Sādhakas—namely, Sarvānanda and Pūrnānanda. The descendants of Sarvānanda reside at Mehar, while those of Pūrnānanda reside mostly in the district of Mymensingh. Little is known about the worldly life of Pūrnānanda, except that he bore the name of Jagadānanda, and copied a manuscript of the Vishnupurānam in the Shāka year A.D. 1448-1526. This manuscript, now in the possession of one of his descendants named Pandit Hari Kishore Bhattāchārya, of Kaitali, is still in a fair state of preservation. It was brought for inspection by Pandit Satis Chandra Siddhāntabhūshana of the Varendra Research Society. The colophon states that Jagadānanda Sharma wrote the Purāna in the Shāka year 1448.
This Jagadānanda assumed the name of Pūrnānanda when he obtained his Dīkshā (Initiation) from Brahmānanda and went to Kāmarūpa (Assam), in which province he is believed to have obtained his “Siddhi” or state of spiritual perfection in the Āshrama, which still goes by the name of Vashishthāshrama, situated at a distance of about seven miles from the town of Gauhati (Assam). Pūrnānanda never returned home, but led the life of a Paramahangsa and compiled several Tāntrika works, of which the Shritattvachintāmani, composed in the Shāka year A.D. 1499-1577, Shyāmārahasya, Shāktakrama, Tattvānandataranginī, and Yogasāra are known. His commentary on the Kālī-kakārakūta hymn is well known. The Shatchakranirūpana, here translated, is not, however, an independent work, but a part of the sixth Patala of the Shrītattvachintāmani. According to a genealogical table of the family of this Tāntrika Āchārya and Vīrāchāra Sādhaka, given by one of his descendants, Pūrnānanda is removed from his present descendants by about ten generations.
This work has been on hand some five years, but both the difficulties of the subject and those created by the war have delayed its publication. I had hoped to include some other plates of original paintings and drawings in my possession bearing on the subject, but present conditions do not allow of this, and I have therefore thought it better to publish the book as it stands rather than risk further delay.
ARTHUR AVALON.
RANCHI,
September 20, 1918.
“We pray to the Paradevatā united with Shiva, whose substance is the unmixed nectar of bliss, red like unto vermilion, the young flower of the hibiscus, and the sunset sky; who, having cleft Her way through the mass of sound issuing from the clashing and the dashing of the two winds in the midst of Sushumnā, rises to that brilliant Energy which glitters with the luster of ten million lightnings. May She, Kundalinī, who quickly goes to and returns from Shiva, grant us the fruit of Yoga! She being awakened is the Cow of Plenty to Kaulas, and the Kalpa Creeper of all things desired for those who worship Her.”—Shāradā Tilaka, xxv. 70.
The Six Centers and the Serpent Power
I. INTRODUCTION
The present works, Shatchakranirūpana (“Description of the Six Centers, or Chakras”) and Pādukā Panchaka (“Fivefold Footstool”), deal with a particular form of Tāntrik Yoga named Kundalī Yoga, or, as some works call it, Bhūtashuddhi. These names refer to the Kundalinī Shakti, or Static Power in the human body by the arousing of which the Yoga is achieved, and to the purification of the elements of the body (Bhūtashuddhi) which takes place upon that event. This Yoga is effected by a process technically known as Shatchakrabheda, or piercing of the six Centers or Regions (Chakra) or Lotuses (Padma) of the body (which the work describes) by the agency of Kundalinī Shakti, which in order to give it an English name I have here called the Serpent Power.{1} Kundala means coiled. This Power is the Goddess (Devī) Kundalinī, or that which is coiled; for Her form is that of a coiled and sleeping serpent in the lowest bodily center, at the base of the spinal column, until by the means described She is aroused in that Yoga which is named after Her. Kundalinī is the Shabdabrahman—that is, Divine Cosmic Energy—in bodies (v. post). The Saptabhūmi, or seven regions (Loka),{2} are, as popularly understood, an exoteric presentment of the inner Tāntrik teaching regarding the seven centers.{3}
The Yoga is called Tāntrik for a twofold reason. It will be found mentioned in the Yoga Upanishads which refer to the Centers, or Chakras, and in some of the Purānas. The treatises on Hathayoga also deal with the subject. We find even similar notions in systems other than the Indian, from which possibly in some cases they have been borrowed. Thus, in the Risala-i-haq-numa, by Prince Mahomed Dara Shikoh,{4} a description is given of the three centers “Mother of Brain,” or “Spherical heart” (Dil-i-muddawar); the “Cedar heart” (Dil-i-sanowbari); and the Dil-i-nilofari, or “Lily heart.”{5} Other references may be found in the works of the Mahomedan Sufis. So some of the Sufi fraternities (as the Naqshbandi) are said{6} to have devised, or rather borrowed, from the Indian Yogis{7} the Kundalinī method as a means to realization.{8} I am told that correspondences are discoverable between the Indian (Asiatic) Shāstra and the American-Indian Māyā scripture of the Zunis called the Popul Vuh.{9} My informant tells me that their “air-tube” is the Sushumnā; their “twofold air-tube” the Nādīs Idā and Pinggalā. “Hurakan,” or lightning, is Kundalinī, and the centers are depicted by animal glyphs. Similar notions have been reported to me as being held in the secret teaching of other communities. That the doctrine and practice should be widespread we might expect if it has a foundation on fact. This form of Yoga is, however, in particular associated with the Tantras or Āgamas, firstly, because these Scriptures are largely concerned therewith. In fact, such orderly descriptions in practical full detail as have been written are to be found chiefly in the Hathayoga works and Tantras which are the manuals, not only of Hindu worship, but of its occultism. Next, Yoga through action on the lower static center seems characteristic of the Tāntrik system, the adepts of which are the custodians of the practical knowledge whereby the general directions in the books may be practically applied. The system is of a Tāntrik character also in respect of its selection of the chief center of consciousness. Various people have in antiquity assigned to various parts of the body the seat of the “soul” or life, such as the blood,{10} the heart, and the breath. Generally the brain was not so regarded. The Vaidik system posits the heart as the chief center of Consciousness—a relic of which notion we also still preserve in such phrases as “take it to heart” and to “learn by heart.” Sādhaka, which is one of the five functions of Pitta,{11} and which is situated in the heart, indirectly assists in the performance of cognitive functions by keeping up the rhythmic cardiac contractions, and it has been suggested{12} that it was perhaps this view of the heart’s construction which predisposed Indian physiologists to hold it to be the seat of cognition. According to the Tantras, however, the chief centers of consciousness are to be found in the Chakras of the cerebro-spinal system and in the upper brain (Sahasrāra), which they describe, though the heart is also recognized as a seat of the Jīvātmā, or embodied spirit, in its aspect as Prāna.{13} It is for the reasons mentioned that the first verse of the Shatchakranirūpana here translated speaks of the Yoga which is to be achieved “according to the Tantras” (Tantrānusārena)—that is, as Kālīcharana its Commentator says, “following the authority of the Tantras.”
This Yoga has been widely affirmed. The following review does not profess to be exhaustive, for the literature relating to Kundalī and Layayoga is very great, but includes merely a short reference to some of the Upanishads and Purānas which have come under my notice, and of which I kept a note, whilst engaged in this work.{14} It will, however, clearly establish that this doctrine concerning the Chakras, or portions of it, is to be found in other Shāstras than the Tantras, though the references in some cases are so curt that it is not always possible to say whether they are dealing with the matter in the same Yoga-sense as the work here translated or as forms of worship (Upāsanā). It is to be noted in this connection that Bhūtashuddhi is a rite which is considered as a necessary preliminary to the worship of a Deva.{15} It is obvious that if we understand the Bhūtashuddhi to here mean the Yoga practice described, then, with the exception of the Yogī expert
