating . . . a Tibetan heterosexual sex manual, I needed to

live up to my responsibilities to my own community. Thus I present a guide

to gay sex infused with my perspectives from India and Tibetan culture.”7

Most modern scholars, however, have reacted strongly against this

transformation and popularization of Tantra in American culture, de-

crying it as a kind of “California Tantra” purveyed by ignorant charla-

tans who “peddle their shoddy wares.”8 We can see this scholarly deni-

gration of the popularized versions of Tantra already in the work of

Agehananda Bharati, who spoke quite critically indeed about the sloppy

syncretism and gross misunderstanding that characterize most American

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forms of pop Tantra. Instead, Bharati argued firmly that the only way

for Tantra truly to enter the West would be through solid scholarship

and careful historical, linguistic, and textual study.9 Bharati’s advice

largely seems to have been followed by most scholars of Tantra over the

past three decades. One might well argue that much of the recent schol-

arship on Tantra has tended to go to the opposite extreme, often bend-

ing over backward to prove that Tantra is not in fact simply about sex-

ual indulgence, but is rather a highly philosophical, intellectual, and even

elitist enterprise, largely the province of highly educated Brahmans and

upper classes. Thus Gupta and Goudriaan argue that Tantra is defined

best “not as a popular movement,” but as “the outgrowth of the spe-

cialized position of an intellectual elite of religious functionaries from

the upper classes, as a rule, of Brahmans.”10 As Kripal argues, much re-

cent literature has continued trends in the work of John Woodroffe—

above all, his attempt to defend the tantra s against the accusation of scan-

dal and immorality, and to redeem them as a sophisticated intellectual

system: “Scholarship on Tantra . . . is still working in the legacy of its

founder, John Woodroffe, whose work was marked by profound philo-

sophical . . . and moral biases and an apologetic designed to rid Tantra

of everything that smacked of superstition, or scandal.”11 In sum, much

of the scholarship on Tantra has oscillated erratically between these two

extremes—the popular celebration of Tantric freedom, healthy sensual-

ity, and this-worldly affirmation, and the apologetic defense of Tantric

philosophy, metaphysics, and mystical speculation.

For my own part, I do think that it is possible—and perhaps now sim-

ply unavoidable in contemporary discourse—to try to reimagine Tantra

in a more useful way. First and foremost, I think it is important to admit

that Tantra is an imagined category, in Jonathan Smith’s sense of the term:

like “religion” itself, it is the result of complex “imaginative acts of com-

parison and generalization,” on the part of both Indian and Western au-

thors. Like “mysticism,” Tantra is to a large degree a social construction,

a category that is by no means stable or fixed, but that has been “con-

structed in different ways at different times”; thus the current imagining

of the category is only one in a series of constructions, and like the others

it is “implicitly bound up with issues of authority and gender.”12

With Douglas Brooks, I would agree that Tantra cannot be defined

“monothetically”—that is, in terms of any one unifying element. Rather,

it is best imagined in polythetic terms, by identifying a number of char-

acteristics that share certain family resemblances. Tantra is thus best used,

in Smith’s sense, as a tool or “heuristic device” that we employ in order

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to organize and interpret a given set of phenomena. Like most categories

in the history of religions, however, it is a highly pluralistic and fluid term,

in need of ongoing critical examination and redefinition—less a neat and

narrowly circumscribed entity than a kind of “messy hodge-podge” or

“heap of rubbish.”13 To return to Wittgenstein’s metaphor of the thread,

Tantra is thus a complex collection of fibers, interlacing strands that have

been woven and rewoven throughout history, while also interweaving

with the threads of politics, power, gender, and economics. Perhaps more

than simply a thread, Tantra might be better described as a great tangled

snarl of crisscrossing strands, or even as a great lint ball, comprised of

fibers and fragments from a wide range of traditions that make up the

religious fabrics of Asia.

However, the polythetic definition leaves us with a basic and difficult

question: namely, how do we decide when a given phenomenon shares

enough of these characteristics to be identified as “Tantra”? How many

and which of these family resemblances do we need before we can use-

fully describe a given phenomenon as “Tantric”? The answer, I would

suggest, lies neither in indigenous Indian traditions nor in the imaginary

projections of Western scholars. Rather, it arises out of the historical en-

counter between these traditions and the scholars who study them; the

category is born through the creative interaction between the scholarly

imagination and the object of study. And because both the traditions and

the scholars are historically, culturally, and politically situated, the imag-

ining of Tantra will be different in every historical moment and in every

new cross-cultural encounter. As Smith reminds us, our imagining of re-

ligion and our definition of major categories such as Judaism, Hinduism,

and so on, are always conditioned by our own particular interests, our

theoretical positions and our political agendas.14 Thus, the specific fam-

ily resemblances we choose to identify as Tantric will always be tied to

our own particular historical positions, normative biases, and political

commitments. And for that very reason, we must always remain “relent-

lessly self-conscious” and self-critical in our imaginings of these academic

categories, ever attentive to ways in which we ourselves are bound up in

relations of power.15 However, in contrast to Smith, I would argue that

categories like Tantra are never simply the creation of the Western schol-

arly imagination; they are far more complex, joint creations, the am-

biguous result of the representation and counter-representation at work

between Indian and Western imaginations, reflecting the interests both

of practitioners and of interpreters. Understood in this sense, Tantra is

not a mere projection of our scholarly fantasies onto the passive mirror

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273

of the exotic Other, but is rather a dialectical relation, in which both sides

are transformed through the encounter and exchange.

Ultimately, as we have seen, the very categories of Occident and Ori-

ent, spiritual East and material West, colonized and colonizer, even

scholar and practitioner, begin to waver and perhaps to break down al-

together. Not only have we encountered a variety of Western devotees

of Tantra and Eastern proponents of American neo-Tantra; more and

more, as we saw in the cases of Osho and the cyber Tantra of the Inter-

net, there is an increasingly globalized Tantra that renders our categories

antiquated and perhaps hermeneutically useless.

I would argue that what is needed most today is a fundamentally em-

bodied approach to Tantra—a Tantra encountered “in the flesh.” That

is to say, we need to look at the peoples and traditions that we wish to

identify as “Tantric” in their most material, corporeal forms, placing them

firmly within their lived, social, political, and economic contexts. Fol-

lowing Wittgenstein, I would suggest that the abstract general term “Tan-

tra” can be understood only in light of the most concrete cases—that is,

the real human beings who perform “Tantric” practices. For as De-

biprasad Chattopadhyaya, once pointed out, “Unlike the followers of

the idealistic systems of philosophy who belittled the importance of the

body and dreamt of the liberation of the soul, the Tàntrikas with their

supreme emphasis on the material human body (dehavàda), conceived

liberation only in terms of the . . . culture of the body (kàya sàdhana). ”16

Thus, as we read in works like the classic VaiãJava-Sahajiyà text, the Rat-

nasàra, “If one knows the truth of the body, he knows the truth of the

universe. . . . If one understands the body, he understands the meaning

of his own self. . . . From the body, one can know the grandeur of KKãJa

and . . . the essence of Ràdhà’s love.”17

By “embodied” Tantra, however, I emphatically do not mean that we

should make the mistake of fetishizing the body as the center and essence

of Tantra—much the way that “sex” has today become the center of most

discourse about Tantra.18 Surely it would be no great improvement merely

to appropriate Tantra as yet another example of the obsession with the

body in American consumer culture. Rather, by “embodied” I mean not

simply the reality of the physical flesh, but also the embodiedness of ac-

tual human agents and their struggles in the messy world of history, pol-

itics, economics, and social change. As June Campbell argues in the re-

markable story of her own involvement in Tantric Buddhism, we must

resist the temptation toward either “idealisation or denial of the messy

aspect” of these traditions.19 What is most needed now is a study of Tan-

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tra seen neither as a seedy cabal of libertines nor as an abstract set of

philosophical texts; rather, as Kripal suggests, we need to take Tantra se-

riously in its “lived compromises and contradictions,” 20 as a living, em-

bodied set of traditions, with an enormous diversity of forms in many

social and historical contexts.

I would follow the lead of Michel Foucault and his insistence on the

fundamentally historical, contextual, constructed, and contested nature

of all cultural phenomena, including those that are supposedly tran-

scendent or sacred. Even the most seemingly “natural” categories of sex-

uality and the body are by no means given facts independent of culture,

but are constructions that are intimately tied to historical and material

interests; they must therefore be understood “on the basis of the tech-

niques of power that are contemporary with [them].”21 As Jeremy Car-

rette has argued, Foucault’s work on the body and sexuality has pro-

found implications for the contemporary study of religion. Like sex, the

body, and other aspects of human experience, religion needs to be criti-

cally grounded in real historical struggles and relations of power: reli-

gion, in short, needs to be “taken out of its privileged realm and brought

into the body politic and the heart of culture”; for “religious discourse

is not some privileged arena free from human prejudice . . . but is rather

constructed in and through the ambiguities of human living.”22 Follow-

ing Foucault, I would argue that the traditions we call Tantric need to be

critically examined as forms of corporeal spirituality—as “movement[s]

that ha[ve] the imprint of a religion which speaks less of a Beyond than

of the transformations in this world.”23

In the past few years, there have been several promising approaches

to the study of Tantra, which have tried to situate these traditions more

concretely in their lived historical contexts. Kripal’s work on Rama-

krishna, Caldwell’s work on Kàlí worship in Kerala, Ronald Davidson’s

work on Indian Buddhist Tantra, and McDermott’s work on Tàktism in

Bengal are all important steps in this direction. A few recent authors like

David Gordon White and Charles Orzech have also pointed to the im-

portant political role of Tantra as a fundamental ideology supporting

kingship and royal hierarchies in Tibet, Nepal, China, and India. As White

argues, “Until recent times, Tantric ritual constituted a bulwark for the

state in the Indianized . . . monarchies of Asia from Nepal to Bali. . . .

[I]t has been through royal support . . . that the various Tantric orders

have been empowered both to promote their sectarian teachings and to

consolidate their socio-economic position.”24 Conversely, White sees the

contemporary state of Tantra as a kind of “broken world” that has lost

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its original political status and royal patronage, now surviving largely

on the margins of most Asian cultures.

Yet White’s otherwise valuable interpretation of Tantra strikes me as

really quite elitist and one-sided, focusing only on the overtly political

role of Tantra in state formation and royal power. Instead, I would ar-

gue for a much more popular and nonelitist view, taking seriously the

non-Sanskritic, lower-class, and nonintellectual forms of living Tantric

practice. In addition to the important forms of elite, Brahmanical, and

royal Tantra, there is also an equally powerful and arguably far more

widespread current of nonelite Tantric practice—what we might call low-

brow, folk, or vernacular Tantra—that has probably always proliferated

on the dangerous margins of mainstream Hindu and Buddhist traditions.

As we see in the Bàuls, Sahajiyàs, and Kartàbhajàs of Bengal;25 the teach-

ings of illiterate saints like Bàmàkãepa or Ramakrishna;26 the shamanic

healers and possession cults of Nepal and Ladakh; the radically trans-

gressive Aghorís of Varanasi; the Nàth yogis throughout India;27 the var-

ious books of pop-Tantric magic for sale throughout Indian bookstalls

(figure 16); and now the spread of Tantra to the West—many, and ar-

guably most, of the traditions we call Tantric are nonelite, oriented to

the lower classes, and expressed through the crudest of vernacular

tongues.28 Hence, much further work remains to be done in order to

ground the traditions that we wish to call Tantric within their embod-

ied, historical, social, and political contexts. Perhaps then we can begin

to reimagine this “general term” through its most concrete forms: as a

very material, physical, and historical, even if rather messy and prob-

lematic, category in the history of religions.

Primitive Passions in a Postmodern World:

Tantra and the Problem of Cross-Cultural Understanding

When touching India, even scholars cannot be impartial.

Why? Because India is not a mere subject of academic

talk, but is a living force. . . . She is still potentially

powerful to impose her ideas upon the world. She is

still an antagonist to be reckoned with in the conflict

of cultures.

Sir John Woodroffe, Bharata Shakti (1921)

To close, I would also like to suggest that this study of Tantra in the his-

tory of religions has larger comparative implications for the problem of

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Figure 16. Cover illustration for Tàràpíåher Bàmàbatàr, a

popular comic book (Calcutta: Nirmal Book Agency, n.d.).

cross-cultural understanding as a whole. For it raises, in a particularly

acute way, the question of whether we are inevitably doomed to misun-

derstand, misrepresent, and often grossly abuse the cultural traditions

of other peoples, or whether it is still possible to transcend these distorted

representations and achieve a more genuine, less abusive, less exploita-

tive, human encounter.

Much of the contemporary Western fascination with Tantra, as I ar-

gued above, is very similar to our fascination with the idea of the “prim-

itive.” As Torgovnick has shown, the West has long defined itself against

its Others and opposites, whether in the form of primitives, savages, or

exotic Orientals. Yet the primitive has always held a markedly ambiva-

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lent role in the Western imagination, at once denigrated as backward,

uncivilized, or dangerous, and yet romantically celebrated as more fully

in tune with nature, the sacred, and the mystical, ecstatic dimensions of

experience. This primitive, ecstatic, and irrational dimension has in some

sense always been a fundamental part of the Western imagination. When

we turn to the “primitive” in our quest for the oceanic or ecstatic expe-

rience, we are in fact searching for a displaced part of ourselves that we

have projected onto the exotic Other:

The West has repeatedly tried to displace . . . the oceanic, severing it from

the perceived self and projecting it outward. But the projection has never

really worked. The time for denial seems long past. The recognition is over-

due that primitivism is much more about us than about them. . . . It is time

to realize that the quest for ecstasy is as much a part of Western fears and

desires as it is a part of . . . their people.29

So too, I would argue, the contemporary fascination with Tantra is to a

certain degree the projection of our own fantasies, repressed desires, and

longings for ecstasy in the seemingly demystified, desacralized, post-

modern world. But this raises the critical question: are we forever

doomed to project our own fantasies onto the empty mirror of an ex-

oticized Orient, without ever really achieving a genuine encounter or ac-

curate understanding of other cultural traditions? And what about con-

temporary Indians and other peoples of Asia? Are they in turn doomed

to assimilate our projected images, always conceiving themselves through

the terms and categories by which Western authors have already defined

them?

In his monumental study of the cross-cultural intellectual exchange be-

tween India and Europe, Wilhelm Halbfass seems to have arrived at a fairly

pessimistic answer to these questions. What we have witnessed in the mod-

ern era, Halbfass believes, is the progressive “Europeanization of the

world”—that is, the domination of the globe by Western culture, ideol-

ogy, and discourse, to such a degree that other cultures can now only define

themselves through the categories that have been imposed by the West:

In the modern planetary system, Eastern and Western “cultures” can no

longer meet one another as equal partners. They meet in a Westernized

world, under conditions shaped by Western ways of thinking.

[F]or the time being there is no escape from the global network of

Europeanization and no way to avoid the conceptual and technological

ways . . . of communication and interaction which the European tradition

has produced.30

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Conclusion

However, it seems to me that the real danger today is no longer the

threat of the “Europeanization” of the world; indeed, it is no longer even

the threat of “Americanization.” Surely we are now living in a very dif-

ferent sort of global economy, where such boundaries no longer have much

meaning. Rather, the threat today is perhaps the spread of consumer cap-

italism and the domination of the global marketplace over all local

economies, polities, and cultural forms—a process of “Coca-colonization”

that is no longer dominated by the West, no longer a matter of either “Oc-

cidentalization” or “Orientalization,” but a far more complex product

of transnational capitalism. To many observers, we seem to be living more

and more in “one McWorld tied together by communications, informa-

tion, entertainment and commerce” that remains “caught between Babel

and Disneyland.”31 As Aijaz Ahmad has argued, we are perhaps no longer

divided into three worlds, nor are we even divided into simple binarisms

such as capitalist/precapitalist or modern/premodern. Instead, there is now

only one world—that of international capitalism: “One of the many con-

tradictory consequences of decolonization within a largely capitalist

framework was that it brought all zones of capital into a single integrated

market, entirely dominated by this supreme imperialist power.”32

Thus many authors are quite cynical and pessimistic about the en-

counter between East and West in the age of global capitalism. As Gita

Mehta argues, India has been subjected to the complete penetration of

American mass marketing, and now any encounter between East and

West will only result in the worst of both worlds: while India seeks the

materialism and technological power of the West, the West seeks the ex-

oticism, eroticism, and cheap drugs of the East. Both end up with empty

distorted phantasms reflecting their own repressed desires:

It is unlikely that either the Occidental or the Easterner has the stamina

to survive the exchange of views, yet both insist on trying. . . . [T]he East-

erner . . . calls what fascinates him in the West economic necessity, tech-

nology, historical imperative. . . . The Occidental . . . calls what fascinates

him in the East the transcendence of economics and technology. . . . The

Westerner is finding the dialectic of history less fascinating than the endless

opportunities for narcissism provided by the wisdom of the East.33

Tantra in the style of Osho-Rajneesh, Mehta concludes, is the epitome

of this superficial cross-cultural exchange: the result is the neo-Tantric

who seeks instant nirvàJa and soda-pop enlightenment: “When East

meets West all you get is the neo-Sannyasi, the instant Nirvana. . . . You

have the karma, we’ll take the Coca-Cola, metaphysical soft drink for a

physical one.”34

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279

In contrast to these bleak and pessimistic visions of “global mono-

culture” and “Coca-colonization,” however, others have suggested the

more hopeful possibility of local resistance and indigenous critique. As

Marshall Sahlins argues, indigenous peoples are never simply dupes of

Western capitalism who passively absorb consumer ideology or the logic

of the marketplace without reflection or agency; instead they appropri-

ate, reinterpret, and transform them according to the logic of their own

local culture: “Western capitalism has loosed on the world enormous

forces of production, coercion and destruction. Yet precisely because they

cannot be resisted, the goods of the larger system take on meaningful

places in the local scheme of things.”35 Hence, some argue like Pico Ayer

that we are witnessing not so much the relentless expansion of capital-

ism into all corners of the planet, but a more dynamic process of “the

spread of America’s pop-cultural imperialism throughout the world’s an-

cient civilizations” and the simultaneous “resistances put up against the

Coca-colonizing forces.”36

My own view here is somewhat more complex and ambivalent—at

once more optimistic than Halbfass’s narrative of inevitable Euro-

peanization of the earth, and yet also more pessimistic than Sahlins’s nar-

rative of valiant indigenous resistance against the onslaught of global cap-

italism. With Sahlins, I would like to highlight, even celebrate, the power

of non-Western cultures to appropriate and transform the forces of global

capitalism, to adapt them on their own terms, according to their own

cultural logic. Yet it seems to me that the rules of the game are still largely

conditioned and structured by the logic of the global capitalist market.

Thus, any resistance tends to become resistance to the market, a defor-

mation of capitalism, and yet still largely ruled by the laws of the mar-

ket, still unable to imagine another space outside of global capitalism.

And if “resistance” means nothing more than adding an Indian “curry”

flavor of Chicken McNuggets to the McDonald’s menu, it seems a fairly

pathetic form of resistance. (For, as Pierre Bourdieu reminds us, “If in

order to resist I have no other recourse than to lay claim to that in the

name of which I am dominated, is this resistance? . . . Resistance may be

alienating and submission may be liberating. Such is the paradox of the

dominated.”)37

In short, we need to recognize the agency and creativity of other cul-

tures, yet we must also be honest about the hard realities of late capi-

talism and economic imperialism. It is surely true that indigenous peoples

always retain the power to represent and define themselves, often in op-

position to the ways in which Western authors would define them; yet it

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280

Conclusion

is no less true that today the exchange between cultures takes place largely

within the context of a global capitalist marketplace. We must not be-

little the fact that those of us in America and Western Europe are often

in a position of tremendous economic, political, and military advantage

over those whom we study, and that there remains a very real danger of

imposing new, perhaps more insidious, forms of cultural imperialism and

neocolonialism.

What is most crucial, therefore, is that we recognize not simply that

categories like Tantra are imagined ones, and not even simply that they

are formed through the cross-cultural interplay between Eastern and West-

ern imaginations. Rather, we must also remember that these imaginings

are also tied to real material interests and to historically, economically,

and politically embodied relations of power. My solution here is not un-

like what Michael Taussig has called “mimetic excess”—his own attempt

to resolve the intense conflicts and contradictions raised by anthropol-

ogy in a postcolonial context. Mimetic excess is the acute reflexive aware-

ness of the mimesis that is at work in all cross-cultural representation—

“an excess creating reflexive awareness as to the mimetic faculty.”38 This

means both that we must be extremely self-critical, ever aware of the po-

tentially destructive effects of our representations of others, and that we

must be always open to the creation of new ways to represent both others

and ourselves.

Finally, on a more positive note, I would also argue that the recogni-

tion that Tantra is an imagined category need not be a cause solely for

postmodern despair or postcolonial guilt. Rather, it can also be quite lib-

erating; for it opens the possibility to reimagine this category in new and

more useful ways. It is in precisely this sense that the encounter with Asian

traditions like Tantra can be truly transformative, for both East and West

alike. As Woodroffe long ago observed, despite our arrogant claims to

global knowledge, we in the West still have a tremendous amount to learn

from India—and perhaps above all from Indian religious traditions like

Tantra: for “she is still potentially powerful to impose her ideas upon

the world. She is still an antagonist to be reckoned with in the conflict

of cultures.”

As Foucault has more recently suggested, the end of Western colo-

nialism has brought with it not only the threat of new forms of neo-

colonialism and economic imperialism; in a more positive sense, it has

also marked the end of Western intellectual domination, opening new

possibilities for the encounter with non-Western ideas. As such it holds

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Conclusion

281

the potential for a genuine transformation of both the West and its others

through the impact of this encounter:

European thought finds itself at a turning point. This turning point, on a

historical scale, is nothing other than the end of imperialism. The crisis of

Western thought is identical to the end of imperialism. . . . For it is the end

of the era of Western philosophy. Thus if philosophy of the future exists, it

must be born outside Europe or equally born in consequence of meetings

and impacts between Europe and non-Europe.39

It is just this kind of transformative impact that I would hope we might

achieve in our encounter with Tantra, and specifically, with an embod-

ied Tantra. This would mean the recognition that both we and those

whom we study are historically embodied, socially and politically inter-

ested agents, that both we and they continuously reimagine ourselves in

relation to real material interests and concerns. Perhaps then we might

move beyond an imagining of Tantra as the exotic, erotic “Extreme Ori-

ent,” and encounter it instead as a rich fabric woven of the many threads

of individual peoples, texts, and practices—as a network of traditions

that are very much rooted, like we ourselves, “in the flesh.”

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Notes

p r e f a c e a n d a c k n o w l e d g m e n t s

1. Various authors use the terms Tantra, Tantrism, and Tantracism more or

less interchangeably to refer to this category of Asian religions. In this book I use

Tantrism to refer to the category as it has been constructed as a particular “ism”—

an abstract, unified category—in the scholarly imagination. For my own part,

however, I prefer to use Tantra, which is at least somewhat less burdened with

the awkward reifications of academic isms.

2. Jeffrey J. Kripal describes a similar narrative of his own early interest in

Tantra in Roads of Excess, Palaces of Wisdom: Eroticism and Reflexivity in the

Study of Mysticism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001), p. 152.

3. This research began in 1994 and eventually culminated in my two books

The Economics of Ecstasy: Tantra, Secrecy, and Power in Colonial Bengal (New

York: Oxford University Press, 2001); and Songs of Ecstasy: Tantric and Devo-

tional Songs from Bengal (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001).

4. Marianna Torgovnick, Primitive Passions: Men,Women, and the Quest for

Ecstasy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998), p. 210; cf. Torgovnick,

Gone Primitive: Savage Intellects, Modern Lives (Chicago: University of Chicago

Press, 1990), p. 8.

5. I found this particularly in areas heavily frequented by Western tourists,

such as Rishikesh and Tàràpíåh, where every third sàdhu (holy man) invites a

young Westerner over to smoke hashish and learn about Tantra. On the “ad-

vertisement of secrecy” in Tantric circles, see Hugh B. Urban, “The Torment of

Secrecy: Ethical and Epistemological Problems in the Study of Esoteric Tradi-

tions,” History of Religions 37, no. 3 (1998): 209–48; and Robert I. Levy, Meso-

283

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284

Notes to Pages xiii–2

cosm: Hinduism and the Organization of Space in a Traditional Newar City in

Nepal (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990), pp. 337 ff.

6. For this critique of Western scholarship on formerly colonized peoples, see

Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory: Classes, Nations, Literatures (London: Verso, 1992),

pp. 34–94; and Bart Moore-Gilbert, ed., Postcolonial Theory: Contexts, Prac-

tices, Politics (London: Verso, 1997), p. 18.

i n t r o d u c t i o n

1. The recent scholarship on Tantra is too vast to cite here in full; the more

interesting recent works are: Jeffrey J. Kripal, Kàlí’s Child: The Mystical and the

Erotic in the Life and Teachings of Ramakrishna (Chicago: University of Chicago

Press, 1998); Sarah Caldwell, Oh Terrifying Mother: Sexuality, Violence, and

the Worship of the Goddess Kàlí (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999);

Charles D. Orzech, Politics and Transcendent Wisdom: The Scripture for Hu-

mane Kings in the Creation of Chinese Buddhism (University Park: Pennsylva-

nia State University Press, 1998); David Gordon White, The Alchemical Body:

Siddha Traditions in Medieval India (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997);

and David Gordon White, ed., Tantra in Practice (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Uni-

versity Press, 2000).

2. Paul Ramana Das and Marilena Silbey, “Celebrating Sacred Sexuality,”

on the Church of Tantra web site (www.tantra.org/amertan.html). On New Age

appropriations of Tantra, see Hugh B. Urban, “The Cult of Ecstasy: Tantrism,

the New Age, and the Spiritual Logic of Late Capitalism,” History of Religions 39,

no. 3 (2000): 268–304.

3. “It so happened that it was in texts known as tantra s that Western schol-

ars first described doctrines and practices different from those of Brahmanism . . .

so the Western experts adopted the word Tantrism for that particular, and for

them, repulsive aspect of Indian religion” (André Padoux, “Tantrism: An

Overview,” in Encyclopedia of Religion, vol. 14, ed. Mircea Eliade [New York:

Macmillan, 1986], pp. 271–72). For a detailed discussion of Western views of

Tantra, see Hugh B. Urban, “The Extreme Orient: The Construction of ‘Tantrism’

as a Category in the Orientalist Imagination,” Religion 29 (1999): 123–46.

4. William Ward, A View of the History, Literature, and Religion of the Hin-

doos, vol. 2 (1811; reprint, London: Kingsbury, Parbury, and Allen, 1817), p. 247;

J. N. Farquhar, An Outline of the Religious Literature of India (Oxford: Oxford

University Press, 1920), p. 200.

5. Philip Rawson, The Art of Tantra (Greenwich, Conn.: New York Graph-

ics Society, 1973), p. 9; cf. Heinrich Zimmer, Philosophies of India (New York:

Meridian Books, 1956), p. 576. The most recent argument for the empowering

nature of Tantra is Miranda Shaw, Passionate Enlightenment: Women in Tantric

Buddhism (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1994). As Pratapaditya

Pal observes, “We . . . have gone from one extreme to the other. While early schol-

ars were unnecessarily apologetic about some of the sexual . . . practices of Tan-

tra, modern scholars revel in the sexual aspects” ( Hindu Religion and Iconology

according to the Tantrasàra [Los Angeles: Vichitra Press, 1981], p. vi).

6. Douglas Renfrew Brooks, The Secret of the Three Cities: An Introduction

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Notes to Pages 2–6

285

to Hindu Tàkta Tantrism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990), p. 209;

cf. White, The Alchemical Body, p. xi.

7. Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality, vol. 1, trans. Robert Hurley

(New York: Vintage Books, 1980), pp. 17–49.

8. On the concept of late capitalism, see Fredric Jameson, Postmodernism;

or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press,

1991); and Ernest Mandel, Late Capitalism (London: New Left Books, 1970).

9. Ronald Inden, Imagining India (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1990), pp. 263–

64. See also Richard King, Orientalism and Religion: Postcolonial Theory, In-

dia, and the Mystic East (London: Routledge, 1999).

10. On the category of the “exotic,” with its fundamental tension between

“extraneity and the erotic,” see Dorothy M. Figueira, The Exotic: A Decadent

Quest (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1994).

11. On the dialectical image, see Walter Benjamin, Illuminations, ed. Han-

nah Arendt, trans. Harry Zohn (New York: Schocken Books, 1969), pp. 217–64;

and Michael Taussig, Mimesis and Alterity: A Particular History of the Senses

(London: Routledge, 1993), pp. 177 ff.

12. Herbert V. Guenther, The Life and Teaching of Nàropa (New York: Ox-

ford University Press, 1971), p. 102.

13. Cosmo quotes Sting on his own Tantric practices: “[Our sex lasts] seven

hours and includes dinner and a movie” (Lynn Collins, “The Secret to Tantric

Sex,” Cosmopolitan, May 2000, p. 243).

14. “Chief portion or essence”: Tatapatha BràhmaJa (Benaras: Chowkhamba

Sanskrit Series Office, 1964), trans. Julius Eggeling (New Delhi: Motilal Banar-

sidas, 1963), 12, 14. See Monier Monier-Williams, A Sanskrit-English Dictionary

(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1899), p. 436; cf. Chintaharan Chakravarti,

The Tantras: Studies on Their Religion and Literature (Calcutta: Punthi Pustak,

1963), p. 1.

15. “The word Tantrism assuredly is a Western creation. India traditionally

knows only texts called tantras” (André Padoux, “A Survey of Tantric Hinduism

for the Historian of Religions,” review of Hindu Tantrism, by Sanjukta Gupta,

Teun Goudriaan, and Dirk Jan Hoens, History of Religions 20, no. 4 [1981]:

350). See also Padoux, Vàc: The Concept of the Word in Selected Hindu Tantras

(Albany: State University of New York Press, 1990), pp. 31 ff. John Woodroffe

made this point long before in Shakti and Shàkta (New York: Dover Publica-

tions, 1978), pp. 54–55.

16. Swami Nostradamus Virato, “Tantric Sex: A Spiritual Path to Ecstasy,”

Church of Tantra web site, www.tantra.org.

17. Paul Ramana Das and Marilena Silbey, “Celebrating Sacred Sexuality:

American Tantra (tm),” reprinted on the Church of Tantra web site, ibid.

18. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, Tantra: The Supreme Understanding (Poona:

Rajneesh Foundation, 1975), pp. 95, 103.

19. White, introduction to Tantra in Practice, p. 5.

20. Benyotosh Bhattacharyya, An Introduction to Buddhist Esoterism (Ox-

ford: Oxford University Press, 1932), p. 51.

21. J. Talboys Wheeler, The History of India from the Earliest Ages (Lon-

don: Trübner, 1874), p. 364.

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286

Notes to Pages 6–10

22. Woodroffe, Shakti and Shàkta, p. 179.

23. Mircea Eliade, Yoga: Immortality and Freedom (Princeton, N.J.: Prince-

ton University Press, 1971), pp. 203–5.

24. Rawson, The Art of Tantra, p. 9.

25. Others have tried to offer a simpler definition for Tantra; Padoux defines

it as the path that “harnesses kàma—desire (in every sense of the word) . . . to the

service of deliverance” ( Vàc, p. 40). More recently, White suggests that a work-

ing definition is “that Asian body of beliefs and practices which, working from

the principle that the universe we experience is nothing other than the concrete

manifestation of the divine energy of the godhead that creates and maintains that

universe, seeks to ritually appropriate and channel that energy, within the human

microcosm, in creative and emancipatory ways” (introduction to Tantra in Prac-

tice, p. 9). See also Teun Goudriaan and Sanjukta Gupta, Hindu Tantric and Tàkta

Literature (Wiesbaden, Ger.: Otto Harrassowitz, 1981), p. 1.

26. Kripal, Kàlí’s Child, pp. 30–33; Sanjukta Gupta, Teun Goudriaan, and

Dirk Jan Hoens, Hindu Tantrism (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1979), pp. 8–9.

27. Brooks, Secret of the Three Cities, pp. 53 ff. On the concept of the poly-

thetic definition, see Jonathan Z. Smith, Imagining Religion: From Babylon to

Jonestown (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982), pp. 1–8.

28. See, for example, my work on the Kartàbhajà sect of Bengal, which has

a profoundly ambivalent relationship to the category “Tantrism” ( The Economics

of Ecstasy: Tantra, Secrecy, and Power in Colonial Bengal [New York: Oxford

University Press, 2001], introduction).

29. Donald S. Lopez, Jr., Elaborations on Emptiness: Uses of the Heart SÜ-

tra (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1996), p. 26.

30. Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya, History of the Tantric Religion: A Histori-

cal, Ritualistic and Philosophical Study (New Delhi: Manohar, 1982), p. v.

31. Brooks, Secret of the Three Cities, p. ix.

32. Herbert V. Guenther, Yuganaddha: The Tantric View of Life (Varanasi:

Chowkhamba Sanskrit Series, 1969), p. 3.

33. Nik Douglas and Penny Slinger, “The Kama Sutra and the Sixty-Four

Arts,” reproduced on the tantra.com web site.

34. See Urban, “The Cult of Ecstasy,” 268–304. Popular books on Tantra

include, among many others: Margo Anand, The Art of Sexual Ecstasy: The Path

of Sacred Sexuality for Western Lovers (Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1989);

John Mumford, Ecstasy through Tantra (St. Paul, Minn.: Llewellyn, 1988);

Christopher S. Hyatt, Secrets of Western Tantra: The Sexuality of the Middle

Path (Tempe, Ariz.: New Falcon Publications, 1996). Nik Douglas includes over

twenty pages of web sites in the appendix to his Spiritual Sex: Secrets of Tan-

tra from the Ice Age to the New Millennium (New York: Pocket Books, 1997),

pp. 309 ff.

35. Rachel Fell McDermott, “Kàlí’s New Frontiers: A Hindu Goddess on the

Internet,” in Encountering Kàlí: In the Margins, at the Center, in the West, ed.

Jeffrey J. Kripal and Rachel Fell McDermott (Berkeley: University of California

Press, 2003), pp. 273–95.

36. Shaw, Passionate Enlightenment, pp. 8–9.

37. Eliade, Yoga, pp. 202–3. As Zimmer likewise argues, “in the Tantra, we

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Notes to Pages 10–15

287

have another sign of the resurgence of the religiosity of the non-Aryan, pre-Aryan,

matriarchal tradition of Dravidian times” ( Philosophies of India, pp. 568–69).

38. André Van Lysebeth, Tantra: The Cult of the Feminine (York Beach, Me.:

Samuel Weiser, 1995), p. 53.

39. See Inden, Imagining India, pp. 263–64; Richard King, Orientalism and

Religion, chap. 5.

40. Foucault, The History of Sexuality, vol. 1, p. 35; my italics.

41. Ibid., pp. 6–7.

42. White, introduction to Tantra in Practice, p. 4.

43. Smith, Imagining Religion, p. xi.

44. “In Said’s transhistorical formulation, Europe, motivated by a unitary

will to inferiorize, created its own identity by establishing the difference of the

Orient. . . . The unidirectionality of his approach overlooks the inherent am-

bivalence of the relationship between the colonizers and colonized” (Figueira,

The Exotic, p. 3). For a balanced discussion of the criticisms of postcolonial the-

ory, see Bart Moore-Gilbert, ed., Postcolonial Criticism (New York: Longman,

1997).

45. See Rosalind O’Hanlon, “Recovering the Subject: Subaltern Studies and

Histories of Resistance in Colonial South Asia,” Modern Asian Studies 22, no.

1 (1988): 189–224; Sara Suleri, The Rhetoric of British India (Chicago: University

of Chicago Press, 1992). As Anne McClintock argues, postcolonialism is “pre-

maturely celebratory and obfuscatory,” for it reifies a singular, monolithic, non-

Western Other and in so doing masks subtle forms of neocolonialism ( Imperial

Leather: Race, Gender, and Sexuality in the Colonial Context [New York: Rout-

ledge, 1995], p. 13).

46. Benita Parry, “Problems in Current Theories of Colonial Discourse,” in

The Post-Colonial Studies Reader, ed. Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths, and Helen

Tiffin (London: Routledge, 1995), p. 41.

47. McClintock, Imperial Leather, p. 15. For similar, more nuanced models,

see John D. Kelly, A Politics of Virtue: Hinduism, Sexuality, and Countercolo-

nial Discourse in Fiji (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991), p. xiv; see

Aiwa Ong, Spirits of Resistance and Capitalist Discipline: Factory Women in

Malaysia (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1987), pp. 216–17.

48. Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory: Classes, Nations, Literatures (New York: Verso,

1992), pp. 34–94. For a discussion of this critique, see Moore-Gilbert, Post-

colonial Theory, p. 18.

49. See Smith, Imagining Religion, pp. xi–xiii.

50. Bruce Lincoln, “Theses on Method,” Method and Theory in the Study

of Religion 8, no. 3 (1996): 225.

51. See Talal Asad, Genealogies of Religion: Discipline and Reasons of Power

in Christianity and Islam (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993),

introduction.

52. Gustavo Benevides, “Giuseppe Tucci; or, Buddhology in the Age of Fas-

cism,” in Curators of the Buddha: The Study of Buddhism under Colonialism,

ed. Donald S. Lopez, Jr. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995), p. 162.

53. Richard King, Orientalism and Religion, chap. 5. King lucidly examines

the “exotic fantasies of Indian religions as deeply mystical, introspective and oth-

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288

Notes to Pages 15–23

erworldly” (p. 142), yet he never mentions Tantra or anything relating to sexu-

ality. I can only conclude that this is because the presence of Tantra would un-

dermine his thesis, namely, that Indian mysticism was imagined as something

otherworldly and identified with Vedànta or other philosophical schools. The in-

tense sensuality of Tantra in the Orientalist imagination seems to contradict this

thesis. However, I would suggest that Tantra represented, for both Indian and

European authors, mysticism in its most degenerate form: a kind of mysticism

that had been corrupted with sensual desire and this-worldly power.

54. Marianna Torgovnick, Gone Primitive: Savage Intellects, Modern Lives

(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990), pp. 247, 246.

55. Wilhelm Halbfass, India and Europe: An Essay in Understanding (Al-

bany: State University of New York Press, 1988), p. 173.

56. Debiprasad Chattopadhyaya, Lokàyata: A Study in Ancient Indian Ma-

terialism (New Delhi: People’s Publishing House, 1959), pp. 65–66.

57. Donald S. Lopez, Jr., Prisoners of Shangri La: Tibetan Buddhism and the

West (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998), p. 44. This is not unlike what

Homi Bhabha calls the play of mimicry at work between colonizer and colonized—

the projection of a Western stereotyped image upon the native, and the manifold

ways in which the native mimics, adapts, and deforms that image (“Of Mimicry

and Man,” in The Location of Culture, by Homi Bhabha [London: Routledge,

1984], p. 86).

58. The pizza effect refers to a cross-cultural exchange of ideas, through which

something comes from one culture (e.g., dough and tomato sauce from Italy), is

transformed in another culture (American pizza), and then reimported in a new

form by the original culture.

59. Friedrich Max Müller, Biographical Essays (New York: Charles Scrib-

ner’s Sons, 1884), p. 13. On this cross-cultural borrowing between India and the

West, see Rachel Fell McDermott, “The Western Kàlí,” in Deví: Goddesses of

India, ed . J .S. Hawley and D. M. Wulff (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996).

60. Walter Benjamin, Gesammelte Schriften, vol. 5, ed. Rolf Tiedemann and

Hermann Schweppenhauser (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1972), p. 595.

61. Susan Buck-Morss, The Dialectics of Seeing: Walter Benjamin and the

Arcades Project (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1989), p. 210: “The dialectical image

has as many levels of logic as the Hegelian concept. It is a way of seeing that

crystallizes antithetical elements by providing the axes for their alignment.” See

also Michael Taussig, Shamanism, Colonialism, and the Wild Man: A Study in

Terror and Healing (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987), p. 442.

62. Taussig, Mimesis and Alterity, pp. 65–66. See Walter Benjamin, “On the

Mimetic Faculty,” in Reflections, ed. Peter Demetz, trans. Edmund Jephcott (New

York: Schocken Books, 1986), p. 333.

63. Taussig, Mimesis and Alterity, pp. 65; see also Torgovnick, Gone Prim-

itive, pp. 1–10.

64. Quote from Taussig, Mimesis and Alterity, p. 142.

65. Lopez, Elaborations on Emptiness, p. 103; cf. Gupta, Goudriaan, and

Hoens, Hindu Tantrism, p. 5.

66. Padoux, “Hindu Tantrism,” p. 275. Probably the best efforts to write

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Notes to Pages 23–26

289

such a history are: Alexis Sanderson, “Taivism and the Tantric Traditions,” in

The World’s Religions, ed. Stewart Sutherland et al. (London: Routledge, 1988),

pp. 660–704; and Gupta, Goudriaan, and Hoens, Hindu Tantrism, pp. 13–46.

67. On the meanings of rgyd, see Lopez, Elaborations on Emptiness, pp. 78–

104; on the Chinese term mi-chiao, see Orzech, Politics and Transcendent Wis-

dom, pp. 135–36n.

68. Tantraràjatantram, ed. Arthur Avalon (New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas,

1981). Cf. YoginíhKdaya Tantra, ed. Upendranàth Dàs (Calcutta: Navabhàrata

Publishers, 1393 Bengali era [1986]), French trans. André Padoux, Le Coeur de

la yoginí: YoginíhKdaya, avec le commentaire Dípikà d’AmKtànanda (Paris: Col-

lège de France, 1994), 1; Punyànandanàtha, Kàmakalàvilàsa, ed. Arthur Avalon

(Madras: Ganesh, 1961), 50f; and SvT. For other narratives of this sort, see Pun-

yànandanàtha, Kàmakalàvilàsa, 50–53. See also Hélène Brunner, Gerhard Ober-

hammer, and André Padoux, TàntrikàbhidhànakoMa: Dictionnaire des termes

techniques de la littérature hindoue tantrique, vol. 1 (Wien: Verlag der österreichi-

schen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2000), pp. 306–7.

69. Eliade, Yoga: “The irresistible Tantric advance in the medieval period im-

plies a new victory of the pre-Aryan popular strata” (pp. 201–2); cf. Zimmer,

Philosophies of India; Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya, History of the Tantric Re-

ligion. Banikanta Kakati traces the origin of left-handed Tantric rites to the tribal

groups of remote and jungly Assam—“a land of natural instincts free from all

regimes of self-mortification” ( The Mother Goddess Kàmàkhyà [Guwahati: Pub-

lication Board, Assam, 1989], pp. 45–47).

70. Woodroffe, Shakti and Shàkta, pp. 587–89; see below, chapter 4.

71. Goudriaan and Gupta, Hindu Tantric and Tàkta Literature, p. 9. See also

Padoux, Vàc, pp. 33 ff. More recent authors like White suggest that Tantra is

the combined result of “shamanic magical” traditions and “speculative and

scholastic productions” (introduction to Tantra in Practice, p. 18). See also Geof-

frey Samuel, Civilized Shamans: Buddhism in Tibetan Societies (Washington,

D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, 1993).

72. S. N. Das Gupta, cited in Chakravarti, The Tantras, pp. 1–2. ìMànaMi-

vagurudeva MiMra derives tantra from tatri, “to understand,” and defines it as

the M àstra that expounds the six categories of Taivism (ibid., p. 2). On the ety-

mology of the term, see also see also S. C. Banerji, A Brief History of Tantra Lit-

erature (Calcutta: Naya Prokash, 1988), p. 1; P. V. Kane, History of DharmaMàstra

(Poona: Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, 1962), pp. 1031–35; Lopez,

Elaborations on Emptiness, pp. 78–104.

73. Rama Nath Sharma, ed., The Aãåàdhyàyí of PàJini (New Delhi: Mun-

shiram Manoharlal, 1987), 5.2.70, 7.2.9.

74. William K. Mahony, The Artful Universe: An Introduction to the Vedic

Religious Imagination (Albany: State University of New York Press 1998),

pp. 78, 95, 110–11.

75. Wendy Doniger O’Flaherty, trans., The Rig Veda (New York: Penguin

Books, 1981), p. 32n6. On the sacrifice as an act of “weaving,” see Mahony,

The Artful Universe, p. 111.

76. SvetàMvatàra Upaniãad, in The Principal Upaniãads, trans. Sarvapelli Radha-

krishnan (London: Unwin Hyman, 1953), 6.10.

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290

Notes to Pages 26–29

77. BKhadàranyaka Upaniãad, in One Hundred and Eight Upaniãads, ed.

V. L. S. Panshikar (Varanasi: Vyàsa PrakàMana, 1983), 2.1.20.

78. J. C. Heesterman, The Broken World of Sacrifice: An Essay in Ancient

Indian Ritual (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993), p. 246n. The Vedic

tradition also uses tantra as a technical term in the sacrificial ritual, contrasted

with pradhàna. Whereas pradhàna refers to the main offerings, the tantra—as the “woof or texture”—comprises the auxiliary acts that remained largely interchangeable among different sacrifices (ibid., p. 61).

79. Tatapatha BràhmaJa, 14.

80. George Thibaut, trans., Vedànta SÜtras with the Commentary by TaGkarà-

càrya (New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas, 1968–71), 2.1.

81. Monier-Williams, Sanskrit-English Dictionary (Oxford: Oxford Univer-

sity Press, 1899), p. 436. On tantra as yantra, see Agni PuràJa, 25.1–3. The Sanskrit dictionary AmarakoMa defines tantra as principle matter, doctrine or Màstra, loom or paraphernalia, but does not define it as a certain class of works. Kane

concludes that the tantra s had not yet been composed by this time ( History of

DharmaMàstra, p. 1031).

82. P. C. Bagchi, “The Evolution of the Tantras,” in The Cultural Heritage

of India, vol. 4, by P. C. Bagchi (Calcutta: Ramakrishna Mission Institute of Cul-

ture, 1953), p. 211.

83. Padoux, “A Survey of Tantrism,” p. 350.

84. See NàràyaJ Ràm Äcàrya Kàvyatírtha, ed., The ManusmKti; with the com-

mentary Manvarthamuktàvali of KullÜka (Bombay: Nirnay Sagar Press, 1946),

2.1.

85. N. A. Deshpande, trans., Padma PuràJa (New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas,

1990), p. 2087. Similarly, in the Bhàgavata PuràJa: “My worship is threefold—

Vedic, Tantric and a synthesis of these two. But of these three, one should offer

me worship according to the method of his choice” (BP 11.27.13). Many later

texts employ this distinction; see C. Mackenzie Brown, The Deví Gítà: The Song

of the Goddess: A Translation, Annotation, and Commentary (Albany: State Uni-

versity of New York Press, 1998), 9.3–4, pp. 263–64.

86. For a good discussion of the spread of Tantra in India, see Sanderson,

“Taivism and the Tantric Traditions,” p. 661; on its spread throughout Asia, see

White, Tantra in Practice.

87. Gopinath Kaviraj, Aspects of Indian Thought (Burdwan: University of

Burdwan, 1966), pp. 175, 216. See E. B. Cowell and A. E. Gough, trans., The

Sarva-Darsana-Samgraha; or, Review of the Different Systems of Hindu Philos-

ophy (Varanasi: Chowkhamba Sanskrit Series Office, 1978).

88. M. R. Khale, ed., BàJa’s Kàdambarí (PÜrvabhàga Complete) (New Delhi:

Motilal Banarsidas, 1956), pp. 338–39. Gwendolyn Lane translates tantra here

simply as “mystical formulas” ( Kàdambarí: A Classical Sanskrit Story of Magi-

cal Transformations [New York: Garland Publishing, 1991], p. 226).

89. Goudriaan and Gupta, Hindu Tantric and Tàkta Literature, p. 21; cf. Ad-

hir Cakravarti, “New Light on Taiva Tàntrika Texts Known in Ancient Cambo-

dia,” Journal of the Asiatic Society 15, nos. 1–4 (1973): 1–10.

90. Those on the side of a Buddhist origin for Tantra include Benyotosh

Bhattacharyya ( An Introduction to Buddhist Esotericism, p. 147), while those

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Notes to Pages 29–33

291

on the Hindu side include David Snellgrove, Indo-Tibetan Buddhism: Indian

Buddhists and Their Tibetan Successors (London: Sirindia, 1987), pp. 152–60.

More recently, Alexis Sanderson has argued that the Hindu Mantramàrga de-

veloped a hierarchy of texts which became the foundation for the later Bud-

dhist fourfold hierarchy of Tantras (see “Taivism and the Tantric Traditions,”

pp. 678–79).

91. Alex Wayman dates the text to the fourth or fifth century; however, the

most recent editor of the critical edition argues that the formative period of

the text was much later, probably the eighth century (Yukei Matsunaga, The

Guhyasamàja Tantra: A New Critical Edition [Osaka: Toso Shuppan, 1978],

p. xxvi); see Alex Wayman, Yoga of the Guhyasamàjatantra: The Arcane Lore of

Forty Verses (New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas, 1977).

92. “Buddhists were not quite clear as to the specific meaning of the word

tantra” (Louis de la Vallée Poussin, “Tantrism [Buddhist],” in Encyclopedia of

Religion and Ethics, vol. 12, ed. James Hastings [New York: Charles Scribner’s

Sons, 1922], p. 193); cf. Lopez, Elaborations on Emptiness, p. 84.

93. “PrabandhaF tantram àkhyàta tat prabandham tridhà bhavet / àdhàrak

prakKtiM càiva asaFhàryaprabheditak / prakKtiMcàkKter hetur asaFhàryaphalaF

tathà / àdhàrak tad upàyaM ca tribhis tantràrthasaFgrahak” (this passage is GST

18.5–6 in Benyotosh Bhattacharyya’s edition).

94. Wayman, Yoga of the Guhyasamàja, p. 61. See also the commentaries by

Tsong-kha-pa and Padma dkar-po in Guenther, Life and Teaching of Nàropa,

p. 114, and Yuganaddha, pp. 3–4.

95. David Snellgrove, The Hevajra Tantra: A Critical Study (London: Ox-

ford University Press, 1959), v.1, 14.

96. Shashibhushan Dasgupta, An Introduction to Tantric Buddhism (Cal-

cutta: University of Calcutta Press, 1958), p. 71.

97. Giuseppe Tucci, The Religions of Tibet, trans. Geoffrey Samuel (Berke-

ley: University of California Press, 1980), p. 262n. Sanderson argues that the

Hindu Mantramàrga had a similar kind of hierarchical classification (“Taivism

and the Tantric Traditions,” pp. 678–79).

98. Lopez, Elaborations on Emptiness, p. 93.

99. F. Otto Schrader, Introduction to the “Pàñcaràtra” and the “Ahirbudhnya

SaFhità” (Madras: Adyar Library Series, 1916), pp. 2, 146. Other texts classify

the body of Pàñcaràtra scriptures into four headings : àgama-siddhànta, mantra-

siddhànta, tantra-siddhànta, and tantràntara-siddhànta, each of which concen-

trates on particular forms of ViãJu and other deities. See Sanjukta Gupta, trans.,

Lakãmí Tantra: A Pàñcaràtra Text (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1972), p. xviii.

100. Kàmikàgama, pt. 1, PÜrvakàmikà, ed. Svàminàtha Tivàcàrya (Madras:

DakãiJabhàratàrcakasaFgha, 1975), 1.29; cf. Mark S. G. Dyczkowski, The

Canon of the Taivàgamas and the Kubjikà Tantras of the Western Kaula Tradi-

tion (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1988), p. 140n.

101. Goudriaan and Gupta, Hindu Tantric and Tàkta Literature, p. 18. Many

suspect that the Kula may have originated in the Buddhist tantra s; it holds an

important place in early texts like the Guhyasamàja, which speaks of the five

families ( kula) of bodhisattvas (see Shashibhushan Dasgupta, Introduction to

Tantric Buddhism, p. 70).

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292

Notes to Pages 33–38

102. Cf. also KaulajñànanirJaya, ed. P. C. Bagchi (Varanasi: Pràcya Prakà-

Mana, 1986), 2.10.

103. Goudriaan and Gupta, Hindu Tantric and Tàkta Literature, pp. 13–14.

Louise M. Finn, trans., The KulacÜjàmaJi Tantra and the VàmakeMvara Tantra

(Wiesbaden, Ger.: Otto Harrassowitz, 1986), pp. 74–77.

104. See Cornelia Dimmitt and J. A. B. van Buitenen, Classical Hindu Mythol-

ogy: A Reader in the Sanskrit PuràJas (Philadelphia: Temple University Press,

1978), pp. 4–5.

105. The most important Bengali compilations are KKãJànanda ÄgamavàgíMa’s

BKhat-Tantrasàra (sixteenth century) and RàmatoãaJa’s PràJatoãiní (eighteenth

century). The former offers no clear definition of the term, but speaks only of

tantramantraviMàrada (skill in the tantra s and mantras); the latter uses the term tantraMàstra, and also says that tantra is a limb of the Vedas ( tantrànàm vedàG-gatva) (Soumyànanda Nàth, ed., PràJatoãiní [Calcutta: Navabhàrata Publish-

ers, 1991], pp. 5, 65).

106. Trans. Padoux, Vàc, p. 58n. On the relations of the Trika, Kula, and

Krama systems see K. C. Pandey, Abhinavagupta: An Historical and Philosoph-

ical Study (Varanasi: Chowkhamba Sanskrit Series Office, 1963), pp. 132–47,

590–611; Navjivan Rastogi, The Krama Tantricism of Kashmir: Historical and

General Sources (New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas, 1979); Sanderson, “Taivism

and the Tantric Traditions,” pp. 670 ff.

107. Rastogi, The Krama Tantricism, p. 32. In many passages (TA 22.40–42;

23.99–100; 26.33–37; 35), tantra appears to be identified with the Taivasiddànta

school and as such is inferior to or more “exoteric” than the Kula or Trika. But

elsewhere (e.g., TA 35.25–27), tantra is contrasted with both siddànta and Màkta (this was pointed out to me by André Padoux, personal communication, 1 June

2001). See also Pandey, Abhinavagupta, p. 604.

108. Rastogi, The Krama Tantricism, pp. 34–36.

109. Ibid., p. 36n.

110. “ViMvottírJamàtmatattvam—iti tàntrikàk; viMvamayam iti—kulàdyàm-

nàyaniviãåàk; viMvottírJaF viMvamayaF ca—iti trikàdi darManavidak” ( Praty-

abhijñàhKdayam, commentary on verse 8); see Jaideva Singh, The Doctrine of

Recognition: A Translation of PratyabhijñàhKdayam (Albany: State University of

New York Press, 1990), pp. 61–62.

111. Padoux, personal communication, 1 June 2001.

112. KÜrma PuràJa 1.16.109–20; trans. Wendy Doniger O’Flaherty, in The

Origins of Evil in Hindu Mythology (Berkeley: University of California Press,

1976), p. 310.

113. David N. Lorenzen, “A Parody of the Kàpàlikas in the Mattavilàsa, ”

in Tantra in Practice, ed. White, pp. 86–87; cf. Lorenzen, The Kàpàlikas and

Kàlàmukhas: Two Lost Taivite Sects (Berkeley: University of California Press,

1972).

114. BàJabhaååa, Kàdambarí, trans. Lane, Kàdambarí, p. 227. “He had col-

lected manuscripts containing information about jugglery, mystical formulas and

spells [ tantras and mantras]. . . . He had the madness of belief in alchemy. He

was obsessed with a yearning to enter the world of the demons” (p. 226).

115. On the concept of the “mother tongues,” or vernacular languages, see

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Notes to Pages 38–42

293

A. K. Ramanujan, Hymns for the Drowning: Poems for ViãJu by Nammàlvàr

(Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1981), pp. 126–27.

116. Brooks, Secret of the Three Cities, p. 5. For a similar view of Tantra in

Nepal, see Robert I. Levy, Mesocosm: Hinduism and the Organization of a Tra-

ditional Newar City in Nepal (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990),

pp. 298–89.

117. Mahendranàth Gupta, TríMríràmakKãJakathàmKta (1902; reprint, Cal-

cutta: KathàmKta Bhavan, 1987), 4.166.

118. DàMarathí Rày, “Kartàbhajà,” trans. in Hugh B. Urban, Songs of Ec-

stasy: Tantric and Devotional Songs from Bengal (New York: Oxford University

Press, 2001), p. 144.

119. See TA and TAV 29.110–11, trans. Lilian Silburn, KuJjaliní: The En-

ergy of the Depths (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1988), p. 161;

PTv, trans. Singh, A Trident of Wisdom, p. 206.

120. White, introduction to Tantra in Practice, p. 16.

121. Some schools, such as the Trika of Abhinavagupta, make emission of

semen the central act, which repeats the supreme emission of the universe out of

Tiva (TA 5.121–24); cf. Paul Eduardo Muller-Ortega, The Triadic Heart of Tiva:

Kaula Tantricism of Abhinavagupta in the Non-Dual Shaivism of Kashmir (Al-

bany: State University of New York Press, 1989), pp. 110–11; Agehananda

Bharati, The Tantric Tradition (Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, 1970), p. 265.

Many other traditions, however, insist that the semen must not be emitted dur-

ing intercourse, which is the greatest danger to the yogi: “maithuna is never al-

lowed to terminate in an emission of semen” (Eliade, Yoga, p. 267). Peter Kvaerne

likewise argues that most of the Buddhist Tantric traditions emphasize the sub-

limation of the semen on an interior plane (“On the Concept of Sahaja in Indian

Buddhist Tantric Literature,” Temenos 11 [1975]: 88–135).

122. On this question, see Sanderson, “Taivism and the Tantric Traditions,”

pp. 679–80.

123. On the manipulation and ingestion of sexual fluids, see White, The Al-

chemical Body, pp. 135–40, 184–202; introduction to Tantra in Practice, p. 6.

Many techniques also involve not just retention of the semen, but the extraction

of the vaginal fluids from the partner into the male body. According to the Haåha

Yoga Pradípikà, “The semen that is about to fall into the woman’s vagina should

be drawn back up. . . . If already fallen he should draw up his own semen [to-

gether with the woman’s secretions] and preserve it” (Georg Feuerstein, Tantra:

The Path of Ecstasy [Boston: Shambhala Publications, 1998], p. 233).

124. Agehananda Bharati, “Making Sense out of Tantrism and Tantrics,”

Loka: A Journal from Naropa Institute 2 (1976): 53. Many authors have praised

Tantra as an empowerment of women; the most recent proponent of this posi-

tive view is Miranda Shaw, Passionate Enlightenment. More skeptical scholars

see women as tools used for the optimization of male power; see Brooks, Secret

of the Three Cities, pp. 25–26. For a discussion of the problem in Bengali Tan-

tra, see Urban, The Economics of Ecstasy, chaps. 2, 6.

125. Feuerstein, Tantra, p. 243; cf. Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya, History

of the Tantric Religion, p. v.

126. “A tantra in the singular can normally refer only to a particular tantra,

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Notes to Pages 42–48

just as the word sÜtra can refer to a particular sÜtra. . . . No one has yet thought of using the word sÜtra . . . as a general term for non-Tantric Buddhism, for we

are well aware of the great variety of literature covered by the term” (Snellgrove,

Indo-Tibetan Buddhism, p. 173).

127. Grace M. Jantzen, Power, Gender, and Christian Mysticism (Cam-

bridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), p. 12; cf. Richard King, Orientalism

and Religion, pp. 9 ff.

128. Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, trans. G. E. M.

Anscombe (New York: Macmillan, 1958), p. 32e.

c h a p t e r 1 . t h e g o l d e n a g e o f t h e v e d a s

1. Mary Louise Pratt, Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation

(New York: Routledge, 1992), p. 6.

2. Robin Rhinehart and Tony K. Stewart, “The Anonymous Ägama PrakàMa:

Preface to a Nineteenth Century Gujarati Polemic,” in Tantra in Practice, ed.

David Gordon White (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2000), p. 272.

3. See Richard King, Orientalism and Religion: Postcolonial Theory, India,

and the Mystic East (London: Routledge, 1999), p. 128; Bernard Cohn, An An-

thropologist among the Historians, and Other Essays (Oxford: Oxford Univer-

sity Press, 1990), p. 146; Amal Chatterjee, Representations of India, 1740–1840:

The Creation of India in the Colonial Imagination (New York: St. Martin’s Press,

1998), pp. 8–9.

4. See Richard King, Orientalism and Religion, pp. 118–42 .

5. Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality, vol. 1, trans. Robert Hurley

(New York: Vintage Books, 1978), pp. 144–47.

6. Richard King, Orientalism and Religion, p. 98. The term “Hindu” is a Per-

sian adaptation of the Sanskrit sindhu, referring to the region of the Indus River

Valley. In the late eighteenth century, British authors began using “Hindu” to re-

fer to the religions of the non-Muslim peoples of India. Dermot Killingley suggests

that Ràmmohun Roy was probably the first one to use the term, in 1816 ( Ràm-

mohun Roy in Hindu and Christian Tradition: The Teape Lectures 1990 [New-

castle upon Tyne, Eng.: Grevatt and Grevatt, 1993], p. 60); cf. R. E. Frykenberg,

“The Emergence of Modern ‘Hinduism’ as a Concept and an Institution: A Reap-

praisal with Special Reference to South India,” in Hinduism Reconsidered, ed.

Gunter D. Sontheimer and Hermann Kulke (New Delhi: Manohar, 1991), p. 31.

7. Cohn, “The Command of Language and the Language of Command,” in

Subaltern Studies, vol. 4, ed. Ranajit Guha (New Delhi: Oxford University Press,

1985), pp. 276, 283–84. See also Gauri Viswanathan, Masks of Conquest: Lit-

erary Study and British Rule in India (New York: Columbia University Press, 1989).

8. Ronald Inden, Imagining India (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1990), p. 49.

9. Herbert Risley, The People of India (Calcutta: Thacker, Spink, 1908), p. 255.

10. Richard King, Orientalism and Religion, pp. 118–42.

11. Thomas R. Trautmann, Aryans and British India (Berkeley: University

of California Press, 1997), pp. xii–xiii, and chaps. 2–4.

12. Sumanta Banerjee, The Parlour and the Streets: Elite and Popular Cul-

ture in Nineteenth Century Calcutta (Calcutta: Seagull, 1989), pp. 35–36.

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Notes to Pages 48–51

295

13. David Kopf, “An Historiographical Essay on the Goddess Kàlí,” in Shap-

ing Bengali Worlds: Public and Private, ed. Tony K. Stewart (East Lansing: Asian

Studies Center, University of Michigan, 1975), p. 114.

14. See David Gordon White, The Alchemical Body: Siddha Traditions in Me-

dieval India (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), pp. 49–51. For early

accounts of rasayana and alchemical arts, see Edward Sachau, ed., Alberuni’s In-

dia, vol. 1 (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, and Trübner, 1910), pp. 191–92;

François Bernier, Travels in the Mogul Empire, ad 1656–1668, trans. Archibald

Constable (London: Oxford University Press, 1934), pp. 316–20.

15. James Mill, The History of British India (London: J. Madden, 1858), vol. 1.

For selections from Dow, Holwell, and others, see Peter Marshall, The British

Discovery of Hinduism in the Eighteenth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge Uni-

versity Press, 1970). For good discussions of early literature on India, see ibid.;

and Kate Teltscher, India Inscribed: European and British Writing on India, 1600–

1800 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995).

16. William Jones, The Works of Sir William Jones, vol. 4 (1799; reprint, New

Delhi: Agam Prakashan, 1976), pp. 105–6.

17. Ibid., vol. 3, pp. 383–84.

18. H. T. Colebrooke, Essays on Hindu Religion and Ancient Indian Liter-

ature, vol. 2 (1837; reprint, New Delhi: Cosmo Publications, 1977), pp. 185–86.

19. Colebrooke, “On the Religious Ceremonies of the Hindus,” in Miscella-

neous Essays (London: Trübner, 1837), p. 111. See also David Kopf, British Ori-

entalism and the Bengal Renaissance: The Dynamics of Modernization, 1773–

1835 (Berkeley: University of California Press 1969), pp. 41–42.

20. Abbé Dubois, Hindu Manners, Customs, and Ceremonies (Oxford:

Clarendon Press, 1906).

21. Ibid., p. 9.

22. Ibid., pp. 286–88.

23. William Ward, A View of the History, Literature, and Religion of the Hin-

doos, vol. 2 (London: Kingsbury, Parbury, and Allen, 1817), pp. lxxvi, xlix, xiii,

xlii, xxii.

24. Ibid., vol. 1, p. 247; cf. pp. li–lv.

25. Ibid., p. 247.

26. H. H. Wilson, Essays and Lectures, Chiefly on the Religion of the Hin-

dus (London: Trübner, 1846), pp. 257–58. As Arthur Avalon observes, “Since

Wilson’s time all who have dealt with the Tantras . . . adopted second-hand the

accounts given by him and Ward” ( Principles of Tantra: The Tantratattva of

Tríyukta Tiva Candra VidyàrJava Bhaååàcàrya Mahodaya, vol. 1 [Madras:

Ganesh, 1960], p. 4).

27. H. H. Wilson, Religious Sects of the Hindus, ed. Ernst R. Rost (Calcutta:

Susil Gupta, 1858), p. 140.

28. Monier Monier-Williams, Hinduism (London: Society for Promoting

Christian Knowledge, 1894), pp. 122–23. Somewhat earlier, in 1874, J. Talboys

Wheeler spoke of the “so-called Tantric religion,” in which “nudity is worshipped

in Bacchanalian orgies which cannot be described” ( The History of India from

the Earliest Age [London: Trübner, 1874], p. 364).

29. Monier-Williams, Hinduism, p. 116.

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Notes to Pages 52–57

30. Ibid., p.130.

31. Quoted in Avalon, Principles of Tantra, p. 5. As J. N. Farquhar put it,

“The observances are foul beyond description, always involving promiscuity and

often incest” ( Modern Religious Movements in India [New York: Macmillan,

1915], p. 304).

32. Edmond Demaitre, The Yogis of India (London: Geoffrey Bless, 1937),

pp. 222–23. Similar accounts can be found in a variety of other authors. Ac-

cording to August Barth, “a Tàkta of the left hand is almost always a hypocrite

and a superstitious debauchee” ( The Religions of India [London: Kegan Paul,

1891], pp. 199–200).

33. Eugene Burnouf, Introduction à l’histoire du Bouddhisme Indien (Paris:

Maisonneuve, 1844), p. 523. Similar narratives of primitive Buddhism and Tantric

decline were used by Indian authors. As Rajendralala Mitra comments, “Prac-

tices are enjoined which are at once the most revolting and horrible that human

depravity could think of and compared to which the worst specimens of Holi-

well Street literature . . . would appear absolutely pure” ( The Sanskrit Buddhist

Literature of Nepal [1882; reprint, New Delhi: Cosmo Publications, 1981],

p. 261).

34. L. Austine Waddell, Tibetan Buddhism: With Its Mystic Cults, Symbol-

ism, and Mythology, and in Its Relation to Indian Buddhism (1895; reprint, New

York: Dover Publications, 1972) , pp. 4–5. See also Louis de la Vallé Poussin,

“Tantrism [Buddhist],” in Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, vol. 12, ed. James

Hastings (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1922), pp. 194–95.

35. Waddell, Tibetan Buddhism, p. 1.

36. Ibid., pp. ix.

37. Ibid., p. 573.

38. Gustav Oppert, On the Original Inhabitants of Bharatavarsa (London:

A. Constable, 1893), pp. 553–54. For Friedrich Max Müller’s influential account

of “Aryan civilization” and its distinction from the “Dravidian” peoples, see Lec-

tures on the Science of Language (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1864),

chaps. 7, 9, 11.

39. Isaac Taylor, The Origin of the Aryans: An Account of the Prehistoric

Ethnology and Civilisation of Europe (London: Walter Scott, 1889), p. 212. Sim-

ilar narratives are repeated by Indologists like Arthur A. Macdonell and Arthur

Barriedale Keith, Vedic Index of Names and Subjects (London: John Murray,

1912), pp. 247–71.

40. Inden, Imagining India, p. 119. See also Trautmann, Aryans and British

India, chap. 2.

41. Jeffrey Weeks, Sex, Politics, and Society: The Regulation of Society since

1800 (London: Longman, 1989) , pp. 6–7.

42. Michel Foucault, quoted in Robert Wuthnow et al., eds., Cultural Analy-

sis: The Work of Peter L. Berger, Mary Douglas, Michel Foucault, and Jürgen

Habermas (Boston: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1984), pp. 171–72.

43. Steven Kern, The Culture of Love: Victorians to Moderns (Cambridge,

Mass.: Harvard University Press 1992), pp. 334–35.

44. John Maynard, “Victorian Discourses on Sexuality and Religion,” Uni-

versity of Hartford Studies in Literature 19 (1987): 61.

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Notes to Pages 57–60

297

45. Patricia Anderson, When Passion Reigned: Sex and the Victorians (New

York: Basic Books, 1995), pp. 17–18.

46. See David Arnold, Colonizing the Body: State Medicine and Epidemic

Disease in Nineteenth Century India (Berkeley: University of California Press,

1993).

47. Anne McClintock, Imperial Leather: Race, Gender, and Sexuality in the

Colonial Context (New York, Routledge, 1995), p. 14. See Edward Said, Ori-

entalism (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1979), p. 23.

48. Robert Orme, Historical Fragments of the Moghul Empire (1782; reprint,

New Delhi: Associated Publishing House, 1982), p. 306. As Katherine Mayo later

described it in her classic, Mother India, the Indian is characterized by a basic

kind of effeminate “slave mentality,” which is “ever the flaccid subject of for-

eign rule,” due to the “devitalizing character of Hindu religion” ( Mother India

[New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1928], p. 29).

49. George MacMunn, The Underworld of India (London: Jarrolds Pub-

lishers, 1933) , p. 96. As Mayo described it, the Indian character is from the ear-

liest age corrupted by premature sexual stimulation, excessive masturbation, and

other moral evils. At the very age “when the Anglo-Saxon is just coming into the

full glory of manhood,” the Indian is so drained and debilitated by sexual in-

dulgences that he is left “poor and sick and his hands too weak to hold the reins

of Government” ( Mother India, p. 38). See also Kenneth Ballhatchet, Race, Sex,

and Class under the Raj: Imperial Attitudes and Policies, 1793–1905 (New York:

St. Martin’s Press, 1980), p. 5.

50. Lewis D. Wurgaft, The Imperial Imagination: Magic and Myth in

Kipling’s India (Middletown, Conn: Wesleyan University Press, 1983), p. 49. See

also Jenny Sharpe, Allegories of Empire: The Figure of Women in the Colonial

Text (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993).

51. Miranda Shaw, Passionate Enlightenment: Women in Tantric Buddhism

(Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1994), pp. 8–9. On the British den-

igration of the devadàsí tradition, see Frédérique Apffel Marglin, Wives of the

God-King: The Devadàsís of Puri (New York: Oxford University Press, 1985).

52. John Campbell Oman, The Mystics, Ascetics, and Saints of India (Lon-

don: T. F. Urwin, 1903), p. 165. Likewise, as Barend Faddegon commented in

1940, “We may regard Tàktism as an epidemic and social neurosis; as such it is

not without significance for neurology” (“Brahmanisme en Hindoeisme,” in De

Godsdiensten der Wereld, vol. 1, ed. G. van der Leeuw [Amsterdam: H. Meu-

lenhoff, 1940], p. 333).

53. Foucault, The History of Sexuality, vol. 1, p. 145.

54. Wilhelm Halbfass, India and Europe: An Essay in Understanding (Al-

bany: State University of New York Press, 1988), p. 173.

55. Prem Lata, Swami Dayànanda Sarasvatí (New Delhi: Sumit Publications,

1990), p. 199.

56. Chiranjiva Bharadwaja, trans., The Light of Truth; or, An English Trans-

lation of the Satyarth Prakash of Swami Dayanand Saraswati (1927; reprint,

Madras: Arya Samaj, 1932), p. 319.

57. The Autobiography of Swàmí Dayànand Saraswatí, ed. K. C. Yadav

(New Delhi: Manohar, 1976), pp. 29–30.

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298

Notes to Pages 60–65

58. Reprinted in Rhinehart and Stewart, “The Anonymous Ägama PrakàMa, ”

pp. 277, 281.

59. Ibid., pp. 267–68.

60. Ibid., pp. 269–70.

61. On the concept of the “counter-Bengal-Renaissance,” see Hugh B. Ur-

ban, The Economics of Ecstasy: Tantra, Secrecy, and Power in Colonial Bengal

(New York: Oxford University Press, 2001), chap. 2.

62. David Kopf, The Brahmo Samaj and the Shaping of the Modern Indian

Mind (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1979), p. xiii. The quote at

the start of this section, and the epigraph, come from Ràmmohun Roy, “A De-

fence of Hindoo Theism,” in The English Works of Raja Ràmmohun Roy, vol. 1,

ed. J. C. Ghose (New Delhi: Cosmo Publications, 1982), p. 98.

63. Friedrich Max Müller, Biographical Essays (New York: Charles Scrib-

ner’s Sons, 1884), p. 13.

64. Kopf, British Orientalism, p. 9.

65. Halbfass, India and Europe, p. 203. See also Tapan Raychaudhuri, Eu-

rope Reconsidered: Perceptions of the West in Nineteenth Century Bengal (New

Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1988), pp. 3–4.

66. Ashis Nandy, At the Edge of Psychology: Essays in Politics and Culture

(New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1980), p. 23.

67. S. K. De, Bengali Literature in the Nineteenth Century (Calcutta: Firma

KLM, 1962), p. 516.

68. Ràmmohun Roy, “An Abridgment of the Vedànta,” in Sources of Indian

Tradition, ed. T. de Bary (New York: Columbia University Press, 1958), p. 573.

69. Letter to A. Duff, in Sophia Collet, The Life and Letters of Raja Ràm-

mohun Roy (Calcutta: D. K. Biswas, 1962) , p. 280.

70. Kopf, The Brahmo Samaj, p. 265; cf. Ràmmohun Roy, “A Defence of

Hindoo Theism,” p. 99.

71. Farquhar, Modern Religious Movements in India, p. 31.

72. Nandy, At the Edge of Psychology, p. 9.

73. Ràmmohun Roy, “A Defence of Hindoo Theism,” p. 99.

74. Ernest Payne, The Tàktas: An Introductory and Comparative Study

(New York: Garland Publishing, 1979), p. 55. Here I will use Arthur Avalon trans-

lation, Tantra of the Great Liberation: MahànirvàJa Tantra (New York: Dover

Publications, 1979). For a more detailed discussion of this text, see Hugh B. Ur-

ban, “The Strategic Uses of an Esoteric Text: The MahànirvàJa Tantra, ” South

Asia 18, no. 1 (1995): 55–81.

75. John Woodroffe, Shakti and Shàkta (New York: Dover Publications,

1978), p. 594.

76. See Urban, “Strategic Uses,” pp. 55–81; J. Duncan M. Derrett, “A Juridical

Fabrication of Early British India: The MahànirvàJa Tantra, ” in Derrett, Essays

in Classical and Modern Indian Law (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1977), pp. 197–242.

77. S. C. Banerji, Tantra in Bengal (New Delhi: Manohar Publications, 1992),

p. 106.

78. Avalon, preface to the Tantra of the Great Liberation, p. xii.

79. Ernest Payne, The Tàktas, p. 55.

80. On the Tantric image of Kàlí and its later transformations, see Jeffrey J.

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Notes to Pages 65–73

299

Kripal and Rachel Fell McDermott, eds., Encountering Kàlí: In the Margins, at

the Center, in the West (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003); on chang-

ing images of Kàlí in the colonial era, see Hugh B. Urban, “India’s Darkest Heart:

Kàlí in the Colonial Imagination,” in the same volume; also Kopf, “An Histori-

ographical Essay,” pp. 12–15.

81. Rachel Fell McDermott, Mother of My Heart, Daughter of My Dreams:

Transformations of Kàlí and Umà in the Devotional Poetry of Bengal (New York:

Oxford University Press, 2001).

82. Wendy Doniger O’Flaherty, ed., Textual Sources for the Study of Hin-

duism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989), p. 134.

83. June McDaniel, The Madness of the Saints: Ecstatic Religion in Bengal

(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989), p. 104.

84. Woodroffe, Shakti and Shàkta, p. 594.

85. Derrett, “A Juridical Fabrication,” p. 206.

86. See Banerji, Tantra in Bengal, p. 108.

87. Ibid., pp. 110 ff.

88. Derrett, “A Juridical Fabrication,” p. 208.

89. Ibid., pp. 225, 214.

90. Ibid., p. 224.

91. De, Bengali Literature, pp. 513, 503. “It is probable that Hariharananda

initiated Rammohun into Tantrik belief. This appears . . . from Debendranath

Thakur’s testimony . . . that he made a disciple of Hariharananda . . . who in-

formed him that Rammohun . . . was a Tantrik Brahman Avadhuta” (ibid.).

92. Ràmmohun Roy, quoted in Halbfass, India and Europe, p. 343.

93. Derrett, “A Juridical Fabrication,” p. 230. See also McDaniel, The Mad-

ness of the Saints, pp. 103–4.

94. Because Hariharànanda’s commentary on the text contains a number of

errors and misreadings, it seems unlikely that he composed the text himself (Der-

rett, “A Juridical Fabrication,” p. 201).

95. B. N. Dasgupta, The Life and Times of Rajah Ràmmohun Roy (New

Delhi: Ambika, 1980), p. 154.

96. Jonathan Z. Smith, Imagining Religion: From Babylon to Jonestown

(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982), p. 98.

97. David Haberman, “On Trial: The Love of the Sixteen Thousand Gopís,”

History of Religions 33, no. 1 (1993): 67–68.

98. Benyotosh Bhattacharyya, An Introduction to Buddhist Esoterism (Ox-

ford: Oxford University Press, 1932), p. 32.

99. Ibid., pp. 172, 165.

c h a p t e r 2 . s a c r i f i c i n g w h i t e g o a t s t o t h e g o d d e s s

1. See Francis Hutchins, The Illusion of Permanence (Princeton, N.J.: Prince-

ton University Press, 1967), pp. x–xii; Thomas Metcalf, The Aftermath of Re-

volt: India, 1857–1870 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1964). For

a classic account of the Indian Mutiny see Colin Campbell, Narrative of the In-

dian Revolt, from Its Outbreak to the Capture of Lucknow (London: G. Vickers,

1858).

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300

Notes to Pages 74–80

2. Indra Sinha, The Great Book of Tantra: Translations and Images from

Classic Indian Texts with Commentary (Rochester, Vt.: Destiny Books, 1993),

p. 11.

3. Michael Taussig, Shamanism, Colonialism, and the Wild Man: A Study in

Terror and Healing (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987), p. 134.

4. Nicholas Thomas, Colonialism’s Culture: Anthropology, Travel, and Gov-

ernment (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1994), p. 15.

5. M. Paul Dare, Indian Underworld: A First-hand Account of Hindu Saints,

Sorcerers, and Superstitions (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1940), p. 56. See also Au-

gustus Somerville, Crime and Religious Beliefs in India (Calcutta: Thacker, Spink,

1931).

6. Richard King, Orientalism and Religion: Postcolonial Theory, India, and

the Mystic East (London: Routledge, 1999), p. 97.

7. Lewis D. Wurgaft, The Imperial Imagination: Magic and Myth in Kipling’s

India (Middletown, Conn: Wesleyan University Press, 1983), p. 6. For a com-

prehensive account from the British perspective, see Colin Campbell, Narrative

of the Indian Revolt.

8. Valentine Chirol, Indian Unrest (London: Macmillan, 1910), pp. 29–30.

9. Friedrich Max Müller, Biographical Essays (New York: Charles Scribner’s

Sons, 1884), p. 49.

10. See Thomas Coburn, Deví Mahàtmya: The Crystallization of the God-

dess Tradition (New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas, 1984), p. 110; Wendell Charles

Beane, Myth, Cult, and Symbols in Tàkta Hinduism: A Study of the Indian Mother

Goddess (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1977), chap. 2.

11. James Preston, The Cult of the Goddess: Social and Religious Change in

a Hindu Temple (New Delhi: Vikas, 1980) p. 63; cf. David Kinsley, The Sword

and the Flute: Kàlí and KKãJa, Dark Visions of the Terrible and the Sublime in

Hindu Mythology (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975), p. 108.

12. William Ward, A View of the History, Literature, and Religion of the Hin-

doos, vol. 1 (London: Kingsbury, Parbury, and Allen, 1817), pp. xcvi, xxxvii.

13. Reverend Alexander Duff, Indian and Indian Missions, Including the Gi-

gantic System of Hinduism, both in Theory and Practice (1839; reprint, New

Delhi: Swati, 1988), p. 265.

14. John Campbell Oman, The Brahmans, Theists, and Mystics of India

(Philadelphia: George W. Jacob, 1903), p. 10.

15. Oman, Brahmans, Theists, and Mystics, p. 11. See also Katherine

Mayo’s gory description of a wild, bloody, almost orgiastic goat sacrifice to Kàlí,

which opens her widely read Mother India (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1928),

pp. 15–16.

16. Caleb Wright, India and Its Inhabitants (St. Louis: J. A. Brainerd, 1860),

p. 225.

17. Chirol, Indian Unrest, pp. 102–3.

18. Taussig, Shamanism, p. 104.

19. William Ward, A View of the History, p. 151.

20. For a good discussion of the Thuggee in relation to British rule, see Rad-

hika Singha, “‘Providential’ Circumstances: The Thuggee Campaign of the

1830s and Legal Innovation,” Modern Asian Studies 27, no. 1 (1993): 83–146.

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Notes to Pages 80–83

301

Amal Chatterjee seems to think the Thuggee narrative was largely the product of

the British imagination, much as the narratives of heresy and witchcraft during

the European Middle Ages were largely the product of the Inquisition ( Represen-

tations of India, 1740–1840: The Creation of India in the Colonial Imagination

[New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1998], pp. 125–44).

21. See Humes, “Wrestling with Kàlí: South Asian and British Constructions

of the Dark Goddess,” in Encountering Kàlí: In the Margins, at the Center, in the

West, ed . Jeffrey J. Kripal and Rachel Fell McDermott (Berkeley: University of

California Press, 2003), pp. 145–68; Hugh B. Urban, “India’s Darkest Heart:

Kàlí in the Colonial Imagination,” in the same volume. See also Javed Majeed,

“Meadows Taylor’s Confessions of a Thug: The Anglo-Indian Novel as Genre in

the Making,” in Writing India, 1757–1990: The Literature of British India, ed. Bart

Moore-Gilbert (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1996), pp. 86–110.

22. Richard Sherwood, quoted in W. H. Sleeman, The Thugs or Phansigars

of India: Comprising a History of the Rise and Progress of That Extraordinary

Fraternity of Assassins (Philadelphia: Carey and Hart, 1839), pp. 13, 18

23. James Sleeman, Thug; or, A Million Murders (London: Sampson, Low,

Marston, 1926), p. 117. On the life and work of Sleeman, see Francis Tuker, The

Yellow Scarf: The Story of the Life of Thuggee Sleeman (London: J. M. Dent and

Sons, 1961); Selected Records Collected from the Central Provinces and Berar

Secretariat Relating to the Suppression of Thuggee (Nagpur: Government Print-

ing, 1939).

24. George Bruce, The Stranglers: The Cult of Thuggee and Its Overthrow

in British India (London: Longman’s, 1968), p. 124.

25. Philip Meadows Taylor, Confessions of a Thug (1839; reprint, Oxford:

Clarendon Press, 1984), pp. 5–6.

26. Amal Chatterjee, Representations of India, pp. 133–34.

27. George MacMunn, The Underworld of India (London: Jarrolds Pub-

lishers, 1933), p. 214. See W. H. Sleeman, Ramaseeana; or, A Vocabulary of the

Peculiar Language Used by the Thugs, with an Introduction and Appendix, De-

scriptive of the System Pursued by That Fraternity and of the Measures Which

Have Been Adopted by the Supreme Government of India for Its Suppression

(Calcutta: Military Orphan Press, 1836); reprinted in The Thugs or Phansigars

of India, compiled from the documents published by Captain W. H. Sleeman

(Philadelphia: Carey and Hart, 1839).

28. James Sleeman, Thug, p. 18; cf. Tuker, The Yellow Scarf, p. 87.

29. Homi Bhabha, “The Other Question: Difference, Discrimination, and the

Discourse of Colonialism,” in Literature, Politics, and Theory, ed. Francis Barker,

Peter Hulme, Margaret Iverson, and Diana Loxley (London: Methuen, 1986),

p. 156.

30. See Edward Thornton, Illustrations of the History and Practices of the

Thugs (London: Nattali and Bond, 1837); Philip Meadows Taylor, Confessions

of a Thug. On Taylor’s Confessions, see Majeed, “Meadows Taylor’s Confes-

sions of a Thug. ”

31. Sherwood, reprinted in W. H. Sleeman, The Thugs or Phansigars, p. 27.

32. David Annan, “Thuggee,” in Secret Societies, ed. Norman MacKenzie

(New York: Holt, Rhinehart, and Winston, 1967), p. 76, summarizing Richard

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302

Notes to Pages 83–88

Sherwood, “Of the Murderers Called Phansigars,” Madras Literary Gazette

(1816).

33. Wright, India and Its Inhabitants, p. 129.

34. W. H. Sleeman to Francis Curwen Smith, June 1830, in Bruce, The Stran-

glers, p. 78. On this point, see Singha, “‘Providential’ Circumstances,” which ar-

gues that the British campaign to suppress the Thuggee in the 1830s was a key

part of the state’s changing role in the territories, justifying the need for a more

pervasive legal and police apparatus (pp. 90–118).

35. Bruce, The Stranglers, p. 6.

36. John Malcolm, governor of Bombay, cited in Bruce, The Stranglers, p. 8.

37. James Sleeman, Thug, p. 109; cf. Thornton, Illustrations, p. 4.

38. F. C. Smith to H. T. Prinsep, 19 November 1830, in Selected Records Col-

lected from the Central Provinces, p. 53.

39. “Measures of the Government for the Suppression of Thuggee,” in W. H.

Sleeman, The Thugs or Phansigars of India, pp. 66–67.

40. James Sleeman, Thug, p. 102. For a good discussion of Act 30, see Singha,

“‘Providential’ Circumstances,” pp. 90–118. As W. H. Sleeman commented,

“Thug approvers whose evidence we required were employed in all parts of In-

dia . . . [but] it was difficult to bring all whose evidence was necessary at the trib-

als to the courts of the district in which the murder was perpetrated. . . . To ob-

viate all these difficulties separate courts were formed, with permission to receive

whatever evidence they might think likely to prove valuable, attaching to each

portion . . . whatever weight it might seem to deserve” ( Rambles and Reflections

of an Indian Official [1844; reprint, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1915],

pp. 88–89).

41. James Sleeman, Thug, p. 29.

42. MacMunn, The Underworld of India, pp. 214, 218.

43. The Earl of Ronaldshay, The Heart of Aryavarta: A Study of the Psy-

chology of Indian Unrest (London: A. Constable, 1925), p. 92.

44. Justice S. A. T. Rowlatt et al., Report of Committee Appointed to Inves-

tigate Revolutionary Conspiracies in India (London: His Majesty’s Stationary

Office, 1918), par. 30; see also Ernest Payne, The Tàktas: An Introductory and

Comparative Study (New York: Garland Publishing, 1979), p. 101.

45. MacMunn, The Underworld of India, p. 239.

46. Ibid., p. 218.

47. Ibid., pp. 101, 209–10. See also the chapter “Sex Symbolism” in the Earl

of Ronaldshay’s The Heart of Aryavarta.

48. See Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths, Helen Tiffin, The Empire Writes Back:

Theory and Practice in Post-Colonial Literatures (London: Routledge, 1989),

p. 33.

49. Susan Buck-Morss, The Dialectics of Seeing: Walter Benjamin and the

Arcades Project (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1989), p. 116.

50. Ibid., p. 219. See also Walter Benjamin, Gesammelte Schriften, vol. 5, ed.

Rolf Tiedemann and Hermann Schweppenhauser (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp Verlag,

1972), p. 595; Buck-Morss, “Benjamin’s Passagenwerk, ” New German Critique

29 (1983): 211–40.

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Notes to Pages 88–92

303

51. See Benjamin, “On the Mimetic Faculty,” in Reflections, ed. Peter

Demetz, trans. Edmund Jephcott (New York: Schocken Books, 1986), pp. 333–

36; Michael Taussig, Mimesis and Alerity: A Particular History of the Senses (Lon-

don: Routledge, 1993), pp. 19–20, 177.

52. Taussig, Shamanism, pp. 230, 391.

53. Taussig, Mimesis and Alterity, pp. 177–82.

54. Sumit Sarkar, The Swadeshi Movement in Bengal, 1903–1908 (New

Delhi: People’s Publishing House, 1973), pp. 314, 400. Sarkar provides a good

outline of the Swadeshi movement, and divides it into four classes: (1) the mod-

erates; (2) the trend toward self-development without inviting an immediate

political clash (constructive Swadeshi); (3) political extremism using extended

boycott or passive resistance; and (4) terrorism (p. 33).

55. K. R. Srinivasa Iyengar, Sri Aurobindo (Calcutta: Arya Publishing House,

1950), p. 177. See Arun Chandra Guha, Aurobindo and Jugantar (Calcutta:

Sàhitya SaFsad, 1978); Peter Heehs, “Aurobindo Ghose and Revolutionary Ter-

rorism,” South Asia 15, no. 2 (1992): 47–69; and The Bomb in Bengal: The Rise

of Revolutionary Terrorism in India, 1900–1910 (New Delhi: Oxford Univer-

sity Press, 1993); Robert N. Minor, The Religious, the Spiritual, and the Secu-

lar: Auroville and Secular India (Albany: State University of New York Press,

1999), pp. 20–23.

56. Sri Aurobindo, cited in Arun Chandra Guha, Aurobindo and Jugantar,

p. 21.

57. As Heehs argues, the term “Jugantar” was originally applied by the gov-

ernment to the group surrounding Barin Ghose and the staff of the Jugantar pa-

per; later it came to refer to the loose federation of secret societies in various

parts of Bengal that stood apart from the Dacca Anushilan. The phrase “Jugan-

tar Party” did not come into general use until after 1915 ( The Bomb in Bengal,

p. 243). As Aurobindo’s brother Barin put it, “Very few among my countrymen,

except the government, know that Aurobindo had been the father the revolu-

tionary cult in Bengal” (Barindra Kumar Ghose, Sri Aurobindo as I Understand

Him, cited in Heehs, “Aurobindo Ghose,” p. 53).

58. Letter of 13 July 1911, published in Sri Aurobindo: Archives and Re-

search 1, no. 2 (1977): 84. Sometime around 1902, Aurobindo had come into

contact with a mysterious brotherhood led by a figure named Thakur Saheb, that

claimed to have existed since the time of the mutiny. Its purpose was to prepare

a national insurrection. See Barindra Kumàr Ghoãe, Agnijug (Calcutta: Book Pub-

lishing, 1355 Bengali era [1948]), p. 38; Heehs, The Bomb and Bengal, p. 43.

59. Keshub Choudhuri, The Mother and Passionate Politics (Calcutta: Vidyo-

daya Library, 1979), p. 56. On Aurobindo’s use of Tantric elements in both his

political and spiritual works, see Kees Bolle, The Persistence of Religion: An Essay

on Tantrism and Sri Aurobindo’s Philosophy (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1971), pp. 79–

102. “The Dacca Anushilan . . . had a complicated system of primary (adya) and

final (antya) vows, all emphasising total subordination to the leader, secrecy and

readiness to do anything for the samiti. . . . The neo-tantric rituals affected by

the revolutionary groups . . . struck a chord in the folk memory of Bengal”

(Sarkar, The Swadeshi Movement in Bengal, pp. 313, 314).

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304

Notes to Pages 92–98

60. Heehs, The Bomb and Bengal, pp. 111–12.

61. Peter Heehs, Sri Aurobindo: A Brief Biography (New Delhi: Oxford: Uni-

versity Press, 1989), p. 53.

62. Ibid., p. 54.

63. Sri Aurobindo Ghose, Bande Mataram: Early Political Writings (Pondi-

cherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Press, 1972), pp. 652, 659–60.

64. Cited in Iyengar, Sri Aurobindo, p. 225; cf. Minor, The Religious, p. 20.

65. Heehs, Sri Aurobindo, p. 37.

66. Cited in Arun Chandra Guha, Aurobindo and Jugantar, p. 19. Lieutenant

Governor Baker described Aurobindo as “an active generator of revolutionary sen-

timent. He is imbued with a semi-religious fanaticism . . . and I attribute the spread

of seditious doctrines to him personally in a greater degree than to any other in-

dividual . . . in India” (Baker to Minto, 10 April 1910; cited in Guenter Lewy, Re-

ligion and Revolution [New York: Oxford University Press, 1974], p. 292).

67. Jugantar, cited in Chirol, Indian Unrest, p. 92. On the revolutionary wing

of the nationalists, see Leonard Gordon, Bengal: The Nationalist Movement, 1876–

1940 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1973).

68. See Bankimcandra Caååopàdhyày, Änandamaåh: Racanàr Preranà o Pari-

nàma, tatsaha Bankimacandrer Änanda maåher Prathama SaFskàraner Phato-

kapi, ed. Cittarañjan Bandyopàdhyày(Calcutta: Änanda, 1983). As we will see

in chapter 3, there are many conflicting interpretations of Änandamaåh; while

some see it as primarily anti-Muslim propaganda, which defends the need for

just British rule, others argue that it was an originally anti-British text that was

censored in order to protect the author’s place as a British civil servant.

69. Choudhuri, The Mother and Passionate Politics, p. 39.

70. Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, The Abbey of Bliss (Änandamaåh), trans.

Nares Chandra Sen-Gupta (Calcutta: Cherry Press, n.d.), pp. 40–41.

71. Quoted in Iyengar, Sri Aurobindo, p. 180. See Aurobindo’s translation

of “Bande Mataram” in V. Rangarajan, Vande Mataram (Madras: Sisiter Nivedita

Academy, 1977), p. xv.

72. Kumari Jayawardena, The White Woman’s Other Burden: Western

Women and South Asia during British Colonial Rule (New York: Routledge,

1995), p. 210.

73. Lewy, Religion and Revolution, p. 292.

74. Leonard Gordon, Bengal, p. 113. “It is our mission to purge bar-

barism . . . out of humanity and to Aryanise the world” (Aurobindo Ghose,

“Bhawani Mandir,” in Bande Mataram, p. 66).

75. Ghose, “Bhawani Mandir,” pp. 61–62.

76. Ibid., p. 65.

77. Ibid., p. 64. On this “search for martial Indianness,” see Ashis Nandy,

The Intimate Enemy: Loss and Recovery of Self under Colonialism (New Delhi:

Oxford University Press, 1983), p. 7.

78. Nandy, The Intimate Enemy, p. 52.

79. Bipanchandra Pal, cited in Choudhuri, The Mother and Passionate Pol-

itics, p. 53; cf. Ernest Payne, The Tàktas, p. 104.

80. Sri Aurobindo Ghose, “The Wheat and the Chaff,” Bande Mataram Daily

(23 April 1908), in Bande Mataram, p. 873.

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Notes to Pages 98–104

305

81. Sri Aurobindo Ghose, “Bhavani Bharati, Mother of India,” Sri Auro-

bindo: Archives and Research 9 (1985): 134, 149–51.

82. Jugantar, quoted in Choudhuri, The Mother and Passionate Politics, p. 46.

As the radical newspaper Sandhya stated in 1907, “This bomb is called Kàlí Ma’s

boma . . . it must be kept in every house. . . . A son is wanted from every family

who must practice the virtues of the Kshatriya. Let them play with Kàlí Ma’s

boma” (Heehs, The Bomb and Bengal, p. 117).

83. Choudhuri, The Mother and Passionate Politics, p. 50; Nandy, The Inti-

mate Enemy, p. 92.

84. See Nandy, The Intimate Enemy, p. 52.

85. See Heehs, Sri Aurobindo, p. 130.

86. Sri Aurobindo Ghose, The Hour of God (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo

Ashram Press, 1973), p. 366.

87. Partha Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments: Colonial and Post-

colonial Histories (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1993), pp. 117,

59.

88. Heehs, Sri Aurobindo, pp. 34–35. As Aurobindo puts it, “The most vital

issue of the age is whether the future progress of humanity is to be governed by

the modern economic and materialist mind of the West or by a nobler pragma-

tism . . . enlightened by spiritual culture. . . . The hope of the world lies . . . in

the flooding out of the light of Asia in the Occident” ( The Supramental Mani-

festation and Other Writings [Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Press, 1972],

p. 326).

89. Heehs, Sri Aurobindo, p. 152.

90. Wilhelm Halbfass, India and Europe: An Essay in Understanding (Al-

bany: State University of New York Press, 1988), p. 249.

91. See Aurobindo Ghose, The Mother (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram

Press, 1929); Kireet Joshi, Sri Aurobindo and the Mother (New Delhi: Motilal

Banarsidas, 1989), pp. 24 ff. See also K. R. Srinivasa Iyengar, On the Mother:

The Character of Her Manifestation and Ministry (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo

International Centre, 1994).

92. Sri Aurobindo Ghose, Sri Aurobindo on Himself and the Mother (Pondi-

cherry: Sri Aurobindo Asram Press, 1953), p. 431; cf. Joshi, Sri Aurobindo and

the Mother, p. 106. On the “the deification and transformation of Mira Richards

into the Mother,” see Jayawardena, White Woman’s Other Burden, p. 214.

93. Aurobindo, cited in Satprem, Mother; or,The Divine Materialism (Madras:

Macmillan India, 1977), p. 1.

94. Heehs, Sri Aurobindo, p. 133; cf. letter of 26 March 1926, in Sri Auro-

bindo Circle 32 (1976): 25–26.

95. Joshi, Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, p. 97.

96. Ghose, The Mother, p. 24.

97. Nandy, The Intimate Enemy, p. 85.

98. Partha Chatterjee, The Nation, pp. 6–11; cf. Halbfass, India and Europe,

p. 250.

99. Halbfass, India and Europe, p. 369.

100. Ranajit Guha, “On Some Aspects of the Historiography of Colonial In-

dia,” in Subaltern Studies, vol. 1, Writings on South Asian History and Society,

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306

Notes to Pages 105–109

ed. Ranajit Guha (1982; reprint, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1994),

p. 7. See also Partha Chatterjee, The Nation, pp. 6–11.

101. Ranajit Guha, “The Prose of Counter-Insurgency,” in Subaltern Stud-

ies, vol. 2, Writings on South Asian History and Society, ed. Ranajit Guha (1982; reprint, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1994): “The specificity of rebel consciousness had eluded radical historiography as well. . . . In this a-historical view

of the history of insurgency all moments of consciousness are assimilated to the

ultimate and highest moment of the series—to an Ideal Consciousness. . . . Since

the Ideal is supposed to be 100 percent secular in character, the devotee tends to

look away when confronted with the evidence of religiosity . . . or explain it away

as a clear but well-intentioned fraud perpetrated by enlightened leaders on their

moronic followers” (p. 39). On this point, see also Saurabh Dube, Untouchable

Pasts: Religion, Identity, and Power among a Central Indian Community, 1780–

1950 (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1998); and Hugh B. Urban,

The Economics of Ecstasy: Tantra, Secrecy, and Power in Colonial Bengal (New

York: Oxford University Press, 2001), chaps. 4, 7.

c h a p t e r 3 . i n d i a ’ s d a r k e s t h e a r t

1. Marie Louise Pratt, Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation

(New York: Routledge, 1992), p. 6. On this point, see also Bart Moore-Gilbert,

ed., Writing India, 1757–1990: The Literature of British India (Manchester: Man-

chester University Press, 1996), pp. 5–6.

2. David N. Lorenzen, “A Parody of the Kàpàlikas in the Mattavilàsa, ” in

Tantra in Practice, ed. David Gordon White (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Univer-

sity Press, 2000), p. 87. See also Hugh B. Urban, “The Remnants of Desire:

Sacrificial Violence and Sexual Transgression in the Cult of the Kàpàlikas and in

the Writings of Georges Bataille,” Religion 25 (1995): 67–90.

3. Lorenzen, “A Parody of the Kàpàlikas,” p. 87.

4. Sita Krishna Nambiar, trans., Prabodhacandrodaya of KKãJa MiMra (New

Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas, 1971), 3.12–13. See also BhavabhÜti’s Màlatí-Màd-

hava, French trans. G. Strehly (Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1885), p. 119.

5. Prabodhacandrodaya, 3.16.

6. Timothy Brennan, “The National Longing for Form,” in The Post-Colonial

Studies Reader, ed. Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths, and Helen Tiffin (New York:

Routledge, 1995), pp. 172–73; cf. Homi Bhabha, ed., Nation and Narration (Lon-

don: Routledge, 1990); Firdous Azim, The Colonial Rise of the Novel (New York:

Routledge, 1993).

7. Benita Parry, Delusions and Discoveries: Studies on India in the British

Imagination, 1880–1930 (London: Allen Lane, 1972), p. 87. On “the notion of

India as a locus of exotic sexual energies,” see M. Keith Booker, Colonial Power,

Colonial Texts: India in the Modern British Novel (East Lansing: Asian Studies

Center, University of Michigan, 1997), p. 176. See also Nancy L. Paxton, Writ-

ing under the Raj: Gender, Race, and Rape in the British Colonial Imagination,

1830–1947 (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1999).

8. On the role of the devadàsí in the British imagination, see Paxton, Writ-

ing under the Raj, p. 84. As Parry comments, “The Tantric tradition . . . was fre-

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Notes to Pages 110–114

307

quently invoked by the British as evidence of India’s depravity and intimacy with

the forces of darkness. The rites of this system gave expression to inclinations

which were rigorously suppressed in Imperial Britain. . . . Indians were feared

not only as subjects who had once rebelled . . . but as perverts threatening to . . .

seduce the white world” ( Delusions and Discoveries, p. 149).

9. Flora Annie Steel, “On the Second Story,” in In the Permanent Way (Lon-

don: Heinemann, 1898), p. 309.

10. In 1876, Burton and his collaborator, Arbuthnot, undertook a project of

translating various Oriental works, primarily erotica, to be released under the

guise of an Oriental publishing house known as the Kama Shastra Society. The

most important texts they translated were the AnaGga RaGga and the Kàma SÜ-

tra, the latter appearing in 1883. Originally, the Kàma SÜtra was intended only

for private circulation, but it was soon pirated and published in Paris and Brus-

sels (Edward Rice, Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton: The Secret Agent Who

Made the Pilgrimage to Mecca, Discovered the Kàma SÜtra, and Brought the Ara-

bian Nights to the West [New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1990], pp. 444–47).

11. Rice, Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton, p. 65. “Burton’s life was passed

in a ceaseless quest for the kind of secret knowledge labeled broadly as Gnosis

by which he hoped to uncover the very source of existence. . . . This search led

him to investigate the Kabbalah, alchemy . . . and the erotic way called Tantra”

(ibid., p. 3).

12. Richard F. Burton, trans., Vikram and the Vampire; or, Tales of Hindu

Devilry (1870; reprint, New York: Dover Publications, 1969), preface. For the

original Sanskrit text, see Heinrich Uhle, ed., Die VetàlapañcaviFMatikà in den

Recension des Tivadàsa und eines Ungenannten (Leipzig: F. A. Brockhaus,

1881).

13. Rice, Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton, p. 59.

14. Burton, Vikram and the Vampire, pp. 82–83.

15. Uhle, Die VetàlapañcaviFMatikà, pp. 14–15.

16. I. A. R. Wylie, The Daughter of Brahma (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill,

1912), p. 390.

17. F. E. F. Penny, The Swami’s Curse (London: Heinemann, 1929), p. 48.

18. Elizabeth Sharpe, The Secrets of the Kaula Circle: A Tale of Fictitious

People. . . . (London: Luzac, 1936), p. 45.

19. Ibid., pp. 14–15.

20. Ibid., pp. 46–47.

21. On Crowley and his relation to Tantra, see Hugh B. Urban, “The Omni-

potent Oom: Tantra and Its Impact on Modern Western Esotericism,” Esoter-

ica: The Journal of Esoteric Studies 3 (2001): 218–59; Lawrence Sutin, Do What

Thou Wilt: A Life of Aleister Crowley (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2000).

22. Elizabeth Sharpe, Secrets of the Kaula Circle, pp. 48–49.

23. Ibid., p. 56.

24. Parry, Delusions and Discoveries, pp. 100–106. On Steel’s life, see her

autobiography, The Garden of Fidelity: Being the Autobiography of Flora Annie

Steel, 1847–1929 (London: Macmillan, 1930); Nancy L. Paxton, “Feminism un-

der the Raj: Complicity and Resistance in the Writings of Flora Annie Steel and

Annie Besant,” Women’s Studies International Forum 13 (Spring 1990): 333–46.

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308

Notes to Pages 114–121

25. Nancy L. Paxton, “Disembodied Subjects: English Women’s Autobiog-

raphy under the Raj,” in De/Colonizing the Subject: The Politics of Gender in

Women’s Autobiography, ed. Sidonie Smith and Julia Watson (Minneapolis: Uni-

versity of Minnesota Press, 1992), p. 401.

26. Paxton, “Disembodied Subjects,” p. 404.

27. Flora Annie Steel, “A Maiden’s Prayer,” in The Indian Scene, by Flora

Annie Steel (London: E. Arnold, 1933), p. 626.

28. Ibid., p. 630.

29. Flora Annie Steel, The Law of the Threshold (New York: Macmillan,

1924), pp. 1–2.

30. Ibid., p. 9. On Bernard, see Urban, “The Omnipotent Oom,” pp. 218–59;

and chapter 6, below.

31. Steel, The Law of the Threshold, p. 44.

32. Ibid., p. 47.

33. Ibid., p. 37.

34. Ibid.

35. Parry, Delusions and Discoveries, p. 129.

36. Lewis D. Wurgaft, The Imperial Imagination: Magic and Myth in Kipling’s

India (Middletown, Conn: Wesleyan University Press, 1983), p. 56.

37. Parry, Delusions and Discoveries, p. 99.

38. Pramod Kumàr Caååopàdhyày, Tantràbhilàãír SàdhusaGga, vol. 1 (Cal-

cutta: ViMvavaní PrakàMiní 1963), p. 233. There are many similar travel narra-

tives centering around tàntrik themes, such as NigÜKhànanda , Sarpatàntriker

Sandhàne (Calcutta: KaruJà PrakàManí, 1980).

39. Pramod Kumàr Caååopàdhyày , vol. 1, Tantràbhilàãír SàdhusaGga, p. 237.

40. Ibid., p. 243. The narrator’s last fading sight is a vision of the tàntrika s

embracing, as if they were Tiva, Parvatí, and the other gods playing in their Hi-

malayan abode.

41. Azim, The Colonial Rise, p. 3. On the rise of the novel as a new genre in

Bengal, see Dusan Zbavitel , Bengali Literature (Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz,

1976), pp. 238–45.

42. See Wilhelm Halbfass, India and Europe: An Essay in Understanding (Al-

bany: State University of New York Press, 1988), pp. 243–45. There is a large

body of literature on Bankim; see especially: Tapan Raychaudhuri, Europe Re-

considered: Perceptions of the West in Nineteenth Century Bengal (New Delhi:

Oxford University Press, 1988); Sudipta Kaviraj, The Unhappy Consciousness:

Bankimchandra Chattopadhyay and the Formation of Nationalist Discourse in

India (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1995); Sisir Kumar Das, The Artist

in Chains: The Life of Bankimchandra Chatterji (New Delhi: New Statesman,

1984); Sunil Kumar Banerjee, Bankim Chandra: A Study of His Craft (Calcutta:

Firma KLM, 1969).

43. Raychaudhuri, Europe Reconsidered, p. 132. For a good discussion of

Bankim’s complex nationalism, see Sudipta Kaviraj, The Unhappy Conscious-

ness, pp. 131–57; Partha Chatterjee, Nationalist Thought and the Colonial World:

A Derivative Discourse? (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993),

pp. 75 ff.

44. Halbfass, India and Europe, pp. 243–44.

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Notes to Pages 121–129

309

45. Bankimcandra Caååopàdhyày, “Letter on Hinduism,” quoted in Partha

Chatterjee, Nationalist Thought, p. 75.

46. Halbfass, India and Europe, p. 339; cf. Sudipta Kaviraj, The Unhappy

Consciousness, pp. 141–43.

47. Bankimcandra Caååopàdhyày, KapàlakuJjalà (1866; reprint, Calcutta:

Taptí Publishing, 1966), p. 10.

48. Ibid., pp. 87–88.

49. Ibid., pp. 84–85.

50. For the original edition of the text, see Bankimcandra Caååopàdhyày,

Änandamaåh: Racanàr Preranà o Parinàma, tatsaha Bankimacandrer Änanda

maåher Prathama SaFskàraner Phatokapi, ed. Cittarañjan Bandyopàdhyày (Cal-

cutta: Änanda, 1983).

51. Das, The Artist in Chains, p. 140.

52. Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, The Abbey of Bliss (Änandamaåh), trans.

Nares Chandra Sen-Gupta (Calcutta: Cherry Press, n.d.), p. 41.

53. Trans. Sri Aurobindo, in V. Rangarajan, Vande Mataram (Madras: Sis-

ter Nivedita Academy, 1977), p. xv.

54. Raychaudhuri, Europe Reconsidered, p. 119.

55. Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, The Abbey of Bliss, pp. 198–99, 199, 200.

56. Trans. Sunil Kumar Banerjee, Bankim Chandra, p. 118. See also Das, The

Artist in Chains, p. 137.

57. J. C. Ghose, Bengali Literature (New York: AMS Press, 1978), p. 160.

See also M. K. Haldar, Foundations of Nationalism in India: A Study of Bankim-

chandra Chatterjee (New Delhi: Ajanta Publications, 1989), p. 101.

58. J. C. Ghose, Bengali Literature, p. 161.

59. Das, The Artist in Chains, p. 139.

60. Raychaudhuri, Europe Reconsidered, p. 132.

61. Ibid., p. 134.

62. David Kopf, The Brahmo Samaj and the Shaping of the Modern Indian

Mind (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1979), p. 287; cf. Leonard Gor-

don, Bengal: The Nationalist Movement, 1876–1940 (New York: Columbia Uni-

versity Press, 1974), pp. 85–89.

63. Rabindranoth Tagore, Letters to a Friend, ed. C. F. Andrews (New York:

Macmillan, 1929), p. 111. Tagore compared the revolutionaries to people who

had taken a drink and made alcohol an end in itself (Leonard Gordon, Bengal,

pp. 157–58); see also Mary Lago, Rabindranath Tagore (Boston: Twayne Pub-

lishers, 1976), p. 34.

64. Kopf, The Brahmo Samaj, p. 301; see also Rabindranoth Tagore, Na-

tionalism (London: Macmillan, 1950), pp. 16–17.

65. Anita Desai, introduction to Rabindranoth Tagore, The Home and the

World, trans. Surendranath Tagore (London: Macmillan, 1967), p. 17. See also

Krishna Dutta and Andrew Robinson, Rabindranath Tagore: The Myriad-

Minded Man (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1995), p. 194.

66. Dutta and Robinson, Rabindranath Tagore, p. 193.

67. Desai, introduction to Tagore, The Home and the World, pp. 10–11.

68. Kopf, The Brahmo Samaj, p. 306.

69. Tagore, The Home and the World, p. 160.

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310

Notes to Pages 129–138

70. Ibid., pp. 120–21. As Bimala likewise remarks, “fascination must be sup-

plied to me in bodily shape by my country. She must have some visible symbol

casting its spell upon my mind. I would make my country a Person, and call her

Mother, Goddess, Durga—for whom I would redden the earth with sacrificial

offerings” (ibid., p. 38).

71. Ibid., pp. 122–23.

72. Ibid., p. 39.

73. Ibid., pp. 80–81.

74. Ibid., p. 123.

75. Ibid., p. 177.

76. Brennan, “The National Longing for Form,” p. 172.

77. Homi Bhabha, “Dissemination: Time, Narrative and the Margins of the

Modern Nation,” in Nation and Narration, ed. Homi Bhabha (London: Rout-

ledge, 1990), p. 3.

78. Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1983),

p. 56.

79. Moore-Gilbert, Writing India, p. 25.

80. Bhabha, introduction to Nation and Narration, p. 4.

81. John Masters, The Deceivers (London: Penguin, 1955) . On Masters, see

Avtar Singh Bhullar, India, Myth and Reality: Images of India in the Fiction by

English Writers (New Delhi: Ajanta Publications, 1985), pp. 121–22.

c h a p t e r 4 . d e o d o r i z e d t a n t r a

1. Sumit Sarkar, An Exploration of the Ramakrishna Vivekananda Tradition

(Shimla: Indian Institute of Advanced Study, 1993), p. 45.

2. Kathleen Taylor has argued persuasively that Arthur Avalon is not simply

a pseudonym assumed by Woodroffe for his Tantric publications; rather, Avalon

is actually the joint persona of Woodroffe (who knew little Sanskrit) and the Ben-

gali translator with whom he collaborated (“Arthur Avalon: The Creation of a

Legendary Orientalist,” in Myth and Mythmaking, ed. Julia Leslie [Richmond,

Eng.: Curzon Press, 1996], pp. 151–61); see also her paper “Arthur Avalon among

the Orientalists: Sir John Woodroffe and Tantra” (paper presented at Oxford Uni-

versity, 2001); and her book, Sir John Woodroffe, Tantra, and Bengal: “An In-

dian Soul in a European Body”? (Richmond, Eng.: Curzon Press, 2001).

3. See Jeffrey J. Kripal, Kàlí’s Child: The Mystical and the Erotic in the Life

and Teachings of Ramakrishna (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998), pp.

21–31.

4. Wilhelm Halbfass, India and Europe: An Essay in Understanding (Albany:

State University of New York Press, 1988), p. 369.

5. Sue Curry Jansen, Censorship: The Knot That Binds Knowledge and Power

(New York: Oxford University Press, 1988). On censorship, see also Hugh B. Ur-

ban, The Economics of Ecstasy: Tantra, Secrecy, and Power in Colonial Bengal

(New York: Oxford University Press, 2001), introduction, chaps. 3 and 6.

6. Kathleen Taylor, “Arthur Avalon among the Orientalists.”

7. Vasanta Kumàr Pàl, “Tantràcàrya Tivacandra,” Himàdri (Agrahàyan 1372

Bengali era, Pauã 1373 Bengali era [1965–66]). On Woodroffe’s involvement in

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Notes to Pages 138–146

311

Tantra, see Bhupendranath Datta, Swami Vivekananda: Patriot, Prophet (Cal-

cutta: Navabhàrata Publishers, 1954), pp. 309–12.

8. Kathleen Taylor, “Arthur Avalon: The Creation,” pp. 151–61.

9. Ibid., p. 158.

10. Ibid., pp. 157, 161.

11. John Woodroffe, Shakti and Shàkta (1918; reprint, New York: Dover Pub-

lications, 1978), p. x.

12. Harold Begbie, quoted in John Woodroffe, India: Culture and Society

(1922; reprint, New Delhi, Life and Light, 1978), p. 157; Woodroffe, Shakti and

Shàkta, p. xii.

13. Woodroffe, Shakti and Shàkta, p. 71.

14. Arthur Avalon, Principles of Tantra: The Tantratattva of Tríyukta Tiva

Candra VidyàrJava Bhaååàcàrya Mahodaya (Madras: Ganesh, 1960), p. 31.

15. Ibid., p. 5.

16. Woodroffe, Shakti and Shàkta, p. 1.

17. Ibid., pp. 63, 365.

18. Ibid., pp. 587, 589.

19. Ibid., p. 3; cf. Halbfass, India and Europe, p. 400.

20. John Woodroffe, Bharata Shakti: Essays and Addresses on Indian Cul-

ture (Madras: Ganesh, 1921), p. 103.

21. M. P. Pandit, introduction to John Woodroffe, The World as Power

(Madras: Ganesh, 1974), pp. vi–vii. “The Primary doctrine of Advaita Vedànta

is Unity. . . . All are connected, one with the other. . . . [P]ractical Science is

charged with the same mission. Railways, steamers, aeroplanes, the telegraph,

the telephone, all help establish the idea of the unity of mankind, to foster a wide

view of the universe” (Woodroffe, The World as Power, p. 4). See also Kathleen

Taylor, Sir John Woodroffe, pp. 194–96.

22. Woodroffe, The World as Power, p. 91.

23. Arthur Avalon, introduction to Avalon, trans., Tantra of the Great Lib-

eration: MahànirvàJa Tantra (New York: Dover Publications, 1979), p. cxix.

24. Woodroffe, Shakti and Shàkta, p. 134.

25. Ibid., p. 594.

26. Avalon, Principles of Tantra, p. 63; cf. Kathleen Taylor, Sir John Wood-

roffe, pp. 187–89.

27. Kathleen Taylor, “Arthur Avalon among the Orientalists.” See also her

Sir John Woodroffe, pp. 40–60.

28. Kathleen Taylor, “Arthur Avalon among the Orientalists.”

29. Woodroffe, Bharata Shakti, pp. xx, xxvi.

30. Ibid., p. xxx.

31. Woodroffe, Is India Civilized? Essays on Indian Culture (Madras:

Ganesh, 1919), p. 345.

32. Ibid., p. vii.

33. Ibid., p. 344.

34. Woodroffe, Bharata Shakti, p. xliii.

35. Ibid., pp. 51–52.

36. Kathleen Taylor rejects the idea that Woodroffe was a secret revolution-

ary behind a public facade of conformity. Instead, she suggests that he was an

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312

Notes to Pages 147–152

extremely complex individual who lived in an age when it was not unusual to

hold views that might today seem contradictory (personal communication,

May5, 2001).

37. Woodroffe, Shakti and Shàkta, p. 730.

38. As Halbfass puts it, “The Hinduism which Ramakrishna exemplifies . . .

appears as an open, yet in itself complete framework of encounter and reconcil-

iation with other traditions” ( India and Europe, pp. 227–28).

39. Kripal, Kàlí’s Child, pp. 24–33; see also Narasimha Sil, “Vivekànanda’s

RàmakKãJa: An Untold Story of Mythmaking and Propaganda,” Numen 40

(1993): 38–62.

40. Mahendranàth Gupta, TríMríràmakKãJakathàmKta (1902; reprint, Cal-

cutta: KathàmKta Bhavan, 1987), 4.166.

41. Ibid., 3.33.

42. Swami Nikhilananda, The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna (New York: Ra-

makrishna-Vivekananda Center, 1942), p. 21. See also LP 1.197–216. As an early

biographer, Satyacaran Mitra, commented, “Although Ramakrishna Parama-

haFsa also practiced sàdhana s of other traditions, the tradition of Tantra was

his preeminent tradition. . . . Ramakrishna ParamahaFsa was a fierce tàntrika”

( Trí Trí RàmakKãJa ParamahaFsa: Jívana o UpadeMa [Calcutta: Great India Press,

1897], p. 72). On the role of Tantra in Ramakrishna’s life, see Sarkar, An Ex-

ploration, pp. 45 ff.; John Rosselli, “Sri Ramakrishna and the Educated Elite of

Late Nineteenth Century Bengal,” Contributions to Indian Sociology 12, no. 2

(1978): 195–212; Walter G. Neeval, “Sri Ramakrishna: At Play in His Mother’s

Mansion,” in Hindu Spirituality: Postcolonial and Modern, ed. K. R. Sundara-

rajan and Bithaka Mukerji (New York: Crossroad, 1997), p. 291.

43. Akãaykumàr Sen, Trí Trí RàmakKãJa PuGthi (Calcutta: Udbodhan

Kàryàlay, 1976), p. 116. As the master recalled, “The Brahmani guided me

through all the exercises mentioned in the sixty-four Tantric works. Most of these

are extremely difficult Sadhanas, which cause many a devotee to . . . sink into

moral degradation” ( Sayings of Sri Ramakrishna [Mylapore: Sri Ramakrishna

Math, 1949], p. 311).

44. Kripal, Kàlí’s Child, p. 5.

45. Nikhilananda, The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, p. 123.

46. Swami Saradananda, Sri Ramakrishna the Great Master (Mylapore: Sri

Ramakrishna Math, 1952), p. 227.

47. Christopher Isherwood, Ramakrishna and His Disciples (London: Methuen,

1965), p. 102.

48. Kripal, Kàlí’s Child, p. 32. See also Kripal, “Mystical Homoeroticism, Re-

ductionism, and the Reality of Censorship: A Response to Gerald James Larson,”

Journal of the American Academy of Religion 66, no. 3 (1998): 627–35.

49. Jeffrey J. Kripal, “On the Fearful Art of Writing Left-Handed: Some Per-

sonal and Theoretical Reflections on Translating the KathàmKta into American

English,” in In the Flesh: Eros, Secrecy, and Power in the Vernacular Tantric Tra-

ditions of India, ed. Hugh B. Urban, Glen A. Hayes, and Paul Muller-Ortega (Al-

bany: State University of New York Press, in progress).

50. Narasimha Sil, “The Question of Ramakrishna’s Homosexuality,” The

Statesman, 31 January 1997, pp. 10–13.

URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 313

Notes to Pages 152–155

313

51. Kripal, “On the Fearful Art.” There have been a number of critical re-

views of Kàlí’s Child; see Swami Atmajnananda, “Scandals, Cover-ups, and Other

Imagined Occurrences in the Life of Ramakrishna: An Examination of Jeffrey

Kripal’s Kàlí’s Child, ” International Journal of Hindu Studies 1, no. 2 (1997):

401–20; Gerald Larson, “Polymorphic Sexuality, Homoeroticism, and the Study

of Religion,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 65, no. 3 (1997):

655–65. For a more positive review, see Hugh B, Urban, review of Kàlí’s Child:

The Mystical and the Erotic in the Life and Teachings of Ramakrishna, by Jef-

frey J. Kripal, Journal of Religion 78, no. 2 (1998): 318–20.

52. Narasimha Sil, RàmakKãJa ParamahaFsa: A Psychological Profile (Lei-

den: E. J. Brill, 1991), p. 8.

53. Ràmacandra Datta, TríMríràmakKãJa ParamahaFsadever JívanavKttànta

(1890; reprint, Calcutta: Jogodyan, Kakurgachi, 1935). As Rosselli comments, Sara-

dananda was “plainly embarrassed by the Tantric episode” in his LílàprasaJga

(“Sri Ramakrishna and the Educated Elite,” p. 203).

54. Swami Vivekananda, The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, vol. 5

(Calcutta: Advaita Ashram, 1984) , letter 22; italics in the original. See Sil,

“Vivekànanda’s RàmakKãna,” p. 50.

55. Kripal, “On the Fearful Art.”

56. On Vivekananda’s spiritual nationalism, see Paul Hacker, “Vivekananda’s

Religious Nationalism,” in Philology and Confrontation: Paul Hacker on Tradi-

tional and Modern Vedànta, ed. Wilhelm Halbfass (Albany: State University of

New York Press, 1995), pp. 319–33. There is a vast literature on Vivekananda,

most of it written from an uncritical devotional perspective. See, for example,

Marie L. Burke, Swami Vivekananda in the West: New Discoveries (Calcutta:

Advaita Ashram, 1983–87). Among the few more critical discussions of the

Swami are: Sarkar, An Exploration; Narasingha Sil, “Swami Vivekananda in

the West: The Legend Reinterpreted,” South Asia 18, no. 1 (1995): 1–53; and

Swami Vivekananda: A Reassessment (Selinsgrove, Pa.: Susquehanna Univer-

sity Press, 1997); Thomas Bryson, “The Hermeneutics of Religious Syncretism:

Swami Vivekananda’s Practical Vedànta” (Ph.D. diss., Divinity School, Uni-

versity of Chicago, 1992); Tapan Raychaudhuri, Europe Reconsidered: Per-

ceptions of the West in Nineteenth Century Bengal (New Delhi: Oxford Uni-

versity Press, 1988), pp. 237–315; William Radice, ed., Swami Vivekananda

and the Modernization of Hinduism (New Delhi: Oxford University Press,

1998).

57. Hacker, quoted in Halbfass, India and Europe, p. 228; cf. Tapan Ray-

chaudhuri, “Swami Vivekananda’s Construction of Hinduism,” in Swami Viveka-

nanda and the Modernization of Hinduism, pp. 2 ff.

58. Hacker, “Vivekananda’s Religious Nationalism,” p. 321.

59. Vivekananda, Complete Works, vol. 3, pp. 267–68.

60. Sister Nivedita, The Master as I Saw Him (Calcutta: Udbodhan Office,

1948), p. 56.

61. Kripal, Kàlí’s Child, pp. 26–27.

62. Vivekananda, Complete Works, vol. 3, p. 190.

63. Swami Tapasyananda, ed., The Nationalistic and Religious Lectures of

Swami Vivekananda (Madras: Sri Ramakrishna Math, 1985), pp. 118–19. On

URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 314

314

Notes to Pages 155–157

this point see Lise McKean, Divine Enterprise: Gurus and the Hindu National-

ist Movement (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), p. 285.

64. McKean, Divine Enterprise, pp. 282–83; cf. Halbfass, India and Europe,

p. 231.

65. Sil, “Swami Vivekànanda in the West,” p. 3; cf. Sil, Swami Vivekananda,

pp. 151–67. As Svàmí SadaMivànanda recalls, “Speaking of Napoleon, he him-

self had become like Napoleon. It was as if he himself were directing the fight of

Jena and Austerlitz. . . . We have won the battle—we have conquered, he cried

in joy” (Svàmí Abhedànanda, Svàmíjír Padaprànte (Svàmí Vivekànander Sannyàsí-

Tiãyaganer Jívanacarita) [Calcutta: Udbhodhan Kàryàlay, 1398 Bengali era (1991)],

pp. 411–12).

66. “It is fitting that, whenever there is a spiritual adjustment it should come

from the Orient. . . . [W]hen the Oriental wants to learn about machine mak-

ing, he should sit at the feet of the Occidental and learn from him. When the Oc-

cident wants to learn about the spirit, about God . . . he must sit at the feet of

the Orient” (Vivekananda, Complete Works, vol. 4, p. 156; cf. Halbfass, India

and Europe, p. 233).

67. Vivekananda, Complete Works, vol. 3, pp. 148 ff. A severe critique of the

West appears in his short work, The East and the West (New York: Vedanta So-

ciety, 1909).

68. Vivekananda, in Memphis, Tenn., January 1885, cited in Rajagopal Chat-

topadhyaya, Swami Vivekananda in the West (Houston: Rajagopal Chattopad-

hyaya, 1993), p. iii.

69. See Sil, “Swami Vivekànanda in the West,” p. 15. “India alone was to be

of all lands the land of toleration and spirituality. . . . For us Hindus this truth

has been the very backbone of our national existence” (Vivekananda, Complete

Works, vol. 3, pp. 186 ff.).

70. Burke, Swami Vivekananda in the West, vol. 1, pp. 445–46; cf. Sil, Swami

Vivekananda, pp. 61–62.

71. Burke, Swami Vivekananda in the West, vol. 1, pp. 32–33.

72. Ibid., p. 31.

73. Vivekananda, Complete Works, vol. 6, p. 190.

74. Letters of Swami Vivekananda, ed. Swami Mumukshananda (Calcutta:

Advaita Ashram, 1964), p. 25. As Kripal comments, “Ramakrishna’s incarna-

tion and its perennialist message were understood as the answers that would de-

liver India from the yoke of an oppressive and spiritually sterile culture, West-

ern civilization. . . . The West is depicted as a demon that only the Goddess Kàlí

can slay” ( Kàlí’s Child, pp. 39–40).

75. Halbfass, India and Europe, p. 229. “Although he is concerned with a

self-assertion of Hinduism based upon Hinduism’s own premises, the way in

which he returns to these sources is mediated by his encounter with the West and

shaped by Western models” (ibid., pp. 238–39).

76. “In Vivekananda’s hands, Orientalist notions of India as otherworldly

and mystical were embraced and praised as India’s special gift to mankind. Thus

the very discourse that succeeded in alienating, subordinating and controlling

India was used by Vivekananda as a religious clarion for the Indian people to

unite under the banner of a universalistic . . . Hinduism” (Richard King, Orien-

URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 315

Notes to Pages 157–165

315

talism and Religion: Postcolonial Theory, India, and the Mystic East [London:

Routledge, 1999], p. 93).

77. Halbfass, India and Europe, p. 232.

78. Vivekananda, Complete Works, vol. 5, p. 67, and vol. 4, p. 407. On Viveka-

nanda’s appropriation of missionary strategies, see Bryson, “Hermeneutics of Re-

ligious Syncretism,” pp. 293–99; Halbfass, India and Europe, pp. 228–29.

79. Halbfass, India and Europe, p. 242.

80. Ibid., p. 235; cf. Vivekananda, Complete Works, vol. 3, p. 457.

81. Vivekananda, Complete Works, vol. 6, p. 226.

82. Ibid., p. 313.

83. Ibid., vol. 7, p. 494; my italics.

84. Agehananda Bharati, The Ochre Robe: An Autobiography (Santa Bar-

bara, Calif.: Ross-Erikson Publishers, 1980), p. 244.

85. Kumari Jayawardena, The White Woman’s Other Burden: Western

Women and South Asia during British Colonial Rule (New York: Routledge,

1995), p. 186; cf. Hacker, “Vivekananda’s Religious Nationalism,” pp. 322–25.

86. Partha Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments: Colonial and Post-

colonial Histories (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1993), p. 76.

87. Ibid., p. 102.

88. Richard King, Orientalism and Religion, p. 107. “Our vigor, our strength,

nay our national life is in our religion” (Vivekananda, Complete Works, vol. 5,

p. 37).

89. Vivekananda, Complete Works, vol. 7, p. 174.

90. Ibid., vol. 3, p. 340.

91. Halbfass, India and Europe, p. 235.

92. Vivekananda, Complete Works, vol. 3, p. 458; cf. ibid., vol. 4, p. 336.

93. Ibid., vol. 7, pp. 215–16.

94. Sil, “Vivekànanda’s RàmakKãJa,” p. 42.

95. Vivekananda, Complete Works, vol. 7, p. 262.

96. Kripal, Kàlí’s Child, p. 171.

97. Bryson, “Hermeneutics of Religious Syncretism,” p. 283.

98. Rosselli, “Sri Ramakrishna and the Educated Elite,” p. 207.

99. Vivekananda, Complete Works, vol. 8, letter 90.

100. Nivedita, The Master as I Saw Him, pp. 251, 47.

c h a p t e r 5 . r e l i g i o n f o r t h e a g e o f d a r k n e s s

1. Jung merits a note here. He was quite interested in certain aspects of Tan-

tra, such as maJjala s and kuJjaliní yoga, to which he devoted a number of pub-

lications. Jung saw in maJjala s and in kuJjaliní examples of his idea of the

“process of individuation,” or the integration of the Self. See The Psychology of

Kundalini Yoga (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1996), and Man-

dala Symbolism (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1972). However,

he was also critical of Indian yoga as an essentially otherworldly and thus im-

balanced worldview, unsuitable for Westerners. On Jung’s connection to Tantra

see Harold G. Coward, Jung and Eastern Thought (Albany: State University of

New York Press, 1985), pp. 110 ff.

URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 316

316

Notes to Pages 165–169

2. D. N. Bose and Haralal Haldar, Tantras: Their Philosophy and Occult Se-

crets (Calcutta: Oriental Publishing, 1956), pp. 6–7. See also Gopínàth Kaviràj,

Tàntrik Sàdhana o Siddànta (Burdwan: Burdwan University Press, 1376 Bengali

era [1969]).

3. On the concept of esocentrism, see Steven M. Wasserstrom, Religion af-

ter Religion (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1999), pp. 37–38, 45–49;

Hugh B. Urban, “Syndrome of the Secret: Eso-centrism and the Work of Steven

M. Wasserstrom,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 69, no. 2 (2001):

439–49.

4. For good discussions of the political history of the history of religions in

this century, see Wasserstrom, Religion after Religion, pp. 127–52; Russell T. Mc-

Cutcheon, Manufacturing Religion: The Discourse on Sui Generis Religion and

the Politics of Nostalgia (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997).

5. Gustavo Benavides, “Giuseppe Tucci; or, Buddhology in the Age of Fas-

cism,” in Curators of the Buddha: The Study of Buddhism under Colonialism,

ed. Donald S. Lopez, Jr. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995). Tucci’s

work on Tantric Buddhism has been very influential; see his The Religions of Ti-

bet, trans. Geoffrey Samuel (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980). Jef-

frey J. Kripal, Roads of Excess, Palaces of Wisdom: Eroticism and Reflexivity in

the Study of Mysticism (New York: Seven Bridges Press, 2001) , pp. 207–50. Born

Leopold Fischer in 1923, Bharati was accepted into Hinduism at age sixteen by

an Indian in Vienna; during the war, he was drafted into the German army and

served in the Indian Legion. He later joined the Ramakrishna Mission, but was

frustrated by its prudery. He left the order and later entered the Dasnami sect in

1951, where he was given the new name Agehananda Bharati. He then taught

at various universities in India and the United States, including the University of

Washington. Bharati’s life is recounted in his autobiography, The Ochre Robe:

An Autobiography (Santa Barbara, Calif.: Ross-Erickson Publishers, 1980); he

also wrote one of the most influential works on Tantra: The Tantric Tradition

(Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, 1970).

6. Benavides, “Giuseppe Tucci,” pp. 162, 178–79. On this general trend

among European intellectuals of this generation, see Arno Mayer, The Persis-

tence of the Old Regime: Europe to the Great War (New York: Pantheon Books,

1981); Steven M. Wasserstrom, “The Lives of Baron Evola,” Alphabet City 4

(1995): 84–90.

7. Heinrich Zimmer, Philosophies of India (New York: Meridian Books,

1956), p. 576.

8. Herbert Nette, “An Epitaph for Heinrich Zimmer,” in Heinrich Zimmer:

Coming into His Own, ed. Margaret H. Case (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Uni-

versity Press, 1994), p. 21. For his biography, see his essay “Some Biographical

Remarks on Henry R. Zimmer,” appendix to Artistic Form and Yoga in the Sa-

cred Images of India (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1984).

9. Maya Rauch “Heinrich Zimmer from a Daughter’s Perspective,” in Hein-

rich Zimmer: Coming into His Own, ed. Margaret H. Case (Princeton, N.J.:

Princeton University Press, 1994), p. 18.

10. Nette, “Epitaph for Heinrich Zimmer,” p. 24.

11. Zimmer, “Some Biographical Remarks,” p. 248.

URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 317

Notes to Pages 170–176

317

12. Case, introduction to Heinrich Zimmer, pp. 4–5. See Zimmer’s Ewiges

Indien: Leitmotive indischen Daseins (Potsdam, Ger.: Müller and Kiepenheuer,

1930).

13. Zimmer, “Some Biographical Remarks,” p. 250.

14. Ibid.

15. Heinrich Zimmer, quoted in Nette, “Epitaph for Heinrich Zimmer,”

p. 30.

16. Case, introduction to Heinrich Zimmer, p. 9. On Zimmer’s admiration

for Jung, see “The Impress of Dr. Jung on My Profession,” in ibid., pp. 43–47.

17. Nette, “Epitaph for Heinrich Zimmer,” p. 23; cf. Zimmer, “On the

Significance of the Indian Tantric Yoga,” in Spiritual Disciplines: Papers from the

Eranos Yearbooks, ed. Joseph Campbell (New York: Pantheon Books, 1960),

p. 284.

18. Zimmer, Artistic Form and Yoga, p. 22.

19. Zimmer, Philosophies of India, p. 578.

20. Ibid., p. 601.

21. Ibid., pp. 601, 602.

22. First quote from Roger Eatwell, Fascism: A History (Harmondsworth,

Eng.: Penguin Books, 1995), p. 318. See also Stanley Payne, A History of Fas-

cism, 1914–1945 (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1995), p. 113n;

Wasserstrom, “Lives of Baron Evola”; Franco Ferraresi, “Julius Evola: Tradi-

tion, Reaction, and the Radical Right,” Archives européennes de sociologie 28

(1987): 107–51. Second quote from Guido Stucco, introduction to Julius Evola,

The Yoga of Power: Tantra, Shakti, and the Secret Way, trans. Guido Stucco (1968;

reprint, Rochester, N.Y.: Inner Traditions, 1992), p. 216n16. See also Steven M.

Wasserstrom, “Eliade and Evola,” in The Unknown, Remembered Gate: Reli-

gious Experience and Hermeneutical Reflection, ed. Elliot R. Wolfson and Jef-

frey J. Kripal (New York: Seven Bridges Press, forthcoming).

23. Stucco, introduction to The Yoga of Power, p. x.

24. See Thomas Sheehan, “Diventare Dio: Julius Evola and the Metaphysics

of Fascism,” Stanford Italian Review 6 (1986): 279–92.

25. Julius Evola, Revolt against the Modern World (Rochester, N.Y.: Inner

Traditions, 1995).

26. Thomas Sheehan, “Myth and Violence: The Fascism of Julius Evola and

Alain de Benoist,” Social Research 48 (1981): 51.

27. Richard Drake, “Julius Evola and the Ideological Origins of the Radical

Right in Contemporary Italy,” in Political Violence and Terror: Motifs and Mo-

tivations, ed. Peter H. Merkl (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986).

28. Evola, The Yoga of Power, p. 15.

29. Ibid., p. 190; cf. Julius Evola, The Metaphysics of Sex (1969; reprint, New

York: Inner Traditions, 1983), p. 117.

30. Stucco, introduction to The Yoga of Power, pp. xv, xii–xiii.

31. Julius Evola, René Guénon: A Teacher for Modern Times, trans. Guido

Stucco (Edmonds, Wa.: Holmes Publishing, 1994), p. 21; cf. Roger Griffin, ed.,

Fascism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1955), p. 317.

32. Evola, The Yoga of Power, pp. 2, 3–4.

33. Ibid., p. 3.

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318

Notes to Pages 176–181

34. Evola, The Metaphysics of Sex, p. 273.

35. Ibid., pp. 6–7.

36. Evola, The Yoga of Power, p. 54.

37. Stucco, introduction to ibid., p. xiv.

38. Julius Evola, “East and West. The Gordion Knot,” review of Der gor-

dische Knoten, by Ernst Jünger, East and West 5 (1954–55): 94, 98.

39. Evola, The Metaphysics of Sex, p. 62.

40. Ibid., pp. 64, 61.

41. Evola, The Yoga of Power, pp. 187–88.

42. Ibid., p. 189.

43. Ibid., pp. 60–61.

44. On Evola’s “deep and continuing impact on the ideology of the extreme

right,” see Sheehan, “Myth and Violence.”

45. Eliade’s connections with Evola are only now beginning to be explored.

Eliade himself wrote a long unpublished manuscript on Evola in 1928 (see Mac

Linscott Ricketts, Mircea Eliade: The Romanian Roots, vol. 2 [New York: Co-

lumbia University Press, 1988], p. 849). See Wasserstrom, “Eliade and Evola”;

Philippe Baillet, “Julius Evola et Mircea Eliade (1927–1974): Une Amitié man-

quée,” Les Deux Etendards (1988): 45–55.

46. John David Cave, Mircea Eliade’s Vision for a New Humanism (New

York: Oxford University Press, 1993), p. 10.

47. On Codreanu and the Legion, see Nicholas M. Nagy-Talavera, The Green

Shirts and the Others: A History of Fascism in Hungary and Romania (Stanford,

Calif.: Hoover Institution, 1970), pp. 250 ff.

48. Mircea Eliade, Images and Symbols: Studies in Religious Symbolism (New

York: Sheed and Ward, 1969), p. 19.

49. For critical views of Eliade’s politics, see Ivan Strenski, Four Theories of

Myth in the Twentieth Century: Cassirer, Eliade, Lévi-Strauss, and Malinowski

(Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1987); Leon Volovici, Nationalist Ideol-

ogy and Antisemitism: The Case of Romanian Intellectuals in the 1930s (Ox-

ford: Oxford University Press, 1991); Daniel Dubuisson, Mythologies du XXe

siècle (Dumézil, Lévi-Strauss, Eliade) (Lille, Fr.: Presses Universitaires de Lille,

1993); Adriana Berger, “Fascism and Religion in Romania,” Annals of Scholar-

ship 6, no. 4 (1989): 455–65; Wasserstrom, Religion after Religion. For a more

sympathetic view, see Bryan S. Rennie, Reconstructing Eliade: Making Sense of

Religion (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1996).

50. Rennie, Reconstructing Eliade, p. 143. The clearest statement of Eliade’s

support for the Legion appeared in his 1937 article, “Why I Believe in the Vic-

tory of the Legionary Movement”: “The Legionary movement will lead not only

to the restoration of the virtues of our people, to a valorous, dignified and pow-

erful Romania; it will also create a new man attuned to a new type of life in Eu-

rope” (quoted in Volovici, Nationalist Ideology and Antisemitism, p. 84).

51. See Ricketts, Mircea Eliade, pp. 882 ff.; cf. Dubuisson, Mythologies du

XXe siècle, pp. 221 ff., 292 ff.

52. Virgil Ierunca, “The Literary Work of Mircea Eliade,” in Myths and Sym-

bols: Studies in Honor of Mircea Eliade, ed. Joseph M. Kitagawa and Charles

H. Long (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1969), p. 344.

URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 319

Notes to Pages 181–188

319

53. Mircea Eliade, The Forbidden Forest (Noaptea de sânziene), trans. Mac

Linscott Ricketts and Mary Park Stevenson (South Bend, Ind.: University of Notre

Dame Press, 1978), p. 214.

54. Strenski, Four Theories of Myth, p. 94. See also Wasserstrom, “Eliade

and Evola.”

55. Guilford Dudley, III, Religion on Trial: Mircea Eliade and His Critics

(Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1977), p. 148.

56. Strenski, Four Theories of Myth, p. 77.

57. Mircea Eliade, The Quest: History and Meaning in Religion (Chicago:

University of Chicago Press, 1969), p. 62.

58. Strenski, Four Theories of Myth, p. 121. As Wasserstrom argues, “For

Eliade and Evola, the initiatic secret of the New Man . . . was the practice of

spiritual sex, specifically the rite of Maithuna, the Tantric sexual retention of se-

men” (“Eliade and Evola,” p. 33).

59. Eliade, The Quest, preface.

60. Mircea Eliade, The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion (New

York: Harcourt Brace, 1959), p. 203; cf. Eliade, Myths, Dreams and Mysteries:

The Encounter between Contemporary Faiths and Archaic Realities (London:

Harvill Press, 1960), p. 237.

61. Eliade, The Quest, preface; cf. Images and Symbols, preface.

62. Strenski, Four Theories of Myth, p. 83.

63. Mircea Eliade, Rites and Symbols of Initiation: The Mysteries of Birth

and Rebirth (New York: Harper and Row, 1958), p. 105.

64. Mircea Eliade, Yoga: Immortality and Freedom (Princeton, N.J.: Prince-

ton University Press, 1971), pp. 201–2.

65. Eliade, Sacred and the Profane, p. 172.

66. Eliade, Yoga, pp. 202–3.

67. Ibid., p. 259.

68. Mircea Eliade, History of Religious Ideas, vol. 1, From the Stone Age to

the Eleusinian Mysteries (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1976), p. xvi.

69. Mircea Eliade, Journal, vol. 3, 1970–78 (Chicago: University of Chicago

Press, 1989), pp. 8–9.

70. Ibid., vol. 4, 1979–85, p. 2.

71. Mircea Eliade, Patterns in Comparative Religion (London: Sheed and

Ward, 1958), p. 419.

72. Shashibhusan Dasgupta, Obscure Religious Cults, as a Background to

Bengali Literature (Calcutta: Firma KLM, 1962), p. xxiii.

73. See Ajit Mookerjee, Tantra Asana: A Way to Self-Realization (New York:

George Wittenborn, 1971), p. 35.

74. Kaviraj is the author of a large number of Tantric works, including:

Gopínàth Kaviràj, Tantra o ÄgamaMàstrer DigdarMana (Calcutta: Calcutta San-

skrit College Researches, 1963); Tàntrik Sàhitya (Lucknow: Hindí Samiti, 1972).

For discussions of his work, see Arlene Mazak, “Gopinath Kaviraj’s Synthetic

Understanding of KuJjaliní Yoga in Relation to the Nondualistic Hindu Tantric

Traditions” (Ph.D. diss., Department of South Asian Languages and Civiliza-

tions, University of Chicago, 1994); Kalidas Bhattacharyya, Gopinath Kaviraj’s

Thoughts: Towards a Systematic Study (Calcutta: University of Calcutta Press,

URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 320

320

Notes to Pages 188–194

1982); G. C. Pande, Mahamahopadhyaya Gopinath Kaviraj (New Delhi: Sahitya

Akademi, 1989).

75. Pande, Mahamahopadhyaya Gopinath Kaviraj, p. 11.

76. Ibid., p. 9.

77. Ram Chandra Adhikari, “Shiva Shakti Yoga,” in Life and Philosophy of

Gopinath Kaviraj (Calcutta: University of Calcutta Press, 1981), p. 92. See

Gopinath Kaviraj, “Tàkta Philosophy,” in Aspects of Indian Thought (Univer-

sity of Burdwan), pp. 175–76.

78. See Gopinath Kaviraj, “Tàkta Philosophy,” p. 175.

79. Gopinath Kaviraj, “Nyàya-VaiMeãika Philosophy,” in Aspects of Indian

Thought, p. 76.

80. See Manoranjan Basu, Fundamentals of the Philosophy of the Tantras

(Calcutta: Mira Basu Publishers, 1986), p. 63.

81. Basu, Fundamentals, p. 631. See Gopínàth Kaviràj, AkhaJja Mahàyo-

ger Pathe (Calcutta: Mahesh Library, 1975); AkhaJja Mahàyoga: MÜla Lekhak

Gopínàth Kaviràj (Varanasi: AkhaJja Mahàyoga SaGgha, 1978).

82. Mazak, “Gopinath Kaviraj’s Synthetic Understanding,” p. 413.

83. Ibid., p. 429. See Gopínàth Kaviràj, AkhaJja Mahàyoger Pathe.

84. Basu, Fundamentals, p. 633.

85. Mazak, “Gopinath Kaviraj’s Synthetic Understanding,” pp. 429–30. See

Gopínàth Kaviràj, “Deha aur karma,” in Tàntrik VàGmay meG TàktadKãåi (Patna:

Bihar Ràãårabhàãà Pariãad, 1963), pp. 221–22.

86. N. H. Chandrashekara, “Akhanda Mahayoga of Pt Gopinath Kaviraj ji,”

reprinted online at www.geocities.com/amvaranasi/amyoga.htm. For Kaviraj’s

view of Takti see “MahàMakti—Trí Trí Mà,” in Tàntrik VàGmay meG TàktadKãåi,

pp. 173 ff.

87. Mazak, “Gopinath Kaviraj’s Synthetic Understanding,” p. 438.

88. Gopinath Kaviraj, Selected Writings of M. M. Gopinath Kaviraj (Varanasi:

M. M. Gopinath Kaviraj Centenary Celebrations Committee, 1990), p. 225.

89. Debiprasad Chattopadhyaya, Lokàyata: A Study in Ancient Indian Ma-

terialism (New Delhi: People’s Publishing House, 1959), pp. xiii, xvi.

90. On the early growth of communism in Bengal, see David Laushey, Ben-

gal Terrorism and the Marxist Left: Aspects of Regional Nationalism in India,

1905–1942 (Calcutta: Firma KLM, 1975); T. J. Nossiter, Marxist State Govern-

ments in India: Politics, Economics, and Society (London: F. Pinter, 1988). On

M. N. Roy, whom some have called the “apocalyptic hero of Indian Communism,”

see Bhabani Sen Gupta, Communism in Indian Politics (New York: Columbia

University Press, 1972), pp. 10–11 (source of preceding quote).

91. Nossiter, Marxist State Governments, p. 21.

92. Ibid., p. 143. On Marxism in Bengal, see Laushey, Bengal Terrorism; Sen

Gupta, Communism in Indian Politics, pp. 152–71. Anjali Ghosh, Peaceful Tran-

sition to Power: A Study of Marxist Political Strategies in West Bengal, 1967–1777

(Calcutta: Firma KLM, 1981).

93. Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya, personal communication, May 28, 2001.

I am very grateful to Dr. Bhattacharyya for his willingness to answer a series of

questions about his life, work, and attitudes toward Tantra.

94. Ibid. Most of Bhattacharyya’s most important works were during or

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Notes to Pages 194–205

321

shortly after the rise of Marxism to power in Bengal: Indian Mother Goddess (Cal-

cutta: Indian Studies, 1971); Bhàratavarãer Ràjanaitika Itihàsa (Calcutta: Firma

KLM, 1974); History of the Tàkta Religion (New Delhi: Munshiram Manohar-

lal, 1974; reprint, New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal, 1996); and History of

the Tantric Religion: A Historical, Ritualistic, and Philosophical Study (New

Delhi: Manohar, 1982).

95. Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya, Indian Mother Goddess, p. 3.

96. Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya, History of the Tantric Religion, p. viii.

Bhattacharyya clearly cites James, Briffault, and others as his inspirations ( His-

tory of the Tàkta Religion, p. xii).

97. Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya, Indian Mother Goddess, p. 5.

98. Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya, History of the Tantric Religion, p. ix.

99. Ibid., p. 171.

100. Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya, Indian Mother Goddess, p. 115.

101. Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya , History of the Tàkta Religion, p. 1.

102. Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya, History of the Tantric Religion, pp. x–xi;

cf. p. 34.

103. Ibid., pp. 125.

104. Ibid., p. 31; cf. p. 34.

105. Ibid., p. 14.

106. Ibid., p. 210.

107. Ibid., p. 302.

108. Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya, History of the Tàkta Religion, pp. 156,

157.

109. Ibid., p. 164.

110. Ibid., p. 165.

111. Debiprasad Chattopadhyaya, Lokàyata, pp. xiii–xiv.

112. See M. N. Roy, Reason, Romanticism, and Revolution (Calcutta: Re-

naissance Publications, Ltd., 1955), p. 294.

113. Narendra Nath Bhattacharyya, History of the Tàkta Religion, reprint

ed., p. 206; cf. History of the Tantric Religion, reprint ed., pp. 26 ff.; and Reli-

gious Culture of North-Eastern India (New Delhi: Manohar, 1995).

114. Erich Neumann argues, “It is in India that the Terrible Mother has been

given its most grandiose form,” as Kàlí, “dark all-devouring time.” As such, the

image of Kàlí represents a much-needed therapy for the psyche of Western man

who is “one-sidedly patriarchal” and has lost the archetypal power of the fem-

inine ( The Great Mother: An Analysis of an Archetype [Princeton, N.J.: Prince-

ton University Press, 1955], p. 150). On Jung and his ambivalent relation to Tan-

tra, see note 1, above.

115. Joseph Campbell, The Masks of God, vol. 2, Oriental Mythology (New

York: Viking Press, 1962), p. 165.

c h a p t e r 6 . t h e c u l t o f e c s t a s y

1. Lynn Collins, “The Secret to Tantric Sex,” Cosmopolitan, May 2000, p.

240. “Tantra is the exotic art of prolonging your passion play to reach new lev-

els of lusty satisfaction. . . . Inspired by the sexual success of these ancient love

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322

Notes to Pages 205–210

teachings . . . Cosmo came up with its own turbo-charged version of Tantra”

(ibid.).

2. Georg Feuerstein, Tantra: The Path of Ecstasy (Boston: Shambhala Publi-

cations, 1998), p. xiv. See also Agehananda Bharati, “The Future (if Any) of

Tantrism,” Loka: A Journal from Naropa Institute 1 (1975): 129.

3. Angus McLaren, Twentieth-Century Sexuality: A History (Oxford: Basil

Blackwell, 1999), p. 1.

4. Michel Foucault, Religion and Culture, ed. Jeremy R. Carrette (New York:

Routledge, 1999), p. 117.

5. The term sexuality first entered the English vocabulary through an 1892

translation of Richard von Krafft-Ebing’s classic work on sexual deviance

(McLaren, Twentieth-Century Sexuality, p. 224n).

6. Agehananda Bharati, The Tantric Tradition (Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor

Books, 1970), p. 298.

7. Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, Collected Writings, vol. 11, comp. and ed. Boris

De Zirkoff (Madras: Theosophical Publishing House, 1950–73), p. 29. See also

A. P. Sinnett, Esoteric Buddhism (London: Trübner, 1884).

8. See Edward Rice, Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton: The Secret Agent

Who Made the Pilgrimage to Mecca, Discovered the Kàma SÜtra, and Brought

the Arabian Nights to the West (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1990), pp.

444–47.

9. Dr. Charles Potter, World Telegram, 7 May 1931, cited in William Seabrook,

Witchcraft: Its Power in the World Today (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1940),

p. 359. As Monica Randall comments, “The media followed his every move. . . .

[N]eighbors accused him of hosting orgies and abducting virgins to sacrifice to

his elephants” ( Phantoms of the Hudson Valley: The Glorious Estates of a Lost

Era [Woodstock, N.Y.: Overlook Press, 1995], p. 78).

10. For a more developed discussion of Bernard, see Hugh B. Urban, “The

Omnipotent Oom: Tantra and Its Impact on Modern Western Esotericism,” Es-

oterica: The Journal of Esoteric Studies 3 (2001): 218–59. Contemporary news

reports include: “Oom: Omnipotent Doctor Bernard Makes News Again,”

Newsweek, 1 July 1933, p. 22; John Lardner, “Out of a Book,” Newsweek, 19

May 1939, p. 24; Eckert Goodman, “The Guru of Nyack: The True Story of Fa-

ther India, the Omnipotent Oom,” Town and Country, April 1941, pp. 50, 53,

92–93, 98–100; “The Ascent of Peter Coon,” Newsweek, 10 October 1955, pp.

53–56; Kenneth R. MacCalman, “Impressions of Dr. Bernard and the C.C.C. as

Viewed by a Nyack On-Looker,” South of the Mountains 14, no. 4 (1970): 2–8.

There is also some scholarly literature on Bernard, such as: J. Gordon Melton,

“Pierre Bernard,” in Biographical Dictionary of American Cult and Sect Lead-

ers (New York: Garland Publishing, 1986), pp. 32–33, 138; Gary L. Ward, “Pierre

Arnold Bernard (Tantrik Order in America),” in Religious Leaders of America:

A Biographical Guide to Founders and Leaders of Religious Bodies, Churches,

and Spiritual Groups in North America, ed. J. Gordon Melton (Detroit: Gale

Research, 1991), pp. 39–40; Paul Sann, Fads, Follies, and Delusions of the Amer-

ican People (New York: Bonanza Books, 1967).

11. Nik Douglas, Spiritual Sex: Secrets of Tantra from the Ice Age to the New

Millennium (New York: Pocket Books, 1997), pp. 192–93.

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Notes to Pages 210–217

323

12. Quoted in ibid., p. 195.

13. International Journal of the Tantrik Order 5, no. 1 (1906): 96–97.

14. Quoted in Sann, Fads, Follies, and Delusions, p. 190.

15. Douglas, Spiritual Sex, p. 195.

16. Pierre Arnold Bernard, Life: at the Clarkstown Country Club (Nyack:

Clarkstown Country Club, 1935). Bernard’s estate contained thirty-four build-

ings, including a temple and a theater, dancing elephants, a gorilla named Gonzo,

a tiger, a leopard, and enough birds to fill an aviary (Randall, Phantoms of the

Hudson Valley, pp. 81 ff.).

17. Leslie Shepherd, “Bernard, Pierre,” in The Encyclopedia of Occultism

and Parapsychology, vol. 1, ed. Leslie Shepherd (Detroit: Gale Research, 1961),

p. 104.

18. Town and Country, April 1941, quoted in Douglas, Spiritual Sex, p. 198.

19. Charles Boswell, “The Great Fuss and Fume over the Omnipotent Oom,”

True: The Man’s Magazine (January 1965): 32.

20. International Journal of the Tantrik Order, quoted in Sann, Fads, Follies,

and Delusions, p. 190. “The principal rites of Tantrik worshippers take place in

secret. . . . This secrecy is in accordance with the Tantrik precept . . . ‘One should

guard the Kaula system from uninitiated beasts . . . just as one guards money . . .

from thieves’” ( International Journal of the Tantrik Order, 5, no. 1 [1906]: 27).

21. Sann, Fad, Follies, and Delusions, p. 189.

22. Boswell, “Great Fuss and Fume,” p. 32.

23. International Journal of the Tantrik Order 5, no. 1 (1906): 105.

24. Seabrook, Witchcraft, pp. 356–57.

25. “Tantrik Worship: The Basis of Religion,” International Journal of the

Tantrik Order 5, no. 1 (1906): 71. “Sex worship as a religion . . . constitutes the

basis of all that is sacred, holy and beautiful” (ibid., pp. 35–36).

26. Ibid., p. 71.

27. Boswell, “Great Fuss and Fume,” p. 33.

28. Quoted in Francis King, Sexuality, Magic, and Perversion (Secaucus, N.J.:

Citadel, 1971), p. 155.

29. Douglas, Spiritual Sex, p. 197.

30. Boswell, “Great Fuss and Fume,” p. 85.

31. Sann, Fad, Follies, and Delusions, p. 190.

32. Boswell, “Great Fuss and Fume,” p. 91.

33. Francis King, Sexuality, Magic, and Perversion, pp. 170–71.

34. John Patrick Deveney, Paschal Beverly Randolph: A Nineteenth Century

American Spiritualist, Rosicrucian, and Sex Magician (Albany: State University

of New York Press, 1997), pp. 211 ff. Some speculate that Randolph encoun-

tered Tantric practices in the course of his wanderings, though there is no real

evidence of this (Douglas, Spiritual Sex, p. 85).

35. Franklin Rosemont, foreword to Deveney, Paschal Beverly Randolph,

p. xv.

36. Deveney, Paschal Beverly Randolph, pp. 218–19.

37. Paschal Beverly Randolph, The Mysteries of Eulis (1860), in ibid., pp. 339–

40. “At the moment his seminal glands open, his nostrils expand, and while the

seed is going from his soul to her womb he breathes one of two atmospheres,

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324

Notes to Pages 217–218

either fetid damnation from the border spaces or Divine Energy from heavens”

(ibid.).

38. See Randolph, The Mysteries of Eulis, in Deveney, Paschal Beverly Ran-

dolph, p. 337. Randolph lists over a hundred uses for sexual magic, from win-

ning money to domestic happiness to “the grand secret of life prolongation” (ibid.,

pp. 319–25).

39. Paschal Beverly Randolph, Magia Sexualis (Paris: Robert Telin, 1931),

pp. 76–78.

40. Paschal Beverly Randolph, Eulis! The History of Love: Its Wondrous

Magic, Chemistry, Rules, Laws, Modes, and Rationale; Being the Third Revela-

tion of Soul and Sex (Toledo, Ohio: Randolph Publishing, 1974), p. 126. “No

real magic power can or will descend into the soul of either except in the mighty

moment, the orgasmal instant of both—not one alone! for then and then only

do the mystic doors of the soul open to the spaces” ( The Ansairetic Mys-

tery, in Deveney, Paschal Beverly Randolph, p. 314).

41. Deveney, Paschal Beverly Randolph, p. 252.

42. Kellner claims to have been initiated by the Arab fakir Soliman ben Aifha

and the Indian yogis Bhima Sen Pratap and Sri Mahatma Agamya Guru Parama-

hamsa, from whom he learned “the mysteries of yoga and the philosophy of

the left-hand path which he called sexual magic” (John Symonds, The Magic

of Aleister Crowley [London: Frederick Muller, 1958], p. 95). On Reuss and

his knowledge of Tantra, see A. R. Naylor, ed ., Theodor Reuss and Aleister

Crowley: O.T.O. Rituals and Sexmagick (Thames, Eng.: Essex House, 1999).

Peter-Robert Koenig argues that the OTO was not founded by Kellner but was

formed after his death under Reuss’s leadership (“Spermo Gnostics and the

OTO,” OTO Phenomenon web site, www.cyberlink.ch/~koenig/ spermo.htm).

See also Koenig, “The OTO Phenomenon,” Theosophical History 4, no. 3 (1992):

92–98.

43. Many of Randolph’s ideas on sex magic were transmitted to Germany

through a little-known but extremely influential occult group known as the Her-

metic Brotherhood of Luxor, begun in the 1880s. Drawing heavily on Randolph’s

sexual teaching, the Hermetic Brotherhood of Luxor warned against the dan-

gerous excesses of sexual magic, which can lead men to madness or suicide (Josce-

lyn Godwin, Christian Chanel, and John Patrick Deveney, The Hermetic Broth-

erhood of Luxor: Initiatic and Historical Documents of an Order of Practical

Occultism [York Beach, Me.: Samuel Weiser, 1995], pp. 213–78; Joscelyn God-

win, The Theosophical Enlightenment [Albany: State University of New York

Press, 1994], pp. 258 ff., 347–61).

44. Oriflamme (1912): 18, in R. Swinburne Clymer, The Rosicrucian Fra-

ternity in America: Authentic and Spurious Organizations, vol. 2 (Quakertown,

Pa.: Rosicrucian Foundation, n.d.), p. 541.

45. Francis King, The Magical World of Aleister Crowley (New York: Cow-

ard, McCann, and Geoghegan, 1978), p. 79. On homosexual rites, see Peter-

Robert Koenig’s chapter “Anal Intercourse and the O.T.O.,” in Das OTO-

Phaenomen: An Agony in 22 Fits, trans. (by author) online, OTO Phenomenon

web site, www.home.sunrise.ch/~prkoenig/phenomen.htm.

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Notes to Pages 218–223

325

46. Francis King, Magical World, p. 79. See also Godwin, The Theosophical

Enlightenment, pp. 255–56.

47. Francis King, Magical World, p. 100. Crowley’s main texts on sex magic

include: Of the Nature of the Gods; Liber Agape—the Book of the Unveiling of

the Sangraal de Arte Magica; and Of the Homunculus, most of which are in-

cluded in Francis King, ed., The Secret Rituals of the O.T.O. (New York: Samuel

Weiser, 1973).

48. Lawrence Sutin, Do What Thou Wilt: A Life of Aleister Crowley (New

York: St. Martin’s Press, 2000), p. 1.

49. Aleister Crowley, “The Temple of Solomon the King,” Equinox 1, no. 4

(1910): 161. On Crowley’s Tantric influences, see Sutin, Do What Thou Wilt,

pp. 92, 127.

50. Sutin, Do What Thou Wilt, p. 141.

51. Douglas, Spiritual Sex, p. 208; Elizabeth Sharpe, The Secrets of the Kaula

Circle: A Tale of Fictitious People. . . . (London: Luzac, 1936), pp. 48–49.

52. Aleister Crowley, The Confessions of Aleister Crowley (1968; reprint,

New York: Hill and Wang, 1970), p. 767. On Crowley’s sex magic and its rela-

tion to the OTO, see Koenig, “Spermo-Gnostics and the O.T.O.”: “Crowley’s

VIIIth degree unveiled . . . that masturbating on a sigil of a demon or meditat-

ing upon the image of a phallus would bring power or communication with a

divine being. . . . The IXth degree was labeled heterosexual intercourse where

the sexual secretions were sucked out of the vagina and when not consumed . . .

put on a sigil to attract this or that demon to fulfill the pertinent wish.”

53. Aleister Crowley, “The Law of Liberty: A Tract of Therion, Issued by the

Ordo Templi Orientis,” reproduced in Clymer, Rosicrucian Fraternity in Amer-

ica, vol. 2, p. 572.

54. Francis King, Magical World, p. 82. A detailed record of the Paris work-

ings is contained in two manuscripts, The Book of High Magick Art and the Es-

oteric Record, compiled by Victor Neuberg.

55. “The orgasm of coitus (as also the effect of drugs) led to openings of con-

sciousness toward the supersensual. . . . The technique . . . was that of excess;

through pain or pleasure, sex or intoxication, it was necessary to attain condi-

tion of exhaustion taken to the extreme limit” (Julius Evola, The Metaphysics

of Sex [1969; reprint, New York: Inner Traditions, 1983], pp. 264, 266).

56. Sutin, Do What Thou Wilt, pp. 244 ff.

57. Symonds, The Magic of Aleister Crowley, pp. 141–42.

58. Aleister Crowley, The Vision and the Voice (London: Simpkin, Marshall,

Hamilton, Kent, 1911), pp. 385–86. On the creation of alchemical androgynes,

see Hugh B. Urban, “Birth Done Better: Conceiving the Immortal Fetus in In-

dia, China, and Renaissance Europe,” in Notes on a Mandala: Essays in Honor

of Wendy Doniger, ed. Laurie Patton, pp. 25–56 (New York: Seven Bridges Press,

2003).

59. Sutin, Do What Thou Wilt, p. 239.

60. Ibid., p. 274.

61. There is a vast array of such books, for example: Christopher S. Hyatt

and Lon Milo Duquette, Sex Magic, Tantra, and Tarot: The Way of the Secret

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326

Notes to Pages 223–228

Lover (Tempe, Ariz.: New Falcon Publications, 1991); Christopher S. Hyatt and

S. Jason Black, Tantra without Tears (Tempe, Ariz.: New Falcon Publications,

2000); Donald Michael Kraig, Linda Falorio, and Tara Nema, Modern Sex Mag-

ick: Secrets of Erotic Spirituality (St. Paul, Minn.: Llewellyn, 1998).

62. Jeffrey Weeks, Sex, Politics, and Society: The Regulation of Society since

1800 (London: Longman, 1989), p. 255; cf. Foucault, Religion and Culture, pp.

57 ff.

63. Omar Garrison, Tantra: The Yoga of Sex (New York: Julian Press, 1964),

pp. xxviii, xxvi.

64. Douglas, Spiritual Sex, pp. 219, 221.

65. Allen Ginsberg, Indian Journals, March 1962–May 1963 (San Francisco:

City Lights Books, 1970), p. 93. On Ginsberg’s relationship with Trungpa, see

Barry Miles, Ginsberg: A Biography (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1989), pp.

440–44, 466–75.

66. Ginsberg, Indian Journals, p. 80.

67. Ibid., pp. 13–14.

68. Alan Watts, “Tantra,” Loka: A Journal from Naropa Institute 1 (1975): 57.

69. Michael York, The Emerging Network: A Sociology of New Age and

New Religious Movements (Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield, 1995),

p. 34. A variety of authors have attempted to provide definitions—or at least

typologies—of the chaotic body of phenomena known as “New Age.” See

Robert S. Ellwood, Religious and Spiritual Groups in Modern America (Engle-

wood, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1988), pp. 14–15; James Lewis, “Approaches to the

Study of the New Age Movement,” in Perspectives on the New Age, ed. James

Lewis and J. Gordon Melton (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1992);

Wouter J. Hanegraaff, New Age Religion and Western Culture: Esotericism in

the Mirror of Secular Thought (New York: State University of New York Press,

1998), pp. 1–21.

70. Paul Heelas, The New Age Movement: The Celebration of the Self and

the Sacralization of Modernity (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1996), p. 169.

71. Sondra Ray, How to Be Chic, Fabulous, and Live Forever (Berkeley, Calif.:

Celestial Arts, 1986).

72. Sanaya Roman and Duane Packer, Creating Money (New York: H. J.

Kramer, 1988), p. 18.

73. Heelas, The New Age Movement, p. 68; cf. Paul Heelas, “Cults for Cap-

italism: Self Religions, Magic, and the Empowerment of Business,” in Religion

and Power, Decline and Growth: Sociological Analyses of Religion in Britain,

Poland, and the Americas, ed. Peter Gee and John Fulton (Twickenham, Eng.:

British Sociological Association, 1991), pp. 27 ff. York comments: “Many New

Agers . . . are adamant that the capitalist profit motive is fully compatible with

New Age ideals” ( The Emerging Network, p. 40).

74. Howard Zitko, New Age Tantra Yoga: The Cybernetics of Sex and Love

(Tuscon: World University Press, 1974), p. xix.

75. Douglas, Spiritual Sex, pp. 17, 345; cf. André Van Lysebeth, Tantra: The

Cult of the Feminine (York Beach, Me.: Samuel Weiser, 1995), xiii.

76. Nik Douglas, “New Tantric Order,” Tantra Works web site, www

.tantraworks.com/tantrausa2.html#NTO.

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Notes to Pages 228–233

327

77. Online advertisement for Douglas, Spiritual Sex, Tantra Works web site,

www.tantraworks.com.

78. Christopher S. Hyatt, Secrets of Western Tantra: The Sexuality of the Mid-

dle Path (Tempe, Ariz.: New Falcon Publications, 1996), p. 22.

79. Margo Anand, The Art of Sexual Ecstasy: The Path of Sacred Sexuality

for Western Lovers (Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1989), p. 44.

80. Douglas, Sexual Secrets, quoted in ibid., p. 41.

81. Van Lysbeth, Tantra, p. 53; cf. Vicki Noble, Shakti Woman: Feeling Our

Fire, Healing Our World: The New Female Shamanism (San Francisco: Harper-

SanFrancisco, 1991).

82. As Dax Michaels argues, “By controlling sexual activity . . . the Church

would insure the filling of their ranks with a growing supply of indoctrinated

Catholics. . . . Only through the usage of Tantric erotic synergy can we again re-

gain our feelings of being connected to ourselves, our mother earth and each

other” (Tantric Massage web site, www.tantricmassage.com/tantric-overview

.html). Many lesbians have appropriated Tantra in similar ways. As Diane

Mariechild suggests, “Erotic love between women can be a celebration of and

an initiation into the female creative spirit. . . . When we open to the great fem-

inine, the holy space that is the foundation of the world, making love becomes

sacred” (“Lesbian Sacred Sexuality,” Church of Tantra web site, www.tantra.org/

lesbian.html).

83. Foucault, Religion and Culture, p. 57.

84. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, From Sex to Superconsciousness (Bombay: Jee-

van Jagruti Kendra, 1971), p. 39.

85. See Chogyam Trungpa, Born in Tibet (Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1971).

See also Donald S. Lopez, Prisoners of Shangri-La: Tibetan Buddhism and the

West (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998), pp. 76–81; Rita M. Gross,

Soaring and Settling: Buddhist Perspectives on Contemporary Social and Reli-

gious Issues (New York: Continuum, 1998), pp. 60 ff.

86. Georg Feuerstein, Holy Madness: The Shock Tactics and Radical Teach-

ings of Crazy-Wise Adepts, Holy Fools, and Rascal Gurus (New York: Paragon

House, 1990), p. 73.

87. See Amy Lavine, “Tibetan Buddhism in America: The Development of

American Vajrayàna,” in The Faces of Buddhism in America, ed. Charles S. Pre-

bish and Kenneth K. Tanaka (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998),

p. 103.

88. Feuerstein, Holy Madness, p. 73.

89. Richard Grossinger, Waiting for the Martian Express Cosmic Visions,

Earth Warriors, Luminous Dreams (Berkeley, Calif.: North Atlantic Books, 1989),

p. 19; cf. Rick Fields, How the Swans Came to the Lake: A Narrative History of

Buddhism in America (Boston: Shambhala Publications, 1986), p. 310.

90. Chogyam Trungpa, First Thought, Best Thought: 108 Poems (Boulder,

Colo.: Shambhala Publications, 1973), p. 7.

91. Chogyam Trungpa, Cutting through Spiritual Materialism (Berkeley,

Calif.: Shambhala Publications, 1973), p. 107.

92. Stephen T. Butterfield, The Double Mirror: A Skeptical Journey into Ti-

betan Buddhism (Berkeley, Calif.: North Atlantic Books, 1994), p. 7.

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328

Notes to Pages 233–239

93. Ibid., p. 107.

94. Trungpa, Journey without Goal: The Tantric Wisdom of the Buddha

(Boston: Shambhala, 1985), pp. 25, 53.

95. Butterfield, The Double Mirror, p. 140.

96. Feuerstein, Holy Madness, p. 75; Merwin’s story is told by him in Miles,

Ginsberg: A Biography, pp. 466–70.

97. Butterfield, The Double Mirror, p. 110.

98. Ibid., p. 100.

99. Ibid., p. 140.

100. Miles, Ginsberg, p. 525; cf. Butterfield, The Double Mirror, p. 185.

101. Jeffrey Weeks, Sexuality and its Discontents: Meanings, Myths, Mod-

ern Sexualities (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1985), pp. 23, 24.

102. Douglas, Spiritual Sex, p. 15.

103. For Rajneesh’s biography, see Hugh B. Urban “Zorba the Buddha: Cap-

italism, Charisma, and the Cult of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh,” Religion 26 (1996):

161–82; Lewis Carter, Charisma and Control in Rajneeshpuram: The Role of

Shared Values in the Creation of a Community (Cambridge: Cambridge Univer-

sity Press, 1990); Susan J. Palmer and Arvind Sharma, eds., The Rajneesh Papers:

Studies in a New Religious Movement (New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas, 1993).

More popular accounts include: Yati, The Sound of Running Water: A Photobi-

ography of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh (Poona: Rajneesh Foundation, 1980); Hugh

Milne, Bhagwan: The God That Failed (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1986); James

Gordon, The Golden Guru: The Strange Journey of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh (New

York: Viking Press, 1987). There is also the posthumously published Autobiog-

raphy of a Spiritually Incorrect Mystic (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2000).

104. Feuerstein, Holy Madness, p. 65.

105. Quoted in Hugh Milne, Bhagwan: The God That Failed (New York: St.

Martin’s Press, 1986), p. 192.

106. The Rajneesh movement had a remarkably successful business struc-

ture, which developed a complicated system of parent companies and subsidiaries,

extending through a range of secular and spiritual enterprises. Three separated

but interlocking organizations were formed: the Ranch Church (RFI) was man-

aged through the Rajneesh Investment Corporation (RIC) and the Rajneesh Neo-

Sannyasin International Corporation (RNSIC), allowing the movement to trans-

fer funds fluidly and easily, while paying as little taxes as possible. Meanwhile,

the Rajneesh Church spread worldwide in a proliferation of ancillary businesses—

not only spiritual institutes and meditation centers, but also secular businesses

like restaurants, discotheques, and cleaning services. See Urban, “Zorba the Bud-

dha,” pp. 174–78; and Carter, Charisma and Control, pp. 77 ff.

107. Carter, Charisma and Control, pp. 225, 237.

108. Bob Mullan, Life as Laughter: Following Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh

(Boston: Routledge, 1983), p. 44.

109. Rajneesh, cited in Kate Strelley, The Ultimate Game (San Francisco:

Harper and Row, 1987), pp. 71–72.

110. Feuerstein, Holy Madness, p. 67.

111. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, Tantra: The Supreme Understanding (Poona:

Rajneesh Foundation, 1975), pp. 55, 56.

URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 329

Notes to Pages 239–245

329

112. Sannyasin informant, cited in Carter, Charisma and Control, p. 48. As

Osho puts it, “You are certainly brainwashed, I use a dry-cleaning machine. . . .

And what is wrong with being brainwashed? Wash it every day, keep it clean. . . .

It is just an up-to-date religious laundry” ( Autobiography, pp. 133–34).

113. Osho, Tantric Transformation (Shaftesbury, Eng.: Element Books, 1978),

p. 4.

114. Ibid., pp. 6–7.

115. Rajneesh, Tantra: The Supreme Understanding, pp. 93, 157.

116. Ibid., pp. 190, 98–99.

117. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, Yoga: The Alpha and the Omega (Poona:

Rajneesh Foundation, 1981), pp. 157, 21. See Susan J. Palmer, “Lovers and

Leaders in a Utopian Commune,” in Palmer and Sharma, The Rajneesh Papers,

p. 127.

118. Rajneesh, Tantra: The Supreme Understanding, p. 100.

119. Feuerstein, Holy Madness, p. 70.

120. Rajneesh, Tantra: The Supreme Understanding, p. 100.

121. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, The Goose Is Out (Poona: Rajneesh Foun-

dation, 1982), p. 286.

122. Swami Anand Jina, “The Work of Osho Rajneesh: A Thematic Over-

view,” in Palmer and Sharma, The Rajneesh Papers, p. 54.

123. Osho, “Osho, Never Born, Never Died,” www.sannyas.net/osho02.htm.

124. Osho, “Osho Times,” www.osho.com/main.cfm?area=magazine.

125. Osho, Autobiography, p. 132.

126. Ibid., pp. 268–69.

127. Appendix to ibid., p. 294; cf. Sharma and Palmer, epilogue to The Raj-

neesh Papers, p. 161.

128. I am indebted to Sarah Caldwell for sharing her work and personal ex-

perience with the Siddha Yoga movement. See her article “The Heart of the Se-

cret: A Personal and Scholarly Encounter with Shakta Tantrism in Siddha Yoga,”

in The Unknown, Remembered Gate: Religious Experience and Hermeneutical

Reflection, ed. Elliot R. Wolfson and Jeffrey J. Kripal (New York: Seven Bridges

Press, forthcoming).

129. Swami Muktananda, Secret of the Siddhas (South Fallsburg, N.Y.: SYDA

Foundation, 1994), p. 1.

130. Douglas Renfrew Brooks, introduction to Douglas Renfrew Brooks,

Swami Durgananda, Paul E. Muller-Ortega, William K. Mahoney, Constantina

Rhodes Bailly, and S. P. Sabharathnam, Meditation Revolution: A History and

Theology of the Siddha Yoga Lineage (South Fallsburg, N.Y.: Agama Press, 1997),

p. xxxv.

131. Swami Muktananda The Perfect Relationship: The Guru and the Dis-

ciple (South Fallsburg, N.Y.: SYDA Foundation, 1985), p. 14.

132. Muktananda, cited in William Rodarmor, “The Secret Life of Swami Muk-

tananda,” reproduced at the “Leaving Siddha Yoga” web site, www.cyberpass

.net/truth/secret.htm.

133. Douglas Renfrew Brooks, “The Canons of Siddha Yoga: The Body of

Scripture and the Form of the Guru,” in Brooks et al., Meditation Revolution,

pp. 334, 327.

URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 330

330

Notes to Pages 245–254

134. Swami Muktananda, The Play of Consciousness (Chitshakti Vilas) (New

York: Harper and Row, 1978), p. 91.

135. Ibid., p. 92.

136. Ibid., p. 99.

137. Ibid., p. 105.

138. Muktananda, The Perfect Relationship, p. 14.

139. Lis Harris, “O Guru, Guru, Guru,” The New Yorker, 14 November

1994, p. 96.

140. Rodarmor, “Secret Life of Swami Muktananda.”

141. Ibid.

142. Harris, “O Guru, Guru, Guru,” p. 97.

143. Caldwell, “Heart of the Secret,” p. 21.

144. Harris, “O Guru, Guru, Guru,” p. 108.

145. Thurman, quoted in ibid., p. 97.

146. Jeffrey J. Kripal, “Inside-Out, Outside-In: Existential Place and Acade-

mic Practice in the Study of North American Guru-Traditions,” Religious Studies

Review 25, no. 3 (1999): 236–37.

147. Ibid., p. 236.

148. Caldwell, “Heart of the Secret,” p. 22, 37.

149. Arthur Kroker and Marilouise Kroker, Hacking the Future: Stories for

the Flesh-eating 90s (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1996), p. 78. One of the few

studies of religion and cyber space is Erik Davis, Techgnosis: Myth, Magic, and

Mysticism in the Age of Information (New York: Harmony Books, 1998).

150. Jenny Terry and Melodie Calvert, introduction to Processed Lives: Gen-

der and Technology in Everyday Life (New York: Routledge, 1997), p. 7.

151. Lavine, “Tibetan Buddhism in America,” p. 113.

152. Rachel Fell McDermott, “Kàlí’s New Frontiers: A Hindu Goddess on

the Internet,” in Encountering Kàlí: In the Margins, at the Center, in the West,

ed. Jeffrey J. Kripal and Rachel Fell McDermott (Berkeley: University of Cali-

fornia Press, forthcoming), p. 30.

153. Zitko, New Age Tantra Yoga, pp. xv–xx.

154. Douglas, Spiritual Sex, p. 323. Douglas includes an appendix that lists

twenty pages of online sex magic.

155. Paul Ramana Das and Marilena Silbey, “Third Millennium Magic,”

Third Millennium Magic web site, www.3mmagic.com.

156. Douglas, Spiritual Sex, pp. 307–8, 19.

157. David Ramsdale and Ellen Ramsdale, “Sexual Energy Ecstasy,” Tantra

web site, www.tantra.com.

158. Paul Ramana Das and Marilena Silbey, “American Tantra’s Top 5 Tech-

niques!” Third Millennium Magic web site, www.3mmagic.com/at_main.html.

159. Kroker and Kroker, Hacking the Future, p. 33.

160. Friedrich Max Müller, Biographical Essays (New York: Charles Scrib-

ner’s Sons, 1884), p. 13.

161. On the concept of late capitalism, see Fredric Jameson, Postmodernism;

or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press

1991); and “Postmodernism; or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism,” New

Left Review 146 (1984): 53–93; Daniel Bell, The Coming of Post-Industrial So-

URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 331

Notes to Pages 255–258

331

ciety (New York: Basic Books, 1973); Claus Offe, Disorganized Capitalism (Ox-

ford: Oxford University Press, 1985); David Harvey, The Condition of Post-

modernity (London: Blackwell Publishers, 1989); Mike Featherstone, “The

Body in Consumer Culture,” in The Body: Social Process and Cultural Theory,

ed. Mike Featherstone, Mike Hepworth, Brian S. Turner (London: Sage Publi-

cations, 1991).

162. For a good discussion of the differences between modern or “Fordist”

capitalism, which predominated up to the 1970s, and late or post-Fordist capi-

talism, see Harvey, The Condition of Postmodernity, pp. 291–98.

163. Frederic Jameson, “Postmodernism and Consumer Society,” in The Anti-

Aesthetic: Essays on Postmodern Culture, ed. Hal Foster (New York: New Press,

1998), p. 99; cf. Terry Eagleton, “Awakening from Modernity,” Times Literary

Supplement, 20 February 1987, p. 194; Jean-François Lyotard, The Postmodern

Condition: A Report on Knowledge (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press,

1984).

164. Jameson, Postmodernism, p. 96.

165. Eagleton, “Awakening from Modernity,” p. 194.

166. Jürgen Habermas, “Legitimation Problems in the Modern State,” in

Communication and the Evolution of Society, by Jürgen Habermas (Boston: Bea-

con Press, 1974), pp. 178–206.

167. Mike Featherstone, Consumer Culture and Postmodernism (London:

Sage, 1991), pp. 112–13.

168. Bryan S. Turner, Regulating Bodies: Essays in Medical Sociology (Lon-

don: Routledge, 1992), pp. 164–65, 47.

169. Rajneesh, Tantra: The Supreme Understanding, p. 96.

170. Bubba Free John, Garbage and the Goddess: The Last Miracles and Fi-

nal Spiritual Instructions of Bubba Free John (Lower Lake, Calif.: Dawn Horse

Press, 1974), p. 104; The Knee of Listening: The Early Life and Radical Spiri-

tual Teachings of Bubba Free John (Middletown, Calif.: Dawn Horse Press, 1978),

p. 270.

171. As Chogyam Trungpa put it, “There is enormous individualism in terms

of the doctrines and teachings that are presented. All of them are valid”

(“Sparks,” Loka: A Journal from Naropa Institute 1 [1975]: 19).

172. Nik Douglas, Tantra Yoga (New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal, 1971),

p. 93.

173. Francis King, Tantra: The Way of Action (Rochester, N.Y.: Destiny

Books, 1990), pp. 128–29.

174. Free John, Garbage and the Goddess, pp. 106–7.

175. Don Webb, “A Sex Magic Primer,” www.altx.com/interzones/violet/sex

.magic.html.

176. Rajneesh, Tantra: The Supreme Understanding, p. 95.

177. Swami Nostradamus Virato, “Tantric Sex: A Spiritual Path to Ecstasy,”

Church of Tantra web site, www.tantra.org.

178. Watts, “Tantra,” p. 56; cf. David Ramsdale and Ellen Ramsdale, En-

ergy Ecstasy: A Practical Guide to Lovemaking Secrets of the East and West (New

York: Bantam Books, 1993), p. 23.

179. Van Lysebeth, Tantra, pp. 347, 139.

URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 332

332

Notes to Pages 258–265

180. Feuerstein, Holy Madness, pp. 108–9.

181. Jeffrey Tye, “Tantra: Sex Magic,” Church of Tantra web site, www

.tantra.org/sexmagic.html.

182. Rajneesh, quoted in Vasant Joshi, The Awakened One: The Life and

Work of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1982), p. 1.

183. Mullan, Life as Laughter, p. 48.

184. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, cited in Laurence Grafstein, “Messianic Cap-

italism,” The New Republic, 20 February 1984, p. 14; Beware of Socialism! (Raj-

neeshpuram, Oreg.: Rajneesh Foundation International, 1984), pp. 15, 19.

185. Osho, Autobiography, p. 157.

186. From the Tantra web site, www.tantra.com/tantra2/product1.html.

187. Robert E. Svoboda, Aghora: At the Left Hand of God (Calcutta: Rupa,

1986), and Aghora II: Kundalini (Calcutta: Rupa, 1993). See June Campbell,

Traveller in Space: In Search of Female Identity in Tibetan Buddhism (New York:

George Braziller, 1996); and Daniel Odier, Tantric Quest: An Encounter with

Absolute Love (Rochester, N.Y.: Inner Traditions, 1997). Campbell provides a

sobering and critical perspective on the role of women in Tantric Buddhism;

Odier’s is a far more romantic tale of self-discovery through Tantric practice.

Jeffrey Hopkins has published a translation of the Tibetan heterosexual erotic

manual, Tibetan Arts of Love, by Gedun Chopel, which he has rewritten from

an explicitly gay point of view ( Sex, Orgasm, and the Mind of Clear Light [Berke-

ley, Calif.: North Atlantic Books, 1998]). The most interesting example of the

use of Tantra for S&M purposes is Fakir Musafar, who argues that both Tantra

and S&M use extreme sex as means of inducing ecstatic states (interview with

Fakir Musafar, by Kristine Ambrosia and Joseph Lanza, in Apocalypse Culture,

ed. Adam Parfrey [Los Angeles: Feral House, 1990]). The first epigraph for this

section comes from an April 1996 interview with Annie Sprinkle, by Gary Mor-

ris, on the Bright Lights Films web site, www.brightlightsfilm.com/16/annie.html.

188. Douglas, Spiritual Sex, pp. 345–46.

189. Annie Sprinkle, Post-Porn Modernist (San Francisco: Cleis Press, 1998),

p. 193.

190. Hakim Bey, “Instructions for the Kali Yuga,” in Apocalypse Culture,

ed. Adam Parfrey, p. 87.

191. Jean Baudrillard, Forget Foucault (New York: Semiotext[e], 1987), pp.

23–24.

192. Marianna Torgovnick, Gone Primitive: Savage Intellects, Modern Lives

(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990), pp. 40, 41.

193. Trungpa, Cutting through Spiritual Materialism, p. 15.

c o n c l u s i o n

1. Susan Buck-Morss, The Dialectics of Seeing: Walter Benjamin and the

Arcades Project (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1989), p. 249, paraphrasing

Benjamin.

2. Michael Taussig, Shamanism, Colonialism, and the Wild Man: A Study in

Terror and Healing (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987), p. 443.

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Notes to Pages 265–273

333

3. See Buck-Morss, The Dialectics of Seeing, pp. 210–12. The commodity

“lies at the intersection of petrified nature and transitory nature, waking and

dream, natural history and historical nature, mythic history (phantasmagoria)

and mythic nature (Symbol)” (ibid., p. 211).

4. On Kàmàkhyà, see Hugh B. Urban, “The Path of Power: Impurity, King-

ship, and Sacrifice in Assamese Tantra,” Journal of the American Academy of

Religion 69, no. 4 (2001): 777–816.

5. Margo Anand, The Art of Sexual Ecstasy: The Path of Sacred Sexuality

for Western Lovers (Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1989), p. 7. Even Georg Feuer-

stein, who is quite critical of popular Tantra, holds out the hope for a new form

of Tantra for a new age: “If Tantra can recruit enough authentic Western prac-

titioners, it could have an important role to play in the birthing of a civilization

that is dedicated to the welfare of all people” ( Tantra: The Path of Ecstasy [Boston:

Shambhala Publications, 1998], p. 273).

6. Jeffrey Hopkins, Sex, Orgasm, and the Mind of Clear Light (Berkeley,

Calif.: North Atlantic Books, 1998), pp. 71–72.

7. Ibid., p. xii.

8. See Feuerstein, Tantra, p. xiv; quote from David Gordon White, Tantra in

Practice (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2000), p. 5.

9. Agehananda Bharati, The Tantric Tradition (Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor

Books, 1970), p. 299.

10. Teun Goudriaan and Sanjukta Gupta, Hindu Tantric and Tàkta Litera-

ture (Wiesbaden, Ger.: Otto Harrasowitz, 1981), p. 9. Likewise, Padoux argues

that Tantra is “in no way popular” but is “the work of Brahmins, expressing the

ideology of the higher classes” (“A Survey of Tantrism for the Historian of Re-

ligions,” review of Hindu Tantrism, by Sanjukta Gupta, Teun Goudriaan, and

Dirk Jan Hoens, History of Religions 20, no. 4 [1981]: 353).

11. Jeffrey J. Kripal, Kàlí’s Child: The Mystical and the Erotic in the Life and

Teachings of Ramakrishna (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998), p. 28.

12. Grace M. Jantzen, Power, Gender, and Christian Mysticism (Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press, 1995), p. 12.

13. Jonathan Z. Smith, Imagining Religion: From Babylon to Jonestown

(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982), p. 18.

14. See ibid., p. 51. As Bruce Lincoln argues, “Scholars are no different from

other human beings. They exist within a time, a place and a social institution,

and their speech, thought and interests originate in, reflect and engage these givens

of their own experience” ( Death,War, and Sacrifice: Studies in Ideology and Prac-

tice [Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991], pp. xvi–xvii).

15. Smith, Imagining Religion, p. xi; cf. Richard King, Orientalism and Re-

ligion: Postcolonial Theory, India, and the Mystic East (London: Routledge,

1999), p. 210.

16. Debiprasad Chattopadhyaya, Lokàyata: A Study in Ancient Indian Ma-

terialism (New Delhi: People’s Publishing House, 1959), p. 358.

17. Quoted in Shashibhushan Dasgupta, Obscure Religious Cults, as a Back-

ground to Bengali Literature (Calcutta: Firma KLM, 1968), pp. 140–41n.

18. On the fetishization of the body in late capitalist society, see Mike Feath-

URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 334

334

Notes to Pages 273–275

erstone, “The Body and Consumer Culture,” in The Body: Social Process and

Cultural Theory, ed. Mike Featherstone, Mike Hepworth, and Bryan S. Turner

(London: Sage Publications, 1991).

19. June Campbell, Traveller in Space: In Search of Female Identity in Ti-

betan Buddhism (New York: George Braziller, 1996), p. 171. Campbell provides

a fascinating insider’s view of the role of female partners in Tantric practice, a

role that is often far from empowering or liberating.

20. Kripal, Kàlí’s Child, p. 29; my italics.

21. Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality, vol. 1, trans. Robert Hurley

(New York: Vintage Books, 1978), p. 150.

22. Jeremy R. Carrette, Foucault and Religion: Spiritual Corporeality and

Political Spirituality (London: Routledge, 2000), pp. xi, 146.

23. Michel Foucault, “Le chef mythique de la révolte de l’Iran,” in Dits et

écrits, 1948–1988, vol. 3, ed. Daniel Defert and Francois Ewald (Paris: Galli-

mard, 1994), p. 716.

24. White, introduction to Tantra in Practice, p. 32. On the political role of

Tantra, see also Charles D. Orzech, Politics and Transcendent Wisdom: The Scrip-

ture for Humane Kings in the Creation of Chinese Buddhism (University Park:

Pennsylvania State University Press, 1998); Urban, “The Path of Power”; David

Snellgrove, “The Notion of Divine Kingship in Tantric Buddhism,” in The Sacral

Kingship: Contributions to the Central Theme of the Eighth International Con-

gress for the History of Religions (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1959); Michel Strickmann,

Mantras et mandarins: Le Bouddhisme tantrique en Chine (Paris: Gallimard,

1996).

25. There is a large body of literature on the Bàuls and Sahajiyàs; see, for ex-

ample, Edward C. Dimock, The Place of the Hidden Moon: Erotic Mysticism in

the VaiãJava-Sahajiyà Tradition of Bengal (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,

1966); Carol Salomon, “Bàul Songs,” in Religions of India in Practice, ed. Don-

ald S. Lopez, Jr. (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1995); and Glen A.

Hayes, “VaiãJava Sahajiyà Traditions,” in the same volume. On the Kartàbha-

jàs, see Hugh B. Urban, The Economics of Ecstasy: Tantra, Secrecy, and Power

in Colonial Bengal (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001); and Urban, ed.

and trans., Songs of Ecstasy: Tantric and Devotional Songs from Bengal (New

York: Oxford University Press, 2001).

26. On Ramakrishna, see Kripal, Kàlí’s Child. On Bàmàkãepa, see Malcolm

McLean, “Eating Corpses and Raising the Dead: The Tantric Madness of

Bàmàkãepa,” in In the Flesh: Eros, Secrecy and Power in the Vernacular Tantric

Traditions of India, ed. Hugh B. Urban, Glen A. Hayes, and Paul Muller-Ortega

(Albany: State University of New York, in progress).

27. On possession in Nepal and Ladakh, see John T. Hitchcock and Rex L.

Jones, eds., Spirit Possession in the Nepal Himalayas (Warminster, Eng.: Aris and

Phillips, 1976); Robert I. Levy, Mesocosm: Hinduism and the Organization of a

Traditional Newar City in Nepal (Berkeley: University of California Press,

1990). On the Nàths, see David Gordon White, The Alchemical Body: Siddha

Traditions in Medieval India (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996). On

the Aghorís, see Jonathan Parry, “Sacrificial Death and the Necrophagous As-

cetic,” in Death and the Regeneration of Life, ed. Maurice Bloch and Jonathan

URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 335

Notes to Pages 275–281

335

Parry (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1982); for a more popular ac-

count, see Svoboda’s Aghora series.

28. Vernacular Tantric traditions is the focus of the volume that I coedited

with Glen A. Hayes and Paul Muller-Ortega, In the Flesh.

29. Marianna Torgovnick, Primitive Passions: Men, Women, and the Quest

for Ecstasy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998), pp. 219.

30. Wilhelm Halbfass, India and Europe: An Essay in Understanding (Al-

bany: State University of New York Press, 1988), pp. 339–40, 441–42.

31. Benjamin Barber, Jihad vs. McWorld: How Globalism and Tribalism Are

Reshaping the World (New York: Ballantine Books, 1992), p. 4. See also Aijaz

Ahmad, In Theory: Classes, Nations, Literatures (New York: Verso, 1992); Ar-

jun Appadurai, “Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy,”

in The Globalization Reader, ed. Frank J. Lechner and John Boli (London: Black-

well Publishers, 2000), pp. 322–30.

32. Ahmad, In Theory, p. 21.

33. Gita Mehta, Karma Cola: Marketing the Mystic East (New York: Simon

and Schuster, 1979), p. 102.

34. Ibid., p. 103.

35. Marshall Sahlins, “Cosmologies of Capitalism: The Trans-Pacific Sector

of ‘The World System,’” Proceedings of the British Academy 74 (1988): 4. A sim-

ilar argument is made in John Comaroff and Jean Comaroff, eds., Modernity

and Its Malcontents: Ritual and Power in Postcolonial Africa (Chicago: Univer-

sity of Chicago Press, 1993), pp. xi–xii.

36. Pico Iyer, Video Night in Kathmandu, and Other Reports from the Not-

So-Far East (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988), p. 5.

37. Pierre Bourdieu, In Other Words: Essays toward a Reflexive Sociology

(Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1990), p. 155. Some authors seem

more hopeful about this sort of local adaptation of the global market: “Coun-

tries still have great leeway in structuring their own polities; the same television

program means different things to different audiences; McDonald’s adapts its

menu and marketing to local tastes” (Lechner and Boli, The Globalization Reader,

p. 2).

38. Michael Taussig, Mimesis and Alterity: A Particular History of the Senses

(London: Routledge, 1993), pp. 254–55.

39. Michel Foucault, “Michel Foucault and Zen,” in Foucault, Religion and

Culture, ed. Jeremy R. Carrette (New York: Routledge, 1999), p. 113.

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URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 337

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URBAN, Tantra 6/12/03 1:27 PM Page 367

Index

Abhinavagupta, xvi, 34–35, 189, 249,

193, 199; pervaded by Tantra, 59,

293n121. See also Tantràloka

63, 160

àgamas, 28–29, 43, 48

Bengal Renaissance, 21, 46, 61–62, 69

ÄgamavàgíMa, KKãJànanda, xi, 39,

Benjamin, Walter, 3, 14, 16, 19, 87–88,

292n105

97, 265

Aghorís, xiii, 261, 267–68, 275

Bernard, Pierre Arnold, 22, 116, 206,

akhaJja mahàyoga, 189–90

208–15, 219, 222, 236, 322n9,

America, 154–55, 203, 212, 215, 224–

323n16. See also Tantrik Order

25, 230–31, 235–38, 242, 249, 251,

in America

259, 270, 273

Bhabha, Homi, 82, 108, 131

American Tantra, 5, 204, 215, 226, 252–

Bhàgavata PuràJa, xv, 27, 36, 290n85

53, 270

Bhairava, 107, 108, 150. See also Tiva

Änandamaåh, 91, 94, 122–25, 304n68

Bhairaví BràhmaJí, 150–51, 312n43

anàtman, 43

bhakti, 69

anuttara-yoga, 31

Bharati, Agehananda, 16, 40, 158, 165–

Äryan myth, 54–55

66, 201, 207–8, 232, 270–71, 317n5

Äryans, 6, 24, 48, 54–55, 140, 156, 172,

Bhattacharyya, Narendra Nath, 7, 167,

184, 195–96

187, 191–202, 320nn93,94

Ärya Samàj, 45, 60

Bhowani (Bhawani), 82, 95

Assam, xii, 28, 90, 289n69

bio-politics, 45, 58

Atharva Veda, xv, 4, 25, 42–43

black magic, 52, 143, 208

Avalon, Arthur, 135, 295n26; as dual

Blavatsky, Helena Petrovna, 208

identity, 139, 310n2. See also Ghose,

Brahman, 25, 42, 65, 142, 190

Atal Behari; Woodroffe, Sir John

BràhmaJas, 26

avatàr, 89, 93, 135, 148, 153–54, 156,

Bràhmo Samàj, 45, 64, 68, 127

163

BKhat-Tantrasàra, xi, 39, 65, 292n105

Buddha, 30, 36, 233, 241, 259

Bàmàkãepa, 275–76

Buddhism, 1, 43, 52–54, 161, 163, 208,

Bande Mataram, 94, 123–25, 130, 188

235; Tantric, 15–16, 28–31, 52, 71,

Baptist Missionary Society, 50, 157

158, 233–34, 251, 270, 273, 290n90,

Bengal, xii, 19, 28, 61, 64, 67, 89–90,

291n101, 293n121, 296n33. See also

117, 122, 126–31, 144, 187–88,

Mantrayàna; Vajrayàna

367

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368

Index

Burton, Sir Richard Francis, 110–11, 208,

228, 236, 247, 258, 277; on-line,

307nn10,11. See also Kàma SÜtra

206, 253

Eliade, Mircea, 8, 10, 13, 22, 24,

cakra (pÜjà), 50, 66, 111–12, 119

165–68, 179–86, 193–94, 202–3,

cakras, 250, 253

318nn45,50

Calcutta, xii–xiii, 91–92, 137–38, 144,

Evola, Julius, 22, 166–68, 172–79, 183,

148, 160, 193

202, 221, 318n45

Campbell, Joseph, 201–3

capitalism, 3, 12–13, 16, 20, 22, 226,

fascism, 22, 168–69, 172–81; Eliade

236, 251, 266, 326n73; late or dis-

and, 180–81; Evola and, 172–79

organized, 207, 254–60, 262–63,

femininity, 3, 55, 57, 79, 96, 111, 154,

278–80, 285n8, 330n161, 331n162,

176, 297n48, 321n114

333n18

feminism, 114; and Tantra, 10, 146,

caryà, 31

229

Catholicism, compared with Tantra, 139,

five M’s, xiii, 40, 66, 119, 150. See also

143, 174

pañcamakàra or pañcatattva

censorship, 136, 147, 152–53, 162–64,

Foucault, Michel, xi, 2, 10–11, 13–14,

249–50. See also secrecy

45, 56, 58, 264, 274, 280–81

Chatterjee, Bankim Chandra, 91, 94,

119–26, 132, 144, 158, 304n68. See

genealogy, 3, 13–14, 265–66

also Änandamaåh; Bande Mataram

Ghose, Atal Behari, 138. See also Avalon,

Chinnamastà, 97, 101

Arthur

Christianity , xii, 2, 8, 47, 49–50, 59,

Ghose, Aurobindo, 64, 88–104, 130,

62–63, 83, 114, 121, 157–58, 169,

144, 155, 188, 303n57, 304n66,

174, 195, 197, 261; superseded by

305n88

Tantra, 147, 171, 178, 221, 224,

Ghose, Barindra, 91–92, 303nn57,58,59

240, 327n82

Ginsberg, Allen, 224, 235

Church of Tantra, 204

Guhyasamàja Tantra, xv, 29–30, 40,

coincidentia oppositorum, 179, 186

291nn91,93

Colebrooke, H. T., 48–49, 59

Gunga Din, 131–33

colonialism, xiii, 11–12, 17, 19, 21, 44–

105, 189, 266, 269, 273, 278–79,

Halbfass, Wilhelm, 15, 59, 62, 101,

288n57

103, 156–57, 277–79, 312n38,

communism, 192–94; Tantra as, 196,

314n75

199–201, 320n90

Hevajra Tantra, xv, 28

Crowley, Aleister, 22, 113, 206, 208,

Hínayàna, 30

216, 218–23, 239, 258

Hinduism, 1, 11, 19, 24, 40, 45–46,

“curry-effect,” 204

49–51, 59–61, 64, 69–70, 77, 101,

cyber space, 22, 250–54, 330n149

121, 154–57, 196, 270, 272,

324nn75,76; Christian missionary

Dakãinàcàra, 33–34

views of, 49–50, 77; as a con-

devadàsís, 58, 109, 306n8

structed category, 46, 51, 159–60,

Deví Bhàgvata PuràJa, 35

294n6; reform of, 59–63, 70, 121,

devil worship, 52, 54

154–58, 312n38, 314nn74,75,76

Deví Màhàtmya, 77

Home and the World, 126–31

dialectical image, 3, 4, 14–16, 87–88,

homoeroticism, 151–52

97, 104, 265–66, 285n11, 288n61.

homo faber, 13, 70

See also Benjamin, Walter; mimesis

homo religiosus, 13, 181–84

Doniger, Wendy, xiv, 25

homosexuality, 221–22, 229, 261, 270,

Dravidians, 54–55

324n45, 327n82, 332n187

drugs, 221, 223–24, 231, 257

Dubois, Abbé, 49–50

incest, 60, 296n31

Durgà, 77, 101, 128–29, 198, 310n70

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom,

133

East India Company, 47

Indian Mutiny, 73, 75–76, 85, 123,

ecstasy, xii, 9, 16, 22, 112, 119, 203,

299n1

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Index

369

Indus Valley, 195

Lakãmí Tantra, 291n99

Internet, 22, 250–54. See also cyber

Lamaism, 16, 53–54

space; World Wide Web

liberation, 6, 11

Islam, 46, 49, 71, 91, 121, 123, 198

Lincoln, Bruce, xiv, 13, 333n14

liGgam, 54–55. See also penis

Jagger, Mick, 204

liquor, 40, 50–51. See also madya

Jayaratha, 34

loom, 4, 25–26, 290n81

Jesus Christ, 59, 114, 148, 241

Jones, Sir William, 47–48, 59

madya, 40, 142

Jugantar, 73, 87, 92–93, 98, 303n57

magic, 2, 52

Jugantar (revolutionary group), 91, 97,

Mahàbhàrata, 4, 26, 28, 76, 178

130, 303n57, 321n114

MahànirvàJa Tantra, xv, 63–71, 142,

Jung, C. G., 165, 170, 201; and Tantra,

205; as a “woman’s Tantra,” 64,

315n1

142; date of composition, 67

Mahàyàna, 30–31, 53–54, 190

Kàdambarí, 107, 292n114

maithuna, xiii, 40, 66, 118–19, 142,

Kàlí, 9, 17–21, 48, 54–55, 58, 61, 63,

151, 186, 293n121, 319n58. See

68, 76–80, 109, 135, 147, 153,

also sex

157–58, 198, 201, 274, 300n15,

màFsa, 40, 142. See also meat

314n74, 321n114; in colonial

maJjala, 7, 171, 315n1

imagination, 77–79, 86, 109, 115–

mantra, 7, 37–38, 48, 61, 64, 143,

16, 118; as a dialectical image, 17,

292nn105,114

87–88, 97; and modern feminism,

Mantrayàna, 30

19, 21; as New Age goddess, 251–

ManusmKti, 27, 66, 67

52; and political unrest, 73–74, 76,

Marx, Karl, 87, 193, 199

79, 87–105, 115, 123, 129, 133,

Marxism, 187, 191–94, 199–201,

305n82; as Statue of Liberty, 224–

320n90

25; sweetening of, in modern Bengal,

masturbation, 259, 297n49

65; and Thuggee, 79–84

matsya, 40, 142

Kàlí Tantra, 49

Matsyendranàth, 33

Kali yuga, 66, 95, 139, 165, 172–73,

meat, 7, 40, 44, 50–51, 60, 142, 185

175–77

mi-chiao, 23, 289n67

Kalki, 93

mikkyo, 23

Kàmàkhyà, xiii, 266

mimesis, 15–17, 73, 88, 280

Kàma SÜtra, 2, 110–11, 208, 217, 223,

modernity, 139–41, 166–67, 226; science

228, 307n10

and, 140–41

Kàmika Ägama, 32

Monier-Williams, Sir Monier, 26

KapàlakuJjalà, 121–22

Mother, the (Mira Richards), 74, 101–3,

Kàpàlikas, 27, 35–37, 107–8, 121

305n92

Kartàbhajàs, xi, 9, 10, 275, 286n28

Mother Goddess, 6, 74, 104, 128, 193–

Kashmir Taivism, 34, 189, 249

96, 198, 201, 310n70. See also

Kathmandu, xiii, 266

Durgà; Kàlí; Mother India; Takti

Kaula, 33, 42, 61, 161, 249, 323n20

Mother India, 19, 74, 89, 94–95, 97–98,

Kaviraj, Gopinath, 167, 187–93, 202

123

Kellner, Karl, 217–18, 324n42

mudrà, 40, 142

Krafft-Ebing, Richard von, 56

Muktananda, Swami, 206, 243–50

Krama, 33, 35, 45

Müller, F. Max, 16, 54, 62, 254

kriyà, 31

mysticism, 8, 15–16, 42, 44, 47, 53, 75,

KKãJa, 121, 148, 178

85–86, 125, 231, 287n53

kãatriya, 96–97, 99

Kãemaràja, 35

Nàthas, 24, 187, 267–68

Kula, 33–35, 45, 291n101, 292n107

nationalism, 3, 21, 73–74, 86, 120–22,

kulaprakriyà, 34–35, 292n107

127, 131–33, 144–45, 153–54, 164,

KulàrJava Tantra, xv, 33, 40, 203,

180; Hindu, 159–60, 315n88;

205

revolutionary, 89–104, 126, 198

kuJjaliní, 6, 142, 246, 315n1

neocolonialism, 12, 262–63, 266, 269

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370

Index

Neo-Tantra, 5, 204, 236, 238–41, 254,

75; ambivalent relation to Tantra,

256, 259, 273, 278. See also

135, 147–53, 161–62, 312n38; as

Rajneesh, Bhagwan Shree

avatàr for the modern age, 135,

New Age, 5, 9–10, 22, 203, 207, 225–29,

153–54, 156, 314n74

243, 250, 257–58, 270, 326nn69,73

Ramakrishna Mission, 157, 316n5

nigamas, 23, 28, 43, 48, 63

Randolph, Paschal Beverly, 215–18,

Niruttara Tantra, xv, 32

323nn34,37, 324n43

nirvàJa, 29, 190, 278; nooky, 205

Reuss, Theodor, 217–18, 220, 324n42

Nivedita, Sister, 94, 154

revolution, 3, 19, 21, 73–76, 85–88,

91–105, 115, 122, 124, 126, 192,

Omnipotent Oom. See Bernard, Pierre

198, 239–40, 304n66, 309n63

Arnold

Rg Veda, xvi, 25

Ordo Templi Orientis, 113, 217–18, 220,

rgyd, 23, 289n67

228, 324n42, 325n52

Richards, Mira, 101–4, 305n92. See also

orgasm, 4–5, 9, 41, 217, 254, 259–61,

Mother, the

325n55

Rishikesh, 266–69, 283n5

orgies, 6, 41, 49–52, 70, 76, 86, 113,

Roy, Ràmmohun, 21, 61–70, 121, 294n6,

184, 186, 232, 260–62, 295n28,

299n91; and MahànirvàJa Tantra,

322n9

63–70

Orient, xi, 9, 12, 15

Rudrayàmala, 49

Orientalism, 3, 5, 10, 15–16, 20–22, 44–

72, 106, 143, 158–59, 208, 265

sacrifice, xiii, 51, 78, 80, 130, 300n15;

Osho, 5, 22, 206, 230, 235–43, 254,

human, 25–26, 52, 63, 73, 86, 93,

259–60, 273, 278, 329n112. See

97, 322n9

also Rajneesh, Bhagwan Shree

sàdhaka, xiv, 142

Osho Commune International, 242–43

sàdhu, 118, 267–69, 283n5; white

sàdhus, 268–69

Padma PuràJa, 27

Sahajiyàs, 187, 275, 334n25

Pañcamakàra or pañcatattva, 40, 142,

Said, Edward, 11, 57, 287n44

156. See also five M’s

Taivas, 32–33, 189

Pañcaràtra, 32, 45, 291n99

Taiva Siddhànta, 292n107

Pañcatantra, 27

Tàkta, 28, 32, 42, 45, 52, 63, 65, 92,

Parvatí, 64, 108, 308n40

126, 128, 147, 187, 193, 195,

PàMupatas, 27, 32

296n32

penis, 39, 41, 219, 324n52. See also

Takti, 24, 40, 65, 76, 85, 89, 100–105,

liGgam

141–42, 147, 153, 156, 191, 197,

Phansigars, 80–81

200, 203, 220, 229, 246, 250,

PiGgalàmata, 31

266; the Mother as, 101–3; and

pizza effect, 16, 288n58

nationalism, 93, 95–96, 100, 128–

postcolonial studies, 11–13; problems

29, 132, 145

with, 12–13, 284n6, 287n45

Makti-pÜjà, 49–50; as religion of Euro-

postmodernism, 238, 255, 275

peans, 156

prajñà, 40

Tàktism, 46, 51, 59, 63, 121, 128,

prakKti, 29, 102–3

189, 196–98; as “religion of the

PrànatoãiJí, 63, 292n105

oppressed masses,” 197–98, 200

PratyabhijñàhKdayam, 35, 292n110

samàdhi, 40, 65

primitive, xii, 15, 17, 79, 262, 276–77;

saFhitas, 23, 28, 32, 43

sex rites, 194–95

TaGkara, 26, 154, 157, 162–63, 238

prostitutes, 50, 236

Sannyàsí rebellion, 122

PuràJas, 23, 27, 33, 42, 77, 148, 158

sannyàsís, 91, 119–20, 122–23, 266, 268

Puruãa, 25–26, 102–3, 190

Saraswatí, Swàmí Dayànanda, 44, 60

Màstra, 23, 66–68, 134, 139

Rajneesh, Bhagwan Shree, 5, 22, 206,

Mava sàdhana, 121

230, 235–43, 256, 259, 278,

secrecy, 2, 31, 33, 51, 64, 70, 73, 76, 79,

328n106; as Tantric Messiah, 237.

82, 109, 149, 212, 303n59, 323n20;

See also Osho

sex and, 11, 44, 49, 55–56, 153,

Ramakrishna, Sri, 22, 135, 161–63, 274–

203–4, 220, 249, 307n11

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Index

371

secret societies, 76, 86, 91–92, 115, 116–

249, 264, 269–81, 283n1, 288n53,

17, 303n59. See also Jugantar

291n92, 293n126, 306n8, 333n10;

semen, 39, 41, 217–18, 293nn121,123,

definitions of, 4–6, 34–35, 42–43,

319n58

271–75, 286n25, 290n81; as dialec-

sex, xi–xiii, 4, 6–8, 10–11, 19, 20, 22,

tical category, 17, 19, 42–43, 202,

24, 70, 77, 87, 97, 106, 150–51, 157,

264–66; as “disease,” 1, 52–53, 58,

162, 176, 185, 194–95, 203–4,

70–71, 145, 196, 297n52; embod-

227–28, 232–33, 235, 240–42, 244–

ied, 273–75, 281; as “engine of

48, 257, 261, 269, 319n58, 325n55;

political change,” 261; etymology

commodification of, 236, 258–60,

of, 4, 23–28, 289n72, 290n78; as

262; divine power of, 213, 215–

“filthy path,” 150, 266; as “floating

22, 230, 241, 259, 323nn25,37;

signifier,” 23, 42; as “latrine door,”

as supreme bliss, 39, 41; in Tantric

150; as “lint ball,” 272; as “para-

practice, 34, 40–42, 49–52, 111,

site,” 160; as “primitive commu-

119, 151, 213–14, 244, 284n5;

nism,” 196–97, 199–201; as religion

in the United States, 8, 206, 213–

for modern world, 70, 165–202; as

14, 223–25, 236–37, 273; during

religion for the New Age, 226–27,

Victorian era, 2, 45, 55–58, 115,

258, 333n5; and revolution, 73–74,

206, 214. See also maithuna; orgies

85–105, 116–17, 126, 128, 130,

sex magic(k), 2, 4, 9, 22, 206, 208, 215–

132, 144, 198, 265–66; sanitization

22, 229, 259, 324n38, 325n52

of, 66, 69, 134–64, 271; as spiritual

sexual fluids, 41, 293n123, 325n52

logic of late capitalism, 207, 254–

sexuality, as modern category, 206,

60; as “spiritual sex,” 2, 4, 205–6,

322n5

228, 254, 321n1. See also American

sexual liberation, 9, 223, 229, 236, 240–

Tantra; Neo-Tantra; tan; tàntrika;

41, 261, 265

Tantrism; Western Tantra

sexual perversion, 56–57, 76, 113, 230,

Tantràloka, xvi, 34, 40, 189, 292n107.

297n49

See also Abhinavagupta; Kãemaràja

sexual repression, 9–11, 57, 117, 204,

tantraprakriyà, 34–35, 292n107

216, 224, 240–41, 261, 327n82

Tantraràja Tantra, 24

shaman, 17, 88–89

tantras, 8, 23, 26–27, 31–33, 36, 30,

Shangri-La, 16

40–42, 44, 50–51, 59, 63–64, 66,

siddha, 243–46

70, 102–3, 116, 134–35, 158, 161,

Siddha Yoga Dham of America, 243–50

189, 284n3, 312n43

Tiva, 24, 33, 40, 54–55, 64–65, 68, 97,

tantrasàra, 31

107–8, 142, 154, 190, 220, 308n40

Tantrasàra, 34, 63

Sleeman, William, 80–84

Tantra Tàstra, 134, 139–40, 145, 147

Smith, Jonathan Z., 11, 19, 69, 271–72

tantràvatàra, 24

TríMríràmakKãJakathàmKta, 147–48

tàntrika, 22, 27–28, 35, 58, 107, 118–

Trívidyà, 45, 274

19, 121–22, 146, 149, 151, 156,

Steel, Flora Annie, 114–17

162, 177, 185, 208, 254, 258, 266–

Sting, 4, 285n13

67, 308n40, 312n42; contrasted

Subaltern Studies, 104–5, 306n101

with vaidika, 27, 32, 290n85; neo-

suc, 27

tàntrika, 205

MÜdras, 27, 196–98

Tantrik Order in America, 22, 116, 203,

sÜtra, 27, 31, 42, 294n126

206, 208–15, 222, 227

Svacchanda Tantra, xvi, 32, 35

Tantrism, xi–xii, 4–5, 11, 16, 29, 32–33,

Swadeshi movement, 85, 91

35, 40, 42, 46–47, 49, 61, 136, 161,

Swadeshi Samàj, 126

167, 178, 283n1; as a “modern”

category, 2, 44–46, 51–52, 136–37,

Tagore, Rabindranath, 91, 104, 126–32,

284n3, 285n15

309n63

tantu, 26. See also loom; thread

tan, 4, 25–26

Tàràpíåh, xii, 266, 283n5

Tantra, 1–2, 4–5, 11, 14, 20, 31, 44, 47,

Taussig, Michael, 15, 74, 79, 88–89, 280

49, 53, 59, 61, 69, 91, 106, 108,

terrorism, 21, 92–93, 126, 128

134, 151, 165, 168, 184–85, 192,

thread, 20, 25–26, 42–43, 272. See also

203–5, 213, 215, 223, 240, 244,

loom; tan

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372

Index

Thuggee, 74, 79–85, 109, 132–33,

Vivekananda, Swami, 22, 94, 134–36,

300n20, 302nn34,40

147–48, 153–64, 314nn65,66,

Tibet, 29, 52–53, 158, 231

314n69; ambivalence toward Tantra,

transgression, 7, 11, 51–52, 126, 150,

161–63

167, 177–79, 186, 214, 229, 244,

víra, 142, 176

261, 264

Trika, 33–35, 42, 292n107, 293n121

Ward, Reverend William, 50, 77, 295n26

Trungpa, Chogyam, 206, 224, 230–35,

Watts, Alan, 223, 225

257, 263–64, 331n171

Western Tantra, 228–29. See also

Tucci, Giuseppe, 15, 166, 316n5

American Tantra, Neo-Tantra

Wicca, 4

Upaniãads, 26, 33, 45, 62, 140, 154

Wilson, H. H., 51, 295n26

upàya, 40, 235

wine, 7, 44, 51, 60, 110, 113, 185.

See also madya

vagina, 39, 150, 293n123, 325n52

witchcraft, 52

vaidika, 27, 32, 290n85

Wittgenstein, Ludwig, 23, 42–43, 269,

VaiãJava, 32–33, 69, 189

273

Vajradhàra, 29–30

women, 9–10, 55, 67, 110–11, 118, 146,

Vajrayàna, 30–31, 42, 53–54, 71, 208,

198, 214, 217; in Tantric practice,

233–34, 251

41, 50–52, 214, 293n124, 332n187,

vajrolí mudrà, 247

334n19

Vàmàcàra, 33–34, 134, 158–61, 219;

women’s liberation, 19. See also

as religion of Europeans, 156

feminism

Vàmas, 27, 61

Woodroffe, Sir John, 6, 8, 22–24, 33,

varJas, 66

134–47, 163–64, 168, 271, 275,

Vedànta, 6, 62, 69, 135, 140, 142,

280; dual identity of, 138, 310n2,

148–49, 154–57, 162, 167, 197,

311n21. See also Avalon, Arthur

311nn21,36; neo-Vedànta, 156–

World War II, 102, 173–74, 180–81

57. See also Vivekananda, Swami;

World Wide Web, xiii, 9, 250–54

Woodroffe, Sir John

Vedas, 6, 24–27, 33, 44–45, 51, 59, 62,

yàmalas, 28, 33, 43

64, 70, 98, 116, 135, 140, 148, 154,

yantra, 7, 26, 37, 171, 204

160, 172, 195, 292. See also vaidika

yoga, 31, 65, 167, 179, 182, 191, 211,

Victorian era, 2, 6, 7, 9–11, 20, 56–59,

213, 223, 238–39, 315n1

106–18, 135, 208, 214

yogi, 48, 191, 210, 267

VíJàMikha Tantra, xvi, 29, 31

yoginí, 9, 30, 112

violence, 58, 75, 77, 86–87, 92–93, 96,

Yoginí Tantra, 269

129–30, 146, 167, 176, 181, 186,

261, 266–67

Zimmer, Heinrich, 8, 10, 22, 166–73,

ViãJu, 27, 291n99

179, 202–3

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Document Outline

- Illustrations

- Preface and Acknowledgments

- Abbreviations

- Introduction: Diagnosing the “Disease”of Tantra

- 1 The Golden Age of the Vedas and the Dark Age of Kàlí

- 2 Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess: Tantra and Political Violence in Colonial India

- 3 India’s Darkest Heart: Tantra in the Literary Imagination

- 4 Deodorized Tantra: Sex, Scandal, Secrecy, and Censorship in the Works of John Woodroffe and Swami Vivekananda

- 5 Religion for the Age of Darkness: Tantra and the History of Religions in the Twentieth Century

- 6 The Cult of Ecstasy: Meldings of East and West in a New Age of Tantra

- Conclusion: Reimagining Tantra in Contemporary Discourse

- Notes

- Bibliography

- Index

Table of Contents

Illustrations

Preface and Acknowledgments

Abbreviations

Introduction: Diagnosing the “Disease”of Tantra

1 The Golden Age of the Vedas and the Dark Age of Kàlí

2 Sacrificing White Goats to the Goddess: Tantra and Political Violence in Colonial India

3 India’s Darkest Heart: Tantra in the Literary Imagination

4 Deodorized Tantra: Sex, Scandal, Secrecy, and Censorship in the Works of John Woodroffe and Swami Vivekananda

5 Religion for the Age of Darkness: Tantra and the History of Religions in the Twentieth Century

6 The Cult of Ecstasy: Meldings of East and West in a New Age of Tantra

Conclusion: Reimagining Tantra in Contemporary Discourse

Notes

Bibliography

Index