Vigyan Bhairav Tantra

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Nefastos
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Re: Vigyan Bhairav Tantra

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Vigyan Bhairav Tantra (9) wrote:Lie down as dead.
Enraged in wrath, stay so.
Or stare without moving an eyelash.
Or suck something and become the sucking.


Here the difficult, powerful emotions of the so-called sins are used as vehicles for the attainment. These emotions are not rejected, but accepted and then sublimated in a way I'd encourage to use this term: namely, to free the said energy from all violence & anguish without changing its essence or intensity in the least.

"Lie down as dead." = Perhaps physically too, but certainly it's important to do this as mental asana. Here we have the so-called mortification, willingness to give up one's will to live. It is unavoidable part of practice at the certain stage, and is needed to transform the energies under Saturn. It is perhaps easiest to understand if taken as alchemical, or philosophical, melancholy & dissolution. But it must be total, unconditional.

"Enraged in wrath, stay so." = Whether this continues the process of mortification or is a separate practice can be argued. I think these can work both ways, and like we see, we have here one stanza with several (stages of) practices which are at least somehow distinct. What this means is that it is not one of these practices but several together, which will bring final result. This is because negative emotions are characteristically without equilibrium, & must be brought in contact with their opposites in order to find attainment they seek. These polar opposites (like will to die & will to live, of which both we see emphasised examples here) call out for each other & must be merged back to unity. Because of this, negative emotions are seemingly chaotic, and often change without warning. Yet if we allow ourselves to drift along with these emotional streams, we are caught in their loop, & will attain nothing. That is why it is said, "stay so". When something has aroused our wrath, we must seek the meaning of that wrath - not just intellectually but spiritually, wholly, energetically. Without that the root of hate is left in our hearts even if the feeling subsides, and sooner or later will wake up the negative emotions. Not if we purify our hate, sublimate it, stay in it even when we are rational. This must not be some jealous egoism, it must be "rational emotionalism" which have choose because of our spiritual ethos, as the background here necessarily is. If the practice is done without that, the Left Hand Path tantra will make us evil & self-centered, or actually, it will show the world we have been like that all along & give us more power to progress (that is, regress) in evil. But if our mindset is right, rooted in spiritual working, this "staying in wrath" will purify us greatly.

The next instruction gives us the "or", as a possibility to attain that same concentration without that dangerous practice of wrath, if that is avoidable - at the moment, or perhaps altogether.

The last instruction is the polar inversion of the first: against forceful mortification, forceful vivification. Sucking is the primal reflex of a baby as it receives shelter, nutrition & love from its mother; it is the very act of vital dependance. In this practice we choose an object of sucking - I presume a smoker might use this practice with one's cigarette - & "become the sucking". What does this mean? We understand that it is not some certain thing we receive from the object of sucking, even if we chose something more nutritional than a cigarette, but the very act of sucking is important to us, because it means "life" with its most positive connotations to our subconscious. At the moment we become one with this deep-rooted feeling of being at the receiving end of the stream of life, we will reach the attainment: for this stream of life is not (only) physical, but fundamentally spiritual.

What leads us through all these stages is once again magnetized prâna. It travels through:

1) Mortification, the Black Aspect ("Lie down as dead.")

2) Transsubstantiation, the Red Aspect ("Enraged in wrath, stay so. Or stare, &c.")

3) Vivification, the White Aspect ("Or suck something and become the sucking.)


One must go through all these different stages.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
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Re: Vigyan Bhairav Tantra

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Vigyan Bhairav Tantra (10) wrote:While being caressed, Sweet Princess,
enter the caress as everlasting life.


Of this stanza of erotic practice, we notice two things:

1) Female personality of the receiver is emphasised ("Sweet princess"). What does this mean? That in order to use this method, we must give up our masculine concept of sex, whether we are men or women physically. We must not - psychologically - act, we must not grasp, nor do any kind of straightforward action, that is the very nature of male sexuality on physical level.

2) Caress must be taken as "(a) everlasting (b) life". We must attain the point of view that transcends time, that understands that the erotic act is the very foundation of spiritual as well as physical life - that they have no duality whatsoever. Nature & the whole being is fundamentally a (rather, the) sexual act, where male Spirit infuses female Matrix with its seed, jiva. This coitus is everlasting bliss:

That which is eternally: Sat (Being) - Shiva as the center (linga)
That which it projects: Chit (Consciousness) - Shakti as the circumference (yoni)
Energy of their union: Ananda (the true state of Soul) - Tantric as the cord (jiva)

When yogi attains initiation of the highest kind, he becomes one with this transcendental Eros, and is in constant state of spiritual union with Shakti. This can be anticipated & sought with this kind of tantra.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
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Re: Vigyan Bhairav Tantra

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Vigyan Bhairav Tantra (11) wrote:Stop the doors of the senses when feeling the creeping of an ant.
Then.


Concerning the seventh stanza above I already mentioned this "creeping of an ant". It's a common & very apt way to describe the feeling one has when the magnetised prâna titillates physical flesh at the area of a chakra center.

Stopping the doors of the senses is a mental process. It does not mean that the sensory data does not enter at all, but it means that we are unmoved by it; that we don't register it as important. It isn't a natural practice for the usual Western mindset, because our thinking has pressed more another kind of dualism: that of the intellect vs. emotion, and not that of the spirit vs. matter.

But if a) we are of the less common temperament that finds this kind of meditation easy and natural, or if b) we have transcended the point where we'd be vulnerable for the dualistical thinking of this kind, the process of "stopping the doors of the senses" can be very beneficent.

By the way, it's interesting to notice that the translation says "stop", not "close". If that's the case, "stopping" the door might mean that there will be no more process of evaluation & polar functioning. (Let's remember Hindu philosophy considers actions as another kind of senses: so there is a "passive" & an "active" sense of touch, for example.) "Stopping" the senses could therefore be like stopping a revolving door, that at the same time lets something in & something out. With this emphasis we can think that it's not so important whether we register the sensations, if we do not participate. We can compare that to the ninth stanza: "...Or stare without moving an eyelash."

"Then." - Then what? The point of entering, where one merges with the particular focus & is carried by it, through it. What happens then? It depends on many things, so this stanza doesn't give an answer. If tantric (tantrika, the occultist) is ready, it can be enlightenment. More likely, it can be beneficent buddhic vision or partial samadhi, revitalisation as the buddhic energy of the ajna chakra is united with conscious ahamkâra-manas, &c. For as I understand, this particular practice is done mostly if not only with the ajna center.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
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Re: Vigyan Bhairav Tantra

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Vigyan Bhairav Tantra (12) wrote:When on a bed or a seat,
let yourself become weightless,
beyond mind.


Again, we deal with re-focusing the thought as means of prânic re-magnetising of the energy centers.

How this "becoming weightless" is done exactly is perhaps easier to grasp intuitively than rationally. For the feeling of weightlessness can be sought with the aid of one's gravitational sense, of which organ everyone has inside one's ear (a scientific, not an occult fact). Herein we can say to work with the "active gravitational sense", as opposed to passive. (See the former stanza's comments.) It is seeking the new magnetic polarisation, which is done by moving the gravitational focus. The center where this is done is the manipura chakra, outwardly connected to one's navel & diaphragm. With the aid of that energy center, re-magnetisation of the whole being can be attained. Physically such a training can lead to unusual phenomenon called as levitation, spiritually it leads to complete re-orientation of thought. Mind that beforehand found its natural abode in the world of sensations will find its most natural focus in spiritual abstractions. I hope it's needless to say that the physical levitation is of almost nill meaning compared to the spiritual re-orientation, and the thing we should be seeking is the latter.

This complete turning around of one's world I have oftentimes mentioned in many texts dealing with the Luciferian turn within the earth's core, when the firmament turns into foundation. It deals with the greater arcana of the Hanged Man. This inversion is Satanic practice par excellence, and as said, focuses with one's Egoic center of manipura, "The City of Jewels". It demands a complete immersion inside one's self, to the point where the lower & the higher selves merge for a moment to be polarised anew. This is the meaning of "beyond mind" in the stanza. When the Self beyond self has been reached, the world turns inside out as a glove. After that, there can be no doubt about the superphysical universe (reality of spirit), although there can be doubt about physical existence. Are we actually physically real? That doesn't matter; what matters is the reality of the spirit, and of it we can be sure when this stage has been attained.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
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Re: Vigyan Bhairav Tantra

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Vigyan Bhairav Tantra (13) wrote:Or, imagine the five coloured circles of the peacock tail
to be your five senses in illimitable space.
Now let their beauty melt within.
Similarly, at any point in space or on the wall -
untill the point dissolves.
Then your wish for another comes true.


Two practices with the one same idea.

In the first, senses are felt as the colours of peacock's tail feather. They have several characteristics:

- Natural (shaped without human hand)
- Yet clearly defined (forming a careful, clear picture)
- Unicentral
- Connected to the bird symbolising (for the ancient Hindus) royalty, discerning ability and power

(And as a bonus, in dualistic theologies peacock also symbolises Lucifer...)

With these points in mind, one can understand the aspects & possibilities of the suggested practice, as well as its easiness for a certain mindset.

The latter practice is a modification where instead of the colours one point is chosen as the laya-point for dharana (central zero-point full of potentiality into which the mind-focus is put). This is mentioned after the former in the same stanza for us to understand that the same all-compassing energy is also there. The "peacock-tail" practice might be easier way for the people with the temperament that focuses more into nuances, while the "wall-point" practice might be easier for the people whose temperament is not so much for the registration of the nuances but of the power aspect of things.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
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Re: Vigyan Bhairav Tantra

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Vigyan Bhairav Tantra (14) wrote: Place your whole attention in the nerve,
delicate as the lotus thread,
in the center of your spinal column.
In such be transformed.


The said nerve, susumna nadi, is the royal way through all the energy centers of one's body, but in order to be used, the said centers must first be cleansed; otherwise the way stops abrubtly (and oftern painfully) to the point of problematic energetical focus. This cleansing should be done by realisation, not by force.

The stanza does not speak of processes of purification that are needed, because in a way, the focusing of thought to the kundalini-nadi, i.e. susumna, is enough. What this means, however, is that the focusing process brings about - one after one - those problems (in the centers) that must be gone through in order to continue the vitalisation (magnetising) process of susumna.

It's very easy to get this wrong, and start working by force. Such an approach can bring results, but far more easily it can bring horrible pains, even paralyses & other severe injuries considering both the spine and the whole being of the aspirant, and even if one ultimately triumphs, he or she will be lacking the important realisations that were to be gained by using the more subtle method.

So, once again I suggest that the problems arising should be carefully noted, and dealt with before assuming the original method of outward concentration. It's surprisingly easy for the aspirants with strong will power to make even permanent damage to one's vehicles (physical, astral & mental "bodies") if the focus is kept stubbornly on an outside object - like a part of one's etheric body - when the problems arise from inside.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
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Re: Vigyan Bhairav Tantra

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Vigyan Bhairav Tantra (15) wrote:Closing the seven openings of the head with your hands, a space between your eyes becomes all-inclusive.


In physical yoga practice, the closing of eyes, ears, nostrils & mouth is done with physical hands. In mental yoga practice, the said closing is done with "mental hands". What are hands? Two times five grasping streams of energy, the pentagram in its twofold currents. And what are the seven openings? They are the world-cube plus that "nail", vital breath, that holds the six principles together in periods between fullness of spirit (also called death).

Closing the gates is action to withhold actions. It is us doing something to invert the energy that flows through the openings. The energy itself can't be stopped, no matter what; but with physical or mental effort we can reverse the process in a way with which we can succumb to our inner worlds where formerly was outer, & vice versa. For, as had been said earlier, all the sensual organs have both receiving & distributing qualities. To feel something is to grasp it, to see something is to mesmerize it, to taste something is to dissolve it, & even hearing or smelling something is interaction with it on a deeper level. In occultism, there is no neutral perception altogether.

And that is why, also, there is no such possibility as to actually "close" the gates in a way that we could withhold our attention in order to project it into pure spirit. No; we can train our consciousness to reach spirit in both kinds of using of the senses: where the gates function as normal, and in a way their function is reversed - like in sleep, or like with the physical practice of this kind. Neither of those methods of channeling is spiritual per se, or not spiritual per se. Spirit is in everything, it's everything, and to reach it is to (gradually) understand how it works.

Once again the duality of physical/spiritual regions, that would easily be misunderstood of being the idea of the yoga practices, is only seeming. Best of the yogis can, of course, attain both: mental opening & closing of the gates, & physical. With either one an attainment is once again reached, & "space between the eyes becomes all-inclusive". The third eye, the Eye of Shiva, "puts to slumber a thousand eyes" or the nâma-rupa, world of illusionary separation of consciousness. Shiva's Eye, or Dangma's, is true spiritual clairvoyance, that sees through the meaningless astral distractions. It sees the world as Mandala, a full form, with harmony even among seeming disharmonies. It is SPACE precisely that is characteristic to this form of spiritual sensation. There is nothing to block anything, there is just Freedom of illumination, will, & love (i.e. deepest sense of multiform unity).

One interesting note is, that the seventh principle, or prâna, is not the one that actually sets the neophyte free. Although the seventh one, the principle of Sun & of light, energizes others, it does not hold the key to their freedom. All of the seven gates are held closed, & all the seven chakras (organs of perception on a different level) must be conquered.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
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Re: Vigyan Bhairav Tantra

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Vigyan Bhairav Tantra (16) wrote:Blessed One, as senses are absorbed in the Heart, reach the center of the lotus.


This "lotus" is anahata chakra, the gateway of the "voiceless sound" of the macrocosmos to reach the individual human being. Located at the chest area, its physical roots burrow into one's heart of flesh, but the real spiritual center is not the same as that physical heart, but free of the strains of the nervous system. "Senses are absorbed" there: again a process that is mentioned in several religions' mysticism, including Christianity (especially Eastern Orthodoxy) & even theosophy (see the Voice of Silence mentioned before).

It is "the center of the lotus" that is reached for: the one I mentioned to be free of psycho-physical strains. When we start the process of the Heart, tears will burst forth; & they'll be the tears of healing. With them comes the blessing, and afterwards, harmony. Staying in that harmony of two interlaced triangles (that being the symbol of Anahata) one becomes able to grasp - not just the fleeting harmony of the microcosmos, but the eternal harmony of the macrocosmos.

We can notice that the stanzas of the text can also be read as different phases or steps of the same process, as well as individual practices.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
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Re: Vigyan Bhairav Tantra

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Vigyan Bhairav Tantra (17) wrote:Unminding mind, keep in the middle - until.


"Unminding mind" is a mind that does not cling to the structures that shape it as such.

Mind is like a web in which we easily become more and more tangled, if we try to fight against its current limitations. Even clearer the same problem - a "minding mind" - becomes in a person who identifies himself with his current mind, seeing its limitations as absolute limits for a human being.

When both of these extremes have been vanquished, the mind is ready to open. It no longer fights, for the struggle would only fuel the dualistic strife within oneself, & neither it is a surrendered victim of its current matter-bound state. In this state one must "keep in the middle".

This is the golden middle path, free of excesses. It does not mean one becomes tepid & loses his outside-the-box creative thinking, quite the contrary: for only those who actually understand the energy & beauty of the two extremes can choose to take or leave them. Living in their fear would be a form of bondage. But one no longer confuses the feeling of freedom in a mountain top to the tragedy of jumping off the cliff, so to say.

The word "until" here implies that such a state of mind should be cultivated for some time. When that act of the tightrope walking, choosing every step according the tenets of the golden middle path of equilibrium has become as a second nature, the mind's own psychologico-metaphysical breaches will be mended by that very force of harmony applied. And when a human mind is healed, it is no longer a stumbling mind of a human, but opened to another kind of harmony, the one of Shiva-Shakti unity; the beauty of both creation & uncreation in every moment.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
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Re: Vigyan Bhairav Tantra

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Vigyan Bhairav Tantra (18) wrote:Look lovingly at some object.
Do not go to another object.
Here in the middle of the object -
the blessing
.


Because "quod est inferius, est sicut id quod est superius". If one would understand just a one thing, he would understand the whole: and it is especially that love that binds one to the object of his desire that is his window to the divine essence in that object. It just have to be purified, the window cleaned. That, in turn, is done in a process where the particular object is taken to the archetypical context by treating & understanding it as divine (in one's mind). Such an object of love is not a tool for anything else, it has absolute value in itself.

Let's take money, for example. People love money, but it is not exactly the money we love, but the power infused to it. The psychological process must be traced carefully, carefully over time, until it becomes clear: there we are "in the middle of the objext" & understand why money (or sex, or gambling, or alcohol or food - whatever) has become an idol for us.

A miser may love the smell of paper money and how it looks & feels, but if he'd just hear that the currency in which his money is had become worthless overnight, his love for those particular papers would fade instantly - for the item itself is just a trigger that stimulates his psychological urges. These urges, however, are always archetypical - i.e. divine - in their very foundation.

Tantra often uses this astral glamour (psychological stimulus) to turn the process from descending to ascending. The process is extremely sensitive and demands a great deal of honesty, but it can be done. I don't even speak of love needed, because that love is already there: the love of money is actually a form of love of God, it just has to be understood. Even most perverted loves are still such, and the divine spark is in them: that is where they gain their ardor & energy.

"Look lovingly at some object." - This looking can be the looking of dhârana, looking at something with one's inner eye. So, a completely mental process. But of course one can use more formal meditation & concretely look at some object (or a symbol of such object) he really loves.

"Do not go to another object." - Because "everything is in everything" one might think that he can let himself flow freely from one object to another. Well, of course he can, and if he stays alert, that too can bring results. But in this particular meditation that is not an option. Instead of flowing between objects, he must flow deeper into that particular object's psychology: otherwise the dynamic energy of potential change is almost wasted in moving from between different points of circumference. Instead, the contemplation should be like climbing a ladder downwards; groping for a hold first in here, then in there, keeping in mind the chosen love. The process lives, but its focus will remain the same. Then that love will unfold; spiral towards its center.

"Here in the middle of the object - the blessing." In the center the psychology will meet the archetypical, i.e. divinity. When this formless form of yearning has been reached, one will experience himself as one with the object of his yearning: the psychological knot will unravel, and the tantric will see he already has/is what he yearns for. This "blessing" is not only a feeling of bliss and freedom, it is also empowerment, because energies that have imprisoned the psychology are now flowing into it. It is like ice melting into revitalizing primal water.

This is a very safe & comfortable way of meditation, be it done as a lesser one (looking at an outer object) or as a major contemplation (looking at one's psychological loves as discussed), and it is a great practice for those who - because of any reason - are not in need of any avoidable struggle in their occult training. Those who have need for struggles to temper their spirits, it might be not optional: in those cases, mind will not so easily keep in the one-sided focus that is needed, because one's true love is focused more into the process itself than in any constant object, which remain as secondary.

By the way: This practice reminds me to recommend Abhayadatta's lives of 84 Buddhist tantric saints ("Mahasiddhas"). Many of the practices done by these eccentric yogis fall to this category of seeing the center of one's object of love. (The book being the one of Buddhism gives the practice a certain nuance. Buddhist emphasis is to see this divinity as void; Hindu emphasis is to see the same as fullness. I think that the former can be seen as the way of rational kâma-manas, the latter as the way of intuitional buddhi-manas. When meeting in the center they are one, however.)
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
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