Tantric Yoga: A study of the Vedic precursors, historical evolution, literatures, cultures, doctrines, and practices of the eleventh-century Kasmiri Saivite and Buddhist unexcelled Tantric Yoga

A wide-ranging, in-depth study of the Saivite and Buddhist Tantric traditions, this dissertation in thirteen chapters covers the historical development of Tantra in the Indian context prior to the Islamic invasions, relying principally on Sanskrit texts. The dissertation provides an introduction to Tantric studies, the Vedic and historical roots of the ideas and emergence of the traditions, the early Tantric literature and social position of the cults, the goals of the practices as understood by their advocates, with considerable technical detail on advanced stages and ultimate goals of Tantric Yoga. Chapter 1 traces the emergence of the field as a legitimate branch of Indology. Chapter 2 examines the Vedic roots of Tantric ideas and practices. Chapter 3 weighs the evidence and arguments for the earliest emergence of surviving written Tantric texts. Chapter 4 surveys early Buddhist Tantric literature in Sanskrit, and Chapter 5 provides a similar overview of the early Saivite Tantric literature, delimited historically by the citations in Abhinavagupta's Tantraloka. Chapter 6 discusses the social status of Tantra in the eyes of non-practitioners, with depictions of Tantric devotees by poets, satirists, and story tellers. Chapter 7 looks at the anatomy and physiology of the subtle body in the Ayurvedic medical tradition, the oldest Vedic Upanisads, the Yoga, Samkhya, and Yogacara schools, the relationship of medical physiology to Tantric physiology, and the role of the subtle body in Tantric Yoga. Chapter 8 examines the principles and objectives of Tantric initiation rites. Chapter 9 looks at the sexual yogas in the Buddhist and Saivite Tantric traditions. Chapter 10 introduces the Kalacakratantra text and its commentary Vimalaprabha by Pundarika, and examines evidence for historical and geographic origins of the texts. Chapters 11-13 are annotated translations of the Mahoddesas 1-3 of the fifth chapter of Kalacakratantra and Vimulaprabha, with a section from Mahoddesa Four on the Dharmasamgraha. The author has not included his full translation of the fourth Mahoddesa.