Nath Sampradaya - FP

Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2011 BEH, vol.
III
Also available online www.brill.nl
features that characterize the Nth Sampradya
today will be summarized (for a more detailed
ethnography of todays Nths, see Bouillier, 2008;
see also Knphat s), followed by an examina-
tion of their historicity: Nths today claim that
their characteristics were introduced by Goraks a
when he founded the Sampradya, but many are
of more recent origin. Aspects of Nth identity
that are shared with other groups, such as the
Nth ascetics observance of typical Hindu
renouncers vows (see sdhus), will not be
examined in detail.
Today the ascetic branch of the Nth Sampradya
is quite distinct from that of the householders.
Membership of the former is open to all and
efected by initiation from an ascetic Nth guru.
Householder Nths greatly outnumber ascetics
Te Nth Sampradya today comprises an order
of renunciate ascetics and a householder caste,
both of which trace their lineages to a group
of nine Nth gurus headed by dintha (First
Nth), who is identifed with the god iva. Next
in most lists of nine Nths comes Matsyendrantha,
followed by Goraks antha (Gorakhnth), who is
said to have founded the Nth order of ascetics.
Te earliest references to the Nth ascetic order
as an organized entity date to the beginning of
the 17th century, but its frst historical gurus,
Matsyendrantha and Goraks antha, lived much
earlier, probably in the 9th and 12th centuries,
respectively, and during the intermediate period
there are numerous references to both ascetic and
householder Nths in texts, inscriptions, iconog-
raphy, and historical reports. In this article, the
Nth Sampradya
Fig. 1: Two ascetics, early 19th century. On the right is a Knphat Nth ( British Library India Ofce Select Materials, Shelf-
mark Add.27255, f.399b).
Nath Sampradaya_1-20.indd 1 8/3/2011 5:31:31 PM
2 Nth Sampradya
and consist of a broad variety of mainly endoga-
mous castes. Tey see themselves as descendants
of Nth ascetics who broke their vows of celibacy
and settled down as householders. Householder
Nths are found throughout India and Nepal,
with certain regions, such as Karnataka, Rajast-
han, West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand,
and Nepal, having higher concentrations than
others. Te various householder Nth castes
include a wide range of social groups, from low-
status Muslim bards in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar
to relatively high-status Sanskritized jogs (Hind.
yog) and Nths in Rajasthan and Karnataka,
respectively.
Te ascetic Nth order is overseen by an orga-
nization called the Akhil Bharatvarshiya Ava-
dhoot Bhesh Barah Panth Yogi Mahasabha (Te
All-Indian Great Assembly of the Renunciate
Yogis of the Twelve Lineages), which was
founded in 1906 and whose headquarters are in
Haridwar. Tere are approximately eight to ten
thousand Nth ascetics in India today (Bouillier,
2008, 15). Teir monasteries, which number about
fve hundred, are found mostly in northern and
western India. Tere are also a handful of monas-
teries in each of the following regions of the sub-
continent: Bihar, Bengal, Assam, Orissa, Andhra
Pradesh, Karnataka, Nepal, and Pakistan.
Nth ascetics may be sthndhr, sedentary,
but most are itinerant. A troop of Nth ascetics
that is known as the jamt and has a foating pop-
ulation of about one hundred wanders continu-
ously about India, reinforcing the collective Nth
ascetic identity by attending important Nth
festivals. Tese festivals recur in annual and lon-
ger cycles. Navartra is spent at Jwalamukhi in
Himachal Pradesh and krttikprn im (full moon
in OctNov) at Pushkar in Rajasthan. During the
month of mgh (JanFeb), a Nth mel is held at
Pushkar, from which the jamt travels to Girnar
to celebrate ivartr. Te jamt attends all of the
triennial kumbhamels. Afer the kumbhamel
held every 12 years at Nasik (the next being in
2016), the jamt spends six months walking to the
Nth monastery at Kadri, near Mangalore in
Karnataka, to install on ivartr a new rj yog
(see below), who is elected at the Nasik mel and
walks with the jamt.
Te appearance and lifestyle of Nth ascetics
are very similar to those of other North Indian
ascetics, in particular the Daanm ng
sam nyss, Rmnand tygs, and Udss (see
sdhus). Tey are celibate, they wear loincloths
and dhots (never undergarments or trousers),
they cover their bodies in ash, and they ofen
wear their hair in jat , dreadlocks, although
several Nths keep their hair short. Tey live by a
dhn or sacred fre, and many smoke cannabis.
Tere are very few female ascetic Nths.
Te Nth order is traditionally associated with
the practice of yoga and Tantra, certain varieties
of which are said to have originated from their
frst gurus, Matsyendra and Goraks a, but today
few pursue either very assiduously. Despite their
founders reputation as its frst teacher, almost no
Nths practice Hat ha Yoga (see Yoga). Te ini-
tiatory, funereal, and other important rituals of
the order are tantric, with the goddess Bl/
Tripursundar (see Kashmir) being the focus
of worship, but for many ascetic Nths, their daily
religious observance consists of living a renunci-
ate life and worshipping the orders deities and
gurus in a manner consistent with typical North
Indian bhakti. Te central object of worship in
several monasteries, and for the itinerant jamt, is
the ptr, a pot containing items emblematic of the
Nths: the sngnd jane, earrings, a rudrks a
ml, and a chillum, the clay pipe used for smoking
cannabis (Bouillier, 2008, 43).
Te religious life of householder Nths also
consists for the most part in devotional practices,
in particular the communal singing of bhajans
(see krtan and bhajan), as well as listening to
public performances of Nth bards singing epic
romances about legendary Nth ascetics, kings,
and heroes. In some regions, Nth householders
function as hereditary temple priests (e.g. Nepal:
Bouillier, 1986). Certain communities of Rajast-
hani Nth householders engage in secret sexual
rites (Gold, 2002). Like their ascetic counterparts,
Nth householders are usually buried afer death.
All Nths, whether ascetics or householders,
wear around their necks the sngnd jane, a long
black woollen thread on which a very small horn,
a rudrks a seed, and a ring are strung. Te horn
(which is really more of a whistle) is blown during
certain rituals and before eating. Most Nth ascet-
ics and a diminishing number of householders
wear thick, hooped earrings in slits cut in the car-
tilages (not the lobes) of their ears, because of
which they are also known as Knphat (split-
eared) yogs, a somewhat derogatory name that is
eschewed by Nths themselves. All Nths hail one
another with the greeting de (see below). Tey
are aiva, ofen worshipping iva as Bhairava, a
form associated with tantric practice.
Nth Sampradya 3
Elements of Nth Identity
Te Name Nth
Te use of the name Nth (Skt. ntha) to denote
an order of human ascetics is relatively recent,
dating to approximately the 18th century (SidPad.
5.43; *deapadavykhy folio 17, recto line 1;
folio 18, recto line 8). Before this time the mem-
bers of the various ascetic lineages that were to
become the Nth Sampradya were known as
yogs (as they still are in the name of the modern
Nth organization, the above-mentioned Yogi
Mahasabha). Householder Nths were also known
thus, and it was not until the 20th century that
they began to refer to themselves as Nths, in a bid
to elevate their status and escape the pejorative
connotations of the name yog/jog, which had
come to be associated with low-status castes and
mendicant orders (Gold, 1992, 51). Tis has hap-
pened only in Rajasthan; elsewhere householder
Nths are still for the most part known as yogs
or jogs.
Te names of some of the early Nth gurus did
sometimes bear the sufx -ntha, but other suf-
fxes are also found, including -pda, -p, -deva,
and -; very ofen the early gurus names are
found without any sufx at all. Meanwhile many
humans and gods with no connection with the
Nth Sampradya have names that bear the sufx
-ntha, for example, the Jaina saints dintha,
Prvantha, and so on; the 16th-century guru of
the Vallabha Sampradya, Vit t halnth; Krs na
as Gopnth, the lord of the shepherd girls; and
Vis nu as Jagannth at Puri (see Orissa). In
a modern gazetteer, a group of fve Vais nava
trthas spread across India is known as the Pac
Nth (Trthnk, 561). From at least the 10th cen-
tury (see below), we fnd groupings of semidivine
Nths, but they are not associated with a human
Nth Sampradya. Prior to the 18th century,
when the word ntha/nth is found on its
own, whether in Sanskrit or a regional language,
it simply means Lord and is usually used to
address a god or an important person. Many
commentators and scholars have seized upon
instances of the word or sufx -ntha as indicative
of the existence of a Nth Sampradya, but until
the 18th century, the word was not used as such.
Te hybrid Hindi/Sanskrit term Nth siddha,
which is commonly used in secondary literature
to denote members of the ascetic Nth Sampradya
throughout the ages, is not found in premodern
literature.
It might be supposed that the forerunners of
the Nths were denoted by the name yog, but
this term is also ambiguous as it has been used, at
least until the modern period, to denote yoga-
practicing ascetics belonging to a wide range
of orders, in particular those of the Daanm
sam nyss and Rmnands. In the absence of
nomenclature as a defnitive criterion for identi-
fying Nths and in the light of there being no
evidence of an organized pan-Indian order of
Nths prior to the beginning of the 17th century,
in order to analyze the history of the Nth
Sampradya during its formative period, the his-
tory of the various elements that constitute Nth
identity today will now be examined in turn. At
the risk of historical inaccuracy, for the sake of
convenience, the forerunners of the members
of what is now known as the Nth Sampradya are
herein usually referred to as Nths.
Te Nine Nths
While there are some relatively early (c. 10th-
century) descriptions of groupings of Nths (see
below), the tradition of nine Nths to which
todays Nth Sampradya traces its origins has
more names in common with those found in early
lists of siddhas than in early lists of Nths. Te
siddhas were semidivine humans who had become
perfected (siddha) as a result of their mastery of
yoga, alchemy ( rasyana), and other esoteric
means. Tey were renowned for their magical
powers (siddhis) and, ofen, their antinomian
behavior. All these features are attributed to
the various nine Nths associated with the Nth
Sampradya. Early lists of siddhas (which usually
name, or purport to name, 84), such as those found
in the 13th-century Tibetan account ascribed to
Abhayadattar, the early 14th-century Maithili
Varnaratnkara (57), and the 15th-century Sanskrit
Hat hapradpik (1.51.8), include dintha, Mat-
syendra, Goraks a, Caurang, Jlandhara, Carpat a,
Knhapa, and Bhartrhari, all of whom appear in
some or all of the later lists of the nine Nths.
Te popularity of the siddhas transcended sec-
tarian boundaries, and the siddhas themselves
appear from their legends not to have claimed
allegiance to any particular sects. Because of the
appearance of the names of siddhas associated
with the Nth tradition in Buddhist lists of
siddhas, such as that of Abhayadattar, some scholars
have postulated Buddhist origins for the Nths.
Tere is nothing in the doctrines associated with
the Nth tradition to support this.
4 Nth Sampradya
First in most of the lists of nine Nths is
dintha (First Nth), who is identifed with
iva. While the Nth tradition is and always has
been predominantly aiva, recent centuries have
seen an increased emphasis on this aspect of their
identity. Nths depicted in medieval miniatures
do not sport the archetypally aiva rudrks a seed
necklaces and tripun dra ash forehead markings
that are commonplace today. Goraks anth nowa-
days is ofen identifed with iva, supplanting
dintha. A popular Hindi Nth mantra is om
iv goraks .
Tere is a great deal of variety in the number
and names of the members of the many lists of the
Nths afer dintha (see e.g. Dvivedi, 1996,
2527; White, 1996, 9095). Early taxonomies of
Nths found in texts of tantric traditions associ-
ated with forerunners of the Nth Sampradya do
not agree on their number: those of the Kubjik
cult (see Kashmir, Bhairava) talk of 25
(Sanderson, 2009, 297n704), other works of
the Pacimmnya (the Western Transmission
of Kaula Tantra) and those of the Trika (see
Tantra) and Kl cults give lists of four
(Sanderson, 1988, 688), the Sat shasrasam hit
describes 18 (Schoterman, 1982, 3538), and the
13th-century Matsyendrasam hit (9.9) mentions
a group of seven (see also Kiss, 2009, 3638). None
of these lists includes Goraks a (or iva) among its
Nths; only those of the Trika and Kl cults or the
later mbhava variant of aivism (on the latter
see Kiss, 2009, 40) include Matsyendra. Te
frst list of Nths to include Goraks a is in an
inscription from near the Kallevara Temple at
Kukkunoor in Karnataka dated to 1279 (Lewis
Rice, 1903, 154155). Tis list, which includes the
names of eight (or possibly nine) Nths, does not
mention Matsyendra but does include dintha.
Te earliest text to give a list of nine Nths that
corresponds with those later associated with the
Nth Sampradya is the Telegu Navanthacaritra
(Deeds of the Nine Nths), which dates to the late
15th century (Rao, Shulman & Subrahmanyam,
1992, 125). Tis texts nine Nths include iva,
Mna (i.e. Matsyendra), Goraks a, Srangadhara
(i.e. Caurang), and Ngrjuna. Te nine Nths
are not mentioned in any of the Sanskrit texts on
Hat ha Yoga associated with the Nths; in fact, no
Sanskrit texts include lists of nine Nths associated
with the Nth Sampradya prior to the approxi-
mately 18th-century Goraks asiddhntasam graha,
which cites a list from a Tantramahrn ava, a work
of doubtful antiquity, doubt compounded by its
inclusion of Datttreya in its list of Nths.
Datttreya has only ever been associated with
the Nth Sampradya in the Deccan region,
and the formalization of that association dates
to approximately the 18th century, when texts
such as the Marathi Navanthabhaktisra sym-
bolically united the Nth Sampradya with the
Mahnubhv sect by identifying nine Nths
with nine Nryanas. Te nine Nths are not
mentioned in the approximately 17th-century
Hindi works ascribed to Gorakhnth, but there
are references to them in the approximately
1600 CE Gur Granth Shib (1.11; 13.3.1; 10.1
[see Callewaert, 1996, 839, 1160, 1390]), the
approximately 18th-century Siddhnt Pat al, a
ritual handbook ascribed to Rmnand (see
Prasad et al., n.d., 7, 29, 31, 3334, 37, 40), and the
Goraks Upanis ad, whose date is uncertain but
is also likely to date to the 18th century. As a cor-
ollary of the attempts to organize various dispa-
rate groups of yogs under the tutelage of
Goraks a (see below), many lists of the nine Nths
from the 18th century and later do not include
Goraks antha: Goraks a is the godhead (he is
referred to as rnth and identifed with the andi
anant purus , the eternal person; Dvivedi, 1996,
27), and the nine Nths are said to be his avatrs.
Several Sanskrit and Hindi hagiographical works
treating the deeds of the nine Nths were com-
posed in Jodhpur in the early 19th century. Today
hagiographies of the nine Nths are widely avail-
able in a variety of vernacular languages.
Individual Nths
Te names most commonly found in the lists of
Nths associated with the Nth Sampradya are
those of Matsyendra and Goraks a, with the latter
generally said to be Matsyendras disciple. A sum-
mary of the data and legends on these two fgures
is given below, followed by brief rsums of other
Nths.
Matsyendra
Matsyendra (Lord of the Fishes) is known
by a variety of piscine names, including Mna,
Macchandar, and Macchaghna. He is associated
with both the Prvmnya and Pacimmnya
(Eastern and Western) transmissions of Kaula
Tantra, as well as their later southern variant
Nth Sampradya 5
known as mbhava, and a variety of texts associ-
ated with these traditions are attributed to him.
He is mentioned in Abhinavaguptas approxi-
mately 1000 CE Tantrloka (29.32) as a Siddha by
the name of Macchanda whose consort is called
Kunkunmb (Te Goddess from the Konkan).
Tis and the provenance of the texts of the cults
associated with him (see below) indicate that
Matsyendra lived in southern India, probably the
Deccan, in the 9th to 10th centuries. He is said to
have reformed the practices of the Kula, which
were associated with yogins living in cremation
grounds thirsty for blood and other bodily fuids,
into the slightly tamer practices of Kaulism (Sander-
son, 1985, 214n110). Matsyendras cult, as evinced
by the 13th-century Matsyendrasam hit, still
involved sexual and other unorthodox practices.
Nth tradition and legends found in a number of
texts including the Matsyendrasam hit and the
early 15th-century Maithili Goraks avijaya main-
tain that Matsyendras disciple Goraks a further
reformed Matsyendras licentious ways, rescuing
him from ensnarement in the land of women.
Goraks a
In the process of reforming the practices of Mat-
syendra, Goraks a (who is known as Gorakh in
vernacular languages) is said to have founded the
ascetic Nth Sampradya and to have been the
frst teacher of Hat ha Yoga, whose practices place
great importance on celibacy and internalize the
sexual practices of Kaula Tantra. Several Sanskrit
texts on Hat ha Yoga are attributed to Goraks a as
well as an extensive corpus of vernacular verses in
the tradition of nirgun a bhakti.
Te frst datable references to Goraks a are
from the early 13th century. He is mentioned
in passing in the Amrtakan ikodyotanibandha of
Vibhticandra, who was born in northern Bengal
toward the end of the 12th century (Stearns, 1996).
Various mentions in Hariharas Kannada Ragales
date to a similar period, in particular, the
Revan asiddhevara Ragale, in which Revana
defeats Gorakha in a magic contest.
Other 13th-century references to Goraks a can
be found in the Matsyendrasam hit, which was
composed in South India (Kiss, 2009, 28); the
Tibetan account of the lives of the 84 siddhas
ascribed to Abhayadattar, in which he is said to
have been born in eastern India; the Kallevara
inscription of 1279 in Karnataka, which was men-
tioned above; and an inscription at Somnath dated
1287 in which he is included among a list of fve
deities. Two Old Marathi works, the 1278
Llcaritra and the 1290 Jnevar, also mention
Goraks a, but the dating of their various recen-
sions is uncertain. Two of the earliest works
on Hat ha Yoga, the Vivekamrtan da and the
(*)Goraks aataka, which both date to the
13th century and whose teachings are similar
to those on yoga found in the Jnevar, were
attributed to Goraks a either at the time of their
composition or not long aferward. Tese early
references to Goraks a and the provenance of the
cults and texts with which he was associated
suggest that he lived in the Deccan region in the
11th to 12th centuries.
References to Goraks a from the 14th century
are found in a list of siddhas in the Maithili
Varn aratnkara; the rn gadharapaddhati (4372
4373), which was compiled near Jaipur in 1363; a
rock inscription at Itum Bahal in the Kathmandu
Valley dated 1382 in which Madanarma Vard-
dhana, a senior minister of King Jayasthiti Malla,
describes himself as gorakhtmajais ya, a pupil
of a descendant of Gorakh (Vajracarya, 1975,
34); and an inscription dated 1391 at the Gorakh-
nath cave in Pharping, also in the Kathmandu
Valley, which records the building by the jog
Acintantha of stone feet of Goraks a for worship
(Regmi, 1966, 31). Te Amaraughaprabodha, a
Sanskrit work on yoga, is likely to date to the
14th century and was attributed to Goraks a. From
the 15th century onward, references to Goraks a
and texts attributed to him become much more
common.
Other Nths
Below is a list of well-known Nths other than
Matsyendra and Goraks a. A wealth of conficting
and overlapping legends surrounds all of them;
only their most important and best-attested char-
acteristics are given here.
Jlandharnth
(or Jlandhari, Jlandharip, Hdip, Jvlendra,
Blnth, Blgund). Usually said to be from
Jalandhar in Punjab and to have travelled to Ben-
gal, Jlandharnth is mentioned in texts dating
back to at least the 13th century. He is ofen said
to have been Matsyendras disciple and the guru
of both Knhap and Gopcand. In some impor-
tant Nth centers, such as those at Jogi Tilla in
Punjab and Jodhpur in Rajasthan, he was the pre-
eminent Nth until as recently as two hundred
years ago.
6 Nth Sampradya
Knhap
(or Knhu, Kan er, Kr s n apda, Karn arip, Kniph,
Knanp). Old Bengali songs by this siddha,
in which he calls himself a Kplika, date to
approximately the 10th century, and he is usually
said to have been from the Bengal region. In the
Goraks avijaya, which was composed in the early
15th century, he accompanies Goraks a, but in
later times, he is associated with Jlandharnth
and said to be his disciple. Teir cult is ofen dis-
tinguished from that of Goraks a, and their panth
(path) is not included in the twelvefold schema.
Caurang
(or Srangadhara, Pran Bhagat). Te son of King
Devapla of Bengal, Caurangs father punished
him by cutting of his arms and legs and abandon-
ing him in a forest. He was rescued by Matsyen-
dra, who taught him yoga, using which he was
able to make his limbs grow back. As Pran Bhagat
his story became very popular in Punjab. His
principal shrine is at Sialkot, now in Pakistan.
Carpat
Renowned for his expertise in alchemy, Carpat is
said to have lived in the Chamba region of the
Himalayas. In the Hindi verses attributed to him
he espouses the doctrines of the avadhta (see
below), shunning the observances and outward
appearance of the Nth yog.
Bhartrhari
King of Ujjain before renouncing the throne to
become a yog. Te Nth Bhartrhari is ofen
identifed with the poet and grammarian of the
same name. He is variously said to have been a
disciple of either Goraks a or Jlandhara.
Gopcand
(or Gopcandra, Govindacandra). Te son of
Queen Mayanmat of Bengal, Gopcands guru is
usually said to have been Jlandharnth.
Ratannth
Famous as both a Nth and a Suf (by the name of
H jji Ratan), Ratannth lived in the 13th century
or earlier. His cult fourished across the north of
the subcontinent, in particular in Punjab and
Nepal. He was the guru of Gg Pr (see Rajast-
han), the subject of a cycle of legends from the
Punjab and Rajasthan.
Dharamnth
In the 15th century, Dharamnth settled at
Dhinodhar in Kacch, where he founded a Nth
monastery, which remained important into the
20th century. He is said to have desiccated the
region as the result of his austerities.
Mastnth
Te founder of the important Nth monastery at
Asthal Bohar in Haryana, Mastnth lived in the
18th century.
Some of the above Nths, in particular
Gopcand, Bhartrhari, and Caurang (as Pran
Bhagat), are the subjects of songs performed by
wandering bards. In addition there are popular
song cycles about Gg Pr, Hr and Rjha, and
Rn Pingal, in whose narratives Nths fgure or
whose protagonists become Nth yogs. Te dom-
inant themes of these cycles are royalty, renuncia-
tion, and romance.
Localized Nth Traditions
Prior to the preliminary organization of Nth
ascetics into an order in the 16th to 17th centuries,
their forerunners comprised various disparate
lineages and localized traditions. Tese diferent
origins continue to infuence regional Nth
traditions.
Te South
Te majority of the early textual and epigraphic
references to Matsyendra and Goraks a are from
the Deccan and elsewhere in peninsular India; the
others are from eastern India. Travellers reports
of yogs contemporaneous with the earliest refer-
ences to Goraks a are almost all from the Malabar
Coast (e.g. Husain, 1953, 164; Rockhill, 1915,
450451). Te earliest iconographic representa-
tions of Nth-type yogs are those found at
Panhalekaji in the Konkan region, which are
dated to the 13th century (Deshpande, 1986), and
the 15th-century examples from Srisailam on the
Deccan plateau (Shaw, 1997) and Vijayanagara
(Verghese, 1995, 113, pl. 53). Contrary to Nth
hagiographical tradition, the early accounts that
give details about Goraks a do not portray him as
a celibate ascetic. In Hariharas Ragales, Goraks a
is said to be married (the Revan asiddhevara
Ragale describes him as living in Kolhapur with
two wives). In the Matsyendrasam hit, he is a
Nth Sampradya 7
king. More than a century later, in Nepal, the Itum
Bahal Inscription mentions a gorakhtmaja,
a [blood] descendant of Gorakh. Although
the earliest traditions maintain that Matsyendra
founded both celibate and noncelibate lineages,
the latter appear to have been more prominent.
Early travellers descriptions of yogs ofen note
that they are married. Te Chinese traveller
Mahuan visited Cochin in 1415, where he saw
married yogs (Rockhill, 1915, 450451). Te
King of the Ioghes from the west coast described
by Varthema in 1505/1506 had a wife and chil-
dren, although included among his entourage
were what sound very much like celibate ascetics
(Badger, 1863, 111112).
Te southern provenance of the early yogs and
their being married tallies with the doctrines and
provenance of the earliest texts associated with
the Nths and their Pacimmnya aiva fore-
bears. A. Sanderson (2011, 4445) locates the
writing of the frst Pacimmnya texts in modern
Maharashtra, from where manuscripts spread to
Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Kashmir, east India, and the
Kathmandu Valley. Te sacred sites taught in
the Kubjikmata and other early Pacimmnya
works are located in various parts of the subcon-
tinent with eastern India and the Deccan strongly
represented. Te Far South, the upper Ganges
valley, the Panjab, Kashmir and the North-West
are absent (Sanderson, 2011, 77). Te texts asso-
ciated with the early Nth tradition, in particular
the Kaulajnanirn aya and Matsyendrasam hit,
both of which are ascribed to Matsyendra, teach a
wide range of arcane tantric practices, including
rites involving sexual intercourse. As well as their
not being celibate, in early reports yogs are said to
possess a variety of tantric siddhis and to have a
disregard for the norms of Brahmanical ortho-
doxy. Te yog donee in the Kallevara Inscription
of 1279 is said to be an adept in a variety of magi-
cal tantric arts. A Persian work called the Nizm
Dakan written near Bidar in northeast Karnataka
in 14301435 describes a Jog called Aghornth
who boasts of his powers of alchemy, shape shif-
ing, and entering others bodies, and he says that
all Jogis consume wine and meat (Digby, 2004,
336339).
Te earliest texts on Hat ha Yoga associated
with the Nths, the Vivekamrtan da and
(*)Goraks aataka, both of which are ascribed
to Goraks a, are likely to originate from Maha-
rashtra and date to the 13th century. While there
is nothing specifc in the texts to locate them, they
have much in common with the teachings found
in Jndevs Old Marathi commentary on the
Bhagavadgt. Tis text, which was composed
in 1290 and is popularly known as the Jnevar,
combines yogic teachings (ascribed to Goraks a)
with vedantic discourse (ascribed to preceptors
whose names have the sufx -nth) in a
similar fashion to the Vivekamrtan da and
(*)Goraks aataka.
In Karnataka, on a hill on the outskirts of
Mangalore on the Malabar coast, we fnd what
may be the oldest Nth monastery still in use.
Te Kadri mat ha sits on a hill above the temple
of Majunth, which houses three beautiful
Buddhist bronzes (now interpreted as Hindu)
from the 10th century. Kadri is sometimes identi-
fed with Kadaldea, the land in which Matsyen-
dra is said in legend to have been ensnared in
the ways of wine, women, and song before being
rescued by his disciple, Goraks a. Te frst refer-
ence to Nths at Kadri is in a Tulu Inscription
dated 1475 (Bouiller, 2008, 96). It describes one
Candrantha Odeya as the King of Kadri. Sub-
sequent descriptions of the head of the mat ha call
him the King of the Yogs, and the Nth head
of the Kadri monastery is still known (in Hindi)
as the rj yog. An inscription dated 1490 associ-
ates Kadri with the worship of Gorakhntha
(Bhatt, 1975, 294).
In 1505/1506 the Italian traveller Varthema
reported how the King of the Ioghe, enjoying
the protection of the Vijayanagar Empire, did
indeed live like a powerful king. He ruled over
about thirty thousand people; he and his people
were considered to be saints; every three or four
years he would go on a pilgrimage . . . with three
or four thousand of his people, and with his wife
and children as well as four or fve coursers, and
civet-cats, apes, parrots, leopards, and falcons;
and he would wear a goat skin and travel through
the whole of India (Badger, 1863, 111112).
His troop undertook various austerities, and some
also carried weapons as well as items that became
Nth emblems, such as earrings and horns.
But when Pietro della Valle visited Kadri in
1624, the then king of the Yogs told him that
formerly he had Horses, Elephants, Palanchinos
and a great equipage and power before Venkatpa
Naieka took away all from him, so that now he
had very little lef (Grey, 1892, 351). Della Valle
notes that the Yogs do not have wives (Grey,
1892, 349350). Te depredations the king of the
Yogs sufered at the hands of Venkt appa Nyaka
8 Nth Sampradya
were caused by the demise of the Vijayanagar
Empire, but the reasons for his adoption of celi-
bacy are unclear. Te legend of the founding of
the Nth mat ha at Vittal, approximately 20 km
from Kadri, may, however, be illustrative of what
happened at Kadri. It is said that in the 17th cen-
tury a troop of celibate Yogs under the leadership
of Meharnth came from the north and so
impressed the local king with their magical pow-
ers that he gave them the territory of Vittal. To
this day, the head of the Vittal mat ha is known as
the rjguru, and he occasionally functions as an
ofciant at Kadri (Bouillier, 2008, 130). It seems
likely that the northern ascetic Nth Sampradya
also annexed Kadri in the 17th century as part of
its claim to pan-Indian status. From the time of
the mat has earliest records (1860), the rj yog at
Kadri has come from northwest India. Te cur-
rent incumbent, like his predecessors, speaks no
Kannada and has very little to do with the large
and prosperous local householder Yog caste (to
their displeasure). He is supported by devotees
from Rajasthan, in particular wealthy Marwari
businessmen who have taken up residency in
Karnataka.
Further information on the association of
the Kadri mat ha with Yogs of the north is likely
to be found in the Kadalmajunthamhtmya,
whose oldest manuscript was copied in 1730 CE
(Nagaraju, n.d., 73) and whose 12th chapter
describes how the illustrious northern goddess
Vindhyavsin settled in Mangalore as Man galdev
(Nagaraju, n.d., 71).
Today there are just eight other Nth mat has in
Karnataka, one in Andhra Pradesh, and none in
Kerala or Tamil Nadu, but there are large num-
bers of householder Nths (who call themselves
yogs) in all the southern states.
Te East
As noted above, our earliest mention of Goraks a, in
the early 13th-century Amr takanikodyotanibandha,
is likely to be from the region now known as
Bengal. Te siddha Knhap, who probably lived
in the 10th century and is associated with
Jlandharnth, also came from that area. R. Eaton
(1993, 77) has noted how from the 13th century
onward, the region comprising northern Bengal
and Assam was renowned as a fabulous and
mysterious place inhabited by expert practitio-
ners of the occult, of yoga, and of magic. Two
Maithili works bear witness to the existence of
the siddha tradition in the region, the early 14th-
century Varn aratnkara and early 15th-century
Goraks avijaya. As noted below, a Nth yog men-
tioned in a 15th-century inscription from Kath-
mandu is said to have come from Gaudadea,
and Nth yogs feature in the 16th-century
Sekaubhodaya, a Sanskrit work from the east.
However, despite these indications, there is
no evidence of the ascetic Nth Sampradya four-
ishing in Bengal until the 18th century (Bandyo-
padhyay, 1992, 3436), and even then they
remained a minority. Nth yogs do not appear in
B. Solvynss encyclopedic etchings of the Hindu
castes and sects of Bengal in the late 18th century
(Hardgrave, 2004, 314330). In Risleys Tribes and
Castes of Bengal, ascetic Nth yogs are hardly
mentioned. Today, of about fve hundred regis-
tered Nth rams in India, seven are in Bengal.
Meanwhile persons belonging to the householder
Yog/Jugi castes are numerous in the region (392,000
in the 1921 census).
Nepal
Te earliest evidence of Nths in Nepal is an
inscription dated 1391 found in the Gorakhnath
cave in Pharping, which records the building by
the yog Acintantha of stone feet of Goraks a for
worship (Regmi, 1966, 31). Te frst evidence of
the cult of Matsyendra (which was distinct from
that of Goraks a) dates to the same period (Locke,
1980, 432433). A copperplate inscription in the
Ks t hamandapa Temple in Kathmandus Durbar
Square dated 1455 may be the earliest evidence of
an order of Nth yog ascetics. It records the pur-
chase of land by the yog Caitanyantha, from
Gaudadea, for avadhtakas. Te word avadhta
means one who has cast of sam sra and is, to
this day, used exclusively to refer to ascetics. How-
ever, inscriptions from the same period suggest
that the jogs in the Kathmandu Valley were
householders who practiced tantric rites (Bouil-
lier, 1986, 130); it may be that they patronized
ascetics of all orders.
Te earliest clear-cut evidence of specifcally
Nth ascetics in Nepal dates to the 17th century,
when the 12 Yog panths are frst mentioned
in the region (Unbescheid, 1980, 175177, 197;
Locke, 1980, 436). A wealth of 18th-century leg-
ends and inscriptions associates Nth ascetics
with the Gorkh (Gurkha) conquest of the west of
the country (Bouillier, 1986, 128).
Today there are ten Nth yog centers in Nepal.
Ascetic Nths are greatly outnumbered by the
members of the various Yog castes.
Nth Sampradya 9
Te Northwest
With two exceptions (Yogi, 1924, 23, who says
he was born on the banks of the Godvar, and a
late Goraks asahasranmastotra, which has him as
coming from the south, namely the country of
Badhava; White, 1996, 134, 422n82), Nth tradi-
tion has it that Goraks a came from North India
(usually Punjab, but also Nepal or Bengal; see,
e.g., Dvivedi, 1996, 96). However, other than his
being named as the progenitor of one variety of
Hat ha Yoga in the rngadharapaddhati, which
was compiled near Jaipur in 1362, the oldest men-
tions of him from that region date to the 15th cen-
tury. Despite numerous reports of interactions
between Sufs and Jogis from the 13th century
onward (Digby, 1970) and Ibn Battutas tales
of yogs in Delhi and near Khajuraho in 1342
(Husain, 1953, 165166), there is no further men-
tion of Goraks a himself in northwest India until
the Alakhbn of Abd Al-Quddus Gangohi,
which probably dates to 1480 (Weightman, 1992,
171172). Te legend of Gorakhs rescuing Mat-
syendra was told in Delhi in 1400 by the Suf
Shaykh Gesdarz, but the yogs names are not
reported (Digby, 1970, 3234).
What information we do have about the Yog
cults that were existent in the northwest in the
early period suggests that they traced their lin-
eages to Nths other than Goraks a. Gesdarz
recounts a meeting with the yog Blgund, which
took place toward the end of the 14th century.
Blgund appears to identify himself with
Jlandharnth (Digby, 1970, 2730). One of
the most important Nth yog monasteries (until
Partition) was that at Jogi Tilla in Punjab (see
e.g. Hoyland, 1922, 113116). Until at least the
17th century, the yogs there traced their lineage
to Jlandharnth/Blnth, and the monastery
was known as Blnth T illa, afer which time it
became known as Gorakh T illa. Jlandharnth
was also the tutelary deity of the Nth yogs who
controlled the Jodhpur court in the frst half of the
19th century.
Te important yog shrine at Dhinodhar in
Kacch was established by Dharamnth in about
1450, and his descendants held him to be the
founder of the Jog sect until the 20th century,
when they began to defer to Gorakhnth
(Postans, 1839, 269; Briggs, 1938, 116).
Details of the practices of these northwestern
yogs are sparse, but what information we can
glean suggests that they were adepts of tantric
practices. Blgund ofered Gesdarz the secrets
of alchemy and eye-black for invisibility, both
archetypal tantric siddhis, as well as a drug for
the retention of semen, safety from enemies, and
the power of making ones bed move by itself
(Digby, 1970, 2223). Dharamnth is renowned
for having stood on his head for 12 years (Briggs,
1938, 117). Such inversions are an ancient ascetic
practice, associated with the yogic retention of
semen.
Te teachings on yoga found in Nth texts from
the northwest present a distinct tradition from
that found elsewhere. One particular feature is the
idea of the daamadvra, the tenth door of the
body through which the life force of the enlightened
yog is said to exit and which is only mentioned in
northern works such as the Amaraughasana,
Gorakhbn , and Siddhasiddhntapaddhati.
Te northern yogs were celibate. Te Jesuit
priest Anthony Monserrate noted that at Jogi Tilla
in the late 16th century there were lay members
of the order in addition to the celibate yogs
(Hoyland, 1922, 115). Te yog followers of
Gorakh described in the 16th- and 17th-century
Suf romances known as Premkhyns are celi-
bate ascetics (nominally at least they are not all
beyond temptation). From the late 16th century
onward, there are many depictions of yogs in
Mughal miniatures, but none shows female yogs.
Te same situation obtains to this day: there are
almost no female Nth ascetics (Bouillier, 2008,
68n15).
Te 16th and 17th centuries saw the composi-
tion of a corpus of Hindi verses ascribed to vari-
ous Nths, in particular Gorakhnth. While this
corpus is somewhat heterogenous, both praising
and scorning typical Nth practices such as yoga,
alchemy, and sexual rites, it is infused with the
nirgun a bhakti of the Sants that was fourishing
in North India at the time. Since this period, the
activities of the ascetic Nth Sampradya have
been concentrated in the north and west of India.
Te Twelve Panths
Te oldest organizational principle of the Nths is
their division into 12 panths (paths). Te frst ref-
erences to yogs being organized thus are found
in Sikh writings from the very beginning of the
17th century (Gur Granth Shib 9.2; 34.2 [Calle-
waert, 1996, 939, 941]; Vran Bh Gurds 8.13).
Te earliest list of the names of the 12 panths is
found in the Dabistn-i Mazhib (Shea & Troyer,
10 Nth Sampradya
1843, vol. II, 128), which was composed in the frst
half of the 17th century. Tere is a great deal of
variety in the many subsequent lists of panths, and
a parallel division of 18 panths is also found. Today,
a list of 12 propagated by the Yogi Mahasabha is
authoritative: Satyanth, Dharmanth, Rmnth,
Bairg, Kapilni, panth, Nat evar, Gan ganth,
Rval, Pvpanth, Mannth, and Pgalpanth
(Bouillier, 2008, 3235; see also Briggs, 1938, 75;
Dvivedi, 1996, 1115).
Of the 12 panths, the panth is perhaps the
oldest. Its current headquarters are located at
the Asthal Bohar Nth mat ha in Haryana. Te
panth is mentioned in the Gur Granth Shib
(28.3 [Callewaert, 1996, 6]), wherein it refers to
the highest order of yogs. Members of this panth
say that means m (mother, goddess), and that
- was the nominal sufx used by all members of
the panth until it was changed to -nth by Mastnth
(Briggs, 1938, 6768). Te tantric yog encoun-
tered by Gesdarz in the 14th century was called
Blgund (Digby, 1970, 22). A link with earlier
Kaula yogin cults is suggested by the wives
of Matsyendranths six noncelibate sons and
deities worshipped in early Deccan yogin cults
having names ending in - (T. 29.2942;
Sanderson, 2011, 76).
Not all Nths are included in the panth rubric.
In particular, the followers of Knhap, whose
practices are said to be of the Kplika tradition,
are excluded from the system (Briggs, 1938, 69;
Dvivedi, 1996, 80).
Appearance
Today the appearance of Nth householders is, on
the whole, little diferent from that of other Indian
householders, bar the diminishing number who
wear ochre clothes, turbans, and, in some cases,
hooped earrings through the cartilage of their
ears. Nth ascetics also dress similarly to other
North Indian aiva ascetics. Evidence from min-
iature paintings dating to the 16th century onward
shows that in the past their apparel was more dis-
tinctive. Tey ofen wore long cloaks, either
patchwork or made from a single piece of cloth.
Peculiar headgear was common, with both
pointed and bowler-style hats depicted. Many
Nth ascetics are portrayed wearing necklaces
from which hang multicoloured strips of cloth.
Tese signifed high status in the sect (Hoyland,
1922, 114). Tey are also shown wearing and using
yogapat t as, bands for supporting the body while
sitting cross-legged. Tese insignia are now found
very rarely, if at all.
Two aspects of the appearance of todays Nths,
both householders and ascetics, are particularly
emblematic of their identity: the hooped earrings
worn through the cartilage of both ears, and the
sm g, the small horn worn on a thread around the
neck. Tese will now be examined in detail.
Earrings
Te wearing of hooped earrings in slits in the car-
tilage of the ears cut by a dagger at the time of
initiation is peculiar to the Nths and is their most
prominent distinguishing feature, on account of
which they are known to non-Nths as Knphat
(split-eared) yogs, a name eschewed by the
Nths themselves, who prefer Daran yog. Te
earrings can be made from a wide variety of mate-
rials, including rhinoceros horn, wood, crystal,
and gold. Not all Nth ascetics wear earrings.
Tose who do not wear earrings are known as
Aughars (for householders in Nepal, the corre-
sponding term is Kunvr Bouillier, 1986, 146).
Tere are many legends about the origins of the
practice (see, e.g., Dvivedi, 1996, 15; Briggs, 1938,
910), in one of which Matsyendra is said to have
been rewarded by iva with the boon of emulating
his appearance, including the wearing of earrings.
Since at least the time of the composition of the
Mahbhrata, the wearing of earrings in India
has signifed high status, both divine and secular.
Textual references from the end of the 1st millen-
nium show that Kplika ascetics wore earrings,
and the depictions of Nths at Panhalekaji and
Srisailam, dating to the 13th and early 16th centu-
ries, respectively, show them to be wearing hooped
earrings. However, even among ascetics, the wear-
ing of earrings was not the sole preserve of the
Nths or their forerunners. Siddhas not associ-
ated with the Nths are ofen depicted wearing
earrings in Tibetan iconography, and 16th-cen-
tury miniatures depicting members of the Giri
and Puri suborders of the Daanms sam nyss
show them to be wearing earrings identical to
those worn by Nths in contemporaneous images.
What does set the Nths apart from other
orders is their wearing of earrings through the
cartilage of their ears, which no other ascetic order
has ever done. Te earliest evidence for this prac-
tice dates to the late 18th century, when we fnd
the frst such depictions in miniatures. Te earli-
est literary occurrences of the name knphat
Nth Sampradya 11
date to the same period. Te frst depictions of
Nths in Jodhpur during the Nths period in
power in the early part of the 19th century show
them to be wearing earrings in the lobes of their
ears, but soon afer, within two decades, they are
depicted as Knphat s. Te Nth custom of wear-
ing earrings in the cartilage of the ears is associ-
ated with Gorakhnth. In some legends, he is said
to have instigated the practice in order to distin-
guish his followers from those of Knhap and
Jlandharnth. Afer their adoption of this prac-
tice, the wearing of earrings became so closely
associated with the Nths that most other ascetic
orders ceased to wear earrings of any sort.
Horns
Not all Nth ascetics (and relatively few Nth
householders) wear earrings, but all Nths wear
the sm gnd jane, the long black woollen thread
on which a very small horn (the sm g), a rudrks a
seed, and a fat ring made of metal, wood, or
bone (the pvitr) are strung. Te horn, which is
really more of a whistle, is blown during morning
and evening worship and before eating. It can be
made of a variety of materials, from gold to plas-
tic. Horns are mentioned in the earliest descrip-
tions of yogs. Ibn Battuta wrote of the yogs he
encountered in 1342 that they have a kind of
horn which they blow at daybreak, at the close of
the day and at nightfall (Husain, 1953, 166). Te
Ioghe encountered by Ludovico di Varthema in
1505/1506
[a]ll generally carry a little horn at their neck;
and when they go into a city they all in com-
pany sound the said little horns, and this they
do when they wish alms to be given to them.
(Badger, 1863, 112)
Te Sekaubhodaya, an early 16th-century San-
skrit work from Bengal, tells of the yog
Candrantha being awoken from his meditation
by other yogs blowing their horns.
Te tiny whistles carried by todays Nths pro-
duce a quiet, high-pitched whistle that would not
be of much use in waking someone or in alerting
potential alms donors. Miniatures from the 16th
and 17th centuries show Nth ascetics wearing
animals horns, probably antelopes, which are
considerably larger than todays sm gs, on short
strings around their necks, without a rudrks a or
pvitr.
It is not until the 19th century that Nths are
frst depicted wearing their horns on long threads.
Tis may have been part of a process of elevating
their status: the thread takes the name jane,
which is that of the similarly long sacred thread
( yajopavta) worn by Brahmans, and in some
19th-century paintings is shown being worn over
the shoulder like the Brahmanical jane. Te frst
depictions of the sm g, rudrks a, and pvitr
ensemble are from the early 20th century.
Te Ptradevat
Each of the important communal Nth mat has of
today, as well as the jamt, their itinerant troop,
has as its central object of worship a ptradevat,
a small clay pot containing elements of Nth iden-
tity: a sm g, a pvitr, earrings, a rudrks a rosary,
and a chillum, the clay pipe used for smoking can-
nabis (Bouillier, 2008, 43). Te ptradevat is a
deity identifed with Gorakh Nth himself
(Bouillier, 2009, 142143). Although pots have
long been among the ritual paraphernalia of
tantric cults associated with the Nths (see, e.g.,
MatSa. chs. 10 and 45), the central position of the
ptra in Nth ritual today seems to be a relatively
recent innovation. It is not mentioned in the
Hindi works attributed to Gorakhnth, but we do
fnd some references to it in works of the 17th cen-
tury such as the Pac Mtr and the Hindi verses
attributed to Gopcand and Carpat .
Te contents of the Nths ptradevat (which,
although nominally secret, were recently revealed
on flm and in print by ofcials of the Yogi Maha-
sabha; Bouillier, 2008, 43) include items that have
only recently become Nth insignia, namely, the
pvitr and the chillum. Te Nths are somewhat
notorious for their consumption of intoxicants
(a practice that the Yogi Mahasabha is trying to
stamp out). Cannabis has been used in India since
about the 11th century CE, but it has only been
smoked from the 16th century, afer the arrival of
tobacco (see intoxication). Furthermore, the
use of a chillum on its own, rather than in the bowl
of a hookah, appears from the many depictions of
the consumption of cannabis in miniature paint-
ings to have been a 19th-century innovation.
de
Today all Nths, both ascetics and householders,
greet one another by saying de, which means
[please give me your] order. Tere is no
12 Nth Sampradya
mention of this word in the context of yogs in
either Sanskrit or vernacular literature prior to
the 18th century, when we fnd it in the
Siddhasiddhntapaddhati (6.9798) and in a
text devoted to explaining the word, the
*deapadavykhy. Shah Abdul Latif of Bhit,
also writing in the eighteenth century, mentions a
class of ascetic called des (Sorley, 1966, 348
355). In early accounts of yogs, they are said to
call out Gorakh, Gorakh rather than de (Gur
Granth Shib 11.4.1 [Callewaert, 1996, 1160];
Kabr Granthval, pad 128.78).
In the Yogisam pradyvis krti (447450), it is
claimed that there is no doctrinal basis for the
yogs use of the word de and that the greeting
should in fact be da, that is, dintha/iva.
Nths and Power
Various scholars have claimed that the Nth yogs
have a history of being militarized indeed, some
have said that they were the frst militarized Hindu
order but this results from mistakenly identify-
Fig. 2: Seven Nth yogs, circa 17th century ( British Library India Ofce Select Materials,
Shelfmark J.22,15).
Nth Sampradya 13
ing all yogs as Nths. In the many reports of
skirmishes between groups of ascetics in North
India between the 16th and 19th centuries, none
is said to have involved Nths, but the combat-
ants, in particular Daanm ng sam nyss, are
ofen referred to as yogs. On being initiated,
Nths take a vow not to bear weapons (Rose, 1911,
401), and the frst overtly Nth Sanskrit text, the
Siddhasiddhntapaddhati, pours scorn on those
who do so (6.64). On a practical level, Knphat
yogs cannot fght because it would be easy for
their earrings to be ripped out, the consequence of
which is expulsion from the order (Bouillier, per-
sonal communication, 2010).
Tus the Nth Sampradya did not, unlike their
contemporaries the Daanm sam nyss and
Rmnands, develop military units ( akhrs),
nor do they appear to have had those orders taste
for trade and banking. Te militarization of the
Rmnands in the early 18th century was closely
connected with their patronage by the Jaipur
monarchy. Te sam nys akhrs, however,
were more mercenary, fghting for whoever they
thought would beneft them most and achieving
considerable infuence and wealth as a result. In a
handful of isolated incidents, the Nths did briefy
achieve positions of power at royal courts, but
these appear to have been the result of the cha-
risma of individual Nths rather than a deliberate
policy of the Nth Sampradya.
Te best-known example of Nths achieving
political power was in Jodhpur in the frst half of
the 19th century. Maharaja Man Singh was con-
vinced that the magical intercession of Ayas Dev
Nath had won him the throne and, to the chagrin
of many, including the British and his Rajput
court, entrusted the running of his kingdom to
Nth ministers for the best part of his 40-year
reign. He patronized Nth scholarship, collected
Nth manuscripts, and wrote Nth eulogies and
hagiographic verses of his own. Te Man Singh
Pustak Prakash library in the Mehrangarh fort in
Jodhpur houses much the most extensive collec-
tion of Nth manuscripts in India, most of which
date to Man Singhs reign.
Elsewhere in Rajasthan (Jaisalmer, Udaipur,
and Kanauj; Bouillier, 1986, 134; Diamond, 2006),
there are legends of Nths empowering kings,
ofen by magical means such as the gif of a sword
which confers invincibility on its bearer, although
it is not always clear to what extent these legends
were fabricated to legitimize reigns. A similar
situation obtains in the Himalayan region. One
incident, whose historicity is beyond doubt,
was Bhagavantnths assistance of King Prthv
Nryan h in his quest to unify Nepal in the
18th century (Bouillier, 1991). Similar tales are
told, albeit on a smaller scale, about Jumla and
Caughera in Nepal, Dewalgarh in Tehri Garhwal,
and Champawat in Kumaon (Bouillier, 1989,
197200).
Places
Important Nth mat has and temples include Asthal
Bohar in Haryana, where Mastnth established
a monastery in the 18th century; Jwalamukhi in
Himachal Pradesh, an ancient place of pilgrimage
and goddess worship; Gorakhpur in Uttar Pradesh,
whose Gorakhnth Temple was established in the
17th century; Devi Patan, an ancient center of
goddess worship also in Uttar Pradesh; Haridwar
in Uttaranchal, where the headquarters the Yogi
Mahasabha are now located but whose impor-
tance for the sect seems to be relatively recent;
Caughera in Nepal, whose monastery was patron-
ized by the state in the 18th to 20th centuries; and
Kadri in Karnataka, which, as we have seen, has
been a Nth monastery since at least the 15th cen-
tury. Among Nth centers, which were previously
important but whose infuence has waned, are
Dhinodhar in Kacch and the city of Jodhpur.
Two important Nth centers that date to the
16th century are now in Pakistan: Jogi Tilla in
Punjab and Gorkhatri near Peshawar. Until Parti-
tion, Jogi Tilla (which has also been known as
both Blnth T illa and Gorakh T illa) was gener-
ally recognized as the headquarters of the Nths,
but since then, the Gorakhnth temples at Harid-
war and Gorakhpur have vied for primacy, with
the latter currently enjoying greater infuence.
In addition to the above important centers,
Nth ascetics visit most of the well-known Hindu
pilgrimage sites, in particular those of aiva or
kta orientation. Numerous shrines and pilgrim-
age centres are of particular importance for Nths,
including the Pashupatinath Temple in Kath-
mandu, Amarnath Cave in Kashmir, Kapurthala
in Punjab, Girnar in Gujarat, and Tryambakesh-
war in Maharashtra. Two previously popular
Nth pilgrimage places are now in Pakistan:
Sialkot (the home of Pran Bhagat) and Hing Laj.
Te latter, which is situated in a remote part of the
14 Nth Sampradya
akran coast in Baluchistan, was the most impor-
tant of the Nths pilgrimage places: it was the
duty of every yog to visit it once.
Doctrine
Te frst earthly guru of the Nths, Matsyendra, is
said to have brought the Kaula tantric doctrine
( Tantra) to the world (Sanderson, 1988, 681).
An important early (c. 10th-cent.) text attributed
to him, the Kaulajnanirn aya, teaches Kaula
doctrines. Te Matsyendrasam hit, a 13th-cen-
tury compendium of teachings on yoga and ritual
attributed to him, describes its doctrine as
mbhava. Tis South Indian variant of aivism
derives from the eastern and western Kaula
streams, but it also marks a moment in the history
of yoga when yoga started to detach itself from
sectarian moorings (Kiss, 2009, 97). Tis necessi-
tated the elimination of sect markers such as dei-
ties, mantras, and metaphysics. Subsequent Nth
works on yoga continue this trend of antisectari-
anism, and it is not until the approximately
18th-century Siddhasiddhntapaddhati, which
itself marks a moment when the Nth Sampradya
was seeking to establish a solid sectarian identity,
that a specifcally Nth metaphysics is expounded.
Te Siddhasiddhntapaddhati teaches the cre-
ation of the world from brahman, through
akti and the elements ( mahbhtas), to the
beginnings of human life. It includes descriptions
of the components of the subtle body and how
they can be used in yogic practice, together with
microcosmic and macrocosmic parallels between
the body and the universe.
Practice
Te Nths have long been associated with a vari-
ety of practices, through which they are said
to have attained siddhis, magical powers, and
jvanmukti, liberation while living. Ofen they
are said to achieve the latter in a body made
immortal through yoga or alchemy. Teir mastery
over death, which is personifed as Yama, is a
recurrent theme of their hagiography, much of
which also mentions the miracles they efected by
the use of their siddhis, such as the ability to fy or
to break droughts.
Although the current religious practice of
Nths, both ascetics and householders, conforms
on the whole to the norms of Hindu devotional
observances, with some Nths even patronizing
vedic rituals, they are still associated with a variety
of tantric practices, in particular tantric ritual,
alchemy, and yoga.
Tantra
Te forerunners of the Nths practiced variants
of Kaula Tantrism (see Tantra), all of which
are efectively extinct today except for the
Daks inmnya (Southern) stream known as
rvidy, on whose practices Nth tantric ritual
is based today. Te chief goddess of current
Nth yog ritual Paddhatis is the same as that
of rvidy: Blsundar or Tripursundar (Yog
Vilsnth, 2010). Te Paddhatis describe a variety
of mantras and man dalas for ritual use. Te
most important rite is the secret ankhadhl, in
which Blsundar (as Yogmy) is propitiated
using various substances, including cannabis,
which appear to be tamer versions of sexual fuids
used in similar rites practiced by householder
castes connected with the Nths (Khan, 1994).
Te ankhadhl is a key part of Nth yogs funeral
rites (Bouillier, 1986, 155).
Alchemy
Included among the siddhas were several adepts
of alchemy (rasyana), some of whom were later
coopted into the Nth Sampradya. Te most
famous was Ngrjuna; others include Nityanth,
Carpat i, and Goraks a himself.
Alchemy is the practice most ofen noted in
early records and accounts of Nth yogs. Marco
Polo remarked on how the yogs he encountered
lived for two hundred years thanks to the elixirs
of mercury and sulphur they ate (White, 1996, 9).
In the 17th century, the emperor Aurangzeb
requested mercury from the abbot of a Nth yog
monastery in the Punjab (Goswamy & Grewal,
1967). To this day, a small number of Nth yogs
are known for their alchemical prowess (Bouillier,
2008, 62, 109, 174).
Yoga
Te Nths have long been associated with the
practice of Hat ha Yoga, of which Goraks a is said
Nth Sampradya 15
to have been the innovator. Te earliest formula-
tion of Hat ha Yoga is found in the approximately
13th-century Datttreyayogastra, a text not
composed in a Nth milieu. Its techniques were
used to preserve bindu, semen, the essence of vital
power. Tese techniques were to a certain extent
incompatible with those of the yoga of the
Pacimmnya forerunners of the Nths, such as
the raising of kund alin (see Yoga) and other tantric
visualizations, as well as sexual rites. Te early
Nth Hat ha Yoga texts, such as the Vivekamrtand a,
(*)Goraks aataka, Khecarvidy, and Hat hapra-
dpik, overlaid onto this Hat ha Yoga their
yoga techniques (which are classifed in the
Datttreyayogastra and later works as laya-
yoga). With the success of the Hat hapradpik,
this synthesis became the dominant form of
Hat ha Yoga and remains so to this day.
Te Nths reinvention of Hat ha Yoga was
a continuation of the process begun in the
Matsyendrasam hit. It involved a reformation of
tantric ritual, relocating it to the body of the indi-
vidual yog and doing away with Tantras complex
paraphernalia and transgressive rites. Tis is
stated explicitly in these early texts. Te fnal verse
of the (*)Goraks aataka says,
We drink the dripping liquid called bindu,
the drop, not wine; we eat the rejection of the
objects of the fve senses, not meat; we do not
embrace a sweetheart but the sus umn nd,
her body curved like kua grass; if we must have
intercourse, it takes place in a mind dissolved in
the void, not in a vagina. (Goat. 101)
In the context of the practice of khecarmudr, an
important Hat ha Yoga practice in which the yog
inserts his tongue into the cavity above the sof
palate in order to drink the nectar of immortality,
the Hat hapradpik says (3.4648),
[Te yog] should constantly eat the meat of the
cow and drink the liquor of the gods. I reckon
him to be a Kaula; the others are destroyers
of the Kula. By the word cow the tongue is
meant, because the insertion of [the tongue] at
the palate is the eating of the meat of the cow,
which destroys great sins. Te essence that fows
from the moon, brought about by the fre gener-
ated by the tongues insertion, is the liquor of the
gods. (HP. 3.4648)
Although the Nths adoption and adaptation of
Hat ha Yoga was very successful their Hat ha
Yoga became synonymous with yoga the Nths
appear not to have practiced their invention very
assiduously. Tere have been few celebrated Nth
practitioners of Hat ha Yoga since the time of the
composition of the Hat hapradpik. No new texts
on Hat ha Yoga have been composed by the Nths,
and none of the many modern schools of yoga
is from a Nth milieu. Meanwhile, the ascetic tra-
ditions among which the frst formulations of
Hat ha Yoga originated, namely, the forerunners
of the Daanm sam nyss and the Rmnands,
adopted the new kun dalin-oriented yoga of the
Nths and continue to write about and practice it
up to the present day.
Te Avadhta
One reason for the Nth yogs apathy toward
Hat ha Yoga is that they, as much as any other
ascetic order, espouse the virtues of the avadhta,
he who has cast of sam sra and pours scorn
on all worldly activity, including religious prac-
tice. Te avadhta takes to its logical conclusion
nirgun a bhakti, devotion to the formless divine.
Rather than by engaging in complicated spiritual
practice, liberation is achieved through sahaja-
yoga (natural yoga), whose only real practice (if
any at all) is the repetition of the name of the
divine. Te locus classicus of the doctrine of the
avadhta is the Avadhtagt, a text of uncertain
date said to have been composed by the god
Datttreya. Tis attribution has led scholars,
probably mistakenly, to associate the text with the
Nth Sampradya, but, whether or not this attri-
bution is justifed, its carefree attitude is mirrored
by texts that certainly are the products of a Nth
milieu, such as the Siddhasiddhntapaddhati and
some of the verses of the Gorakhbn. In its last
two chapters, the Siddhasiddhntapaddhati, afer
teaching the doctrines outlined above, paradoxi-
cally denounces all learning and practice in a
paean to the avadhta.
Texts
Tere is a huge corpus of texts attributed to Nths,
many of which are unedited. Dvivedi (1996, 95)
asserts that there are stories about Gorakhnth in
every Indian language. Te following is a sum-
mary of important texts attributed to Nths,
together with works that were not composed in a
Nth milieu but that shed light on the Nth
Sampradya.
16 Nth Sampradya
Several texts have been attributed to Matsyendra,
including the Kaulajnanirnaya, Akulavratantra,
Matsyendrasam hit, Candrvalokana, and Yoga-
vis aya. Te frst three are tantric compendia; the
latter two are yogic works.
A huge number of works have been attributed
to Goraks a. Tey include the Goraks asam hit,
which is an expansion of the Kubjikmatatantra,
an important Pacimmnya Kaula work. Te
Goraks asam hit contains no references to Goraks a,
other than in its colophons, but its ninth chapter
is about Jlandharantha. Connected, at least
in the Nth tradition, with the Goraks asam hit
is the Bhtiprakaran a, a work on alchemy also
attributed to Goraks a. A perhaps contemporane-
ous work on alchemy is the Rasaratnkara of
Nityantha.
Of the many works on Hat ha Yoga said to have
been authored by Goraks a, the Vivekamrtan da
and (*)Goraks aataka are among the earliest.
Slightly later is the Amaraughaprabodha. Te
Khecarvidy of dintha (i.e. iva) is another
early Nth work on Hat ha Yoga. All of these Nth
works on Hat ha Yoga were used by Svtmrma
to compile the Hat hapradpik in the 15th cen-
tury, as were other texts, including the Yogabja
and Amanaskayoga, which have recently been
ascribed to Goraks a, despite this attribution not
being found in their manuscript colophons.
Two Old Marathi works whose frst recensions
were composed in the 13th century are important
in establishing the early history of the Nths. Te
frst is Jndevs commentary on the Bhagavadgt,
popularly known as the Jnevar, in which
he says he is of the lineage of Matsyendra and
Goraks a, and teachers of Vednta whose names
end in -ntha. Among the Jnevars teachings
is a beautiful passage on kun dalinyoga (see
Kiehnle, 2005). Te other Old Marathi work is the
Llcaritra, an early text of the Mahnubhv sect
that makes references to Nths. Hariharas early
13th-century Kannada Ragales similarly provide
etic information on the Nths, as does the
nyasampdane, a collection of tales in Kannada
about the Vraaiva saints ( Lingyats), which
was compiled over the course of the 15th century.
Te late 15th-century Telegu Navanthacaritra of
Gaurana is the frst work to give a list of nine
Nths corresponding to those found in later Nth
works.
We also glean information about the yogs of
this early period from descriptions of their inter-
actions with Suf saints in the latters hagiogra-
phies (see Digby, 1970; Ernst, 2007; 2005) and
from the tales of travellers to India from the 13th
century onward (see the surveys in Pinch, 2006,
6170; White, 2009, 198217).
Te early 15th-century Maithili Goraks avijaya,
which is reworked in a variety of Bengali
recensions from perhaps the 17th century onward,
tells the story of Matsyendras rescue from the
land of women by Goraks a. Te 16th-century
Sekaubhodaya, a fctitious account of a Muslim
Sheikh (seka) overcoming yogs and Brahmans, is
also from Bengal.
Perhaps the earliest Nth work on Hat ha Yoga
from northwest India is the Amaraughasana,
whose oldest manuscript is dated 1525 CE. Te
16th and 17th centuries saw the production in the
northwest of a large corpus of medieval Hindi
texts attributed to Nths, in particular Gorakhnth.
His works have been edited as the Gorakhbn
by H. Dvivedi, who also compiled a selection of
Hindi works attributed to other Nths (Dvivedi,
1978).
Many texts from the same period provide infor-
mation on Nths but were not composed by them.
Tese include the Avadhi romances known as
Premkhyns (Mrigvat, Padmvat, Kanhvat,
and Madhumlat), the Sikh Gur Granth
Shib and the Janamskhis (see McLeod, 1980,
6670), and the large corpus of Hindi devotional
literature not attributed to Nths (Callewaert & de
Beeck, 1991).
Texts that were products of, or are about,
an organized Nth Sampradya date to the
18th century onward. Tese include the Kadal-
majuntham htmya (see Nagaraju, n.d.), Siddha-
siddhntapad dhati, Goraks asiddhn ta sam graha,
Siddhasiddhntasam graha, Navanthabhaktisra,
Sudhkara candrik (S. Dvivedis early 20th-
century Hindi commentary on the Padmvat),
and Candranth Yogs Yogisam pradyvis krti.
Te Development of the Nth
Sampradya
Nth hagiographical tradition has it that the great
yog Goraks antha founded the Nth yog order
perhaps one thousand years ago and disseminated
his teachings through 12 panths. Scholars of the
tradition have, on the whole (and in a manner
similar to that displayed in the early historiography
of Buddhism), accepted the Sampradyas claims
and viewed the history of the order afer its estab-
Nth Sampradya 17
lishment as one of steady decline, with the result
that by the 20th century it shows all the signs of a
sect in decomposition (Eliade, 1973, 302).
Historical and ethnographic data show that the
reverse is more the case. Even if overall numbers
of yogs may have declined (and there is no way we
can be sure of this), the Yogi Mahasabha, estab-
lished in the early 20th century, is the frst body to
attempt to have overall control of the many dispa-
rate lineages of ascetic Nths.
From the historical data given above, we may
infer that the likely story of the development of
the Nth Sampradya is as follows. Goraks a lived
in South India, probably in the Deccan region,
in the 11th or 12th century. He was a great
tantric yog, practicing rites that may have been
those of the mbhava tradition taught in the
Matsyendrasam hita, a tradition that sought to
free itself from the exclusivity and complexity of
earlier tantric ritual. His yoga involved the visual-
ization of the raising of kun dalin in combination
with other physical practices, including sexual
ones. His cult included both celibate and married
yogs, and he was among the latter.
At a similar period, or perhaps slightly earlier,
there lived in northwest India a tantric siddha
called Jlandharnth whose practices were of the
Kplika tradition and who travelled to Bengal.
Tere were strong ties between South India and
Nepal in the 11th to 13th centuries (Michaels,
1985; Lvi, 1905, 364365), and subsequently the
cult that had developed around Goraks a in South
India also became established in Nepal and the
contiguous eastern region. Meanwhile, in the
Deccan, the tantric yoga of Goraks a became less
licentious as the celibate ascetic aspect of the cult
began to come to the fore. Te antinomian exter-
nal practices of Tantra were internalized and,
together with the visualizational techniques of
kun dalinyoga, were melded with the physical
practices of early Hat ha Yoga, whose original
aim was the sublimation of sexual continence into
liberation.
Te creation of this classical Hat ha Yoga was
attributed to Goraks a. By this time, yog cults,
both ascetic and householder, were fourishing all
over the subcontinent. In the northwest, lineages
associated with Jlandharnth and others had
come into contact with Sufs as well as other
Hindu ascetics, and, in the spirit of antisectarian-
ism prevalent at the time, there was an interchange
of soteriological techniques and aspects of ascetic
lifestyle. Tis produced a North Indian ascetic
archetype that survives to this day, with the result
that members of the main North Indian ascetic
orders, including the Nths, are almost identical
in lifestyle and appearance.
By the 16th century, the yog orders of the
Gangetic Plain held Goraks a to be their tutelary
deity, as evinced by the Suf romances of the
period known as Premkhyns. Te ascetic yog
tradition was separate from the householder yog
cults that continued to fourish in their early
heartlands of Karnataka, Bengal, and Nepal and
which spread to Rajasthan.
At the same time, in a process whose causes are
still open to debate, but which was enabled by the
Pax Mughalia and precipitated by the Mughal
Empires decline, religious identities in northern
India began to solidify (OHanlon & Washbrook,
2011). Te details of this transition are hard to
identify not least because Indian sects like to
present their history as ancient but it was in
the 16th to 17th centuries that the four main
ascetic orders of North India (Nths, Daanm
sam nyss, Rmnands, and Udss) acquired
their corporate identities. By 1600 the Nth yogs
were said to comprise 12 panths, all of whose
headquarters were in North India.
A feature of the legitimization of the three big-
gest ascetic orders (those other than the more
localized Punjab-based Udss) was a claim to
pan-Indian status, which involved making ties
with monasteries in the south. In the case of the
Nth yogs, this resulted in the annexation of the
Kadri mat ha. In the early 16th century, when
the head of the Kadri mat ha in Karnataka, known
as the king of the yogs, ruled over 30 thousand
subjects, this would have proven difcult, but,
as we have seen, little more than a hundred years
later, the incumbent was in much reduced cir-
cumstances. Further research may reveal more
details of this annexation; at the moment, we can
only surmise that initially compromises were
made on both sides. Te king of the yogs was
allowed to keep his unique title and granted
sovereignty over all yogs in the south, but he was
no longer allowed to cross the Narmad. Today
the king of the yogs is chosen from among mem-
bers of the northern branches of the order and
pays scant attention to his supposed confnement
in the south (Bouilier, 2008, 130).
Tis annexation did not result in the southern
yogs assimilating to the ways of the northern
ascetic yogs. To this day, there are very few Nth
yogs resident in the south, and the northern ascetics
18 Nth Sampradya
are quite distinct from the southern householders.
A continuing bone of contention is the southern-
ers reverence for Datttreya, who as the tutelary
deity of the Jn akhr, the foremost division of
the northern Nth yogs rivals, the Daanm
sam nyss has no place in their pantheon.
Te 17th to 19th centuries saw further consoli-
dation of the ascetic Nth Sampradya. Goraks a
came to be the chief deity of almost all of the many
panths, eventually supplanting Jlandhara in Raj-
asthan and Punjab. Some of the panths were orig-
inally kta and Vais nava, but a aiva orientation
became predominant. Te composition of the
Siddhasiddhntapaddhati in the early 18th cen-
tury was the frst textual legitimization of the Nth
Sampradya. During the late 18th century,
Goraks as position was further reinforced by
all the panths who recognized him as the leader of
the order starting to wear their earrings through
the cartilage of their ears, rather than the lobes.
Subsequently the notion that Goraks a is the
supreme being an idea that is occasionally found
in earlier sources became accepted, with the
result that he is now held to be identical with iva.
Te fnal consolidation of the order occurred in
1906 with the establishment of the Yogi Maha-
sabha, the frst organization to attempt to oversee
the Nth Sampradya as a whole.
Te Nth ascetics existence as a pan-Indian
sampradya has given them more prominence
in Nth historiography than their disparate lay
counterparts. In interactions between the two, the
ascetics are known to emphasize their superiority
in spiritual matters, not to mention their subordi-
nating householder Nths by claiming that the
latter are the descendants of fallen ascetics. It is
quite possible that the householder Nths are in
fact heirs of the oldest Nth traditions. Tus,
in Karnataka, Nepal, and Bengal, where jog tradi-
tions have existed since the Nths beginnings,
there has never been a strong ascetic Nth pres-
ence, but to this day there are well-established
Yog castes. Furthermore, some Yog castes, such
as those in Rajasthan, have preserved tantric rites
that are now found in the ascetic order in sani-
tized forms (and this may hold true for other Yog
castes, most of whom have not been studied by
ethnographers).
Aferword
Irrespective of when Nth ascetics were organized
into a formal sampradya, Nth ascetic and
householder lineages have had a profound infu-
ence on Indian religious culture over the last
thousand years. Tey are the heirs to the 1st-mil-
lennium traditions of siddhas and vidydharas
(wizards). Te ascent of kun dalin through the
cakras aligned along the spine, which was frst
taught by forerunners of the Nths, has become
the accepted blueprint for the workings of the
subtle body and the most widespread metaphor
for mystical experience. Te physical techniques
for raising kun dalin were synthesized by the
Nths and became synonymous with yoga. Te
wonder-working yog is a fgure to be found in a
broad range of religious literature, and it is ofen
the Nth yog who is being invoked. Te Nths
disdain for caste hierarchy and sectarianism
allowed them to mix freely and exchange ideas
with other open-minded religious specialists, such
as Sufs and nirgun a bhaktas, while their widely
accepted claims to supernatural power meant that
they had to be confronted by other religious tradi-
tions, confrontations ofen given literary form in
mythological disputations between Gorakhnth
and the tutelary deities or founders of those
orders, such as Datttreya or Kabr. To this day,
the Nth yogs are esteemed by other ascetic orders
as masters of the magical arts of Tantra, and both
ascetic and householder Nths are credited with a
variety of supernatural powers, notably that of
exorcism.
In this kaliyuga (see cosmic cycles), all religious
institutions in India are thought to be in a state of
decline. But many Nth castes are thriving, hav-
ing raised their status through Sanskritization,
and while there are several Nth monasteries that
have seen better days, new ones continue to be
established, and others are adapting to the con-
stantly evolving Indian religious landscape and
fourishing as a result. A case in point is the
Gorakhnth Temple in Gorakhpur, which has a
vast and well-maintained campus and whose recent
heads have been infuential political leaders.
Secondary Literature on the Nth
Sampradya
Te frst explication of the religious practices of
the Nths was by S. Dasgupta (1946). Tis was
Nth Sampradya 19
expanded upon by M. Eliade (1958). H. Divivedi,
drawing on a broad range of textual sources and
ethnography, wrote a thorough history of the
Sampradya and its practices (1996). D.G. White
(1996) surveyed the place of alchemy in Nth
practice. C. Kiss (2009) has given a detailed analy-
sis of the doctrines associated with Matsyendra.
Te frst comprehensive ethnography of the
Nths was by G.W. Briggs (1938). G. Unbescheid
gave a more nuanced and localized account of
the Nths in Nepal (1980). A. Gold and D. Gold
have produced a number of studies of Nth house-
holders in Rajasthan. Over the last 25 years,
V. Bouillier has produced a wealth of ethnogra-
phy on Nth householders and ascetics in Nepal,
Haryana, Rajasthan, and Karnataka, and she gives
the frst coherent overview of the Sampradya in
her landmark 2008 monograph, which reveals
many key features of the Nths hitherto not
reported, in particular the Kadri pilgrimage.
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