Lecture tag: Tantra

Readings in the Netra Tantra, Session Six (HT15)

The Netra Tantra is an important early medieval Śaiva text. We will read and discuss sections of the text based on the two manuscripts in the NGMPP Library and compare these with the published KSTS edition. Apart from reading the text we will discuss its meaning.

Readings in the Netra Tantra, Session Seven (HT15)

The Netra Tantra is an important early medieval Śaiva text. We will read and discuss sections of the text based on the two manuscripts in the NGMPP Library and compare these with the published KSTS edition. Apart from reading the text we will discuss its meaning.

Readings in the Netra Tantra, Session Eight (HT15)

The Netra Tantra is an important early medieval Śaiva text. We will read and discuss sections of the text based on the two manuscripts in the NGMPP Library and compare these with the published KSTS edition. Apart from reading the text we will discuss its meaning.

Understandings of Bhakti and Tantra in Balinese Hinduism (HT15)

Balinese Hinduism is a tradition that emphasizes dharma rather than bhakti. Still, esoteric bhakti can be found in Bali, especially in the experiences of the pedandasor brahmin high priests. They are primarily Saivite, though there are a few Buddha-Siva priests remaining. Bhakti is combined with the daily ritual identification with Siva/Surya, the surya-sevana ritual, involving tantric mantras, mudras, pranayama, nyasa, and bhutasuddhi. The priests transform ordinary water into the holy water which is needed for virtually all other Hindu rituals in Bali, and in doing so they not only ritually identify with the god, they also develop a devotional relationship to him. The surya-sevana ritual includes both bhakti and tantra. This paper will describe the roles of bhakti and tantra from field interviews with practitioners, primarily Balinese pedandas.

This paper will argue that the concept of bhakti is known in Balinese Hinduism, but it is not primarily associated with emotion. It is associated withsannyasa, with dharma, with jnana, karma, and with yajna. It is almost anythingexcept emotion. The concept of tantra is also known, and found primarily in four areas. There is priestly tantra, in which the pedanda identifies himself with the gods and with the universe, and ritually merges his identity with the god Siva. There is magical tantra, both black and white, in which mantras, mudras, yantras and amulets are used to supernaturally influence the world. There is architectural tantra, in which the layout of temples, and indeed the island of Bali itself, is an expression of the mandalas of deities. And there is bodily tantra, in which the Kanda Empat are both deities and biological entities which develop along with the human souls, spiritually evolving from physiological organs to divine beings.

Śākteya Mudrās: Hand Gestures in Tantric Goddess Worship (MT 16)

This seminar fundamentally attempts to understand and contour hand gestural or mudrā practice in tantric rituals. Rooted in older traditions, mudrās have always been an integral part of tantric rituals. Delineating on how śākteya tantric practitioners construct a symbolic world through their visualisation and use of mudrās, this talk will explore training methods of mudrās followed by śākteya practioners. Furthermore, the intertwined nature and presence of mudrās in Indian classical dance and Hindu Temple traditions will be discussed.

Janaki Nair is PhD student at Northumbria University, researching on Semiotics in Tantra and Indian dance. She is affiliated with the Śakta Traditions research project at the OCHS.

Hindu Theology for a King: Baladeva Vidyābhūṣaṇa’s Tattvadīpikā: Session Three (TT15)

The Tattvadīpikā (An Illumination of Reality) is an unpublished Vedāntic work written by Baladeva Vidyābhūṣaṇa (ca 1700-1793), a prominent Bengali Vaiṣṇava author in the early modern period. The manuscript is held in the library of the Maharaja Sawai Man Singh II Museum in Jaipur (Manuscript #5693 in Gopal Bahura’s Literary Heritage of Rulers of Amber and Jaipur). The work is not widely circulated among Bengali Vaiṣṇavas, and its existence was practically unknown till the catalogue of the library was published in 1976. This suggests that the work was probably written exclusively for Jaisingh II (1688-1743), a famous Rajput king of Jaipur Baladeva worked for, who was known for his keen interest in Hindu Theology.

The text is primarily concerned with a refutation of other schools of thought such as Buddhism, Nyāya, Vaiśeṣika, Sāṅkhya, and Advaita Vedānta, providing us with an excellent insight into the intellectual climate in early modern North India. This reading class aims to introduce students with an intermediate knowledge of Sanskrit to the style of theological debate in Sanskrit writings as well as to the methodology of editing a text based on a manuscript.

Dr. Kiyokazu Okita is Assistant Professor at The Hakubi Center for Advanced Research, Kyoto University, Department of Indology, Faculty of Letters, Kyoto University.

The Tantric Mandala of Srisailam Temple and the Religious World of Saivas and Saktas (TT 16)

This seminar focuses on various aspects of the Tantric mandala of Srisailam and the religious culture of Saiva and Sakta communities as is demonstrated in textual sources as well as hundreds of images depicted on the Prakara enclosure of the temple complex. The iconological patterns and symbolism of the images suggest that a Tantric mandala of Siva/Bhairava and Goddess Durga was created to represent a particular body of religious systems, cosmology, mysticism, visualization of deities and esoteric practices of Saivas and Sakta groups between the seventh and the fifteenth centuries. The mandala helps us to understand the ways Tantrikas conceptualized Srisailam as the macrocosmic universe of Siva and Sakti, and their religious worldview based on the soteriological goals to gain both worldly and supernatural enjoyments (bhukti) and powers (siddhis) as well as liberation in this life (jivanmukti). This seminar explores four facets of Tantric religious culture in order to 1) establish the Saiva-Sakta cultic connections and religious practices of Bhairava and Durga and the cult of Virabhadra and Bhadrakali 2) explore the goddess-oriented Sakta traditions such as the tribal connections of Durga prior to her transformation as the Great Goddess of Sanskrit tradition, the worship of seven mothers (saptamatrikas), the village goddess Camunda and Bhairavi, the goddess of Tantras 3) establish the development of esoteric practices of “mystical physiology” through the subtle body of energy system (cakras) to obtain either supernatural powers and to achieve god consciousness, the kundalini practice for the union of Siva and Sakti energies, and the Tantric visualization and meditation practices of Sadasiva and 4) the use of yantras, mandalas, lingas and images in meditation and worship.

Dr Prabhavati C. Reddy is an Adjunct Faculty member of Religious Studies at George Mason University in Virginia, USA. She is an interdisciplinary scholar with a Ph.D. in Sanskrit and Indian Studies from Harvard University, an M.A. in Asian Art History from the University of Texas-Austin, and an M.A and M.Phil. in Ancient History and Archaeology from Osmania University, Hyderabad, India. She has previously taught at George Washington University and was a two-year Andrew Mellon Post-Doctoral Fellow at Northwestern University where she taught in the Department of Religious Studies. She specializes in Hindu traditions and is interested in the historical development of sectarian traditions with reference to constructive theological frameworks and syncretism, religious authority and identity, and conflict and resolution in response to sociological and political processes. She is the author of Hindu Pilgrimage: Shifting Patterns of Worldview of Srisailam in South India (Routledge, 2014) and has published several articles on Indian art and Indian diaspora/Hindu temples in North America. She is currently working on two books entitled, The Tantra and Siddha Traditions at Srisailam: Kundalini and Hatha Yoga Practices in Medieval India and Vaisnava Rituals and Sacred Images. She has lectured at universities in both the U.S and India as well as has presented papers at professional conferences.