The Tantras (Āgamas)
The tantras are spiritual teachings that focus on the worship of the divine for both spiritual and material success. What distinguishes them above all, however, is their particularly high regard for the feminine aspect of existence and spirituality. Mahāyāna Buddhism was an important precursor to Tantric thought, and the first Tantric texts, which appeared beginning in 500 CE, were unconventional and free from the traditional spiritual approaches of the time.
The Śiva-Sūtra and the Nine Schools of Tantra
The most significant early work of non-dual Tantra is probably the Śiva-Sūtra, which first appeared around 900 CE. According to legend, it appeared to Vasugupta in a dream. It is a highly mystical work that explores the foundations of Śaiva Tantra and non-dualistic thought.
Tantric philosophy continued to develop rapidly from the 9th century CE onward, until the end of the classical period in the 13th century. Nine major schools of Tantra shaped India —including Trika, the Trinity, whose teachings we at Matsya also pass on in our Trika Pūjā initiation.
What Tantra Has Contributed to Modern Yoga
The Tantric schools contributed greatly to the yoga we practice today: physical purification techniques, the gestures of power (mudrās), additional prāṇāyamas, and the chakra system. It is interesting to note that the Tantras incorporated Patañjali’s aṣṭāṅga yoga into their body of practice early on —as a foundation for successfully practicing Tantric yoga. It was precisely from this synthesis that our modern Hatha Yoga developed.
Among the concepts derived directly from tantric sources are: the goddess Kuṇḍalinī, the system of the six chakras, the 72,000 nāḍis of subtle physiology, the ten prāṇa-vāyus, and the ascent of consciousness through prāṇāyāma, dhāraṇā, and dhyāna—topics that still form the core of our own Hatha and Kundalini yoga practices today.
Meditate on the kuṇḍalinīśakti, which rises like a bolt of lightning through all the chakras, one by one, until it reaches the dvādaśānta. Then, finally, the magnificent form of Bhairava appears.
Vijñāna-Bhairava Tantra (29)
Abhinava Gupta and the *Tantrāloka*
Abhinava Gupta was born around 950 CE into a family of musicians and Brahmins and showed an early talent for spirituality and the arts. He chose to live as a brahmachari—without a family of his own, but continuing to live with his own family. Over the course of his life, he was initiated into 15 major spiritual lineages in India, including all the great tantric traditions of his time, and attained mastery in all of them.
At that time, the tantric corpus was as extensive as it was fragmented. Abhinava Gupta then began composing a monumental work of 37 books, the Tantrāloka (Light on Tantra), to systematize the rituals, meditation, and philosophy of 64 Āgamas into a comprehensive work. Since the *Tantrāloka* was so extensive, he later wrote a more concise summary of it, the *Tantrasāra*, to make the gift of tantric thought accessible even to laypeople.
For those who wish to delve deeper: Mark Dyczkowski, a Western Sanskrit scholar with whom Matsya is closely associated, has dedicated his life to translating this very *Tantrāloka*.
Abhinava Gupta died in 1020 AD. Legend has it that his physical form vanished while he was reading the *Bhairavastava* to his followers.
Just as the mirror underlies everything in the reflection, so God, as consciousness, permeates everything that is reflected in it.
Śrī Abhinava
This post is part of our series on the history of yoga. In the next post, we’ll begin the post-classical era—with the story of Matsyendra and Gorakṣa, the founders of Hatha Yoga.
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