Sunday, June 10, 2012
Saturday, June 9, 2012
Ganesh Baba's Kriya Yoga
My Kriya Yoga teacher was Shri Mahant Swami Ganeshanand aka Ganesh Baba. He in turn received his first Kriya initiation from the venerable Lahiri Mahasaya, and subsequent initiations from Sanyal Bhupendranath Mahasaya, Sri Tripura Devasharma, and Swami Sivananda. Born in Orissa India between 1890 and 1895, he lived as a householder until 1945, when he retired from worldly life, took sanyas vows, and served as manager of Anandamayi Ma's ashram for some years before becoming a monk in the tradition of the Naga Babas, in the Anand Akhara branch of the order founded by Shankaracharya, ash-covered sadhus who wander through India emulating Shiva, and noted for smoking a mix of cannabis with tobacco. He eventually received many teachings, but his main sadhana became Kriya Yoga. Baba was unusually vivacious, energetic, educated on many subjects, extroverted, talkative, eloquent, and charismatic, and began to attract interest from visitors from the West during the 1960s, when he developed his teaching style, and stressed the importance of developing and maintaining habits of straight but relaxed vertical posture AT ALL TIMES while standing, walking, or sitting as requisite to any further progress with Kriya. The number one rule when around him was you had to maintain straight posture all the time, or you probably would be dismissed. He called those who don't stand, walk, and sit straight "slouchers," unfit for further instruction. He pointed out that straight posture is one of the main physical hallmarks of human evolutionary progress, and that "slouchers" are in effect reversing that process. He also stressed the importance of developing habits of slow rhythmic diaphragmatic breathing almost all the time. He stressed the importance of having healthy diet and exercise habits. He also taught various pranayama exercises to do daily, and for more advanced students, further instructions for working with the subtle body, concentration, and becoming attuned to inner sound, inner light, and kundalini phenomena. Apart from his teachings, the main thing I enjoyed about him was his energy, which was constantly joyful, boundless, and contagious. Also his amazing knowledge of many subjects and brilliant wit and conversation skills. I went to dozens of his satsang/parties when he was in New York City. They were a total blast, great fun. We also had some unforgettable private sessions. He was a fantastic singer and would sing chants and Indian songs along with whoever musicians happened to be at the satsangs. Just to give a brief idea of what the satsangs were usually like, people would arrive at the starting time of around 8PM and Baba would talk to people informally for a while, then he would give a discourse, answering questions at the same time, which would last about an hour, then there would be a jam session with Baba singing songs and playing hand cymbals along with the musicians there, and that would last about another hour, then his students would serve a vegetarian dinner, then Baba would continue talking informally and answering questions after the dinner, and everyone there would mingle with each other and converse after the dinner, Baba talking and joking around with people the whole time. That's how it would typically go. It would all usually last at least 4-5 hours. I remember I would usually leave at around 1 AM. Baba was at least 87 years old at the time, always ready to party, have fun, and teach. Baba could be rough on some people, but he was always pretty gentle and gentile with me. I suppose he knew that was the way to best way for him to relate to me. He related to everyone differently. He held several satsangs at my home and on two occasions stayed all night after the others left and we talked alone about many subjects til the sun rose. He didn't live on a "normal" timetable and if he was having fun it didn't matter to him what time it was. It wasn't unusual for the satsangs to turn into soirees and last all night. The last time he visited me at my home he gave me the photograph displayed at top. I last saw him briefly in Central Park just before he returned to India. The second photo below is of him with me in Central Park in 1983, at the time he was staying in New York City and I was going to his satsangs every week. My time with him left indelible impressions on me and was always enchanting and amazing, perhaps beyond my skills to adequately describe. I may be a pretty good writer but I'm not a poet. The best way I can think of to further describe Baba and his teachings is through my review of The Crazy Wisdom of Ganesh Baba: Psychedelic Sadhana, Kriya Yoga, Kundalini, and the Cosmic Energy in Man, by Eve Baumohl Neuhaus, Inner Traditions, 2010. Links, quotes, stories, and photos of him follow:
Ganesh Baba (1890?-1987) was an Indian Swami, itinerant ascetic, and highly educated Kriya Yoga master who became popular among hippies and free-thinking mystics during and after the spiritual consciousness revolution of the 1960s countercultures. Many of his fans loved to be with him mainly because of his magnetic charismatic personality, because of his constant fount of wit and humor, and because he was just a blast to party with. But there were some among his followers who were also serious spiritual seekers and who got to know Baba’s unique yoga teachings, his “Cycle of Synthesis” which integrates esoteric Kriya Yoga, diverse sources of ancient Hindu wisdom, and knowledge of the 20th century modern sciences.
Baba left behind a diffuse array of manuscripts, notebooks, and letters for his followers to sort through after he passed on to the “other shore” as he would say. Around 1980, Baba assigned his disciple Eve Neuhaus to develop a coherent manuscript about his teachings from his papers. Eve took this assignment seriously, and now we have the results in The Crazy Wisdom of Ganesh Baba: Psychedelic Sadhana, Kriya Yoga, Kundalini, and the Cosmic Energy in Man. Though Baba was a skilled writer, his writing style reflects the time of his early 20th century education in India, and much of it comes across as somewhat archaic by today’s standards. Eve clarifies his ideas in ways much more comprehensible to today’s readers. As a devoted follower of Baba myself, I can testify that she not only exposits Baba’s whole teaching with perfect accuracy, but does so with even greater clarity than I ever heard from Baba himself in my many precious hours and days with him. She has also fruitfully integrated Baba’s ideas with some other ideas she has learned since, a practice I’m sure Baba would approve of because he was a dialectical thinker, a believer that ideas are living things that grow through improvement. Baba knew that rigidification and ossification into dogma is one of the greatest plagues of spiritual thought, which has afflicted religions throughout the ages, and a plague that as I’ve noticed has also effected Kriya Yoga teachings as they have been institutionalized since the mid-twentieth century. Ongoing innovation upon ideas is necessary to keep them vital and alive, though this must be done with great care, as Eve well knows.
Though Neuhaus’ exposition is clear and concise, it is no less esoteric. The book presents information about Baba’s methods which if read and followed carefully, and practiced diligently, will efficiently open one’s doors of perception, help to break one’s cycles of attachment and suffering, and speed along one’s process of coming to personal knowledge and experience of Spirit and the inner light of wisdom.
However, to progress to an advanced stage on this path, it’s often necessary to work closely with someone who is experienced with these methods, preferably someone with whom one feels a strong sense of personal connection and rapport. Though this kind of personal connection was part of a long tradition in India, in this age of mass spiritual culture, such guru-disciple bonds have become rare. This was another precious service that Baba himself provided. He deliberately kept his following down to a manageable number who he could relate to on a personal basis. We knew him not as a celebrity on a stage, but as intimately as a best friend or close relative. Hopefully, such connections will remain vital as Kriya teachings move ahead.
Baba’s Cycle of Synthesis, which integrates all the physical, biological, psychological, and spiritual aspects of yoga practice, including the aspects of posture, pranayama, kundalini, and meditation, is a work of spiritual genius, produced before the world was ready to receive it. It’s a revolutionary form of Kriya Yoga practice, inventively named “Crea Yoga” by Baba, which improves upon the tradition of Kriya Yoga as it is usually taught, presently, by the lineage of teachers who followed Lahiri Mahasaya, Sri Yukteswar, and Paramahansa Yogananda. Crea Yoga provides improved keys to unlock mysteries of ancient knowledge that were for centuries known only to a few dedicated mystics. As we seek to evolve to a higher stage as a species, Crea is a yoga for the 21st century.
Some vignettes on Ganesh Baba and my times with his disciples:
Some of the recordings I post on YouTube (links below) are of Baba's singing. I recall one session when as lyrics he chanted "Let the dead bury their dead!" over and over for at least fifteen minutes. I wish I recorded that. It's a quote from Luke 9:60.
I recall one session where a group arranged themselves around the seat where Baba was to discourse. The mood in the room was unusually serious. Baba came in, sat down, looked at the group, laughed, then said, "I must have gone mad!...Tonight I will teach you about the science of charlatanism." He then laughed again and continued with an otherwise routine discourse. He was quite the jokester, always knew not to take himself too seriously, and could easily joke about himself as well as joke about almost anything. I think that's part of why he liked me so much. He could see in me a fellow Dionysian. He had some very good teachings, but unfortunately, some in his inner circle lacked the humor and took it all too seriously. Some of them were rather unfriendly to me and those were the ones who seemed lacking in humor. The ones with more humor liked me. I can also be quite Apollonian but I'm also generally rather Dionysian. I also find humor in a lot of things and laugh a lot. I think Baba appreciated that.
Once a fellow regular member of the group invited me to his home for a "demonstration of occult powers" (siddhi) that a friend of his supposedly acquired unexpectedly on a lengthy spiritual retreat. About thirty people were gathered in his living room and the man came in. He looked quite ordinary, was about 30 or so, dressed in ordinary jeans and shirt, and sat down among us in a circle. The lights were dimmed and he told us that he would go around the circle gazing into our eyes in turn and at the end the lights would go up again and he would ask what each of us saw. When he gazed in my eyes I saw him transformed into an old but strong and sagely looking man dressed in a white robe. His eyes became absolutely blazing, piercing lights. At the end he asked what we saw and each person reported the same thing. I have no idea how that was done. Maybe it was a magic trick of some kind but I do believe that supposedly impossible things, according to a conventional materialist understanding, are sometimes possible. Unfortunately, I didn't have the presence of mind to record the man's name and lost contact with the host, so I now have no idea who he was.
The following two clips were initiated when someone in the group just asked, "Baba, would you comment on resonance?"
Ganesh Baba on Death and Reincarnation
Ganesh Baba on Death and Reincarnation, continued
Ganesh Baba on Posture and Evolution
Ganesh Baba Talks About His Initiations
Ganesh Baba's Vision of the New Millenium
Ganesh Baba Talks About the Third Eye
Ganesh Baba Singing
Ganesh Baba Funny Audio Nuggets
Ganesh Baba Jam Session
Ganesh Baba on the Ray of Attention
more links:
http://www.ganeshbaba.com/ More info and links to audio of his sessions: http://www.ganeshbaba.com/Ganesh_Baba.html Flower Raj site with links to a Ganesh Baba interview: http://blog.theflowerraj.org/2009/10/ganesh-baba-talks-with-terry-clifford/ Memories of Ganesh Baba by Peter Meyer: http://www.serendipity.li/baba/gb_art.html Various other links about him: http://www.serendipity.li/baba.html Memories of visiting Ganesh Baba's residence in India by Hari Meyers: http://www.serendipity.li/baba/fsmi.htm
Excellent Scribd article about Ganesh Baba by Eve Neuhaus (click on zoom in to make the print larger): http://www.scribd.com/doc/61668665/Ganesh-Baba-Article
Excellent Scribd article about Ganesh Baba by Eve Neuhaus (click on zoom in to make the print larger): http://www.scribd.com/doc/61668665/Ganesh-Baba-Article
Ganesh Baba quotes:
"Carry your spinal column as a column, not as an arch."~ Ganesh Baba
"The world isn't a chorus of concords or a choir of discords, but a cosmos representing the consummate harmony between concord and discord."
"Keep your back straight, breathe deeply, and all else will follow."~ Ganesh Baba
"The universe is evolving, man is evolving with it, and man's personal God is also evolving. Only the Absolute has no need for evolution."~ Ganesh Baba
"Before going to the deep waters, learn to swim in the shallow waters."
"Psychedelics without meditation is like a boat without a rudder."
"The universe is verily pervaded by OM, the Word that was with God, the Word that is God. It is the Prime Cosmological Constant."
"The universe of matter and energy is a topographical expression of the space-time continuum where space is the weave and time is the weft."
"May man change; otherwise perish he must as a special species, continuing only as a biped beast busy building his material bee-hives."
"Intuition is the superior, astral intelligence, a cosmic extra-sensory perceiving intellect. It emerges when mind is controlled."
"If one is a meat eater, we give him so much meat he will ask for dal and chapati."
"If one is a meat eater, we give him so much meat he will ask for dal and chapati."
"All phenomenal diversity is reduced to one Ultimate Unity, one unbroken sphere spread everywhere, containing and permeating everything."
"Do not count time if you want to evolve. If you count time, you will only revolve."
"There is nothing contradictory between the experiences of the seers and the scientists except the direction of the flow."
"Since time immemorial we have used plant substances to help us recognize the higher frequencies of knowledge."
"The hand of human destiny oscillates between unity and diversity, spirit and nature, pure consciousness and action in the world of form."
"We are puppets made of vibrating molecules surrounded by electrical charges. Our Overself vibrates at a much higher frequency. Straight back, deep breath and simple foods increase our vibration."
"The synthesis of creativity with evolution alone can click the cosmic gears to enable us to go back to our launching station at Infinity."
"God is the supreme shopkeeper, his market is infinite."
"As children our thoughts were few or heart-filled with the solace of self-satisfaction - we were natural yogis in union with ourselves."
"In Nirvana your little ego is snuffed out. Nirvana is a process of being snuffed out. Nirvana is a defocalization on the sensate world and switching over our consciousness to the insensate world of intuition, of inner light, and of inner oscilloscopic vision in our gyral center."
On death and reincarnation:
After death, the soul drifts through dimensions the materialist mind cannot comprehend.
We are like water when we are on earth, like steam or vapor when we pass over into death.
Everything in this world is linked to an octave on a musical scale. On the other side of death, the octave is raised further up the scale.
In death, we do not sit trembling before a God; we sit and see all that we did and meant to do. There is no sterner judge than man himself.
The akashic records are seen by everyone who passes from earth-life to beyond. Man sees his past and judges himself.
Mind can only try to bridge the gap between the ideal conditions of the Overself and the actual ones here on Earth.
The human frame is a vehicle of Primal Power.
At the center of the spinal nerve is a capillary channel which connects the 4-D corporeal core to the multi-D Cosmic Core.
The Silver Cord is the cord of consciousness in the form of a shaft of radiant energy, capable of infinite extension.
The Silver Cord connects the corporeal core with the core of Cosmic Consciousness as the umbilical cord connects child to mother.
The Silver Cord binds the being to the non-being, the relative to the Absolute.
On Yoga:
No matter what its form, all yoga is dedicated to reconnecting matter with spirit.
Yoga is the study of the mind by the mind.
Yoga is spontaneously called into action whenever there is application of concentrated mental attention.
Yoga is the realization of our unity with or indivisibility from the Cosmic Whole.
Yoga is a family reunion between life and death.
Yoga is the final weapon in the hands of man.
Yoga seeks to train and control the creative principle in man.
Tantra and yoga are twins and must be treated as such. Tantra is associative psycho-somatics; yoga is dissociative ultra-psychology.
Whether associative or dissociative, both tantra and yoga utilize the same techniques.
Kriya (action) is the rouser of kundalini (power). Once it is roused, yoga and tantra use kundalini differently.
Kundalini is comparable to magnetism - the vital molecules in the human body become directionally oriented and vibrant with vital power.
The yogi wants to take the highway to liberation; the tantrika prefers to enjoy the byways.
In tantra, every day is Mother's Day.
The four prime phases of our being are the physical, biological, psychological and the spiritual. Neglecting any one undermines the rest.
P1, perfecting one’s posture, is the first step in conscious evolution.
Good posture is a must, continuously, without any excuse for interruption.
The breath connects the world beyond space and time to the world of space and time.
If the mirror of the mind is foggy, clean it up with daily effort, sadhana (spiritual practice).
Yoga is a family reunion between life and death.
On Prayer:
Prayer must be intensive enough to penetrate into the Core of the Causal Body.
Kriya yoga activates the life-current and conveys the prayer-pulses through the cerebro-spinal channel to the Causal Core via the pineal. In Kriya yoga, the physical, vital and conscious phases of our being are brought into synchronous harmony. We are at the corporeal end and Cosmic Consciousness is at the Causal end. Kriya yoga connects the two. Thus, it is the most effective method of prayer.
But, all in all, response to prayer is the least desirable result for those who are capable of correct prayer. Desirelessness for results is an initial criterion for the cultivation of the capacity of controlling results by prayer.
Prayer for highly consummated human beings is a constant allegiance and ever-offering of love and devotion. Highly consummated human beings do not pray for results. They surrender the results to the will of Cosmic Consciousness.
Breathe in abundance; breathe out surrender.
Prayer, to consummated human beings, is constant communion with Cosmic Consciousness, the cause of all creation, the goal of all evolution.
Prayer becomes a merger of their ephemeral "becoming" into eternal "being."
Some other quotes I recall:
"Keep your head above your heart. Nature put them in that order for a reason."
He liked to sometimes explain word origins and one day joked about psychics, "They are psych because they're crazy and chic because I kick them!" (I wouldn't take his jokes too seriously.)
Here I reproduce a nice Facebook conversation we had when I posted this blog:
M: Deniz, Im curious. Is Ganesh Baba part of the Yogananda lineage? Or is it a different Kriya lineage? Just curious about how that works. I think Babaji started it, but Im not sure of how many Kriya branches exist.
Deniz: Thanks for your question, M. All Kriya Yoga stems from the teachings of Lahiri Mahasaya, who founded the tradition in the late 1800s. Actually, Lahiri Mahasaya was reviving a tradition of Raja (integral) Yoga, and remodelled it so that it could be taught to householders, or people living regular lives rather than in monasteries. Sri Yukteswar was a disciple of Lihiri Mahasaya, and Yogananda was a disciple of Sri Yukteswar. Ganesh Baba told a story of recieving a miraculous healing from Lihiri Mahasaya when very young, as he took ill and his parents were rushing him to see a doctor. Though the story is not possible to confirm, Baba always called that his first initiation. So Ganesh Baba was not a disciple of Yogananda, but only claimed contact with Lahiri Mahasaya, though he told me that he knew and spent some time with Yogananda's elder brother in India. Various Kriya lineages grew from Lahiri Mahasaya, and the Yogananda lineage was just one of several. I hope that explains.
S: Where is Ganesh Baba now and how can i get in touch with him?
Deniz: Thank you, S. He went off to the other shore in 1987 at the ripe old age of at least 92. He lives on in the memories of the many who love him.
S: Oh it's such a loss for humanity. He is only physically gone like all masters, they still appear for sincere seekers.
Deniz: True, as with all loved ones, he stays close to our hearts. I maintain my connection by doing my best to honor his teachings and the tremendous personal love and attention he gave me with my remembrances of him as I do here on the web (through my YouTube posts of audio of his sessions as well as my blog here), and through faithfully practicing everything he taught me, which has for a very long time not required any big effort because they've been throughly integrated as part of my lifestyle. I practice his posture, pranayama, and meditation instructions every day.
M: So, Mahavatar Babaji isnt the founder? He too is mentioned in Yogananda's book.
Deniz: Yes, many Kriya yogis may say that Babaji is the founder before Lahiri Mahasaya. Babaji may be interpreted to be as what is known in the West as an angel apparition. So called astral initiations, or initiations that occur on the astral rather than the earth plane, are a long recognized phenomenon in that culture, so there would often be a medium for that, and Lahiri Mahasaya called that medium Babaji. It is up to every free thinking Kriya yogi as to how to interpret that story. In all my many hours with Ganesh Baba, he never mentioned Babaji. Ganesh Baba thought it was most important to do the practice, and he would sometimes dismiss certain beliefs as "hocus pocus," having no practical relevance. Knowing him, I would surmise that the would have thought the Babaji story may have had great relevance for Lahiri Mahasaya if he thought Babaji initiated him, but perhaps not much relevance for us Kriya yogis who just should get down to the practice here and now.
S: Shiva is said to be the one who gave yoga to the world and others just revived it, so says the shaiva sect. Mostly it is regarded as Pathanjali to be the one who gave yoga. Then there is Krishna giving kriya yoga initiation to Arjuna. Ther is actually no end to stories. But its actually irrelevant from where it came. The important thing is to practice it diligently. There is a tendency to get caught up inn the story and miss the objective. There are many who try to defend a story, rather than do what he is supposed to do.
Deniz: Yes, that's exactly my outlook and I think it would be Ganesh Baba's outlook too. In the Christian culture, there's the story of the Annunciation to Mary that might be considered equivalent in some ways. But I think to a practical mind, it would be much more important to practice Jesus' teachings of love and compassion than to be concerned about whether the Annunciation story is literally true as it is told in the legend.
M: Quick aside question, is it true that Tantric scriptures outdate Patanjali by a thousand years? I thought Hinduism was the oldest religion and Tantra was included not earlier.
Deniz: Patanjali is usually dated to the 2nd century BCE. There are various interpretations of the idea of Tantra, perhaps the most basic being that it is about the integration of opposites of the subtle body nadis through sublimation through the sushumna or central kundalini channel. If Tantra is interpreted in this most basic and perhaps most authentic way, as I understand it, then perhaps Tantra dates all the way back to the Indus Valley civilization in the 2nd millenium BCE, where the beginnings of yoga are traced. Now the word Tantra has been exploited in a lot of bogus ways to make money for false gurus, and as I've noticed, much of the original and authentic significance of it has been lost in this process.
Some other quotes I recall:
"Keep your head above your heart. Nature put them in that order for a reason."
He liked to sometimes explain word origins and one day joked about psychics, "They are psych because they're crazy and chic because I kick them!" (I wouldn't take his jokes too seriously.)
Here I reproduce a nice Facebook conversation we had when I posted this blog:
M: Deniz, Im curious. Is Ganesh Baba part of the Yogananda lineage? Or is it a different Kriya lineage? Just curious about how that works. I think Babaji started it, but Im not sure of how many Kriya branches exist.
Deniz: Thanks for your question, M. All Kriya Yoga stems from the teachings of Lahiri Mahasaya, who founded the tradition in the late 1800s. Actually, Lahiri Mahasaya was reviving a tradition of Raja (integral) Yoga, and remodelled it so that it could be taught to householders, or people living regular lives rather than in monasteries. Sri Yukteswar was a disciple of Lihiri Mahasaya, and Yogananda was a disciple of Sri Yukteswar. Ganesh Baba told a story of recieving a miraculous healing from Lihiri Mahasaya when very young, as he took ill and his parents were rushing him to see a doctor. Though the story is not possible to confirm, Baba always called that his first initiation. So Ganesh Baba was not a disciple of Yogananda, but only claimed contact with Lahiri Mahasaya, though he told me that he knew and spent some time with Yogananda's elder brother in India. Various Kriya lineages grew from Lahiri Mahasaya, and the Yogananda lineage was just one of several. I hope that explains.
S: Where is Ganesh Baba now and how can i get in touch with him?
Deniz: Thank you, S. He went off to the other shore in 1987 at the ripe old age of at least 92. He lives on in the memories of the many who love him.
S: Oh it's such a loss for humanity. He is only physically gone like all masters, they still appear for sincere seekers.
Deniz: True, as with all loved ones, he stays close to our hearts. I maintain my connection by doing my best to honor his teachings and the tremendous personal love and attention he gave me with my remembrances of him as I do here on the web (through my YouTube posts of audio of his sessions as well as my blog here), and through faithfully practicing everything he taught me, which has for a very long time not required any big effort because they've been throughly integrated as part of my lifestyle. I practice his posture, pranayama, and meditation instructions every day.
M: So, Mahavatar Babaji isnt the founder? He too is mentioned in Yogananda's book.
Deniz: Yes, many Kriya yogis may say that Babaji is the founder before Lahiri Mahasaya. Babaji may be interpreted to be as what is known in the West as an angel apparition. So called astral initiations, or initiations that occur on the astral rather than the earth plane, are a long recognized phenomenon in that culture, so there would often be a medium for that, and Lahiri Mahasaya called that medium Babaji. It is up to every free thinking Kriya yogi as to how to interpret that story. In all my many hours with Ganesh Baba, he never mentioned Babaji. Ganesh Baba thought it was most important to do the practice, and he would sometimes dismiss certain beliefs as "hocus pocus," having no practical relevance. Knowing him, I would surmise that the would have thought the Babaji story may have had great relevance for Lahiri Mahasaya if he thought Babaji initiated him, but perhaps not much relevance for us Kriya yogis who just should get down to the practice here and now.
S: Shiva is said to be the one who gave yoga to the world and others just revived it, so says the shaiva sect. Mostly it is regarded as Pathanjali to be the one who gave yoga. Then there is Krishna giving kriya yoga initiation to Arjuna. Ther is actually no end to stories. But its actually irrelevant from where it came. The important thing is to practice it diligently. There is a tendency to get caught up inn the story and miss the objective. There are many who try to defend a story, rather than do what he is supposed to do.
Deniz: Yes, that's exactly my outlook and I think it would be Ganesh Baba's outlook too. In the Christian culture, there's the story of the Annunciation to Mary that might be considered equivalent in some ways. But I think to a practical mind, it would be much more important to practice Jesus' teachings of love and compassion than to be concerned about whether the Annunciation story is literally true as it is told in the legend.
M: Quick aside question, is it true that Tantric scriptures outdate Patanjali by a thousand years? I thought Hinduism was the oldest religion and Tantra was included not earlier.
Deniz: Patanjali is usually dated to the 2nd century BCE. There are various interpretations of the idea of Tantra, perhaps the most basic being that it is about the integration of opposites of the subtle body nadis through sublimation through the sushumna or central kundalini channel. If Tantra is interpreted in this most basic and perhaps most authentic way, as I understand it, then perhaps Tantra dates all the way back to the Indus Valley civilization in the 2nd millenium BCE, where the beginnings of yoga are traced. Now the word Tantra has been exploited in a lot of bogus ways to make money for false gurus, and as I've noticed, much of the original and authentic significance of it has been lost in this process.
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