The Baul(s), the wandering mystic minstrels of Bengal, are considered to be inheritors of the ancient Vrâtyä.1
The different groups of ascetics can be recognized by exterior signs.
The Shaïvä(s) attach Lingä(s) to their arms; the Rudrä(s) (who worship the destructive aspect of Shivä) draw a trident on their foreheads; the Ugrä(s), who worship Durgâ, the terrible aspect of the goddess, draw a Damaru (drum) on their arms; the Bhattä(s), or bards, draw Lingä(s) on their foreheads, both arms, heart, and navel. [Anandä Giri, Shankarä Vijayä]
The Kâlâmukhä(s) mark their foreheads with a black line. It is the Kâpâlikä(s) who practice the difficult discipline of the Great Vow (Mahâvratä). The Kâlâmukhä(s) are also skullbearers, but do not practice the Great Vow.
The Black Faces (Kâlâmukhä)
THE Kâlâmukhä(s) are the adepts of the sect of the Pâshupatä(s) to which Lakulishä belonged. Their practices are less extreme than those of the Kâpâlikä(s). They are divided into two orders according to whether a divinity is worshiped under a masculine or a feminine aspect. These orders are called the Order of the Lion (Simhä Parishad) and the Order of the Goddess (Shakti Parishad). Additional orders consider the divinity as androgynous. These are the Ganapatyä(s), who venerate Ganapati, the elephant-headed god, (son of the Goddess and the Saumyä(s), from Somä, the seed). They have Skandä (the jet of sperm), son of Shivä, as their divinity.
The Kâlâmukhä(s) most important obligation is the construction of sanctuaries and the installation of idols. They practice the rites of Lingä worship and always wear a Lingä about their person. The priests are called Jangamä (moving lingä[s]). Some Kâlâmukhä(s) live in community in monasteries. The Order of the Lion, reorganized by Lakulishä, recommends a tranquil life like that of the forest-ascetics, dedicated to the profound study of the gamä(s).
There are numerous girl servants of the gods, Devä-dâsî(s), in their sanctuaries, and during the months of the year when they wander, they are often accompanied by a concubine. Khajuraho was one of the centers of the Kâlâmukhä(s) where many Devä-dâsî(s) resided.
The festivals of the Kâlâmukhä(s) include the receiving of the sacred thread, the passages of the sun from one zodiacal sign (Samkrânti) to another. The month during which the moon is in the fourteenth lunar house (the constellation called Citrä (March–April) is for them an important month. On the religious and ritual plane they observe no caste distinction.
The Skull-Bearers (Kâpâlikä)
THE founder of the Kâpâlikä(s) was a mythological sage called dinâthä. In the doctrine of the Kâpâlikä(s) the various gods are aspects of Shivä, the supreme ruler of the "multiple" (sakalâ), which implies that he appears in various forms. These forms are divided into creative aspects (Samsri-Kartri) and destructive aspects (Samharä-Kartri). The ultimate aspect (Paramâtman) is the destructive aspect called Bhairava (The Terrible). It is with this aspect that the Kâpâlikä(s) seek, in a sort of mystic communion, to identify themselves. The Shakta likewise worship the goddess in her destructive form, Kâlî.
In their attempts at such identification, the Kâpâlikä(s) try to make themselves resemble the image of Bhaïravä. This is why, according to the Tiruvorriyer Purânam (written in Tamil):
The Kâpâlikä(s) must wear distinctive signs (mudrä[s]) which evoke the image of the god and which are as follows:
Three lines of ashes are drawn on the forehead.
The head is shaved except for a lock of hair at the top of the head, attached with a string of bones.
Large rings are worn in the ears.
A necklace of bones is worn.
A black sacred thread made of braided hair is worn.
He must rub his body with ashes.
He must have a Rudraksha seed tied to his wrist by a string and carry a strip of cloth to attach his knee in some of the Yogä postures.
The gamä-Prâmanyä, quoted in the Shrî-Bhâshyä of Râmânujä, adds the following distinctive ornaments:
A pendent (ruchakä)
A jewel on the forehead (shikhâmani)
As accessories (upä-mudrä), a human skull (kâpâlä), a club (khatvângä), and a wand (lagudä) or a trident (trishûlä)
The Kâpâlikä(s) use a human skull as a receptacle for their food. They eat meat and drink wine, particularly palm wine (toddy). They utilize wine in their rites. They practice all the prohibited forms of sexual relations.
The Kâpâlikä(s) are considered experts in alchemy (dhâtuvâdä); they practice the transmutation of metals and prepare an elixir for long life (rasâyanä). This implies a serious responsibility. Even in our days, whoever has acquired the power to make gold incurs a curse if anyone is suffering from hunger within a radius of a half-koshä (1,800 meters) from the place he inhabits.
The goal of the Kâpâlikä(s) is not to obtain a hypothetical liberation after death; they seek, rather, by means of Siddhi(s) or magical powers, to transgress the limits of the material body which imprisons the true being to attain a consubstantiality with the celestial beings by practicing rites of communion or else directly through the favor of a god obtained by austerities and sacrifices.
The keystone of the Kâpâlikä faith was bhakti, a personal devotion to a personal god. This god was usually identified as Shiva in his terrific Bhaïravä incarnation. The rituals were propitiatory and imitative. The aim was an identification or mystical communion of the worshiper and his god. . . . On the mundane plane, the devotee gained suprahuman magical powers (siddhi[s]) while on the eschatological plane, he attained final liberation (mukti) from transmigratory existence and dwelt in a heaven of perpetual sexual bliss.... He becomes homologous with the god and participates in or receives the gift of divine attributes. [Lorenzen, The Kâpâlikäs and Kâlâmukhäs, p. 83]
Urban society is always opposed to the practices of the Kâpâlikä(s). The Lalitavistarä describes them as madmen who smear their bodies with ashes, wear red garments (kasâyä), shave their heads, and carry a trident (tridandä), a pot, a skull, and a club (khâtvangä).
Râmânuja, in his commentary on the Brahmä Sûträ (11.2.35), calls them the "enemies of the Vedä(s)" (Vedäviruddhä) and describes them as rubbing themselves with ashes from the funerary fires and eating ash, using a skull as a receptacle for their food, armed with a club, using palm wine in their rites, carrying a Rudrâkshä (eye of Shivä) rosary made of the seeds of a sacred plant, and also wearing one wrapped around their bun of hair. It was in opposition to these practices that the adepts of Vedic religion in the epoch of Buddhä and Mahâvîrä decided to give up eating meat and drinking alcohol.
According to the doctrine of the Kâpâlikä(s), as presented by Bodholbanä-Nityânandä and quoted in the Shankarä Vijayä of nandä Giri, Bhaïravä has eight major aspects: Chandä (violent), Krodhä (wrathful), Unmattä (demented), Kâpâlin (skull-bearing), Bhishanä (terrible), and Samhârä (destructive). It identifies these aspects with the Brahmanic gods Vishnu, Brahmâ, Sûryä, Rudrä, Indrä, Chandrä, and Yamä. The eighth, Samhârä, is Bhaïravä.
Practices (Charyâ)
AMONG the practices recommended by Lakulishä are found:
Yogic exercises for the purpose of acquiring magic powers
The six purifications (Shat-Karmä) of Hathä Yogä
Sexual practices, considering erotic delight as an experience of the divine state
Initiatic or other rites of the Kâlâmukhä(s) and the Kâpâlikä(s)
Participation in rites of sacrifices and the eating of the victim's flesh at the sacred banquets
The use, during the course of congregations of a mystic character, of an intoxicating beverage made from Indian hemp, which encourages states of trance
The observances recommended for ascetics are seven in number. They must:
Live naked and smear their bodies with ashes three times per day, preferably using ashes from funerary fires
Sleep on a bed of ashes
Shout a particular manträ: Ahâ, Ahâ
Sing aloud the praises of the god
Dance together, either according to the art of dance or in other manners
Curve the tip of the tongue backward and bellow like a bull, the sacred animal which is Shivä's vehicle (this bellowing is called hudukkârä)
Prostrate before holy places and circumambulate them while invoking Shivä
They must avoid practicing these observances in the presence of noninitiates.2
The Five M's
THE living being is an image of the universal being. All the body's organs, therefore, have correspondences within the divine being. One can approach divinity through any of the vital functions. In Tantric practice, the less intellectual ones are considered as the most direct. Thus, the alimentary functions, the creators of energy, and the purificatory functions, the functions of rejection, can also be utilized toward the goal of making contact with the supernatural. Tantric rites include practices linked to what the texts call the five M's, for their Sanskrit names each begin with this letter. The five M's are considered sources of pollution in the rites of the right hand, but in the ritual inversion of Tantrism they become the elements of purification. The mystic poems of Kanhapada repeatedly state that what is lowest in the world is highest in the domain of spirit.
The five M's are meat (Mansä), wine (Madhyä), copulation (Maïthunä), excrement (Malä), and urine (Muträ). Urine is also called Shivâmbu (water of Shivä) since it issues from the Lingä. Modern commentators have substituted for the last two M's fish (Matsya) and dried grains (Mudrä).
According to the Kulârnavä Tanträ (v. 79-80), "Wine is Shakti, the Goddess; meat is Shivä; erotic delight, the current which unites Shivä and Shakti, is the divine state called liberation (Mokshä)."
Malä and Muträ
ALL Hindus ritually absorb each day a small quantity of the five products of the cow, including the dung and the urine. There exist additional practices and rites connected with the functions of rejection which are given in the Damarä Tanträ and revealed to initiates only.
Meat (Mansä) and Sacrifice (Medhä)
THE consumption of meat is tied to the principle of sacrifice. Communion, the consumption of a piece of the victim by the participants, is an essential element of the rite.
Life exists only through perpetual massacre. No being can survive except by devouring other living beings. In order to draw near to the celestial powers, we must associate ourselves with the cosmic sacrifice, coaxing the gods by offering victims and thus avoid hecatombs. The act of killing is a responsible act, which must be accomplished as a rite. The victim must be offered to the gods before being consumed. We then eat only the scraps from the god's table and cease thereby to be murderers. We thus prevent the gods from striking at random.
Human Sacrifice
LIKE the ancient Greeks, Indians believed in the efficacy of human sacrifice. To avoid wars, cataclysms, and hecatombs, men should offer victims to the gods. The necessity of sacrifice is an important element in the Kâpâlikä doctrine. According to the Kâlîkâ Purânä, "The goddess Kâmâkhyâ, companion of Bhaïravä, is satisfied by an offering of flesh. The consecrated blood becomes an ambrosia. The head and flesh of the victim must be offered to the goddess. Morsels of flesh are a part of the food offerings."
According to the Prabodhä-Chandrodayä:
The Kâpâlikä who eats human flesh from the skull of an honorable man becomes the image of the Great God (Mahârâjä parajayä). He breaks his fast by drinking wine from the skull of a brahmin.
The personal counterpart of human and animal sacrifices is self-sacrifice. This concept subsumes a wide range of activities from ... suicide to self-mutilation and from physical penance to simple exercises of mental discipline. The chief penance performed by the Kâpâlikäs was of course the Mahavrata (Great Vow). [Lorenzen, p. 87]
Alimentary communion in ritual is based on the notion that we become what we eat. The identification of ritual foods with the body and bodily products of Shivä and Shakti create a consubstantiality of the communicant with them. He becomes god and participates in divine attributes such as immortality and magical powers.
The ancient rites of human sacrifice (purushämedhä) were performed frequently during the medieval period. They are mentioned in various plays of the classical theater. In the Mâlatî Mâdhavä by Bhavabhûti (seventh century), a Kâpâlikä seeks to sacrifice the heroine, Mâlatî, with the aim of acquiring a power of incantation (manträ-siddhi). In about the same period, Vadirâjasûri, in his Yashodharä-Kavyä, describes the saving of two children who had been groomed and bedecked with ornaments prior to being led to the place of sacrifice.
The Vetâliipanchavishati tells how King Vikramä, who was in the process of being robed for the sacrifice, was saved by a Vetâlä, a phantom who had incarnated himself in the body of a dead person.
The seventh day of the festivals dedicated to Shivä (Shivä Mahotsavä), still celebrated today at Madura, reenacts the impalement of numerous jainä(s) ordered by King Tirujanar Sambandhar (seventh century). This event is described in the Kâranâgamä in the part concerning the life of this Shaiva saint. [Gopinatha Rao, Elements of Hindu Iconography, vol. 1, Introduction]
Again, in the sixteenth century, the king Narä Narâyanä in north Bengal had 150 men sacrificed during the course of a single ceremony.
Intoxicating Liquors (Madhyä)
A state of drunkenness, which obliterates material preoccupations, is a useful preparation for ecstatic rites. Dancing is also a means of preparation for magical practices. The wine generally utilized is palm wine, today called toddy. But the intoxicant most commonly employed in Tantric ritual is Vijayä, a drink made out of Indian hemp, today called bhang. It is recommended to drink it an hour and a half before the rites concerning the five M's. According to A. Bharati (The Tantric Tradition, p. 252), its effect is considered to be aphrodisiac (uttejakä).
Drugs
EACH of the substances which make up matter corresponds to a graph, or an entity expressible by means of a diagram or by a mathematical or chemical formula. As we have seen, there exists a consciousness, or individuality, which governs each formulation, each conglomerate, each aspect of matter. The substances of which living beings are composed correspond to complex formulae. The living being is a biochemical factory, and the phenomena of perception, of sensation, of pleasure and pain, of memory and even of thought, can be regarded as reactions resulting from the activity of chemical components that act on the cells of our nervous system and brain. The intrusion of an excess of one of these components modifies, if only temporarily, our emotional equilibrium, our capacities for pleasure or suffering, for action, lucidity, memory, perception, our joy in life, or our depressive states.
These substances called drugs—stimulants, depressants—are by no means neutral products. Like all the components of the living being, they correspond to entities who come forth from the divine plan and who are endowed with personality, consciousness, and autonomy. The states of our soul are due to the contingencies of a sort of war between armies of molecules corresponding to subtle beings. The aggression of one of these chemical spirits upon the human being is no different from that of a demon or an angel. It is a sort of possession. This is why a drugged person is no longer master of himself. He may detest the drug that imposes itself upon him despite himself. There exists a spirit of tobacco, a spirit of hemp, a spirit of peyote, a spirit of the poppy, a spirit of wine, which, if they are not controlled, lead their victim as they fancy. All religions have recognized the existence of these subtle forces and have sought to cajole them.
There is no religion whose rites do not make use of an intoxicating substance. Something of this always subsists, even if we have lost its meaning. We drink to the success of an enterprise, and wine plays a role in the Christian mass. The Amerindians utilized tobacco to seal an alliance and practiced very elaborate peyote rituals. A ritual exists for opium smokers and for tea ceremonies. The Somä rites, which bring on mystic
al ecstasy, are an essential element in the Vedic rituals, and the god Somä occupies an important place in the Aryan pantheon. In the West, Dionysos, as god of wine, takes the place of the god Somä. In India today, bhang (a drink made of Indian hemp) is consumed in assemblies of a ritual character.
When the gods wish to destroy a wicked tyrant, they inspire the madness in him which causes him to lose himself. Drugs are among their armaments. Their irrational and immoderate intrusion signals the imminent end of the species at the end of the Kali Yugä.
To control the chemical spirits that wish to take possession of our faculties, we must first of all understand their nature and venerate them. Every drug is both angel and demon. It is by ritualizing their use that we can, as all traditional cultures have done, master them or eliminate their influence.
Sexual Rites (Maithunä)
ACCORDING to the Kâpâlikä Unmattä-Bhaïravä, in his commentary on Madhavä's Shankarä Digvijayä (XV.28):
The state of ecstasy which manifests in the sexual act is a participation in the very nature of Bhaïravä. What we call liberation (mokshä) is the achievement of a state of ecstacy. Liberation is comparable to a permanent orgasm, an active state of delight (anandä) which is a part of the nature of the gods.
He who venerates the self, established in the vulva (bhâgâsanästhä) attains liberation. [gamä-Prâmânyä]
The union of the sperm (Shivä) and the menstrual blood (the goddess) in their perpetual copulation forms the Tantric ambrosia (kulâmritä). In the yogic practice called Vajroli Mudrä, drinking the nectar issuing from the sexual union signifies the reabsorption through the penis of the sperm emitted in coitus mixed with the feminine blood.
Love and Death
While the Gods Play Page 13