Maithuna

Maithuna is usually carried out in a circle of initiates, guided by a guru. It may incorporate meditation, yogic postures, the recitation of mantras (sacred syllables), the visualization of yantras (diagrams of lines and colours that represent the cosmos) and the invocation of whole series of deities or devatas (created by the coupling of Shiva and Shakti). The partners should ideally remain immobile, and the man should not discharge his semen. If by accident he does, he smears it on his forehead in the region of the "third eye", which allows him to reabsorb at least some of its potency. The moment of orgasm is, in theory, lost in a much longer wave of ecstasy, which does not involve ejaculation.

The woman, on the other hand, may experience a conventional orgasm, and is even encouraged to do so, as this is believed to release the rajas, the vaginal secretion generated by sexual excitement. In some Tantric schools, the production of the rajas is even the main objective of maithuna: it is collected on a leaf and added to a bowl of water. After being ritually offered to the deity, it is drunk by the man. Even if the rajas is not collected outside the body, it is considered that a true adept knows how to absorb it through his penis, a technique known as vajroli-mudra, which enriches his own hormone system. However, the principal exchange between the partners in most Tantric rituals is considered to be sexual energy.

Within the material human body, Tantra envisages a complex system of channels, or nadis, carrying energy from the transcendental cosmos that pours in through the crown of the head. This system is known as the subtle body, which re-radiates part of its accumulated energy to form the self-generated illusion that the material body experiences as the real world. (This radiation is thought of as waste, and is sometimes described as a rat, sucking at the Tantrika.)

At various points along the centre of the material body, the inner radiations of the subtle body condense as chakras (wheels) or padmas (lotuses). Hindu Tantra basically identifies chakras at the base of the spine, the genitals, the navel, the heart, the throat, between the eyes and at the crown of the head (there are more in some classification systems). Buddhist Tantra locates chakras at the base of the spine, the navel, the throat and the crown of the head. Each chakra corresponds to a progressively higher state of awareness.

Enlightenment, always described in male terms, is achieved by driving the energy that is coiled in the base of the spine (the female kundalini or serpent energy of the Hindus, or, for the Buddhists, a personification of female energy such as a dakini) up through the different chakras to the crown of the head. To the Hindu, this is the seat of Shiva, and the kundalini is a manifestation of Shakti. By rousing the normally sleeping serpent, and causing it to shoot up through the body to the crown, the Tantrika re-creates the union of the god and goddess within himself.

Sexual dualism exists in the human subtle body as two nerve channels. The ida (Buddhist lalana), which is red, runs along the left of the spinal cord and represents female creative energy, the moon and, ultimately, the void and knowledge. The pingala (Buddhist rasana), which is grey, runs to the right of the spinal cord and is the male creative energy, corresponding to the sun and, ultimately, compassion and practicality. So long as these two channels remain distinct, the individual will continue to be trapped in the cycle of death and rebirth. To the Buddhist especially, the combining of these opposites within the body is seen as a way of cancelling them out, bringing the individual closer to the condition of the void.

The energy generated during real or imagined intercourse with a female partner, along with yogic techniques of breath control, stimulate the kundalini of the man, which blends with his unshed semen to produce bindu (translated semen). Bindu, like the foetus, is composed of the five elements -- earth, water, fire, air and ether -- and its formation in the body represents a form of conception.

The bindu breaks away from the two sexual channels and generates a new, asexual central channel called sushumna (or avadhutika, the cleansed one) along which it travels to the higher chakras, and ultimately to the "lotus on the top of the head". There it unifies all the elements of which it is composed, as well as the different male and female aspects of the practitioner. The Tantrika, therefore, uses ritual sex to fuel a kind of internal alchemy, fusing spiritual energy with material (unshed) semen in order to unite the various elements of the self.

12 年 前
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