(This essay is from a larger collection, which traces some of the parallels and distinctions between various sacred sex traditions and a practice sometimes known as karezza. It is not meant to be a definitive look at Hindu tantra, an effort that would require many volumes. For more on karezza: www.reuniting.info/wisdom/what_is_karezza.)
A collection of lore about the concept of lovemaking without sexual satiety would not be complete without mentioning tantra. Yet few subjects are more bewildering than the concept of beneficial synergy between mates in the Hindu religion.
On the other hand, the term tantra can create more confusion than clarity. Tantra comprises both a celibate tradition known as the “right-hand path” and a sexual tradition known as the “left-hand path.” Moreover, there exist both a Tibetan Buddhist tantra (to be discussed later) and the classic Hindu tantra. Finally, even within classic tantra, streams diverge—and have shifted with time.
Although there are now as many different sexual-tantra recipes as there are cat breeds, classic Hindu sexual tantra was not about mutual enlightenment or deeper union. Despite the showy display of worshiping the divine god or goddess in a shared ritual for raising the kundalini energy (refined life force energy), the maithuna (or “twinning”) ritual apparently developed for solo spiritual pursuits, not as a mutual, or ongoing, cultivation of sexual energy for spiritual purposes.
Author James Powell traces the roots of tantra back to a sexually permissive, matriarchal society in India. A favorite divinity of these early worshipers was the lusty Krishna—a dark blue fellow who was a sort of sexual Pied Piper, luring otherwise well-behaved married women from their beds to orgies in the wild.
Some worshipers of Krishna formed couples. They would stimulate intense, even violent, erotic emotions in themselves by reading and chanting the amorous adventures of their God. They would then perform sexual yoga, in which the male would play the part of Krishna and his partner the role of one of the cowherd girls [of the Krishna myth]. Love rituals were performed in large circles. It was felt that more intense erotic emotion could be produced if the women in such rituals were the wives of other men.
Later, tantra moved in a decidedly patriarchal direction under the Brahmans. Retained semen was equated with light and spirituality. Women were increasingly viewed with suspicion because they tempt men to lose semen. As a consequence, men believed that their health and spiritual power depended more upon keeping their seed than upon synergistic union.
A strong emphasis on celibate spiritual practice arose. Even among spiritually minded householders (men with families), the goal seems to have been to avoid ejaculation by limiting intercourse strictly to sex for procreation. For example, in Autobiography of a Yogi, the late Paramhansa Yogananda reported that his parents had sex once a year for purposes of procreation. Similarly, a devotee of the late Baba Muktananda told me that householders could consider themselves celibate if they had sex only once a month.
Some yogis sought to use ritualized sex for spiritual purposes (the lefthand path). Far from seeking mutual enlightenment with a partner, the yogi sought to awaken his own Feminine Principle within—residing in the form of the kundalini energy coiled at the base of the spine. Its release ideally manifests as psychological androgyny. The most powerful method of arousing the kundalini was said to be the sexual embrace—preferably with a young virgin. Virgins were believed to be full of spiritual power and capable of initiating one into the flow of subtle energies. (Similar beliefs were popular in China around the same period, and the Chinese ultimately trafficked in pre-pubescent girls in order to harvest their yin energy just before their first periods, when it was allegedly at its peak.) For yogis, this ritual lovemaking had nothing to do with romantic love. The woman was revered not as a woman but as “the Goddess”—and it didn’t much matter if she were a total stranger.
Not surprisingly, the left-hand path of sexual tantra fell into disrepute in its native land and went underground. In the view of yoga scholar Georg Feuerstein, much sexual tantra came to resemble black magic (or sex magick). It calls for exerting power over others and disregarding their wellbeing in search of personal gratification. According to Feuerstein, the self-centered focus of many tantric practices is revealed by their preoccupation with pursuit of orgasm, perhaps after partners have aroused each other for the purpose of achieving an altered state of awareness.
Feuerstein counsels that genuine tantra of either path (right or left) is a mystery that seeks to transcend the illusory self (ego) by awakening the body’s erotic potential while one’s energy is contained. The goal is bliss, a beyond-the-body state of communion with the Divine, not a heightened state of sensory pleasure. Classic tantra recommends techniques for transforming, or moving beyond, passion. In contrast,Western teachers frequently adapt its methods to increase passionate intensity—and gratify the ego’s desires.
As Feuerstein explains, at orgasm the creative tension that could serve as a bridge to ecstasy is lost. The whole point of avoiding orgasm is to accumulate the subtle force or nervous energy called ojas, which is wasted the moment the nervous system fires during sexual stimulation.
[It’s not semen loss that’s the problem.] It’s actually the firing of the nervous system during sexual stimulation. That applies to both men and women.—Georg Feuerstein
In Sacred Sexuality, Feuerstein records that openhearted lovers, tantric or otherwise, have spontaneously stumbled upon the experience of communion:
[After a night of lovemaking] I felt as though I was conscious or constantly awake on some higher plane. The entire day I remember feeling totally and perfectly relaxed. In this perfect relaxation I stood outside of time. To say there was no beginning or ending of time would seem irrelevant. There was simply no time. . . . [I was aware that everything material] was all spontaneously and playfully arising from one great source. . . . Somehow I had become infinity with eyes. I felt as if I had just been born in that moment, or that I had been asleep all my life and had just awakened. I also remember thinking that this was the true condition of everyone and that everyone could know this. . . . I remained in this state of edgelessness for about three weeks, and life was intensely magnified. . . . I ate almost nothing during this period. . . . I remember telling my lover that it felt as if my spine were plugged into the “universal socket” and that it was a source of infinite energy. . . . During this time I was more creative than I had ever been (or have been since) both at work and outside of work. . . . I also became prescient, seeing into the future and then later experiencing the scenes I had foreseen down to the last detail. . . . I loved everyone, including my lover, the same, infinitely. There was really no one separate to love.
Hi Marnia,
From what I understand, the Taoists in China had similar practices, no doubt translated from India in the distant past. You could cultivate energy in single path practices, in which you practiced qigong, internal energy exercises and other health practices, on your own. Or you could engage in dual path cultivation with a partner. In dual path the object was to cultivate the great energy of sexual relations without achieving orgasm (and for men, losing semen, which is viewed as a very special commodity). At the moment of orgasm, through breathing exercises and muscular control, men would withold ejaculation and send the sexual energy through gates up the spine and into the pituitary and pineal glands in the skull to boost their energy. I suspect the technique is similar for women.
But it must be noted that these exercises are meant to boost the body's energy, not to achieve a closer connection with your partner. Emotional attachment is strongly prohibited. So it's not really a form of sacred sex, but an energy exercise. And that's tough to achieve, especially with a long-time partner. I suspect the concept of vampire emerged from these practices; not people who sucked blood, but acolytes who stole the energy of their partners to enhance their own longevity.
The loss of semen mentioned above: I always believed it to be a metaphor for great energy loss. I have undergone a period of celibacy, following the single path. But lo and behold, the body wants to ejaculate–frankly it happens in my sleep, as it did when I was a young boy before I began releasing it on my own.
I have never practiced this form of "sacred sex" with a woman–I've always been greedy.
Best regards,
Bob
Thank you so much Marnia, You have explained very well the history of tantra and especially the patriarchal path which is selfish and egoistic as all of patriarchy is. I call my path tantric kabbalah. I do so because tantra is an active word meaning to weave and kabbalah is a receptive word meaning to receive. Together they make the poles of active and receptive or male and female which is necessary for energy flow. When I learned about the selfish and patriarchal aspects ot tantra I almost wanted to rename my system but ultimately chose to keep the name because of its energy aspects and also because of its association with sacred sexuality. My path is much closer to the matriarchal system of goddess worship as it views all women as the manifestation of the Divine Feminine and focuses upon the female orgasm and expanding the female orgasm to become continuous. You speak about losing the neurologic charge through orgasm when nothing could be further from the truth. Both orgasm and the state of mystical union share the simultaneous maximal stimulation of the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems. This is the union of opposites resulting in bliss and divine union. This state also includes major changes in neruonal flow within the brain. I remember a partner who would not be able to speak for a couple of hours having glossalalia during orgasm. This was not related to vascular flow but the neuronal flow. My regular tantric partner speaks of losing her body, having it dissolve into nothingness during orgasm and only experiencing the ecstatic presence of the Schechinah. This type of continuous orgasm is the evolutionary and spiritual inheritance of women. All women deserve this service every day as payback for the evolutionary risk of dying in pregnancy and childbirth. All men owe all women this service in return for existence. Everything that men love about themselves is due to their brain whose size endangers women's lives through childbirth. The expanded orgasm and even the secret of orgasm during childbirth are all compensation to women for their heroism of motherhood. You can not pay back your own mother or all the mothers of history. But every man can be heroic to every woman through Divine tantric service to the Schechinah and learning ejaculatory control. Ejaculatory control is not for semen retention, all glands need to be emptied, but it is to be able to heroically serve the Divine Feminine, the Schechinah through tantric service.
love and light,
Stuart
http://stuartmarkberlin.com
resrchmd@aol.com
Beware of "masters" who create their own systems, and couch their practices in religious gimcrackery. It results in obfuscation, not illumination. It's probably a surefire way to get laid.
Bob
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Thanks,
Krulayar
Hi Stuart,
Thanks for your thoughts. I'm glad to hear that you're serving the Divine Feminine with such enthusiasm. I'd like to suggest, however, that orgasm is not exactly what we've been led to believe it is. It's not over when our genitals come back to homeostasis. More and more evidence is turning up that the *neurochemical* cycle of orgasm (the subtle changes that ensue before the brain returns to homeostasis) is a lot longer than we've suspected…with the potential for some very unfortunate repercussions in terms of harmony between partners.
The cycle is at least 7 days in men, and probably closer to two weeks in both sexes. And it appears that the more intense the degree of sexual satiation…the rockier the recovery period can be in terms of mood swings and so forth. I have just published a book that outlines a lot of the evidence, although there is a lot more to learn. (Cupid's Poisoned Arrow: http://www.pitchengine.com/cupidspoisonedarrow/wh…
This suggests that you can't measure the effects upon your partner, or the harmony in your relationship, by her condition for the two hours following climax. Maximum stimulation of the parasympathetic nervous system may feel great, and yet not lead to subsequent balance.
On the other hand, I agree that a generous approach in the bedroom *is* the best way to increase harmony – and even make relationships a spiritual vehicle. See "How to talk to Cupid" http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/cupids-poison… I'm just not persuaded that more intense orgasms are the best measure of that generosity, given that the Coolidge Effect seems to be alive and well in humans. (See "What If She Were Always in the Mood?" http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/cupids-poison…
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