Ordo Antichristianus Illuminati^®

Tantric Initiation & the Scholar-Practitioner

Copyright © Leilah Publications, LLC 2002-2008 All rights reserved.

The virtue of religion to the human condition is prevalent. The motive is that all men and women perceive to a certain degree, the everlasting wail of the ‘First Noble Truth,’ that everything is sorrow and religion consoles them by either an authoritative denial or perpetuation of this truth. This psychological ply is done via transgression of the situation itself, or by promising amends in other states of existence. A fundamental problem is that religions, without exception, often fail and become decrepit at the first tests of history and culture. The claim of religion is to excel, and incidentally, make obsolete the judgments of reason by reconciling mysticism and science. In this formula, a direct experience and more importantly expression of intelligences superior in kind to any incarnate human occur. Preconceptions of religion and the arts and sciences of the occult by the initiated scholar breed spiritual materialism and secular demonization.

Esoteric religion presupposes ideals of a discarnate intelligence or experience of ultimate reality, regardless of whatever linguistic intrusion humanity places upon it. This is exactly what no religion has proven scientifically, trapping the human condition in its finitude and trance of sorrow. The wail that all life is sorrow is promulgated by the glorification of suffering, altruism, and spiritual materialism of western-prostituted religions. Tantric practices of Vajrayana Buddhism and classical Hinduism coalesce into a thread inclusive of nearly every religious tradition that enters American society, only to become prostituted by consumerism. Intrusion by secular agendas of pale intellectual speculation retards mystical and esoteric address to the diagnosis of human finitude and evolution. For the practitioner initiated into the esoteric depths of religion it appears the human condition has not yet fulfilled or defined any sort of limit. Barren intellectual address by theologians outside of their own religiosity to the arts and sciences of esoteric religion invites misperception. Theological and academic establishments have unceasingly striven to convince their respective audiences that the most private of mystical experiences is not an esoteric event at all, merely an ambiguous and incomprehensible experience to be publicly affirmed and validated.

Magic and mysticism are sciences of understanding oneself and one’s condition in life; all respective practices and traditions serve as an art in applying that understanding in action. Esoteric traditions unearthed in religion recognize frankly that truth is relative and apparent, all of which is imply self-adjustment and evolution. To partake of initiation into esoteric traditions without understanding and doing the necessary work, makes for a misunderstanding of the whole point of initiation. Ritualistic initiation overseen by a competent preceptor bestows the activation of efficiency for self-realization, what Christian mystics describe as "union with Christ."

Initiation is the foundation of spiritual progress in religion and its esoteric intrigues. Efficiency in initiation is the mean that actively executes effects to make changes in conformity with the will. Ceremonial initiation into a system of esoteric practice implies taking responsibility for ones self and actions, to dedicate intent to the take of realizing all creative potentials as a human and spiritual being. Such is the task of one who seeks to evolve and attain to self-mastery. Initiations into such systems as Tantra are means of self-actualization and psychological development. The root of the word initiation stems from the Latin noun, initium, which literally means ‘beginning’, ‘a commencement anew.’ Thus, initiation marks beginnings of a new perception and attitude toward life and death. Moreover, it is the entry into entirely new archetypes of existence, meaning above all, spiritual maturity, and progression.

There is more misperception spoken of and written about Tantra than nearly all religions of the world. A good sum of this outside approach to esotericism is fostered by the idea that there is something of a foreboding mystique about Tantra, even perhaps a sense of aversion to its transgressive elements. Tantra is the method, the ritual, and the act of the divine manifestation exclusive to the sacred feminine. In non-initiated approach Tantricism from secular avenues, it is common for outside academia to associate the practice with the religious application of the sexual act.

Sexuality is employed in diverse elements of Tantra, yet Tantra further is concerned of integrating antinomian divine applications. As with other arenas of human exploration, Tantra generates theories for explaining the myriad facets of the human condition under a polytheistic schema. For practitioners, secular conceptions evolve into dogma and fixed beliefs that become firmly entrenched in academic debate as manifestations of attitudes perpetuated by ignorance. Occult concepts of sexuality in relation to Tantricism are no different from those in any other angle of society. Sexuality and eroticism in religion and Tantra can confirm preconceptions and elevate them to a spiritual or traditional place of received wisdom. From a certain point of view, Tantra is an art of uniting archetypal opposites in the far-reaching depths of the human psyche to awaken the ‘Middle Way’ as revealed in the Buddhadhamma.

Tantric practice is arguably the most advanced form of Hinduism, adjacent to the arts of yoga. Tantra is not obsessed with the will-to-die, enshrouding existence as immersed in sorrow and suffering. Alternatively, the diverse arts of Tantra are concerned not with the dross attitudes of fatalism and subservience toward a savior-figure designed as redeemer to the human condition. The centerpiece of Tantra as an evolving Indo-Aryan art is the teaching and practice of Vedic mysteries, one of the eldest sources of ancient wisdom and ordained knowledge of religion. When men and women first sought in ancient days to adore their deities, sexuality and fertility were used in ritual petitions for sustenance. Restriction and misperception of sexuality in its religious applications leads to ruin, often transformed into the most deplorable evil by perverted souls lost in the mire of insanity.

The popular study and scholarly approach of Tantric ritual, texts, and artifacts in ancient religions reflects a re-enchantment of the feminine from patriarchal phallo-centrism. Western religious traditions are as rife with solar-phallic worship as Hindu culture and religion is pregnant with goddess iconography and devotion. Artifacts with feminine motifs relating to fertility rites in the well-preserved Mohenjo-Daro suggest iconic powers of the sacred feminine in goddess worship. . The arrival of Vedic culture is believed to have replaced an earlier matrilineal culture with a patriarchal one.

The sacrificial rites of the Ŗg Veda serve as a mid-point between pastoral fertility worship of the Indus Valley, and Vedic asceticism of patron Brahmins. Fertility rites and feminine motifs discovered point to a coalescent archetype in cultures, a mother-goddess who grants fertility of women, animals, and successful agriculture. Unlike Biblical canon, and its officiators, which obscure and subordinate the role of the sacred feminine, the complexity of Vedic rites and literature includes the sacred feminine as potent consort Devas. Although suggestive of Upanishadic practices such as ascetic Yoga, the lińga , or mahalinga, is a symbol latent in ancient patriarchal religions evolving from solar-phallic worship, and the myth of the dying "god," i.e. that myths of the Christ, Mithra, and Osiris. As students of religion, we must debate whether theologians have perhaps overlooked, oversimplified even, the concept of sacrifice in petition for fertility in procreation and agrarian harvest.

Later Vedic traditions of Vaişņavisn and Śaivism coagulated the sacred feminine into Puranic and Tantric practices. Vedic orthopraxy indicates early fertility worship to expiate fecundity of soil and sexual procreation. Again, overlooking the significance and abundant findings in ancient Indus Valley culture of feminine figurines, personification of rivers, petitionary fertility rites, and scholars can only speculate on the worship of a primordial Mahā Devī. Textual evidence suggests this trend began in the medieval period of Hinduism, though to rely solely upon scripture would be a polemic against the influence of the sacred feminine in ancient religion.

In regards to the more transgressive nature of the sacred feminine, this writer worships zealously, Vāma Kālī. Maha Devi is Kālīka . Kālīka is Maha Devi. This is because Matah, or Ma Kālī is without beginning and without end, She permeates the effulgence of Being. She is imagined by mentality to be Black, yet Ma Kālī is colourless, above the coloured Gunas, as Her hair is disheveled in fury and erotic power. She liberates Maya, Visnu, and Siva, dances upon even the destruction of Brahman. She is the liberation of being, pervading even nirvana, as all Sadhakas are so very dear to Her, (and you are so dear to I, Matah!), She is the sole Creatrix, Preserver, and Destructress of infinite millions of worlds.

Upon her voluptuous body is the mark of the Yoni, the mark of creation. This signifies, upon her terrifying visage, the withdrawal of all things. We are nothing to Her, yet so very dear to Ma Kālī. Kālī brings the changeless, the nothingness of Being, Consciousness-Bliss, and Thought under Her dominion. It is at our death that we beg the Mother of the World to grant us liberation. The great Daksina is beyond Kama and Kala to myself. She, I worship as the bīja, "KRIM" the Destructress of time and Love. Kālī devours all existence and chews all existing things within her teeth, I imagine her apparel to be a mass of blood and bone. She is Black to Me.

Kālī is the Mind that draws up the unseen between illusion and reality. She is called the Devourer of Death in the 333 worlds, causing the Demons of dispersion to flee her countenance in fear and terror. She devours all and naught, hence do the sages call Kālī, MahaKala. I am the primordial Kalika because She is Herself in Him. Kālī possesses the "eight great powers of the Three-Eyed One in the palm of Her hands." Kālī gives birth to Being according to its Dharma. To this writer, Ma Kālī is the matrix of the thousand-petaled Lotus in the sea of despair. O’ Thou, nectar of Death, Thou Three-Eyed One, I aspire to the burning grounds of Thee!

Ma Kālī invokes the ultimate mystery of sex and death. My blood forms an erotic image of flesh that I give to Kālī without hesitation. The breath of Kālī becomes the Law of the Threshold I enter upon in a Fall from Grace. I see the Kula, and I belong to the Supreme Devadata. I recite the mantras while feeding upon my own blood, I meditate constantly on the black-looking one, the conqueror of time, killer of all. In our darkest nightmares and wildest fantasies, Ma Kālī is the form of Void and Self of Form. If a being can understand this, s/he is as Mad as I. Matah is the uncanny form seated in sex upon my burning body! How I long for that, to be One in the Void of Self, and meditate forever in Her burning grounds, watching Her dance the dances of Death.

Sir John Woodroffe writing under his nom-de-plume ‘Arthur Avalon’ in his "Garland of Letters," eloquently states Kālī is in her aspect as withdrawing time into itself. "Kālī is so called because She devours Kala (Time) and then resumes Her own dark formlessness." ("Garland," pg. 235). Woodroffe says scholars speculate Kālī was originally the Goddess of the Vindhya Hills, conquered by the Aryans. The necklace of skulls which sensationalizes her terrifying mythic image, he adds, are those of white people! If we as devotees of the Black Woman rely on the Tantra texts themselves, we at best gain an uninitiated (for those not taken dīkşā) insight into the tantrik ideal of Ma Kālī. In the Kulachudamani Tantra (quoted above), Lord Shiva asks questions answered by Matah, the Supreme primacy of the "Mother" archetype. According to Woodroffe, who published the Sanskrit text with an English introduction in his Tantrik Texts series, the Kulachudamani Tantra is dated as the oldest of the known Tantrik texts.

The cremation ground represents metaphysically a place where all desires are burnt away in order to purify the atman for liberation. All taboos and conditionings must be burnt away before liberation. This theme is central to the secrets, comically called, of the O.T.O. "IXth" and "Xth" Degrees. Homoeroticism and bisexuality, all forms of sexual "deviation" are explored and purified from taboo in the Tantrik initiate whom dwells in the burning grounds. "Kālī is so called because She devours Kala (Time) and then resumes Her own dark formlessness." (Woodroffe, "Garland." Pg. 235). When I execute ritual or meditate, I contemplate Kālī the unborn One, the Black Woman whom devours my identity. Kālī is time withdrawn into my Self. Ma Kālī extends into my primordial past and into my karmic future. Ma Kālī is the crown of cultural dignity and identity; She is a terrifying pendant of female sexual dominance and power. As the haunter of the cremation grounds, Ma Kālī dwells upon the outskirts of civilization with ghouls and demons as her companions in the smoky burning grounds.

Kālī is the unrecognizable aspects of ourselves, the merging of instinct with cause. I can vouch in my own secret ritual workings with Vāma Kālī, and by isolate time spent with my Guruji, that Kālī’s wayward spiritual visitors include madmen of great genius, the bereft, despondent, bereaved, seekers, deviants. These are the true children of Kālī. The outcast, the exiled, and the taboo, the wayward and lost are Her true companions. Kālī penetrates the breech of nothingness and the lie of its bounds; she is the Mother of Not. Ma Kālī is the withdrawal of form into the Void, and the expulsion of Cause from time. Kālī is the truth in all action, to Kālī only action matters.

According to legend, there once was a great battle with blood everywhere. Durra fought the Buffalo demon and slew him, but so many more demons manifested. Every time when Durga would slay a demon, from each drop of blood that fell to the earth, another demon would arise forth. Thus in order to save the world of the Devas, out of Durga’s third Eye manifested Kālī, the Queen of Destruction. She went into a killing spree, killing everything in sight. The Gods became terrified that Kālī would destroy the balance and order of the universe. The empyrean court knew that only Siva could allay Kālī so Siva went and lay down upon the earth beneath Kālī. In her mad dance of destruction, she stood upon the inert Siva. When she looked below and saw that Her foot was atop her consort, she ceased dead in Her dance and in embarrassed disarray protruded Her tongue. Hence is Ma Kālī ‘s tongue hanging out and protruding insidiously.

No man nor Deva may ever Unveil She. Ma Kālī lurks in the burning grounds, the place where our thoughts and karmic acts are destroyed. Kālī annihilates the cause and the effect, Matah annuls the difference between Love and Lust. She is the ambivalent fusion of Death and sexuality, of terrifying violence and erotic power. Few men and women come to Know Her nature fully. Kālī is the embodiment of the isolate Being, the thrust of antinomianism. Ma Kālī is the nightmare of Mankind, She is a fetish of fear and fantasy where terror annihilates Self. Kālī and men whom attain to Kālī withdraw into the Abyssal Self that is the Infernal Fallen Angel if you will, the daemonic, qlifot of the Holy Guardian Angel. By casting the self through the glamour of the Abyss, segregating all conceptions of Love from Will, the chela opens up passage ways in the psyche that are considered "qlifotic" and Chthonian. Kālī is the demon whom is never sated and swallows all things. Kālī even swallows all cause, and the Void itself.

The natural inertia of humanity desires religion and ethics ready-made.  Thus far, we can say Tantra with its diverse compendium of literature embodying esoteric ritual occupies a prominent place in the religious life of Indian culture. The system is regarded as occult, to be expounded by the enigmatic character of the Guru to the postulant who is duly initiated and consecrated. The most recognizable manner in which the term Tantra is portrayed in modern academia denotes a class of esoteric literature addressing a diverse mystical and magickal adoration of various deities. Again, concerning the ritualistic applications of Tantricism, the ideal is the self-realization of the identity of the individual soul, the microcosm with the divine manifest, the macrocosm.

Thus, the skeleton of Tantric ritual is the task of the Aspirant to identify with the deity worshipped along with its presiding macrocosm. Collectively, Tantra almost has been unequivocally misperceived and condemned by scholars foreign to the practice. Only a limited portion of the vast compilations of Tantric literature has the public had access to. The fraction of these exclusive and obscure texts is now more available to the curious scholar with the assistance of information technology.

Let us reaffirm that initiation, as the entering into new modes of perception is the mystical foundation of Tantric practice viewed as antinomian. " ‘dīkşā (from the Sanskrit, dakş, ‘to be able, to be lit’) or Tantric initiation is the most essential preliminary of the esoteric form of worship, investing one with the right to follow the injunctions of the Tantras." (Chakravarty 1963; 3) To the profane external world of men and women, subjective examination of Tantra by academics has suffered unto the secular two chief misconceptions.

Academic enthusiasm projects archetypes of it that is at once so magical that the common scholar is easily ensnared intellectually or wardened off. The adverse characters alternatively, seek to emphasize transgressive and exoterically obscene elements in the diverse sects, claiming to be Tantric that the uninitiated aspirant bound by preconditioned ethics shies away from the apparently abominable. Few scholars are aware that both attitudes here are unwarranted and unjustified. These preconceptions foster Tantric prejudice against profane publicity, as Tantra are essentially and individualistic and occult affair. Tantra as a collective employs such common facets as the indispensability of the Guru-Chela relationship, the occult secretiveness of ritual performance, and the necessity of proper initiation. Preconceptions of religion and the arts and sciences of the occult by the uninitiated scholar-practitioner breeds spiritual materialism and secular demonization.

Immersed in western cultural relativity, Tantricism has been injected with the stereotypical taboo of the orient. Such a predisposition creates an environment for profane bootleggers of religion, spending time at length within traditions only to repackage it in the brand of material charlatanism. Scholars point out briefly the involution of spiritual materialism in Tantricism; "then there are the Western dilettantes, the self-proclaimed Tantric entrepreneurs, who have hitched their elephant-wagons to the New Age star to peddle a dubious product called Tantric Sex, which they (and their clientele) assume to be all there ever was to Tantra." (White 2000; 4) Reaction from so-called scholar-practitioners attempts to rehabilitate public misconceptions of Tantra by highlighting such arguable elements as the "refined (right-handed) philosophical speculation that grew out of the preexisting (left-handed) Tantric practices." (White 200; 5)

The individualization of sexuality and material transgression in Tantrika brings to our attention the threads of historical interaction between initiates and those rare breed given the debatable mantle of scholar-practitioner. Spiritual materialism is a term coined by the controversial Tibetan Guru Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche. The idea veiled in these penetrating words is that spiritual practice exists under a dominion of the temporal self, the illusion of the ego. With the temporal self, there emerges an innate desire for transcendental knowledge, mystical attainment, and self-aggrandizing versions of virtue, ethics, and religion. Disciples who have undertaken initiation with Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche relate spiritual materialism to "temporary meditation experiences tend to force the ego out of hiding – they show us how limited life is within the "I," and reveal the spiritual materialism of the ego, how it will try to co-opt spiritual experience for its own ends." (Ray 2001; 252)

Concerning the insider-outsider approach to Tantric studies, the mantle between scholar and practitioner often is blurred in subjectivity. Various scholars masquerading as practitioners have charged at times Tantric preceptors with misconduct of ethics, sexuality, and unenlightened behavior to say the least. These charges upon the psychology and style of initiation often are due to preexisting aversion to the occult arts and sciences, with its often-erotic mysteries. Arguably, spiritual egotism injects itself here into the vague impression between scholar and practitioner. Another western disciple of Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche clarifies the self-seeking pursuit of scholarship in the scope of spiritual attainment; "Trungpa identified the commercial mentality behind the hope for some kind of payoff at the end of the path, and correctly related this to the materialism that permeates our whole society." (Butterfield 1994; 39)

It is possible to argue then, that "defined in conceptual terms, the Tantras are self-restricting and elitist. Most Tantras say their texts and teachings are not meant for those without highly specialized qualifications (adhikara), and initiations…their claim are that they are the exoteric canon’s higher, esoteric extension meant only for the few." (Brocks 1997; 277) In this perception lies an understanding and reluctant acknowledgment of the discriminating sciences of the occult. Reductionism of esoteric and select Tantric systems distorts the religious applications of it so much that initiates often fail to recognize their own religious heritage.

In the area between religion and secularism, between scholar and practitioner, a shade emerges as a sort of ‘Trojan Horse,’ pitting the speculative debate of confessional vs. secular-academic against cyclic inconclusiveness. How does an academic insider of a prescribed religion promulgate experience and expression objectively? Furthermore, academia Americanizes Tantrika and its magical applications commercially, damaging public perception and reinforcing the attitude that Tantra remain for the select and secret few. Is it conceivable for one to be thrust within the Tantric tradition while remaining an objective scholar? Alternatively, is it permissible in principle for a practitioner to engage academia? Initiation is the reconciler here. Let one look impartially upon this issue by first examining the nature of initiation.

The scholar-practitioner who has failed in initiation, or simply not undertaken the ordeals of initiation, perpetuates "a homespun movement whose teachers have not received the teachings and the accompanying spiritual transmission with a recognized lineage." (Feuerstein 1998; 98) Initiation allows the postulant new archetypes of life and death compounded with dynamic worldviews. To allow initiation unto the unfit is not only severely damaging to all aspects of the aspirants constitution, it also is disastrous for the teacher and student.

Initiation utterly and without regards, destroys the bonds of ignorance and profanity, allowing the self-knowledge to attain illumination. In Sanskrit, the term for initiation is dīkşā. We have a possible linguistic explanation of the term as so: "Abhinava Gutpa etymologically associates this term with the words dana (giving) and kshapana (destroying)." (Feuerstein 1998; 100) Thus, initiation gives the aspirant the means to destroy the bonds that shall hinder one from the ladder of spiritual progress and evolution. Secrecy is a most dire aspect within the arts and sciences of the occult. The mystical intent behind magickal oaths of secrecy is that by revealing to the profane experiences about the rituals of initiation, one dissipates essential energies of that mystical ceremony.

During a personal initiation into the tradition of Order of the Golden Dawn, my terrified essence was instructed, "Inheritor of a dying world, we call thee to the living beauty. Wanderer in the Wild Darkness, we call thee to the Gentle Light. Long hast thou dwelt in darkness, quit the night and seek the day." (Regardie 1998; xvii) Some years later amidst the Great Pyramid of Gizeh in Ægypt, this writer was humbled yet again. As I lay bound, nude, and blind, my Preceptors spake: "Despise not sadness, and hate not suffering, for they are the initiators of the heart," and thereafter was said "I am the preparer of the pathway, the rescuer unto the Light; out of the darkness, let that Light arise." With ritualistic incantations, the psyche receives new archetypes. As the adepts of our Initiatic Inheritance have expressed, "it is necessary to emphasize the fact that an anterior personal training and prolonged magical effort are the sole means by which one is enabled so to awaken the dormant spiritual life of another that he may well and be truly called initiated." (Regardie 1998; 23)

‘Western’ peddlers of Tantra shackle their cosmetic and stylized products to the masses of many fallow Thelemites, usually under the dubious trade name of "sex magic(k). In the early Tantras, sex was employed as practical means of initiation and consecration via the sexual fluids, including urine and menstrual excretions, called rajas. The function of the male initiate was too inseminate into the female, to insanguinate the fluids with those of the female consort. The role of male and female is vitally reciprocal, and outside of a Vedic/Brahmanic template, gender subversion in the practice did not occur. Aropa, or transubstantiation, is the mystical ‘quality’ invoked in the process of sexual insanguination, a sacramental rite whereby the semen is emitted after controlled arousal and ebbing throughout various parts of the body.

The conjugal symbolism of lińga and yoni in Tantra reflects the Christ-Bridegroom and Church-Bride of Christian ‘Garden’ Scriptures such as ‘Vineyards of Isaiah’ (Isaiah 5) and the ‘Song of Solomon’ (Psalms). There is no theological dogmatism, nor divine jealousy between god and culture in the Tantras. An underlying theme of the Tantric canon holds that each sexual act reciprocates an act of divine manifestation, be it creation or destruction. Such afore-mentioned forms of insemination are best conducted during inverted forms of coitus, referred to in certain treatises on vulgar eroticism as Lataveshtitaka, and Vrishadhirudhaka. One of the most difficult aspects of inverted coitus, is to master a specific method in preventing ejaculation and withholding the seed until all emotive and psychological conditions manifest for the right "magickal" moment for the seed to be injected. The seed, bīja, must be forced to re-ascend with such extreme force, orgasm may be achieved without ejaculation.

It is by the halting of the seed, and mastery of retaining the sperm, into the pure petals of the lotus are thoughts and breathe halting to make for a transient, fleeting experience of Death. It is said by the ancient Ægyptians, "the body of a woman burns like fire." Tantra is an inner art where one immerses the psyche and the body into the seminal sea without drowning in base lust. Constant adoration and worship of the Devadatta opens pathways to a greater Lust many magicians greatly fear. Eroticism in the form of divine worship and adoration awakens a sort of Madonna Intelligenza, a seed-bearing Understanding, and the Lust that activates the capability of agape in the formula of the Lover. Such processes that are vulgarized by the Thelemic peddlers of "sex magic(k)" often lead to failure invoked by base desire for ends due to the intrinsic nature of human sexuality.

Initially, Tantric sādhana (practice) emanates hedonistic impressions to the uninitiated and yet transcends the dualistic notions of purity and impurity. Hedonistic attributes to the vulgar stem from the Adepts partaking of the five prohibitions, madya, māmsa, matsya, mudrā, maithuna which are liquor, meat, fish, parched grain (prepared in an aphrodisiacal manner), and sex all within the scope of controlled ritual, through transgression of proper caste conduct. In a non-dualist Tantric schema, Initiatic powers both worldly (bhukti) and spiritual (mukti) conjugate reality and illusion. Theologians of Tantra often make habit to differentiate textual and esoteric, or oral, Tantric traditions with exoteric folk religion stepped in rural Hindu belief. Immersion into a kula (family clan, or Tantric lineage) internalizes for the practitioner unconventional methods of devotion, transgression, and sexuality.

When sex and ritual are undifferentiated to the body and seminal fluids, chela and guru become one, rising above the stain of defilement that separates Lust and Love. It is in this nondualist union between chela and guru, where sex is exalted as eroticized ritual, that action and cause are unified, karmic conditions annihilated. One is initiated into his/her kula at the precise moment one receives the holy mantra in dīkşā, coalescing the psychic body with that of one’s guru/guruji. One does not reach enlightenment without the Divine Body treading the pathways of passion and ritualized sex, converting the transgressions of the profane into initiations of the heart. A mind dominating the physical body is the cause of phenomenal reality and illusion. Paired with an unquenchable thirst of passion, the soul that engages in base sexual ritual receives the mad thirst from bottomless ponds of lower lust.

It is said in the Hevajra Tantra (2.2.52): "By passion are beings bound and by that very passion they are released." Ritual sexuality in Tantra at once cleanses impurities and bestows efficacy. Every act and experience is reciprocated with exterior symbolic ritual. Tantric initiation endows the subtle body with the ability to act as a suitable vessel for esoteric knowledge and ritual, such as sexual yoga, or ritual with yantra and mandala. The affect of such ritual and initiation in Tantra is harvested from the fruits of knowledge and practice sowed by the austere aspirant. It is essential that ritualized Tantra practice be performed with a properly consecrated consort. By initiation of the heart through the pathways of passion and ritual sex does the Adept come to the triadic truth that magic(k) and truth are immanent, transient, and both.

Tantra as a spawn of Brahmanic-Vedic, and later yogic traditions, reconciles karma and the human condition. To accomplish this, the sādhaka (practitioner) meditates on the nature of samsāra and nirvāņa as indivisible, upon sexuality as coalescent yet unitive, a sort of nondual “duality.” Tantric practice reintegrates and reenchants the entire canopy of sexuality, reconciling spirituality and eroticism. Scholar D.G. White defines the Initiatic renewal of Tantra as "reintegration of the world into the soteriological path." (White; 2000) Eroticism in Tantra stems from an entirely preeminent ritual nature, wisely consigned in secrecy. Insanguination of sexual fluids is held as the eminent source of all power. Moreover, as sexual transgressions of the profane coagulate into initiations of the heart, secrecy, and inhibition guard against spiritual threads of the kula sinking into swamps of gross lust.

The essence of all iconography in Tantra is reflected in the lotus. A lotus has its roots in the sodden mire of dark and vaporous swamps, yet blossoms into majesty of a flower. A Tantrika duly initiated and consecrated annuls transgressive differences in the ritual anointing with blood, semen, and urine. Gestation of life and death, and Tantric secrets therein, are unveiled in the sacramental insemination, and anointment, of sexual fluids. The germination of sexual fluids under Tantric ritual context, anointed and consecrated to proper Devī, and deva, contain religious secrets imbued in the ātman (distinct soul) wherein life and death gestate and are transient noumena.

The act of initiation or dīkşā affords us with a semantic default definition of the term guru, as guru to any practicing Hindu or Tantrika is one who has received dīkşā and in he resides the ability to confer dīkşā, and has actually transmitted dīkşā. A major contrast between dīkşā and abhiśekha (anointment) is that the latter qualifies one to consecrate and initiate others, and never requires transmission of mantra upon the neophyte. A person receives transmission, conferral, of a sacral maņdala, yantra, or into ritualistic yajńa (ritualistic sacrifice) with mantra customarily conferred. Dīkşā invariably correlates to adhikāra, or ‘specific entitlement’ of the neophyte receiving transmission. The enigmatic guru, or guruji, transmits and anoints a person with dīkşā the divine manifestation or principle s/he is fit by Will and karmic constitution to experience and do.

To the disciple Tantrika, guru/guruji is the Hermit-Hag Fool, madman-madwoman, teacher, parent, adversary, and Lover whom is forever in a swoon, at one with ordained knowledge, realization, beatitude, and passion. "If the guru first mentally awakens the pupil and then reveals to him this high knowledge of Kula, then both enjoy direct companionship of Yogini and Vira and even cross this worldly ocean effortlessly." (Kularnava Tantra, II. 39-40). In the transmission of dīkşā, iconic images of transgression, and sexuality are not representations of common devis, rather, they reflect a level of supra-individual polarity that transcends sexuality. Such a polarity when reached cancels out modality and the substratum of everything as the guru or guruji reaches adept hood and annuls the conditions between śunyatā ( Tibetan ston pa nid) and nirvāņa. On the novelty of gnosis via dīkşā, Tibetan Tantric doctrine implies that śes rab, the deified "knowledge and conversation," is static and the deified means or method (thabs in Tibetan, Skt. Upāya) is dynamic. In certain Tantric practices focused upon yoga, various āsanas such as the vajrāsana (Vajra posture) and padmāsana (Lotus posture) correlate to inversions of Hindu notions of polarity (Tibetan, yab yum).

In the Voidness of Tantric enlightenment, the guruji-guru annuls the conditions arising between dualism and monism, wherein aught in the phenomenal world is transcended in ritualized sex. The Tantrika is concerned with ritual, to realize the paradox in aught, and deify all images and formulas pertaining to his dīkşā within the spiritual constitutions of his/her being. The true Tantric guruji-guru is the destroyer of the fetters of phenomenal existence. Naturally, the guru/ji-chela structure is not infallible to the fraudulent esotericism that is rampant in such peddling of "Tantric sex," and "sex magic(k)," in ‘Western’ society. A true and viable test of the guru/ji is the extent of study and symbiosis with the prospective disciple, in order to affect a mystic transmission of dīkşā. Secrecy guards well the tradition, and kula, from constant public and profane intrusion, nonetheless produces widespread public skepticism consistent with the Tantric peddling of Western, even ‘Thelemic,’ occult organizations.

The non-ascetic, even anti-ascetic, and anti-Brahmanic practices form the structure of esoteric Hindu tradition. The Vedas, which are the foundation of Hindu traditions on the Indian subcontinent, display only guarded ascetic temperament. Theologians debate on this anti-ascetic, esoteric "Tantric," and "psycho-experimental" influence stems from pre-Aryan migration to the region (Bharati; 1965). The Brahmanic social strata place little literary merit to the Tantras, thus highlighting the scholar-practitioner polemic within a Hindu cultural context. For this polemic, perhaps it was the soteriological thrust that led Tantric guru-gurujis to remain exceedingly discreet over transmission of dīkşā, and held secrecy for lengthy generations. Without tutored secrecy, occultation from fraudulent peddlers of "sex magic(k)," Tantric practice would do well under honest occidental scholarship and a cultural respect of darker pathways within the Tantric Kulas. A spiritual proselytization of Tantra must not degenerate into anti-academic, soliciting of inferior, impotent "sex magic(k)."

Adept mastery of seminal fluid retention in ritualized sex is one of the elite soteriological aims of the Kālī kula within the vāmācāra Initiatic heritage, to which this author belongs. . The effect of retaining, then withdrawing the seminal sex fluids suspends the three main discursive functions of the mind: cognition, volition, conation, in Sanskrit, jńāna, icchā, and kriyā. This triadic mystogram is represented by the inverted triangle, the foundational sigil of all yantras symbolizing the sacred feminine principle, Śakti. The Rajas of a woman is the substance that feeds the seminal elixir during inverted ritual coitus. The sperm and menses in a literal context of Tantric semantics refer also to the union of the masculine and feminine principle invoked by seminal withdrawal.

The lesser known and scoffed dangers of Tantric ritual, (often ignored by Western Occultists, so-called) could be sexual intoxication, and possibly pathological addictions in relation to such forces obscured in the carnal nature of human sexuality. If the bīja and corresponding principles fall amidst ritualized coitus, the primal feminine force will have been immersed, submerged moreover, to the deepest layers in the psyche, and the intrinsic power could create a persuasive bondage to the forces one sought to master. Such carnal energies of sex and desire could be aroused within emotional and psychic bondage to the orgasm. This intoxicated state of amor insatiabilis brings naught to satiate the sexual desire of the soul under a tyrannical ache for the elementary forces invoked in ritual Tantra of the vāmācāra. If inversion, and synthesis of polarity fails to occur during ritualized coitus, then pathologies toward mere lustful pleasure remain preeminent in the psychic map of the ātman. In the metaphysics of sex contained in Tantric ritual, obsessive gratification leads to an abyss where tyrannical lust and mania absorb the soul into a violent swoon.

It is possible via transmission of dīkşā tainted with lust of Love one becomes irrevocably enslaved by insatiate vices. The greater ordeal is a peril wherein the carnal force of sex is stripped bare and externalized in polarity by the intoxicate need for fulfillment of vice. Such a corruption of the seminal seed and remitting of the bīja and ovum causes states native to erotic intoxication. Misuse of ritual and initiatic coitus impedes the flow of seminal energies (called the coiling serpent, or kuņdalinī), obstructing the proper course of these physiologic energies in the Suşumnā nadi. An often convulsive quickening of orgasm leads the perverted of desire to a seductive suffocation. Erotic intoxication in maltreatment of ritual sexuality, specifically inverted coitus, is akin to the symbology of the banal psalms of lovers, the psychic pain associated with sexual pride, compounded by algolagnia (âlgos,’pain,’ and lágnos, arousal).  Such are the darker pathways into red magic(k).

"Maheshani, meditate as being absorbed in the yoni cakra, with yoni on the tongue, yoni in the mind, yoni in the ears and yoni in the eyes. Mighty Lady, all sadhana is vain unless with the yoni. Therefore, reject other pujas and do Yoni Puja. Maheshani, there is no siddhi without devotion to the Guru." (Yoni Tantra, X) Betaking oneself past transgression and sexual mania in the lowlands of sensual suffocation, the Tantrika immolates him/herself in the black yoni of the Sexual Tormentress. When the lotus becomes the slave of pleasure, aught is plunged into the swamps of rotted souls whom feed upon lust as hungry ghosts. The proceeding passage from the Kularnava Tantra illustrates a practical remedy for erotic and sexual possession, for these are as copulating shadows in the pungent fruits of Imperial Love.

Tantric practice is characterized by extreme anthropocentrism, with the notion that the Tantrika manifests the multiverse from the heart lotus. "The Vedic pantheon in Tantric theology is located in the constituents of the psyche." (Gupta. 1979) The ideal conjunction of the ātman is with anānatman, seminal and religious communion with primeval creative bisexuality. Such an eloquent transience of sexuality and religiosity is the soteriological aim of Tantra. For the postulant whom succumbs to vice has no part in coitus with the Dark Devī. Perfection is attained by those transgressions that lead to fall.

Sex is the greatest erotic force in magic(k). Thus, Tantra anoints the sadhaka, or sadhika, in the graces of obscure knowledge ordained in dīkşā that sex and death is immanent, transient, and both. Only in the orgiastic moments of bestial instinct does Tantra open pathways to the terrifying pendant of female sexual dominance and erotic power that is the Dark Devī. Operations of ritual coitus evoke a carnal passion often leading the inept and impotency of copious occult "organizations" scrambling to claim lineage to dead Adepts, to speak much incongruity of the Dark Devī, the Black Concubine. Such dullness and enmity to the Three-Eyed "Destructress of the sins of the three worlds" (Karpūrādī-Stotra v.4) is befitting of such peddlers of "sex magic(k)." It is by opening the pathways of transgression and piety and the transience of both in ritual coitus is the Adept anointed by the red magic(k) of the Dark Devī.

Secrecy in such occult practices as Tantra often is the cause of aversion to external transgressive practices exposed to the public. Within the debate of the Scholar-Practitioner, reconciliation is only attained through understanding the process and indispensability of initiation. Usual understanding of Tantra and other occult arts is filtered through the discriminating government of the temporal self, in the illusion of the ego. As one Tantrika offers, "samsara is just a ‘cover’ for nirvana." (Ray 2001; 232) Under the ægis of obscurity and secrecy, Tantric orders overall tend to be sectarian, regarding their native ordained knowledge far beyond the capacity of other sects.

Tantric sectarianism thus recapitulates classic Hinduism by integrating previous religious traditions, such as Buddhism, at a base level. The MahaDevī and the innumerable motifs ascribed to Her are sexually uncontrolled, socially contradictory, and ambivalent. Outside of a scholarly prospect of Tantra, the practices and ordained knowledge operate on a "mesocosmic level that is on the level of a mediating template between protocosm and metacosm as well as between macrocosm and microcosm." (White; 2000) The media offered to the Adept in Tantra include initiation, transgressive elements of ritual and sexuality, yoga, and remapping of the psyche through consecration (abhişeka) and teaching (vidyā).

The continual self-expression of the ego concedes the scholar-practitioner to seek levels of acceptance in the academic circles of his/her peers, and in the spiritual scope, to attain to a subjective understanding of the practice and not and objective one. Tantra is a formidable art and science of the occult traditions and it must be addressed wisely with spiritual maturity, skillful means, and self-discipline. Occult secrecy protecting the tradition from constant public and profane intrusion, has produced widespread public skepticism, charlatan fascination with and defilement of ancient practices, while secrecy at the same time has preserved an ageless spiritual tradition. Svāhā.

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