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A Contextualized Approach to Understanding Tantra
Understanding historical context is crucial to making informed choices. It provides a useful reminder of the reality of cultural relativity and the mutability of institutions and cultural practices. It is a common tactic to speak of revealing secrets – particularly potent language for the sexually repressed West. We are hungry for secret knowledge.
Many present-day Tantric teachers preface their workshop brochures or books with subtitles like “ancient secrets revealed” – actually an old strategy which has served well the Masons, the Mormons, the Rosicrucians and many other cults and religious groups. This strategy serves entrepreunial and coercive purposes, seeking to empower the teacher in the mind of the student, endowing him or her with ancient knowledge which has been kept secret.
Jeffrey Kripal in his book Kali’s Child: The Mystical and the Erotic in the Life and Teachings of Ramakrishna (1995) speaks of the power of invoking “the secret” in gaining disciples in his provocative study of Ramakrishna, the 19th century Bengali mystic. It is psychologically compelling to hear a secret hinted at, particularly when the teacher possesses charisma and charm. Is a secret which is talked about a secret, or a device?
Many scholars have observed the contrast between “secret” Tantric teachings, and how openly the secrets are talked about. Urban, for one, maintains that it is a myth that little is known in the West about Tantra. Rather, he says, Tantra is one of the most studied and written-about of all ancient ritual systems.
Tantra and Tantric practices continue to evolve. Old cultural and ritual elements are reformulated and repackaged to serve new contexts. I invite you to use this bibliography as an aid to your exploration of Tantra.
Return to Tantra Bibliography Index
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