Day 2 Talk 2: The Anthropology of medieval Śākta Yoga in Textual History and Ritual Practice

"The Anthropology of medieval Śākta Yoga in Textual History and Ritual Practice"
By Dr Bjarne Wernicke-Olesen

Abstract: This paper discusses the particular Śākta anthropology of tantric yoga aimed at the affirmation and divinisation of the body with examples from present-day Kālīkula traditions in Nepal. The Śākta model of the human is first mentioned in the chapter on subtle visualising meditation (sūkṣmadhyāna) in the ninth century Netratantra, or ‘Tantra of the Eye’. It is the earliest known tantra to mention tantric Śāktism (kulāmnāya) and to teach a system of six bodily centers called cakras, which the meditating yogi is supposed to pierce with his inherent power (e.g., śakti, kuṇḍalī, nādasūcī) to attain a divine body (divyadeha). The Netratantra’s chapter on subtle
meditation is significant in that it presents two different anthropologies and systems of visualisation, which the Trika commentator Kṣemarāja refers to as the tantric system (tantraprakriyā) and the Kula system (kulaprakriyā). As fieldwork has shown, these two systems are still practised by Śākta Aghorīs in present day Nepal as an embodied memory that is text and tradition specific. Historically, the Kula system of visualising meditation was combined with a physiologically fixed model of the 6-cakra-system and standardised in the tenth-century Kubjikāmatatantra. This standardised version of the 6-cakra system in combination with kuṇḍalinīyoga became prevalent from the twelfth century onwards and was further developed (e.g., by adding a seventh cakra) when adopted by the Śrīvidyā tradition. Eventually, this Śākta anthropology originating in the medieval Indian Kulamārga became part and parcel of global religious history, not least
through Woodroffe’s famous translation of the Ṣaṭcakranirūpana as The Serpent Power (1919).

Bio: Originally trained in classical Indology and the comparative Study of
Religion, Bjarne Wernicke-Olesen is a Research Lecturer in the History of
Religion with special emphasis on Indic Religions and Languages (Sanskrit,
Pali). He is a Fellow at the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies and a Member
of the Theology and Religion Faculty. He teaches and tutors broadly across
Sanskrit, Pali, Hinduism, Buddhism, and the theories and methods of the
Study of Religion. He is the Director of the Śākta Traditions research pro-
gramme and founder of the OCHS Kathmandu Office.