Raffaele Torella

LIBERATION-FROM-PASSION VERSUS LIBERATION-THROUGH-PASSIONS

(Lecture at Indian Institute for Advanced Study, Shimla,, 23 October, h.15)

It is a given fact that there is no action in ordinary life which does not proceed from an
idea or expectation of pleasure; moreover, the various philosophical schools and authoritative
texts agree on considering rga as the root of all feelings, emotions and activities of the mind.
As in the case of vidy, neither should the rga-principle be mistaken for what is only a
particular epiphenomenon of it. To begin with, rga is not the craving for objects but what lies
behind it. Nor is it to be mistaken for a 'disposition' to attachment such as avairgya the
absence of renunciation, which is a quality of the mind and, therefore, essentially belongs to
the sphere of objects. Indeed, in everyday life man continuously experiences disaffection after
fruition is accomplished, but rga rises again immediately afterwards, with a different object.
This rga which never ceases in ordinary life - in the sense that it is continuously actualizing
itself in the various specific rgas as actual experiences and feelings (pratyayas) - is precisely
the rga made of latent impregnations (vsanrpa).
[The aiva philosophers refer here to the Skhya doctrine of the eight bhvas and fifty
pratyayas. The bhvas are the basic predispositions of the human mind: righteousness,
knowledge, detachment and sovereignty, along with their opposites. The pratyayas represent
the totality of the psychical processes of human life.]
At the root of both kinds of rgas lies, finally, the rga 'pertaining to the knowing subject'
(vedakagata), the rga as an ontological principle.1 If the single episodes of passion in the
individual can drive him towards particular experiences, this is only due to their being
supported by the inner energy of such a root-rga, i.e. rga as cuirass. It is not pleasure which
directly moves rga, as the Matagapramevara-tantra says shrewdly, but it is rga which
creates pleasure with respect to the particular object it turns to.2 In this way, we can account
for attachment to their own status that even those which belong to the lowest strata of being
(dogs, worms and so on) show. This does not mean that the adept who has overcome this
individual rga is cut off from pleasure. Instead, he enjoys a particular form of pleasure in all
actions. The very existence of the vtarga the one who has transcended passions is one of
the recurring arguments in all the texts to prove that rga rests in the depths of the subject, not
in objects, for in the latter case the mere existence of objects would suffice to keep rga alive.
Therefore, rga too emotion-passion-attachment, like vidy science, knowledge, is
both a complex and an elementary reality, which is all the more difficult to define the more
internally it abides in the structure of the I. Let us be aided in this difficult task by some
insightful considerations by Abhinavagupta in his magnum opus The light of the Tantras
(IX.61-64). The universe has been created in order to satisfy the souls in which a frenzy, a
feverish craving for fruition, has been aroused. This frenzy (lolik) has no object at all, it is,
so-to-speak, a 'desiring state' (abhilit), a state of indefinite, passionate expectation, hence
the thinking of oneself as imperfect, a kind of nescience, in a word: basic impurity, mala. This
1

Cf. Rmakahas commentary on Matagapramevara, vidypda, XI.4cd-5ab (p. 326).

A passage by Spinoza comes to mind (Etica, III, prop. 9, scolio): Toward nothing do we strive, nothing do we
want, we crave and desire because we judge it good; but, on the contrary, we judge something good because we
strive toward it, we want it, we crave it and we desire it.
2

is only the readiness to assume future limitations, which is why it does not constitute a tattva,
as on the contrary rga does. Rga is essentially this same frenzy once it has been limited by a
still indistinct object. The individual avairgya the absence of renunciation is only a
qualification of the mind, and consists of its being continuously modified and coloured by the
various objects.
The cuirasses constitute the most internal and concealed structure of individual personality. In
establishing their existence, tantric traditions - in general, even those grounded on dualistic
presuppositions - seem to have been driven by a twofold need: to overcome the dualism and
basic incommunicability of the purely spiritual and the purely material components puruaprakti or purua-buddhi -, and to single out a boundary within the human being where the
two components touch one another, as it were. What Tntrikas' thought and action seem most
interested in are precisely borderlines, rather than the definite states of being. In particular, the
monistic schools of Kashmir end up seeing borderlines everywhere or, in other words, infinite
potential openings, which make the spiritual-material dichotomy more and more problematic
and finally overthrow it altogether. Attention is obviously focused primarily on the human
being, no doubt the most paradoxical being in the universe. Of all possible subjectivity levels,
the most crucial is after all the lowest one, the level of human beings, since it is the only one as the Matagapramevara-tantra and its commentator say (X.23a-c; p. 318) that has the
privilege of containing in itself the whole path of the universe, from iva down to the Earth.
And, in the human being, paradoxical par excellence are the cuirasses, which on the one hand
partially restore the power of the spiritual principle and, on the other, embrace it so tightly that
they may prevent it from expanding in all its potential glory. Thus, the individual gains weight
and a definite structure from the cuirasses, but at the same time he also sacrifices his fluidity,
or in other words, his free pervasiveness and sovereignty. In presenting sometimes one aspect,
sometimes the other, the texts do nothing but refer to the two sides of a coin. This also has a
probably involuntary correspondence at a lexical level, in the recurring of two almost identical
terms having an opposite meaning: (ud)balita-valita reinforced-surrounded/encircled/limited).
The essentially ambiguous nature of the cuirasses is indirectly highlighted by the hint
that they also have a 'pure' form. For example, pure kal brings about a series of actions which,
though still limited in themselves (adoration of iva, meditation and so on), enable the
individual soul to rid itself of samsara. There is a pure form of rga, too, which arises in those
who are detached from bonds; by virtue of it, the limited soul experiences a drive to the
summum bonum, the search for a guru, passionate devotion to iva.
This structure supporting the I has one more characteristic, which is not explicitly mentioned
but the texts hint at occasionally. This characteristic is directly connected with the deep level
where the cuirasses are located and act, always behind any visible manifestation: the fact that
they are subliminal and escape perception. The secrecy of the cuirasses is precisely that
peculiar to any real borderline, in which one may find oneself without knowing it in advance,
as it were. In fact, as it seems, the moment when the cuirass is fully cognized is also the
moment when it becomes incapable of performing its task, thus opening the way to going
beyond it.
This overall conception of the cuirasses is basically shared by the dual and non-dual aiva
tradition, too. For its part, the latter seems particularly interested in developing two aspects,
namely, the direct correspondence of cuirasses with the highest powers of iva, on the one
hand, and their being 'intermediate' (or, in a sense, also 'mediating') realities and 'supports', on
the other. As to the first point, we can limit ourselves to pointing out that the cuirasses Energy,
Science, Passion, Time and Necessity are considered to be the contracted forms of the divine

powers of Consciousness, Bliss, Will, Knowledge and Action, respectively, or, in different
contexts, My (also a cuirass), Energy-Consciousness (taken together), Time-Necessity and
Passion are taken as the contracted forms of the Pure Principles Anrita- iva, Sadiva,
vara and Sadvidy; or, yet again, a homology is established between sarvakarttva absolute
power of action and kal, sarvajatva absolute power of consciousness and vidy, pratva
fullness, perfection and rga, nityatva eternity and kla, vypakatva pervasion and niyati.
But it is the second point which deserves closer examination. Among the aiva scriptures that
have come down to us, the Partriik presents a different designation for this group of
principles, that is, dhra 'support'. "Though the specific nature of these principles does not
cease to belong to the realm of the object, their function ", says Abhinavagupta in the PTLV3,
"is to bring about the unification of the knower and the knowable, differentiated as they are in
the sphere of my. [...] These powers 'hold up' (dhrayanti), that is, make the soul stand
midway (madhye), like Triaku. (King Triaku, who wanted to ascend to heaven with his
physical body, was hurled down from heaven by the gods and then arrested midway by
Vivmitra, thus remaining suspended in the sky4: he was then transformed into a
constellation.) If these principles did not exist, Abhinavagupta goes on, either the individual
soul would become insentient, like a stone, or it would directly enter the sky of supreme
consciousness, like Paramevara: in both cases, however, the knowable would equally cease to
be, since it presupposes the existence of a myic knowing subject.5

From this rapid immersion into the metaphysics and psychology of ivaite Tantrism, we
emerge with a few strong, highly peculiar ideas (of course, necessitating more extensive and
in-depth research), which can be summarised as follows:
a) Identification, deep within the individual subject, of a sustaining/limiting structure acting as
a link between the material sphere and the spiritual sphere.
b) This structure consists mainly of three cuirasses kal, vidy e rga - apparently very
different from each other, responsible for the energetic, intellectual and passional/emotional
dimensions respectively.
c) These three dimensions are not viewed as watertight compartments, but as strictly
interconnecting realities, communicating with and feeding each other.
d) They are the very playground where human adventure is played out, and can act as a means
of bondage as well as of liberation.

Abhinavaguptas authorship of the PTLV has recently been questioned.

The story of Triaku, so popular in India, is narrated in many texts (and with many variants); see e. g.
Rmyaa, Blaka, Chapters 57-60; Skanda-Pura, Ngaraka, Chapters 2-6; etc. This story also reached
the West and we can even find it condensed in a lovely poem by Longfellow, Viswamitra the Magician (By his
spells and incantations, / Up to Indra's realms elysian / Raised Trisanku, king of nations. Indra and the gods
offended / Hurled him downward, and descending / In the air he hung suspended, / With these equal powers
contending. / Thus by aspirations lifted, / By misgivings downward driven, / Human hearts are tossed and drifted /
Midway between earth and heaven.)
4

It is worth noting that in the many descriptions of the emanation of the universe in the form of the gradual
emanation of Sanskrit phonemes (wholly parallel to the better-known cabalistic speculations), found in the aiva
scriptures, it is always the semivowels that are related to the Cuirasses! The very subtle arguments elaborated by
the aiva doctors are explained in R. Torella, "The kacukas in the aiva and Vaiava Tantric Tradition: A Few
Considerations between Theology and Grammar". In: G. Oberhammer (Ed.), Studies in Hinduism, II, Miscellanea
to the Phenomenon of Tantras, sterreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-Historische Klasse,
Sitzungsberichte, 662. Band, Wien 1998, pp. 55-86

The Senses

In one of the early chapters of the Bhagavadgt, we read:

After creating the creatures and also the sacrificial offering, of old Prajpati said,
Increase yourselves through the sacrifice; may it be for you the cow that fulfils all your
desires. Through the sacrifice, you feed the gods and the gods in turn feed you. Feeding
each other, you will achieve the supreme good. The gods, fed by the sacrifice, will
provide you with all the enjoyments you seek. Who so enjoys such experiences without
offering them back to the gods that have provided them, that man is none other than a
thief. (III.10-12)
For us, the interest of these verses is rather indirect, lying wholly in the way in which they
were commented on by the great Abhinavagupta, totally revolutionising their meaning. Thus
speaks the Bhagavadgtrthasagraha Compendium of the Meanings of the Song of the
Blessed One:
The gods, i.e. those used to taking pleasure6, are the sensorial functions, the
Goddesses of the Senses, deities well-known to the secret traditions [i.e. the Krama];
those you must satisfy with the [sacrificial] act; in other words, you must devour the
objects of the senses as much as possible. Once satisfied, in your self these goddesses
will bring about supreme bliss in concord with what is the nature of the self, they being
united by with having their abode in the self. In such a way, incessantly, that is by the
alternating of moments of ordinary consciousness and of perfect absorption, reciprocal
nourishment is achieved, characterised by the [joint] satisfaction of the senses and
identification with the self, by virtue of which you will rapidly obtain the supreme
good, the brahman in whom all reciprocal differentiations dissolve. Satisfied by this
sacrificial act, the senses take up their abode in any object of meditation, etc. [] The
general meaning of the sentence is thus as follows: Whoever aspires to achieve
supernatural powers and liberation with slight effort must devote himself with
abandonment to enjoyments as they occur, aiming, as his only goal, to make the febrile
restlessness of the senses cease. (ed. cit., p. 46)
In order not to remain with the suspicion that the above is merely the result of a capricious and
momentary virtuosity of Abhinavaguptas an attitude, moreover, that would be anything but
alien to the Kashmiri masters of supreme-non-duality, who call themselves upholders of
freedom (svtantrya-vdin) we should extend our research to other texts of Tantric ivaism.
We find the same concept outlined even in one of the stras of the ivastra, enigmatic but
fortunately for us aptly clarified by Kemarja: Enjoyer of the Triad, Lord of Heroes
(I.11).
Kemarjas commentary is as follows:

One of the traditional ancient etymologies for the word deva god is pleased to derive it from the root div- in the
sense of to take pleasure, to play, to act freely and gratuitously. Here, Abhinavagupta is of course utilising this
etymological artifice to introduce his daring metaphorical interpretation (gods=senses).

Mixing the three states of wakefulness, sleep and deep sleep with the bliss of the fourth
by virtue of meditation on the Wheel of Powers, he who, thoroughly pervaded by such
cogitation, manages to see every karmic impression of duality dissolved in them, now
reduced to the continual flow of the essence of bliss, that man is the enjoyer of the triad,
the one who tastes it with wonder (camatkart)7. Consequently, according to the
principle expressed in the verse that says, There is in the three levels what is called the
enjoyer and what is called the enjoyable; but he who knows them both, he, albeit
enjoying, is not stained [by the enjoyment] ", a particular yogin is, in the Great
Traditions [the Krama], described as the uncontested dominator of himself, full of
supreme bliss, the Lord of Heroes (vra)8 intent on devouring the differentiation of
beings the lord, that is, of the senses -, imbued by the being of Manthna Bhairava. He
who does not manage to achieve such a condition is none other than the common herd,
the enjoyed [and not the enjoyer] by the three levels of wakefulness, etc. He who has not
raised himself to this peak even if he is a yogin does not deserve the name of Lord
of Heroes: he is in actual fact nothing but befuddled. This is said. This is demonstrated
in detail in various texts, such as for example the Svacchanda,9 where we read, "Thanks
to free (svatantra) yoga which moves on the free path, the yogin united with the seat of
the Free [Bhairava] achieves identification with the Free". 10
Once the adept identifies what is his true centre, sensorial experience will cease to be a tie and
can be used as an instrument of liberation. Suitably saturated by extreme intensification,
accompanied by release from all individual yearning, the senses are restored to their nature as
an expression of the Power.
Again, in commenting on ivastra I.12 The Stages of Yoga are Amazement, Kemarja,
says:
Just as one who sees something out of the ordinary experiences a feeling of amazement,
so the feeling of amazement in enjoying contact with the various manifestations of
knowable reality is continually produced in this great yogin with the whole wheel of the
senses increasingly revealed, motionless, disclosed, by virtue of penetrating into its
most intimate nature, the compact union of ever-renewed consciousness and wonder,
extreme, extraordinary.11

The theme of wonder, which appeared earlier in the ivastra as vismaya amazement (see below *), was
destined to undergo major developments in subsequent philosophical and aesthetic speculation (for the latter, see
R. Gnoli: The Aesthetic Experience according to Abhinavagupta, II Ed., Chowkhamba Sanskrit Studies No. LXII,
Varanasi 1968) with the synonymous term camatkra, used perhaps for the first time in a pregnant sense by
Utpaladeva. Wonder is the condition of the enlightened subject, his becoming aware of the Self and of
everything under the sign of a perpetual and infinite wondering enjoyment, as opposed to the restricted nature
and automatism of ordinary consciousness. The essence of camatkra may be identified in the act of opening
oneself to experience the all in the most intense and penetrating manner, while firmly maintaining the centre of
gravity on the subject that perceives rather than on the object perceived.
8 It should be noted that the term vra hero is commonly adopted to designate the most famous type of Tantric
adept, inclined to practices centred on energy, often consisting in tackling reality (sex, inebriating beverages,
meat, etc.), whose negative nature has to be dominated and overturned.
9 VII.260 (Svacchandatantra, with commentary 'Uddyota' by Kemarjcrya, edited by V.V. Dvivedi, Vols. I-II,
Parimal Sanskrit Series No.16, Delhi 1985)
10 Cf. R. Torella, Gli Aforismi di iva con il commento di Kemarja (ivastravimarin), cit., pp. 68-69.
11 ibid. p. 69.

Powers themselves (we should not forget that the most common term for sense is indriya,
whose original meaning was [power] of Indra) are nourished and increased as
Abhinavagupta says in the passage from the Bhagavadgt quoted above12 by the objects of
the senses themselves in a context of purified enjoyment, in turn sustaining and strengthening
the individual on the path toward liberation.
A hymn by Abhinavagupta is entirely devoted to this theme, the Dehasthadevatcakrastotra
Hymn to the wheel of the deities residing in the body.13 The supreme god in the form of
nanda-Bhairava Bhairava-Bliss14, embracing his consort nanda-Bhairav who represents
his energy aspect (if Bhairava is consciousness in his form as pure light, Bhairav is the
projective-cognitive drive inherent in consciousness), is visualised at the centre of an ideal
eight-petal lotus flower. On each petal is seated a deity portrayed in the act of rendering cult to
the god (or the divine couple) who is in the middle. The goddesses are the eight Mts (or
Mtks), a group of powerful and dangerous deities who, despite their apotropaic name of
Mothers Little Mothers, are unhappily known to the nocturnal frequenters of the cremation
grounds, and are considered as a sort of emanation or double of the Supreme Goddess. The
procedures and ingredients of this imagined pj are rather unusual: Vaiav as the sense of
hearing offers instead of the prescribed flowers sounds; Vrh as the sense of touch offers
tactile sensations; Indr as the sense of sight offers the most beautiful forms and colours;
Cmu as the sense of taste offers delicious tastes; Mahlakm as the sense of smell offers
rare scents. And that is not all. The remaining three Mothers are linked to the intellectual
functions: the haughty mbhav as the sense of the individual ego offers Bhairava, instead
of flowers, acts of presumption;15 Kaumr, the capricious adolescent goddess, as mind
(manas), offers fantasies and mental constructs (vikalpa); the solemn Brhma, as intellect
(buddhi), offers Bhairava acts of final ascertainment (ascertainment, nicaya, constitutes the
final phase of the cognitive process). It should be said, by the way, that these eight elements
often constitute the so-called puryaaka eightfold body or, according to another
interpretation, the ogdoad that lies in the body, a kind of bearing structure within the human
being that sums up the cognitive and emotional aspects; it is the eightfold body that constitutes
the transmigratory nucleus of the individual at death. Yet again, we see that Tantrism responds
to the brahmanic separation into high intellectual functions and low sensorial functions not
only in terms of integration and affirmations of equal dignity, but even deification. The energy
that makes them function is none other than the energy that coincides with supreme
consciousness or, in religious terms, with iva himself.
In truth, the ivaite masters thrust much further. The intrinsically unbridled and only
superficially trainable nature of the senses actually places them in a privileged position as
compared to the mind which, on the other hand, is for its own part more at risk of becoming a
sort of blanket that every day smothers the fire of the individuals deepest identity that, in any
final analysis, coincides with God himself. The same is true of the emotions, the more so the
stronger and more uncontrollable they are. Within aiva non-dualistic traditions, there thus
12

See p. *, where other relevant passages are also quoted.

Edited in K.Ch. Pandey, Abhinavagupta. An Historical and Philosophical Study, II Edition. Varanasi, pp. 952953.
14 The God Bhairava embodies the terrifying form of iva and represents the upsetting of all individually limited
forms.
15 A strange offering in a world apparently so depersonalized as the Indian one. In actual fact, abhimna,
although meaning presumption, pride in everyday language, is used in the philosophical lexicon to designate,
within the cognitive process, the moment at which the cognition taking shape connects with a given individual ego
(I perceive this vase).
13

arises a school of teachings aimed at enrolling the senses, passions and emotions against the
mind. The long- lasting nature of the mind is maliciously contrasted with the instant of the
emotion. As an antecedent and also theoretical assumption of such a position, a laconic stra of
the ivastra may be invoked, a text to whose programmed obscurity we are by now
habituated: In the middle the lower birth is produced. To try to unravel this statement, we
once more have recourse to the commentator Kemarja:
For him who only at the initial and final extremes tastes the essence of the fourth, in
the middle, in the intermediate area, the lower birth is produced, wretched, the
lowest creation, the ordinary way of living.
What is certain is that here our commentator risks being even more obscure than the stra he
wishes to elucidate. What the Kashmiri master has in mind is the well-known distinction of
human experience as four conditions (avasth), already encountered in the Upaniads. The first
three (wakefulness, dreaming, dreamless sleep) together constitute the modality of ordinary
experience, whereas the fourth corresponds to the status of the liberated. According to the
spiritual tradition from which Kemarja draws his inspiration, experience of the fourth state in
actual fact also occurs within the other three, but solely at two special moments of each act: the
initial instant, in which the very first vibration of the still wholly undifferentiated will comes
directly into contact with the energy of consciousness, and the final instant, in which the wilful
action, having completed its outer curve (in which it has become other than itself), fades away
once more in the vibrating light of consciousness. The whole intermediate zone is the myic
sphere of differentiation. The median zone is thus the canonical locus of the ordinary mind, in
which the instant sleeps for the duration. The instant is wakened by the teachings
experiential rather than theoretical that we find deposited in particular in two texts: the first,
the Vijna-bhairava Bhairava-as-consciousness, is of a scriptural nature and is attributed to
iva himself, portrayed, in his terrifying-absolute form as Bhairava, in dialogue with his divine
consort; the second, by a human author (the Kashmiri Vmanadatta), is a brief work in verse,
with the title Svabodhodayamajar The Little Bunch of Flowers of the Rising of Ones
Intimate Awareness.16 It is worth our while to focus our attention at least on the latter.
The central teaching of the Svabodhodamajar thus concerns how to dissolve the mind
effortlessly. The method proposed is extremely subtle: the mind (for which the terms manas
and citta are used indifferently) is never attacked frontally, but is, so to speak, outflanked,
taken from behind, exploiting its normal function in order to block it. For example, the adept is
instructed to let his mind focus with special intensity on an object presented by the senses until
it is totally occupied by that object. Then, when its object vanishes naturally, the mind is still
too closely linked to it to be able to withdraw once more within itself and ends up dissolving
itself after the object. This occurs in the case of an adept who focuses his attention fixedly on
the noise of thunder or on a pleasant sound, or music; or else on the beauty of an object seen.
In other cases, the same result is obtained without the object vanishing, but hinging on the
natural, progressive fading away of the sensation itself. Here, Vmanadatta refers to the
enjoyment that comes from tasting choice food, or smelling the scent of jasmine, or reaching
orgasm. As we see, to dissolve the mind even the minor sensorial faculties can be used, such
as touch, taste or smell, albeit largely overlooked by the Vijnabhairava. Following
Vmanadattas discerning examination, we face a third situation: when the mind is totally and
suddenly invaded by a sensation or emotion, creating as it were a vacuum around it. For
16

Edited and translated by R. Torella, The Svabodhodayamajar, or how to suppress the mind with no effort.
In: R. Tsuchida, A. Wezler (Eds.) Harnandalahar. Studies in honour of Prof. Minoru Hara on his Seventieth
Birthday, Verlag fr Orientalistische Fachpublicationen, Reinbek 2000, pp. 387-410.

example, when a person remembers something he thought he had forgotten; when a person
finally manages to identify with certainty something that he has seen only vaguely from a
distance; when a person gives himself over to any sensual pleasure. Or again, when it is not the
fullness of presence, but on the contrary an absence, an empty space whether caused
deliberately, or occurring on its own that takes over the mind and finally brings about its
dissolution.
Let us, however, listen to at least a few of these verses, as terse as they are astonishing, of the
Svabodhodayamajar.
In the past, the Masters have taught the means to dissolve it [the mind]. Being afraid that this
authoritative teaching should decay, I will illustrate it. (v. 4)
The ancient masters have shown how to suppress it through detachment and repeated practice.
[Instead], we will teach how to obtain suppression with no effort. (v. 12)
This is just like what happens when a rumbling thunder gradually vanishes: once the thunder
has completely vanished, the mind too, due to its resting on it, becomes extinguished. (v. 14)
The adept should fix his exclusive attention on any pleasant sound coming to his ears, till the
moment in which the sound, having disappeared, becomes the cause of the suppression [of the
mind]. (v. 15)
In this practice, the sensorial faculties, which are the instruments of perception, are to be
brought to a state of equality. Equality comes from the escaping from attachment, as well as
from the extinction of aversion. (v. 18)
One should escape from all attachment, and from all aversion as well. Attached to all, just like
the fettered man, is Bhairava, and averse to all. (v. 19)17
Sensorial faculties, when bereft of perceptible objects and void, are dissolved into the Self. The
happiness of isolation arises in him, who attains the dissolvement of the sensorial faculties. (v.
20)
If one is running without being determinately aware of his own efforts in making steps, and,
consequently, has his mental activity free from intentions and constructs, the supreme Self
shines in him. (v. 24)
Whatever longing he may experience for any object, like food and so on, he should satisfy it as
far as possible. Thus, he will become full and without support. (v. 28)
At the end of coitus, the adept should project his mind into the place between the navel and the
sexual organ. When the love bliss dissolves, he becomes waveless in one instant. (v. 38)
If, in the manners outlined so far, instant by instant he brings about the dissolution of the mind
into the Self, he attains the essence of consciousness. He is called liberated-while-living. (v.
44)

Conclusion
At the end of this excursion into the lesser known folds of Hindu Tantrism a journey that
does not follow straight paths, but is necessarily winding and uncertain we have at least
managed to understand the title correctly, itself not a little ambiguous. Does India really owe to
17

Sul testo di questo verso c una notevole fluttuazione nei manoscritti e nelle citazioni antiche In the text of this
verse there is a notable fluctuation in the manuscripts and old quotations (cf. R. Torella, The
Svabodhodayamajar, op. cit., pp. 398 e 405).

Tantrism the invention (understood in its etymological meaning of inventio) of desire? As we

have seen, the reply is certainly negative: neither its invention, nor even its re-invention after a
period of eclipse. India has always been fully aware of the centrality of the body18 and the
drives of the psyche, in a single word, of the desiring dimension of man. The fact that this is
not clear externally is due to the work of containment erected by the brahmanic lite over the
almost two thousand years of its grandiose attempt at dominating the Indian world as a whole.
Lacking any direct power, it has replaced it by successfully imposing, as an alternative, an
opposition between purity and impurity that has marked every aspect of Indian culture: purity
of spirit, purity of philosophy, purity of rites, purity of language, purity of social and religious
conduct, etc. On the impure side, all power (excluding its own) is tacitly placed, any reality
that owing to its intrinsic nature - tends to escape control and standardisation: most of all, the
tumult of the body, and of the sensorial-emotional-passional sphere. In the latter, special
importance is given to eros. Although eros has only been dealt with fleetingly here, this is not
due to any undervaluation but, on the contrary, on the one hand to react against its
overvaluation (the congeries of studies on Tantric eros, for the most part generally of inferior
quality, end up leaving in the shade the rest of the emotional sphere, much less documented
and perhaps even much more hair-splitting to investigate), and on the other not to over-burden
what is intended to be only a preliminary study.
A last blunder would be to see in Tantric teachings the sophisticated result of a protest by
subtle theologians inclined to private transgressions. On the contrary, Tantrism represents an
open response to the brahmanic world, just as grandiose as the challenge that triggered it and
with goals just as vast. The counter-attack occurs precisely at the central point, i.e. questioning
the legitimacy and very basis for the division between pure and impure, destined to crumble
progressively beneath the thrust of a deliberate non-dual behaviour (advaitcra), in which
the more authentic meaning of Tantric transgression can be sought. But who and what takes
responsibility for this response? To speak, as has commonly been done, of popular incitement
that includes the re-emergence of ancestral doctrines and non-Aryan or even pre-Aryan
motifs, means first and foremost an unawareness of the profound cultural unity of the Indian
subcontinent, albeit with its thousands of variations. It means, furthermore, not being aware
that many of the Tantric rebels are themselves brahmans, neither more nor less than their
antagonists. In Tantrism, it is not another India calling for revenge, but the only India feeling,
within a part of its own brahmanic lite, that the moment has come to reformulate itself in
order to guarantee its own future survival in an historically changed world.

18

In this connexion, I should like to recall a personal experience. In the summer of 2004 I was at Helsinki for the
World Sanskrit Conference. I was listening to a paper by Rama Nath Sharma, the illustrious scholar of Sanskrit
grammar and the language sciences, when I was struck by a quotation, apparently taken from the Dharmastra,
the vast corpus of texts that have always governed the socio-religious behaviour of the orthodox Hindu. In this
quotation, the body is mentioned as the prime tool in achieving dharma. Inquisitive, at the end of the conference, I
approached my Indian colleague to ask him the specific source. Sharma replied (accompanying his answer with a
vague smile of understanding), But everybody knows.