Tantra Basics Part 1: Meaning and Origin

My intention with this overview is to paint a general picture of Tantra and its meaning, without getting bogged down in too much detail. It is aimed mostly at beginners who want a decent introduction to Tantra, although I think even experienced Tantrikas will still find this article interesting.

I have tried to find a balance between a scholarly approach, using academic sources and historical evidence, whilst also trying to keep it fairly light and easy to digest.

What is the meaning of Tantra?

So we’ll start off by considering Tantra meaning, and the question “What is Tantra?”

Of course, It’s not easy to give a simple answer to this question.

Tantra is a vast and fluid subject, which shifts its definition as you grow in your own consciousness.

Today you may believe Tantra to be one thing, but tomorrow you may change the way you understand it.

Trying to to define Tantra is like trying to hold smoke in your hands.

This ethereal and mercurial quality is 6perhaps what makes Tantra such a powerful path, being adopted and adapted throughout the ages by countless spiritual aspirants of different backgrounds.

Tantra can have various meanings.

The word Tantra itself is a Sanskrit word and it has several different translations..

Modern day Tantra teachers commonly translate it as…

– Technique

– Technology

– The loom which weaves

– To expand and liberate

These are the typical Tantra meanings you’ll most likely hear, and they are very popular in today’s Tantra circles.

A more authentic Tantra meaning…

But, interestingly, these translations did not come from the original Tantra teachings. They’re actually found in other texts, such as the Vedas, which are mostly non-Tantric. 

According to the Sanskrit scholar and Tantra practitioner Christopher Wallis, in the context of Tantric teachings, the word Tantra has as its Sanskrit roots, “Tan”, which meant the spreading of wisdom, and from the other root, “Tra”, which saves us from suffering.

So we could say that is a very Tantric translation… “the spreading of wisdom which saves us from suffering.” (Wallis, 2013).

A definition which captures the spirit of Tantra…

However, I don’t think we should completely discard those other translations when we are trying to understand the meaning of Tantra.

Although those definitions are not strictly speaking from the Tantric texts, they are still very much in line with the spirit of Tantra.

So now we get to this point in the discussion already, where it becomes apparent that you, as an individual, can decide for yourself how you want to define the word Tantra.

We have quite a few concepts to choose from, each of them being quite valid in their own way.

For myself personally, I like to get an overall sense from all these translations and the definition which I go with is something alongs these lines:

Tantra means the weaving together of wisdom in order to expand and liberate.

Listen to the podcast episode of this post, over on anchor.fm

But the word Tantra has another important meaning.

It also refers to a text which contains Tantric teachings.

So we often talk of the Tantras, and Tantric teachings coming from the Tantras, that is the original Tantric texts.

As explained by the Tantric guru Rama Kantha, who lived around a thousand years ago…

A Tantra is a divinely revealed body of teachings, explaining what is necessary and what is a hindrance in the practice of the worship of God. These teachings are given to those qualified to pursue both the higher and lower aims of human existence.

– Rama Kantha, Sārdhatriśati -kālottara-vṛtti (from Wallis, 2013)

Here Rama Kantha is using the word Tantra in the context of both the higher and lower aims of existence. What I believe he is referring to is that the teachings of Tantra can be applied for the higher goals of aspiring towards liberation and enlightenment, and can also be applied to the lower goals of fulfilling our more human aspirations in the material world.

Modern-day Tantra meanings…

So to give you even more of a feel for what Tantra is, check out these definitions and explanations as quoted from several different modern-day teachers…

Tantra is primarily about uniting love, spirituality and sexuality with awareness.

– Osho (1983)

Tantra relaxes the body, opens the heart and brings the mind into clear focus

– Margot Ananda (1989)

Tantra is for someone who practices all paths, because all paths encompass Tantra.

– Frederick Lenz (1984)

The tantric way is open to all the richness of human nature, which it accepts without a single restriction. It is probably the only spiritual path that excludes nothing and no-one.

– Daniel Odier (2001)

Unlike sexuality, which tends to find release at the lower end of the energy system, Tantra is about building our energies to the fountain-head of the uppermost dimension of the energy system.

– Sadhguru (2020)

Everything that we need in order to be complete is within us right at this very moment. It is simply a matter of being able to recognise it.

– Lama Yeshe (2014)

To summarise the meaning of Tantra…

Tantra is a system of spiritual practice, and a path of yoga, which integrates every aspect of human experience. It uses the body, the senses, the emotions, the heart, and the mind to gradually awaken to the fact that we are, right now, perfectly Divine consciousness.

Origins: How did Tantra start?

Ok, so if we want to deepen our understanding of what Tantra really is, it’s helpful to know something about the history and origin of Tantra.

What are the origins of Tantra? How did it come about?

Well, the origins of the Tantric traditions are something of an enigma. This is because there just isn’t much physical evidence from the very early history.

As the historian Kamalakar Mishra (2009) says, “The history of Tantra lies in deep obscurity”.

We know that the word Tantra first appears in a non-tantric context, in the Vedas. The earliest use of the word is in the Rig Veda, dating to somewhere between 1700 BCE to 1100 BCE. In those early poems of the Rig Veda the word is usually translated as meaning “the loom that weaves”. This was not really a Tantric use of the word, since the Vedas are not Tantric texts. However, as we have seen already, that translation of the word does fit with the general spirit of Tantra.

The earliest physical evidence of Tantra.

Tantra as a distinct tradition doesn’t appear in the historical record until somewhere around the year 500 CE.

Scholars are still debating whether the word “tantras” here refers to religious rituals” or “stringed instruments”, which is another of its translations.  Some scholars (Balogh, 2019) propose that this text could be an example of a shlista sentence,  a shlista is a sentence with two layers of meaning superimposed on some of the words. In this case the translation could therefore refer to both ritual and musical instruments.

In any case, the first actual Tantra to have survived down to today appeared about 75 years later. Known as the Nishvaasa-tatva-samhitaa, this tantric text was composed over several generations between the years 500 CE to 625 CE, and later was committed to writing on a 9th century palm leaf, which was found by archaeologists in Nepal.

In that text we have the very first known teachings on Tantrik yoga. These are literally the earliest written words from Tantrik teachings…

And the translation into English by Christopher Wallis (2019)…

So we know for sure that Tantra as a system of spiritual practice was definitely being taught from at least the year 500 CE in North Western India.

Early Tantra may have developed as an alternative to the Vedas.

We don’t have any Tantric texts going back earlier than this. However, it’s very possible that Tantra may have existed long before, from the time of the Vedas, which is the period approximately between 1500 BCE – 500 CE, or even before the Vedas. Some scholars actually do think this. For example, Kamalakar Mishra, the former professor of philosophy at Banaras Hindu university in India, points out that almost all the traditions in ancient India existed first in oral form and were handed down from guru to disciple or from generation to generation by word of mouth (Mishra, 2009). So it is reasonable to believe that Tantra could well have existed as an oral tradition from the time of the Vedas, or earlier, and perhaps was only written down after the time of the Vedas.

At this point it would be more accurate for us to use the term proto-Tantra… proto meaning an early or original version that no longer exists.

Although we don’t have any concrete evidence of fully developed tantric traditions in the distant past, historians generally agree that Tantra was clearly influenced by earlier Indian traditions and practices. Whilst some of those traditions were likely proto-tantric, one of the most obvious influences on the development of Tantra was that of the Vedas themselves. The scholar David Gray talks about this, in his  2016 publication in the Oxford Research Encyclopaedia.

Tantra, on the other hand teaches that spiritual liberation can be achieved through the embodiment of human experience, from enjoying things like food and drinking, and recognising the sacredness in day-to-day material things. It does not advocate the repression of the natural human instincts, and sexual urges. In the performing of rituals and worship there was no restriction of caste, and women played just as important a role as men.

Seen in this light it seems very likely that alternative traditions to the Vedas became increasingly popular. The Indian scholar Banerjii, in his book A Companion to Tantra (Banerji, 1988) points out that the Vedic division of society by castes and social classes must have fostered animosity, resulting in people turning to those alternative traditions that didn’t discriminate against the castes or class, and which were more accessible and inclusive for the common people.

Tantra we know today has many features that are contrary to the teachings of the Vedas, and also features which are not found in the Vedic traditions. So it’s reasonable to believe that Tantra could have developed from those alternative proto-Tantric traditions that were prevalent during that time.

And there is evidence of numerous ancient religious traditions in India dating back thousands of years.

In the book The Roots of Tantra, historian David Lorenzen (2002) tells us that many of these ancient Indian ascetics organised themselves into sects that were very tantra-like, being shamanic, and counter-cultural, and sort of opposed to the mainstream, and very secretive.

But we can go back even further.

Possible prehistoric roots of Tantra.

According to historian M C Joshi (2002), some aspects of Tantra have roots going back even to prehistoric times. A part of tantra that has the Divine Feminine as its focus, known as Shakta Tantra, can possibly be traced back as far as the Upper Palaeolithic period in India. We’re talking now about 20,000 years ago. A time when humans were still hunter-gatherers. Archeologists have found mother goddess figurines carved from bone, dating back, astonishingly, to somewhere between the 23,000 BCE and 17,000 BCE. Also from this period are colourful stones marked with triangles. Some scholars propose that these stones are related to primitive goddess worship, and may be early examples of the later Tantric use of yantras. Yantras are sacred diagrams in which triangles are used to symbolise fertility and masculine and feminine polarities. Tantra today still uses yantras in meditations and rituals, and they often have upward pointing triangles to represent Shiva, the divine masculine, and downward pointing triangles to represent Shakti, or the Divine feminine.

Well, we cannot be 100% certain that’s where tantric Yantras have come from, but it does seem pretty amazing that people were doing something with triangles painted on stones up to 20,000 years ago. To me it really shows that there is something powerful and timeless about the triangular forms of the yantras that we see in Tantra today.

The story of Tantra so far…

So we are starting to get this picture of Tantra possibly developing from very early, almost prehistoric, primitive, shamanic, pre-Vedic traditions, that seem to have been prevalent in ancient India, and then gradually becoming a popular alternative to the mainstream Vedic traditions of that period.

To be continued, in part 2 …

References:

Anand, M. (1989). The Art of Sexual Ecstasy: The Path of Sacred Sexuality for Western Lovers. Jeremy P. Tarcher Inc.

Balogh, D. (2019). Inscriptions of the Aulikaras and Their Associates. Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston .

Banerji, S. C. (1988). A Brief History of Tantra Literature. University of Michigan.

Goodall, D., Sanderson, A., Isaacson, H. (2015). The Niśvāsatattvasaṃhitā: The Earliest Surviving Śaiva Tantra, Volume 1. Institut Français de Pondichéry.

Gray, D. B. (2016, April 5th). Tantra and the Tantric Traditions of Hinduism and Buddhism. Oxford Research Encyclopedia. https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780199340378.013.59

Joshi, M. C. (2002). Historical and Iconographic Aspects of Shakta Tantrism. In K. A. Harper, & R. L. Brown (Eds.), The Roots of Tantra (pp. 39-55). State University of New York Press, Albany.

Lenz, F. (1984). Insights: Tantric Buddhist Reflections on Life. Interglobal Seminars.

Lorenzen, D. N. (2002). Early Evidence for Tantric Religion. In K. A. Harper, & R. L. Brown (Eds.), The Roots of Tantra (pp. 25-36). State University of New York Press, Albany.

Mishra, K. (2009), Kashmir Saivism: The Central Philosophy of Tantrism (Rev. ed.). Rudra Press.

Odier, D. (2001). Desire: The Tantric Path to Awakening (English translation). Inner Traditions. (Original work published 1999).

Osho (1983). Tantra, Spirituality, and Sex (2nd ed.) Rajneesh Foundation Europe.

Osho (1991).  The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha, Series 10. The Rebel Publishing House, Germany.

Payne, R. K. (2002). Tongues of Flame: Homologies in the Tantric Homa. In K. A. Harper, & R. L. Brown (Eds.), The Roots of Tantra (pp. 39-55). State University of New York Press, Albany.

Sadhguru (2020, December 11th). What is Tantra Yoga? Definitely Orgasmic, But Not Sexual. Isha.sadhguru.org. https://isha.sadhguru.org/uk/en/wisdom/article/about-tantra-yoga

Wallis, C. D. (2013). Tantra Illuminated: The Philosophy, History, and Practice of a Timeless Tradition (2nd ed.). Mattamayura Press.

Wallis C. D. (2015, August 2nd). What is Tantra?: Setting the Record Straight. Hareesh.org. https://hareesh.org/blog/2015/8/2/what-is-tantra?rq=what%20is%20tantra

Wallis, C. D. (2019, April 22nd). The Very First Teachings on Tantrik Yoga (c. 500 CE). Posted on Facebook.com https://www.facebook.com/groups/tantrikyoganow/posts/1168179610023186/

Wallis, C. D. (2021, May 3rd). The First Use of the Word Tantra. Posted on Facebook.com. https://www.facebook.com/groups/tantrikyoganow/posts/1795018294005978/

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