The editors intend this book not as a comprehensive survey of the problems associated with the origins of
Tantrism; rather, they wish "to pose a body of new questions and stimulate new dialogue and research" (preface by Harper, p.
This is due not least to the current 'state of the art', which is considered insufficient in this regard: '
Tantrism remains a largely unexplored field in Indonesia as elsewhere' (Rubinstein 2000:224).
With the countercultural revolution and sexual liberation of the 1960s,
Tantrism finally entered into the Western popular imagination in full force.
However, Gandhi is not to be wholly identified with this or any one religion, since as I have indicated, he shares affinities to Jainism,
Tantrism, pacifist Christianity, Greek Orphic religion and Greco-Roman (Stoic) asceticism, and to outright denials of religious authority.
Questions and Answers on Tibetan
Tantrism. Macao: Tianxinjian Press.
"This vision of an energetic and vibrating world seems to have been borrowed from
tantrism, a later form of Hinduism and of Buddhism, which is presented as the Way of the Divine (masculine) and of his Energy (feminine)." (9)
It is notable that
tantrism played a vital role in infusing the concept of symbolic and secret worship of the deity, which eventually brought together many such religious doctrines in a common sphere.
Shingon
Tantrism and Nichiren--the living personality of the historic Buddha asserts itself and colors the practical ethic--and of course the end product--for the monk at least, remains the same as it was under the Bo tree.
The claim that Pazs poetry was deeply influenced by Buddhist and Hindu traditions is neither new nor surprising (Paz himself wrote about
Tantrism in Conjunciones y disyunciones); nonetheless Callans thorough explanation of yogic principles and mythology, together with his ability to connect the meditative practice at many different levels to Blanco, provide new insight into the importance of the "East" in Paz's work.
One of the strong points of Flood's book is that he has a wealth of knowledge about asceticism in all three religions, including the Brahmanical tradition in Hinduism and, specifically, Saiva
tantrism in Kashmir, the Theravada tradition of Buddhism and both Eastern and Western Christianity as well as the figure of Simone Weil (who may lie close to, and yet not fully within, Christianity).