{"id":8445,"date":"2026-09-02T18:49:34","date_gmt":"2026-09-02T18:49:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/yogamatsya.com\/?p=8445"},"modified":"2026-09-02T18:49:34","modified_gmt":"2026-09-02T18:49:34","slug":"the-tantras-agamas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/yogamatsya.com\/en\/the-tantras-agamas\/","title":{"rendered":"The Tantras (\u0100gamas)"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Tantras (\u0100gamas)<\/h1>\n

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.<\/strong> Mah\u0101y\u0101na 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.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

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\"Trika<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
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The \u015aiva-S\u016btra and the Nine Schools of Tantra<\/h2>\n

The most significant early work of non-dual Tantra is probably the \u015aiva-S\u016btra, 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 \u015aaiva Tantra and non-dualistic thought. <\/p>\n

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<\/strong> \u2014including Trika, the Trinity, whose teachings we at Matsya also pass on in our Trika P\u016bj\u0101 initiation<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

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What Tantra Has Contributed to Modern Yoga<\/h2>\n

The Tantric schools contributed greatly to the yoga we practice today: physical purification techniques, the gestures of power (mudr\u0101s), additional pr\u0101\u1e47\u0101yamas, and the chakra system. It is interesting to note that the Tantras incorporated Pata\u00f1jali\u2019s a\u1e63\u1e6d\u0101\u1e45ga yoga into their body of practice early on<\/strong> \u2014as a foundation for successfully practicing Tantric yoga. It was precisely from this synthesis that our modern Hatha Yoga developed. <\/p>\n

Among the concepts derived directly from tantric sources are: the goddess Ku\u1e47\u1e0dalin\u012b, the system of the six chakras, the 72,000 n\u0101\u1e0dis of subtle physiology, the ten pr\u0101\u1e47a-v\u0101yus, and the ascent of consciousness through pr\u0101\u1e47\u0101y\u0101ma, dh\u0101ra\u1e47\u0101, and dhy\u0101na\u2014topics that still form the core of our own Hatha and Kundalini yoga practices<\/a> today.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

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Meditate on the ku\u1e47\u1e0dalin\u012b\u015bakti, which rises like a bolt of lightning through all the chakras, one by one, until it reaches the dv\u0101da\u015b\u0101nta. Then, finally, the magnificent form of Bhairava appears. <\/p>\n

Vij\u00f1\u0101na-Bhairava Tantra (29)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

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\"samana<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Abhinava Gupta and the *Tantr\u0101loka*<\/h2>\n

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\u2014without 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. <\/p>\n

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 Tantr\u0101loka<\/strong> (Light on Tantra), to systematize the rituals, meditation, and philosophy of 64 \u0100gamas into a comprehensive work. Since the *Tantr\u0101loka* was so extensive, he later wrote a more concise summary of it, the *Tantras\u0101ra*, to make the gift of tantric thought accessible even to laypeople. <\/p>\n

For those who wish to delve deeper: Mark Dyczkowski<\/a>, a Western Sanskrit scholar with whom Matsya is closely associated, has dedicated his life to translating this very *Tantr\u0101loka*.<\/p>\n

Abhinava Gupta died in 1020 AD. Legend has it that his physical form vanished while he was reading the *Bhairavastava* to his followers.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

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Just as the mirror underlies everything in the reflection, so God, as consciousness, permeates everything that is reflected in it.
\u015ar\u012b Abhinava<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This post is part of our series on the history of yoga<\/a>. In the next post, we\u2019ll begin the post-classical era\u2014with the story of Matsyendra and Gorak\u1e63a, the founders of Hatha Yoga. <\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

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<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Zur \u00dcbersicht: Geschichte des Yoga<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
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More<\/h2>\n

If you want to know more about us, take a look in the downloads section!<\/p>\n

Dort haben wir Kundalini Yoga Kriyas, Mantras und viele sch\u00f6ne Dinge. Nur f\u00fcr dich \ud83d\ude09 <\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

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To the downloads area<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The nine schools of Tantra, their contribution to modern Hatha and Kundalini yoga, and Abhinava Gupta, the author of the *Tantr\u0101loka*.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8440,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8445","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized-de"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/yogamatsya.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8445","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/yogamatsya.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/yogamatsya.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yogamatsya.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yogamatsya.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8445"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/yogamatsya.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8445\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yogamatsya.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/yogamatsya.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yogamatsya.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yogamatsya.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}