Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
TANTRIC?
Nicholas F. Gier, Professor
Emeritus, University of
Idaho (ngier@uidaho.edu)
First presented at the annual
meeting of the Society for
Asian and Comparative
Philosophy,
Asilomar Conference Center,
Monterey, California, June,
2006
Second presentation at Rice
University, Department of
Religious Studies, November,
2006
Forthcoming in Gandhi Marg
28 (2007), but without
Sections IV & V
For a 900-word version click
here. A 5,000 word version is
here.
My meaning of
brahmacharya is this:
"One who never has
any lustful intention,
who . . . has become
capable of lying naked
with naked women . . .
without being in any
manner whatsoever
sexually excited."
--M. K. Gandhi[1]
The greater the
temptation, the greater the
renunciation.
--M. K. Gandhi[2]
I threw you in the sacrificial
fire and you emerged safe
and sound.
Manu Gandhi[3]
I can hurt colleagues and the
entire world for the sake of
truth.
Sushila Nayar)[4]
[Gandhi] can think only in
extremeseither extreme
eroticism or asceticism.
--Jawaharlal Nehru[5]
The professional Don
Juan destroys his spirit as
fatally as does the
professional ascetic,
whose [mirror] image he
is.
--Aldous Huxley[6]
Some scholars believe that it
in my opinion, Ludwig
Wittgenstein's homosexual
information in an ad hominem
experiments in brahmacharya, a
As would be expected, we
simultaneously a left-handed
foundation of Hindu
is a summary of Gandhi's
Gandhi himself.
The final section will
Hindu spirituality.
brahmacharya . . . irresistibly
short-sighted mortals
II
shakti-power."[21] Gandhi
describes womankind as
suffering."[23]
mother's milk."[25]
The fact that women felt no
approaching perfection as a
by becoming a eunuch by
Shakti is substantially
existence.
broadcasting demonstrated
"shakti, the miraculous power of
God."[32]
an alternative view of
woman."[36] When he
experiments were
original, untransformed
Durga/Kali's shakti. A
presence."[40]
[43]
Buddhist Tantricism,
causation."[45] Ironically, an
Furthermore, nonviolence,
metaphysics,[47] or the
III
"psycho-experimental
interpretation of non-Tantric
morality.
Tantricism represents a
premodern recovery of
experiments in truth on a
as occasion necessitated."[51]
However, in his response to A.
am as ancient as can be
imagined and hope to remain so
energy."[54]
Gandhis experiments with
untruthfulness.[55] Gandhi's
secrecy was simply expedient
nondualists."[56] Gandhi is
frustratingly inconsistent on
of this movement.
use of unconventional
boundaries of marriage."[57] It
qualifies.
IV
Before Gandhi started his
brahmacharya experiments in
1938, he had a string of intimate
relationships with European
and Indian women. I am
indebted to Girja Kumar's book
Brahmacharya: Gandhi and His
Women Associates for
information about the five
information about the five
women discussed in this section.
In contrast to Bose, who
encountered resistance
everywhere when he tried to
publish on this topic 50 years
ago, Kumar's book, which is
more explicit, judgmental, and
comprehensive than Bose's, has
been warmly received, signaling
that most Indians are now ready
to accept Gandhi as fully
human. Kumar's sources are
not secret or anonymous; in
fact, most of the material comes
from letters found in Gandhi's
Collected Works.
husband.[59]
brahmacharya experiments.
retrieve it.
When Millie finally broke
me."[61]
"experienced an intensely
[62]
[Gandhi's] kundalini."[63]
brahmacharya mistresses,
perdition." Writing to
been to Saraladevi
Chowdharani.
Madeleine Slade, later
constipation.
V
Of the women closely
associated with Gandhi, at least
ten were said to have slept in
his bed. They can be identified
his bed. They can be identified
as follows:
Sucheta Kriplani, a
member of Parliament
and professor at Benares
Hindu University, was a
member of Gandhis
Peace Brigade in East
Bengal in 1947. She
maintained a
brahmachari marriage
with J. B. Kriplani, a
famous socialist and saint.
Gandhi fought their union
tooth and nail. Although
Gandhi invited Mrs.
Kriplani to his bed on a
regular basis, he insisted
that married couples in
Gandhis "sacred
associations" actually began at
his Sevagram ashram as early as
1938, when his wife Kasturba
was still alive. Sushila Nayar
not only slept with him there,
but also gave him regular
massages, sometimes in front of
visitors, and they, as I have
noted, bathed together. About
his relations to Nayar, Gandhi
states: "She has experienced
everything I have in me. . . . She
In an extremely candid
In an extremely candid
confession, Gandhi admits that
at Sevagram he had made a
grave mistake:
VI
transformation of Indian
intellectuals, bolstered by
to incorporate a significant
"possessor of beautiful
recommends intercaste
camps of interpretation of
Ramakrishna completely
refused to participate, thereby
a drop of it.
intercourse--proved to be
Ramakrishna's greatest
samadhi. Ramakrishna
Returning to Gandhis
sexual desire.
As a young revolutionary in
by many of these
by her devotees.
In Aurobindos mature
philosophy the Tantric elements
are clear, complete with Tantric
terms such as sadhaka (Tantric
aspirant) and sadhana (Tantric
practice). The primordial being
of Aurobindo's Shakta
cosmogony is Mahashakti, the
transcendent Universal Mother,
who "descends" as the Tantric
polarity of Ishvara-Shakti,
which expresses itself as the
purusha-prakriti dualism in the
nescient world. P. B. Saint-
Hilaire explains Aurobindo's
Hilaire explains Aurobindo's
view most aptly:
of . . . Prakriti, and
remains veiled as a
Ignorance. When he
emerges, he is perceived
at first as a calm,
immovable
consciousness, detached
Thereafter he gradually
Prakriti.[113]
right-handed Tantra.
Aurobindo, and even Gandhi,
Renaissance.
It is significant that
bodies,"[115] he is embracing
standpoint of a masculinized
supported.
In conclusion, if we can
is a very unique
nonritualistic, nonesoteric
sufficient evidence to
inconsistent in his
justifications for his sexual
completely sincere in
ENDNOTES
[1]Letter to R. A. Kaur, March
18, 1947.
[15]Kumar, p. 294.
[21]Pyarelal, p. 214.
[22]Gandhi, Womans's Role in
Society (Ahmedabad: Navajivan
Publishing, 1959), p. 8.
[23]Gandhi, Harijan (November
14, 1936), p. 316). "Woman is the
incarnation of ahimsa. Ahimsa
means infinite love, which again
means infinite capacity for
suffering" (Harijan [February
24, 1940], p. 13.
[24]Cited in Martin Green,
Gandhi: Voice of a New
Revolution (New York:
Continuum, 1993), p. 261.
[36]Pyarelal, p. 223.
[38]Devi-Mahatyma, 1.59
(Coburn translation).
[40]Brahmavaivarta Purana,
Rakriti-Khanda 55.87, trans.
Tracy Pintchman, The Rise of
the Goddess in the Hindu
Tradition (Albany, NY: SUNY
Press, 1994), p. 164.
[41]Bharati, p. 236.
[47]Bharati, p. 21.
[50]Ibid., p. 20.
[57]Ibid., p. 69.
[58]Kumar, p. 90.
[60]Ibid., p. 317.
[63]Ibid., p. 152.
[68]Ibid., p. 225.
[75]See Kumar, p. 7.
[77]Kumar, p. 288.
[84]Kumar, p. 331.
[95]Ibid., p. 33.
[98]Ibid., p. 333.
[99]Ibid., p. 338.
[102]Bose, p. 150.
[103]Ibid., p. 151.
[104]Ibid., p. 95.
[105]Ibid., p. 159.
[116]Huxley, p. 45.