VIMALANANDA’S DEDICATION FOR THIS BOOK
Dedicated to One who is the source of life
The Dynamic Cosmic Energy which pervades
the entire universe perennially
The fountainhead of supreme joy, divinity, and magnanimity:
Portrait of Vimalananda
(taken from a photograph and drawn by Dr. Vasant D. Lad.)
My Mother Tara
Vimalananda, the subject of this book, designed the cover and dictated to the author the following regarding its symbolic meaning:
“Ghora is darkness, the darkness of ignorance. Aghora means light, the absence of darkness. Under the Tree of Knowledge is an Aghori, a follower of the path of Aghora. He has gone beyond ignorance thanks to the Flame of Knowledge which billows from the funeral pyre. The funeral pyre is the ultimate reality, a continual reminder that everyone has to die. Knowledge of the ultimate reality of Death has taken the Aghori beyond the Eight Snares of Existence: lust, anger, greed, delusion, envy, shame, disgust and fear which bind all beings. The Aghori plays with a human skull, astonished by the uselessness of limited existence, knowing the whole world to be within him though he is not in the world. His spiritual practices have awakened within him the power of Kundalini, which takes the form of the goddess dancing on the funeral pyre: Smashan Tara. He is bewildered to think that all is within him, not external to him; that he sees it not with the physical eyes but with the sense of perception. The Flame of Knowledge is that which preserves life, the Eternal Flame, the Supreme Ego, the Motherhood of God which creates the whole Maya of the universe and thanks only to Whose grace the Aghori has become immortal.”
The contents of this book have been encapsulated on its cover: the breadth, the power, the majesty and the divine delirium of Aghora.
Further descriptions may be found within the book in Chapter 2, SHAKTI, The Vision of the Goddess. A larger view of the panoramic cover including expanded interpretations of the symbolism may be found at http://www.brotherhoodoflife.com/.
The beautiful, faithful and symbolic wrap-around cover art was created by renowned artist and humanitarian Robert Beer. For further information please visit http://www.tibetanart.com/
Full Cover Art
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PREFACE
My teacher, the Aghori Vimalananda, spent many years perfecting his knowledge of Tantra and its advanced discipline Aghora. He distilled his experiences and presented me with the essence. My comprehension of Tantra is due entirely to his instruction and is redolent of the influence of his personality.
Tantra is the science of personality. Just as Ayurveda was promulgated by the ancient sages of India as a truly holistic way to maintain the physical body, and just as Ashtanga Yoga is meant to optimize one’s spiritual nature, Tantra is a mental science, a meta-psychology, a method for exploring the mind and developing the range of one’s perceptions.
It is said that the state of undifferentiated unity is the only absolute reality, and that the cosmos possesses only a relative reality because it is not permanent and unchanging. The universe possesses all possible qualities and attributes, and each being within the universe possesses a limited number of qualities and attributes. Personality is the self-identification of the ego with a set of attributes. All beings possess egos and therefore all beings have personalities. The cosmos Herself possesses the ultimate personality, the supreme expression of the totality of manifested existence: the Adishakti, or Adya.
To state that humans, animals, trees and flowers possess their own individualities and idiosyncrasies is less apt to induce controversy than to assert that even beings which are disembodied or which are embodied, but are less individualized than we, also possess personality. The issue of disease is a good example. Diseases are beings with parasitical intentions. Some have collective bodies, like worms, bacteria or viruses, just as bees and ants show signs of collective consciousness. Other diseases, bereft of their own bodies, arise within organ systems of some animal or plant due to metabolic malfunctions.
When the intruding personality differs significantly in sophistication of organization from its host, physical disease is likely for then the attacker’s ego will be insufficiently developed to assume control of all essential physiological functions. Conversely when the spirit of a dead human enters the body of a living human it will feel right at home and the disease will display predominantly mental symptoms such as altered values and habit patterns.
Whatever the intruder, cure is the expelling of the alien and the return of the normal personality. An individual’s immunity exists on the physical levels in white blood cells and in antibodies, and on the mental level in the degree of personality integration; the cause of immunity is the ego’s power of self-identifying with body and mind. The word “ego” is used here not in a Freudian sense but as an indicator for the force of individual identity in the organism. The stronger the self-identification the greater the immunity to attack from another personality which might usurp some area of the ego’s domination. Every cell is ceaselessly remembered by the ego as being part of its organism. When the organism dies the cells are free, in the absence of the ego’s grip, to go their separate ways. If a cell rebels against the ego’s domination and seeks to proliferate itself into a new personality, the result is a cancer. Be the predator external or internal, disease is its onslaught on one’s personality.
According to Tantra everyone is ill who is doomed to live with a limited personality. Only those who go beyond time, space and causation to become immortal can be said to be truly in harmony with the cosmos and therefore truly healthy, since health is derived both from internal balance and from harmony with the environment. Hence one significant area of Tantric research has always been methods for prolonging one’s life. In one sense the added years are significant mainly because they indicate the degree of successful achievement of the rituals.
Ayurveda is also concerned with longevity, but its approach is to strengthen the individual’s innate personality. Yoga, recognizing the essential impermanence of the human personality seeks to efface it entirely to permit one to return directly to the unlimited Absolute. Tantra aims to replace the limited personality with an unlimited, permanent one.
An individual may fail to become eternal but may in the course of Tantric practice accumulate sufficient energy (Shakti) to obtain some extra-ordinary power, called a Siddhi. Wisely used, Siddhis can accelerate one’s spiritual evolution. Commercialized, Siddhis bind one down more firmly to the wheel of cause and effect.
One simple sort of Siddhi involves the collection of some particular herb at the astrologically appropriate moment with the appropriate ritual. After further preparation such plants can bestow superphysical powers on their users. The plant species selected is one known to have an affinity for the sort of power desired. The ritual draws that power into the plant at the moment when it is available in the cosmos to be tapped. The herb’s own personality is then overshadowed by the personality of the force drawn into it.
Metals and gems are also used in Tantric alchemy. Indian alchemists like their Western counterparts searched for the Philosopher’s Stone, the way to turn base metal into gold. While exoterically this base metal referred to iron, bronze, brass and copper, the esoteric reference was to the transmutation of the base metal of the individual’s limited consciousness into the gold of enlightenment, a state of unlimited consciousness. An alternative meaning suggests the transmutation of the base metal of the body into the gold of immortality via the touchstone of Amrita, the elixir of life.
It is said that herbal-based preparations can prolong one’s life for 400 to 500 years, but that through the use of mercury there is no end to how long one can live. Mercury is regarded as the ultimate metal because it is the sole element which can be brought to life. Repeated herbal applications and treatments with fire bring the mercury to life. It is then treated like a child: its appetite is awakened and it is fed. At an appropriate point it is sacrificed. The personality thus created is thereupon liberated to display its attributesi and with its assistance one can create gold, fly in the air, or live eternally — or rather the new personality can take over one’s body and live eternally through it. Mercury which is less efficiently prepared cannot bestow immortality but can cure disease and increase longevity. Insoluble preparations of mercury and sulfur are widely used in Ayurvedic medicine; such compounds are by-products of alchemical experimentation.
Immortality is a desirable goal in the context of the Indian belief in reincarnation. If one has a long list of karmic connections to be lived through it is infinitely more convenient to live through them all in one lifetime rather than be forced to endure rebirth again and again. Herbs and minerals are only two methods for achieving immortality, however. Another method is practiced by Aghoris, Tantrics who have superseded all ritual limitations. When they find themselves near death (any good Yogi will know of his impending death six months in advance as his Prana or life-force begins to flow out of his body), Aghoris deliberately leave their bodies and enter the bodies of corpses, taking them over and making them live for as long as they please, until they decide to change bodies again.
Most dead personalities cannot move about so freely on their own, and some Tantrics worship in graveyards and charnelgrounds simply to catch hold of human spirits to force them to perform work. This is also a sort of Siddhi. The sort of work possible depends upon the power of the captured personality. This method produces quick results but it is dangerous, for a minor error in ritual may result in insanity, death, or worse.
Other ethereal beings who never took human form can also be bound by Tantra and their tremendous power harnessed. The most puissant are the deities, personifications of various cosmic forces. The ultimate Siddhi is control of Adya, the personification of the entire cosmos.
Essential to the production of any Siddhi are Mantra, Yantra, and Tantra. In the journey toward Siddhi, Mantra is the energy which moves your vehicle (the Yantra) according to the road map (Tantra). In an industrial analogy the finished product (Siddhi) emerges when the raw material (Mantra) is fed into the milling machines (Yantra) according to a fixed process (Tantra).
A Mantra is a collection of sounds. When pronounced their vibrations provide energy to the Yantra. Sound appears on the electromagnetic spectrum as one variety of energy which can be manipulated by the Tantric. There are three main types of Mantra:
a) Descriptive — usually in Sanskrit, these Mantras describe either the process undergone, the desired goal, or both.
b) Meaningless — aggregations of sounds which have no known meaning in any human language.
c) Bijas — individual nasalized syllables.
Bija means seed, and these “seed-sounds” produce fruit according to the Bijavrksha Nyaya, or the Law of Seed and Tree. The frequent repetition of these Bijas eventually results in a sort of standing wave, permanently energizing either an external Yantra or some area of the aspirant’s brain, resulting in the continuous production of a specific effect, one which is coherent with the personality invoked. Four types of Vani or speech exist for the pronunciation of Mantra:
a) Vaikhari — vocal speech
b) Madhyama — nasalized speech
c) Pashyanti — purely mental repetition
d) Para — telepathic speech, in which only the intention but not the sound is conveyed.
The more subtle the speech, the deeper its effect on both the individual and the surrounding environment. Just as a laser produces coherent light, a human brain can produce coherent energy when a single frequency (Bija) is selected and is amplified appropriately with Yantra and Tantra.
The Yantra is the crucible in which the herb, mineral, animal, or human is prepared through the Mantra’s energy. The Yantra contains the energy, reflecting it back upon itself until it can accumulate to that point when as in a laser it, of its own accord, projects itself. The projection assumes the form of the deity appurtaining to the Bija repeated. When Mantras other than Bijas are employed the energy will continue to accumulate until it is used or is otherwise discharged. Here the Yantra acts something like a capacitor. Yantras are frequently diagrams drawn on birchbark, crystals or copper plates, or they can be drawn with powder or sand. Images may be used as Yantras, but the best Yantra is said to be the human body.
Tantras are the three main varieties according to the aspirant’s capabilities: external, internal and mixed. The Pashu or animalistic type of aspirant is by nature greatly attached to the enjoyment of external sense objects and so should perform external worship to control these urges to outwardness. The Divya or divine type tends to be introverted and need not bother with external ritual. These aspirants require Antaryaga, internal sacrificial rites.
The Vira or heroic type can perform both external and internal worship competently with thorough attention to detail. Everyday life becomes a sacrificial rite for a Vira with each act an act of worship hidden at all times from the casual observer.
For a Vira the entire world is a graveyard, filled with the dead. A true Tantric regards every human being (including himself) as already dead since the fact of birth makes death inevitable. For a Tantric, and even more so for an Aghori, the entire world is his playground and his temple.
Still, rituals which make use of literal corpses and skulls are available for those who wish to get quick results. Such practices are part of the Vama Marga, or Left-Hand Path, which is the violent counterpart of the Dakshina Marga, or Right-Hand Path. The Dakshina Marga is meant for those who seek steady progress with reduced danger of setbacks. The Varna Marga is described as “Shighra, Ugra and Tivra,” or “fast, terrible and intense.” On this path the chances for catastrophe are great unless a powerful guru’s protection is provided. The sexual rituals which have made Tantra notorious are part of Varna Marga.
The ritual in which sex appears, which is known as Panchamakara, is actually of three types depending again upon the class of the celebrant, and in only one type does actual sexual intercourse occur. That version is meant only for Tamasic people, Tamas being mental inertia or dullness. The intensity of the five (Pancha means five) articles of worship — meat, fish, parched grain, wine and sex — overwhelms the dullness of the mind with stimulation. If the aspirant has been properly prepared, this increased mental energy can assist his or her spiritual evolution. An ill-prepared aspirant will be overcome by stimulation and will descend into debauchery.
Rajasic people (Rajas means mental activity) have active minds which must be properly channeled. They need less stimulation and more control, and use ginger, radish, boiled (as opposed to parched) grain, coconut milk and flowers in their Panchamakara. Sattvic people naturally enjoy ample Sattva (balance of mind and alertness) and do not require external aids to worship. They utilize the meat of silence, the fish of breath control, the grain of concentration techniques, the wine of God intoxication, and the coitus of one’s ego with the Absolute.
The Sanskrit terminolgy used to describe the Panchamakara hides this meaning beneath its exterior. For example, “fish” stands for breath control because one’s two nostrils are referred to in Yogic terminology as rivers since they are continuously flowing (the right is called the Ganga and the left the Yamuna). Just as fish swim in rivers, the breath swims through the nostrils, and holding the breath (Kevala Kumbhaka) is equivalent to “eating” the “fish.”
Panchamakara is only one of many Tantric rituals but it illustrates well a fundamental Tantric concept: Bhutashuddhi. The physical universe is a permutation of five Great Elements: Earth, Water, Air, Fire and Ether, equivalent respectively to the solid, liquid, and gaseous states of matter, heat (which transforms matter from one state into another), and the field in which all activity takes place. To achieve universal harmony these Five Elements must be harmonized. Panchamakara is a fast, intense way to do this: meat stands for Earth, fish for Water, wine for Fire, grain for Air, and sex for Ether. When one reaches the stage of balance in which these inputs cause no disequilibrium of consciousness or metabolism it is much less likely that any other fluctuation in the Five Elements will cause disharmony, and a state of health has been reached, since health is balance and disease is imbalance. This health is infinitely more permanent than ordinary health.
To deal with only Five Elements, though essential in every Tantric sadhana, would be too mechanistic, and Tantric authorities advocate personification in accompaniment. Rather than seek to extirpate their emotions entirely as Yogic practitioners do, Tantrics magnify their emotions and transfer them entirely to a deity, a personified cosmic force. All the aspirant’s natural propensities can spend themselves in this devotee-deity relationship, avoiding suppression of any desires which might erupt later to disrupt the harmony.
Thus Tantra insists, “There is no Mukti (freedom from delusion) without Bhukti (enjoyment).” “Enjoyment” refers to the acceptance of all phenomena which may occur to an individual, be they “good” (enjoyable) or “bad” (painful). The aspirant relies on the magnanimity of Nature (personified as the deity) to protect and provide. Yoga and Vedanta aim directly at Mukti, which was appropriate in earlier ages when the mundane world was less demanding. Tantra is more practical for today’s world. Ayurveda is meant for those who desire only Bhukti, or unrestricted sensory enjoyments. It was promulgated as a separate doctrine because many today cannot comprehend health’s spiritual aspects.
The doctrine of Kundalini and the Chakras is associated with that of the Five Great Elements. When the Elements have been thoroughly purified in an individual then the Kundalini Shakti, a goddess in her own right, has a free path upwards through the Chakras to meet and mate with Her Shiva in the brain. Each of the five lower Chakras is the seat of the subtle form of one Element, and only when they are purified and harmonized can the Kundalini free Herself from their grasp. Herbs can be useful to assist in this process, as can mercury. Even disembodied spirits can be useful since they churn the nervous system to the high pitch necessary to withstand the tremendous might of Kundalini, who is the individual equivalent of the cosmic Adya. Each aspirant’s perception of Kundalini will differ according to their innate emotional make-up, and therefore many forms of the Goddess are available for worship.
Whatever the form, the aspirant must interact with Kundalini on a personal basis. Some treat Her as sister, some as friend, advisor or wife. A few regard Her as a sixteen-year-old daughter, and the Aghoris treat Her as a servant. But my teacher Vimalananda opined that it is best to treat Her as a mother. In Her aspect as Adya She is Mother of all worlds and all beings. We emerge from Her, exist in Her and eventually dissolve into Her again. Moreover, a friend may fail you, a wife may quarrel with you, and a servant might rebel against you, but your mother will never desert you. Vimalananda told me, “Always sit in the lap of the Divine Mother. Let Her do everything for you, rely on Her totally, and She will never forsake you. If you try to do things on your own you will fall and hurt yourself. Only She can take care of you. The greater your Bhakti (devotional love) for Her the faster will be your progress.”
Bhakti is essential because She is really you—you are a miniscule part of Her — and you must love yourself to make progress. Even the masculine deities are all part of Her. Whether the Tantric aspirant worships a male or female deity depends on the guru, but the outcome will be the same: Kundalini will reunite with her Shiva. First Mantra, Yantra and Tantra will be used to create the form of the deity in the aspirant’s consciousness. Then the devotee and the deity will be together continuously, observing their stipulated relationship (son-mother, husband-wife or whatever). This is called Tanmayata. Eventually Tadrupata occurs in which all but a few vestiges of the devotee’s original personality are eliminated and only the deity’s personality remains.
For the Panchamakara ritual to be successful a couple who seek to perform it must first perfect Shiva Lata Mudra, a practice in which all sexual desire is eliminated. The male identifies entirely with Shiva and the female with Shakti, and this attitude must be held for three hours at a time to ensure success. The Tantras say, “Shivo bhutva shivam yajet”: First become Shiva and then you will be able to worship Shiva properly. When this self-identification with the deities is complete then the consumption of fish, meat, grain, wine and the sexual act are no longer acts of indulgence but become sacraments because the deities themselves partake directly.
The merely curious have no business dabbling in Tantra, but some so-called gurus in the West encourage their half-baked followers to do so. Such self-delusive activity reinforces the crystallizations of the personality which prevent spiritual progress. Tantric rituals are sacrificial rites. Though herbs, minerals, and animals are used as offerings, they are secondary to the true offering, the sacrifice of one’s limited self into the sacrificial fires of penance. In the Panchamakara ritual the female is the fire into which the male offers semen, just as clarified butter is offered in orthodox fire worship.
Ordinary sex is no sacrifice. When two people come together to copulate they usually seek gratification for themselves, the slaking of their lust. Perhaps indirectly they will try to satisfy their partners. Tantric sex becomes possible only when one has totally effaced one’s own personality and offers oneself for the gratification of the deity, the universe incarnate.
This is one reason Tantra has always been a closely guarded secret. The danger of abusable knowledge falling into the hands of the unworthy has limited its spread. One should never seek to practice classical Tantra without a guru because no Tantric texts exist which provide thoroughly accurate details of any ritual. Each text omits an essential step, or includes false information, and only through a guru can the reality, handed down from teacher to disciple over generations, be known.
Even if pure Tantra is beyond the reach of most Westerners the Tantric attitude has much to offer. To consider some of the topics already considered, Western psychology can learn much from the Tantric concepts of personality and ego. The concept of individual constitution— not merely in the Ayurvedic sense of Vata, Pitta and Kapha but also the mental constitution of Sattva (Divya), Rajas (Viral, and Tamas (Pashu) — suggests that people can be categorized according to what sort of approach will suit their temperament and would therefore be more likely to work. Tantric herbal and mineral preparations are part of Ayurveda and can be evaluated for their efficacy. The whole physiology of sound and light can be revolutionized by examination of Mantra and of visualization.
Some of these Tantric attitudes are already being employed in the West, perhaps unknowingly. For example, cancer patients are sometimes instructed to visualize to encourage remission. One such visualization might be a school of piranha devouring the dead meat of the tumor mass. This is Tantric in nature; the sacrifice of an undesirable personality (the cancer) to an objectified projection of nature (the piranha). Such visualizations are often effective but because they are inherently combative they are not as useful for promoting health, which is non-aggressive, as they may be for cure. Tantra can suggest new and better visualizations which could positively increase the individual’s stamina, vigor and happiness while simultaneously eliminating the disease.
Visualization can also be extended to other auto-immune diseases besides cancer, since auto-immune disease occurs when the ego loses its ability to distinguish what is part of its organism and what is alien to it. Psychologically this process is already being used in Neurolinguistic Programming. Undesirable habits or personality quirks can be altered thereby without analysis, guilt or trauma, and new traits can be added. Because there is no limit for self-improvement Tantra can be repeatedly employed to assist in adjustments.
For those who are already relatively healthy, Tantra can create deeper levels of harmony and health. Immortality may be generally unobtainable but a long healthy life is not, for which good immunity is required. In Sanskrit, immunity is Vyadhikshamatva, which means literally “forgiveness of the disease.” By improper lifestyle and attitudes we create conditions in our bodies and minds which are agreeable to certain beings, which accept our (unspoken) invitation and move in. Most of us despise the disease without realizing that we have invited it to ourselves. When one learns to forgive oneself, and to forgive the disease its depradations, then the disease’s return is effectively barred.
Unfortunately, even the Tantric attitude can be dangerous. As one accumulates power, the ego will balloon out unless the personality is continuously incinerated simultaneously. Hence Tantra’s insistence that power be objectified and personified. Since Tantric ritual can be used to create emotions which did not previously exist, perhaps adoption of the Tantric attitude can prove therapeutic for those many today who suffer from emotional paralysis. Hence Vimalananda’s insistence on the greatness of motherly love.
From the strictly spiritual point of view a study of true Tantra would provide Westerners a proper perspective with which to consider their own spiritual practices. For example, they might begin to regard Kundalini with greater respect after learning of the effects of Her complete awakening. Or, consider the millions who repeat Mantras daily. Most are ignorant of the requirements for Mantra Siddhi and so will repeat the Mantra sincerely for years with very little result, whereas with a little attention to Tantric teachings they could make quick progress by learning such things as:
a) The location in the vocal apparatus where the Mantra should be recited along with its proper pronunciation.
b) The process of Bhuta Shuddhi and the practice of Nyasa (which prepares the body and mind to act as a fit receptacle for the deity).
c) The Dhyanavidhi, or specific visualization appropriate to the Mantra.
d) The five great restrictions, which are reciting the Mantra daily the same number of times, at the same place, at the same time, with the same offering, while observing strict sexual continence during whatever period is set aside for this purpose.
e) The total number of repetitions required, which differs for each Mantra (100,000 is often cited), plus the appropriate number and variety of offerings to the Five Great Elements.
Though Tantra may sometimes seem hopelessly complex and impractical one is unavoidably filled with awe at the amazing thoroughness and attention to detail which the ancient sages showed while promulgating this science. Even if it cannot be instantly commercialized or otherwise exploited in some mundane fashion, surely Tantra deserves appreciation for its very existence.
The greatest benefit of the study of Tantra and Aghora is perhaps an enhanced appreciation for motherliness. The doctor who cannot take a motherly attitude toward his patients is a mere pill pusher. My teacher insisted that all males should learn motherly love. Tantra is the worship of Mother; it is the most advanced method for inculcating maternal feelings. It is undeniable that as you look to the world, so the world will look to you. If the world is your Mother and all its inhabitants your family there is never need for loneliness, fear or despair. As my teacher Vimalananda observed frequently, when speaking of the Mother, “What more does one need to do once the Mother has accepted him? She will do everything without being asked. She is the being to be realized.”
INTRODUCTION
This is the story of the Aghori Vimalananda. An Aghori is a practitioner of the spiritual discipline known as Aghora. The word aghora can be interpreted as “deeper than deep,” or as “gentle,” or “filled with light, illumined.” Aghora is the apotheosis of Tantra, the Indian religion whose Supreme Deity is the Mother Goddess.
Tantra has thus far been glimpsed in the West only in its most vulgar and debased forms, promulgated by unscrupulous scoundrels who equate sex with superconsciousness. Sex is indeed central to Tantra, the cosmic sexual union of universal dualities. The aim of Tantra is Laya, return of the seeker to the state of undifferentiated existence. Actually Tantra cannot be termed a religion, because it is bereft of tenets and dogma. It consists only of methods for achieving this Laya, or union of the individual with the infinite. This union is described with a sexual metaphor: the union of the personal ego (which is female) with the absolute (male). Under special circumstances sexual rituals are employed in Tantra to hasten spiritual progress, but the concept of licentiousness is totally foreign to the Tantric tradition.
Tantra has been divided into Right-Hand and Left-Hand Paths. The Right-Hand Path involves a search for the Unlimited Reality via the road of external imposition of purity. While its practices may seem strange to some, its emphasis on personal purity will be familiar to those in the West who know of Bhakti Yoga, Karma Yoga, and Raja Yoga, all of which conform more or less to orthodox ideals of religious discipline.
The Left-Hand Path has attracted attention to itself by the actions of those unwise souls who seek quick and easy spiritual development without any preliminary renunciation of sensory gratification. The result of such rashness is invariably indulgence of the worst and most blatant sort, which has damaged the Left-Hand Path’s reputation.
The Left-Hand Path relies on its practitioners’ absolute internal purity to protect them while they practice rituals which may involve necromancy, intoxicants, sex, or other “forbidden” practices. Most serious aspirants automatically shun the Left-Hand Path because of its potential for misuse, which is indeed great. It is truly treacherous for the unwary: one text observes that “walking on swords or riding a tiger is child’s play by comparison.” Ironically, those undisciplined individuals who cannot succeed at the Left-Hand Path are naturally attracted to it by the potential for unbridled indulgence it seems to proffer, while those sincere seekers who might eventually succeed at it are frightened away by its temptations.
There are a few, though, who do dare and who successfully complete the rigorous Left-Hand training of Tantra and Aghora. Strict renunciation is the prerequisite, extreme enough to purify the aspirant through and through. Only when purity is perfected is the aspirant assigned rituals which to the untutored observer might seem hedonistic or “sinful.” Aghora is not indulgence; it is the forcible transformation of darkness into light, of the opacity of the limited individual personality into the luminescence of the Absolute. Renunciation disappears once you arrive at the Absolute because then nothing remains to renounce. An Aghori goes so deeply into darkness, into all things undreamable to ordinary mortals, that he comes out into light. Sects in India are often distinguished by color of turban or drape of robe. Popularly, Aghoris have been stereotyped as ash-swathed ascetics with long matted hair who walk through life wild-eyed, skulking about in charnel grounds, wrestling with jackals for carcasses. The title Aghori is claimed by some groups who even assert an exclusive right to it.
Vimalananda had his own definition of Aghori which was independent of any doctrine or dogma. Indeed, his usage of terms like Vedic and Tantric may also be devoid of detectable textual support, for he never cared for texts. He believed — and it is a noble Indian tradition to do so — that a lineage’s practices prevail over textual injunctions. Whatever you believe yourself to be you are, if you are sincere and honest enough. You are responsible for yourself, and your opinion of yourself is authoritative. This attitude often irritates those who have invested heavily in the infallibility of any one text or group of texts, but then Vimalananda had no use for organized religion anyway. As you read his story, remember that what he called Vedic might not necessarily be Vedic to a temple priest, but that both opinions might be equally valid, according to context.
Throughout his life Vimalananda resisted any attempt to fit him into any mold. He guarded his originality jealously. He was without doubt distinctly individual, but simultaneously he was exceedingly difficult to pin down and define. What we speak of in this book as Aghora is solely according to Vimalananda’s teachings. He studied many systems and selected elements from each — Bhakti Yoga, Kundalini Yoga, and others — and melded them into a tool which he employed to advance himself. He believed that each individual should “carve out his own niche”: study what he or she could understand, select those practices which they could sincerely do, and do them faithfully. So by this definition Aghora would always be different for everyone; only the Aghori’s attitude would be held in common. Each Aghori would follow different practices, but all Aghoris follow them with the same intensity and disregard for self-preservation.
To Vimalananda, the true Aghori cannot be recognized by any external sign or mark. Experience in the world of ascetics had taught him that many fake Aghoris lurk under outward appurtenances. And he stoutly maintained that the true Aghora is wholly internal. Sectarian Aghoris might well take issue with this opinion, but Vimalananda lived up to it. He lived in an ordinary flat in Bombay and went about his business inconspicuously. Inside, he was pure Aghori: as hard as diamonds or as soft as wax, as the situation demanded. To his spiritual “children” he was the perfect mother — a combination of friend, philosopher, and guide. To those with inflated spiritual egos he was merciless.
One immutable tenet of Aghora is that death is to be personified and deified. Aghoris crave not for physical death but for destruction of all their limitations, “killing” themselves by internal or external processes. Aghoris do not fear death; once embarked upon a course of action the true Aghori either succeeds or dies trying, for there is no middle ground and no retreat. Aghoris love to spend time in cemeteries and burning grounds (collectively called smashan in Hindi). An Aghori is never happier than when he is seated intoxicated in the smashan performing a ritual near a funeral pyre, flames shooting up to lick the midnight blackness. Vimalananda, so concerned with external propriety in other ways, never hesitated to visit the smashan when he had rituals to perform.
Some of the events described in this book may well offend the reader’s sensitivities. Part of this was Vimalananda’s intention. He wanted Western holier-than-thou renunciates to know that “filth and orgies in the graveyard” (as one American once described Aghora) can be as conducive to spiritual advancement as can asanas, pranayama, and other “purer” disciplines. But another part is intrinsic to Aghora. In many ways it is and must remain totally incomprehensible to the ordinary person, and for some people no amount of explanation will satisfy when they question the wisdom or the spiritual benefit inherent in, say, consumption of human brain. Aghora is mysterious and deep — deeper than deep, in fact — and only those who can lay aside all their cultural clothing and plunge into it naked can dive into its depths.
When Vimalananda and I were in America one of my friends asked him, “As much as I have read about you and heard about you and now listened to you, I still cannot understand what an Aghori is. Would you please try to explain it to me?’’
Vimalananda told me later, “She asked me so honestly and earnestly that I felt I had to reply eloquently, even though this is really not something you can put into so many words.”
He told her, “An Aghori is beyond the bound of the earthly shackles; nay, something above the elements which shape the universe, and you. He takes a sort of intoxicant and thus get intoxicated in Supreme Love which emanates from the inner-most recesses of his heart. Shall I call it interiority? It is that which is beyond awareness. He gives off the best part of love. Why part? Part of the Supreme, Universal Love, where one experiences, with the help of perception, All-in-One/One-in-All. When you, the finite, merge into infinity what dost thou not know? During this stage he merges with his own deity so that he becomes Him — capital H. That is why he is said to have gone from darkness to divine enlightenment. This is an Aghori.” Vimalananda was an extremist. He was certain that anything worth doing was worth doing well, and he was ready to stake his all to ensure that whatever he began was completed. For him, Aghora was the doctrine of no return, a personal creed which demanded relinquishing all in exchange for divine love. He wanted to warn spiritual dilettantes in the West that the frivolity with which they treat discipline and the self-delusion they attempt to pass off as enlightenment is merely a cheating of their own consciousness which leads only to the pit. For example, when I was once unwise enough to comment that a certain guru was supposedly awakening his disciples’ Kundalinis by boffing them with a peacock feather duster, Vimalananda exploded in reply: “Has the Kundalini Shakti become so cheap that some so-called godman can awaken it in multitudes of people all at once? Oh, no! Were our Rishis (ancient seers) fools to spend decades out in the jungles working at hard penances to awaken Kundalini and to perfect Aghora? No, the people who think they can buy Kundalini are the fools. Westerners think they can purchase knowledge, but all they get for their money is fake teachers from India who dish out any slop to them and get rich on their gullibility.”
Vimalananda conformed to none of the usual “guru” stereotypes. When at the races he dressed like the horse owner he was, and when at home he dressed like an ordinary Indian. He ate meat on occasion, used intoxicants frequently, and smoked cigarettes incessantly. He did all these things for specific, but hidden, reasons. Most of the people who knew him only formally never suspected that he might be of a spiritual bent. He cultivated this carefree image deliberately to avoid attracting attention to himself. This led me to early skepticism of his spiritual prowess, for I had been brainwashed by “spiritual authorities” to expect a certain role from a guru.
Fortunately for me I soon learned that Vimalananda’s revulsion toward hypocrisy and posturing was exceeded in strength only by his obstinacy. At one time he had actively attempted to speed certain persons along the spiritual path but was unsuccessful with them due to their unpreparedness. He thereupon determined to provide real tools for spiritual cultivation only to those students whom he had first thoroughly tested and prepared. Hence, he never referred to himself as a guru, nor did he act in the way we have come to expect gurus to act. For example, when he chose to call me Ravi he did so because it is cognate with my nickname, Robby, and it was more convenient to use while speaking in an Indian language. It was not because he wanted to impress me by giving me some Sanskrit name.
He made a show of complete disinterest in teaching while actually spending much time evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of each of his spiritual “children.” This Indian tradition is known as Kurma Guru (literally, “Tortoise Teacher”). After a mother tortoise buries her eggs on a sandy beach it is said that she retreats a certain distance and then concentrates on those eggs with such an intense current of love that the warmth of her love reaches the eggs and causes them to hatch. In the same way, a Kurma Guru seems to pay no attention to his disciples’ progress but in reality monitors them closely and sometimes pulls their strings from afar.
Vimalananda’s entire life was teaching and being taught. He was always ready to learn something new, and always ready to teach — in his own way — if a student was sincerely willing to learn. His day-to-day life was a lesson for whoever could understand it, a continual resubmission of his will to the Divine Will.
He was not easy to fathom, and he deliberately made his lessons hard to understand. When he decided I should learn something he would deftly insert it into a flood of mundane trivialities directed at others in the room and would expect me to be alert enough to pick it out. Weeks or months later he would question me about it, suddenly and without warning. I would be expected not only to have noted and remembered the datum but to have processed it internally to fit my own situation as best I could. He often observed, “What sort of educational system do we have nowadays? They announce their examinations in advance so that any idiot can mug up a bunch of notes in preparation. The key to testing someone is to test them when they least expect it and are least prepared for it. Then you have an accurate idea of how much they really know.”
Sometimes just keeping up with Vimalananda’s talks was test enough. Depending on his mood and audience he might speak in very fluent high British English, in colloquial Gujarati, or (most commonly) in Hindi. When the mood struck him he could switch to high-flown Urdu, and sometimes stabbed at Marathi or Bengali. He was an actor by inclination and he had an incredible command over a wide variety of language styles, which he could permute at will to obtain precisely the right effect on his audience. Over the eight years and nine months that I was privileged to know him he repeated each of his favorite stories a dozen times or more, but never the same way each time. Each repetition was uniquely flavored by his delivery.
Translation was thus no easy task. I have rendered all his words into English, approximating in his usual English style the intent which flowed through whatever vocabulary, syntax, and diction he was employing in whatever language he was speaking at the time. Working from memory and from the brief notes I would jot down after our conversations I decided it would be most effective to leave the narrative in his own words throughout, so that readers can imagine if they like that they, too, sat with Vimalananda and heard him tell his tales.
There is another reason for presenting his words as they were spoken. Vimalananda’s impression on people was achieved primarily not by what he did, but by how he did it; not by what he said (though this was important), but by how he said it. Who he was was more significant than what he did, but he made people dig for his interior reality and most often they would come up empty-handed. Those few who knew him well — at least superficially — could never agree with each other on who he was, because his personality differed for each of his friends. He was a multitude of different people, all in one body. Once, before he had met me, he had a desire to jot down his musings and to accompany them with testimonies from his close acquaintances. He asked several of his friends, “If you had to write down something about me what would you write?” One replied with a single word, “Versatile.” Another said, “Words just cannot express the reality.” A third opined, “I would just turn in a blank sheet of paper because by saying nothing everything is said.” His foster daughter had the last word by informing him, “No one has any business to read about you because unless they have experienced you they could never know the reality.” She was motivated by possessiveness, no doubt, and in fact knew him no better than did any of the rest of us, but her point is well-taken: How does one convey in two-dimensional print a multidimensional being? And it was not that he had anything to hide. There was nothing inscrutable about him; he never put on airs. He was available for everyone’s scrutiny. He would talk to us in the way a child talks to its mother, neglecting to alter or hold back anything for the sake of self-image. He was a true innocent at heart, a child in many ways, never ashamed to display his innocent wonderment or admit to his mistakes. And like a child, he could equally well be a bad loser at games; the Aghori in him expected to win.
Perhaps it was because of this “child” within him that he could be such a good “mother” to all those around him. Or perhaps his concentration on the Divine Mother engendered the child in him. Whatever the causation, he was like a truly incorrigible child, a prankster from birth, always out for a gentle practical joke, ready to laugh at anything funny and to make anyone else laugh if he could. Nothing was bland around him. He could be miserable, overjoyed, or profoundly taciturn; he was never merely sad, happy, or quiet. His Aghora training had taught him to succeed or die. He never played any role halfheartedly but threw himself fully into everything he did, no matter how minor. There was not a phony bone in his body.
The personality “Vimalananda” was indeed amazingly versatile. His family once owned most of Bombay, and his early life was princely, but the life of idle riches never tempted him. He knew by turns fabulous wealth and wretched poverty, and served variously as an army officer, textile machinery manufacturer, dairy owner, quarry operator, race course gambler, and anchorite. He achieved high academic qualifications and observed strict spiritual disciplines.
Experts at Indian music regarded him as both an instrumental and vocal maestro. Among those who knew him he was renowned for his expertise at astrology, his ability to diagnose disease by merely looking at a patient’s face, and his capacity to interpret the body markings on horses and elephants. In his youth he was a semipro wrestler and won his last bout at age 38, defeating a boy half his age. I never saw him beaten at arm wrestling even when his opponent was a powerful young wrestler one-third his age. His friends regularly demanded that he cook for them, so tasty and unique were his culinary concoctions. He could move each and every muscle in his body, including his ears and eyebrows, in time to music, as a result of his training in Indian dance.
He was an artist. He liked to say, “Here in India we believe in watching the artist at work, not in looking at the work of the artist. Artistry is not what the artist produces but is the artist himself, producing. A great composer’s music may be transmitted from generation to generation in the West. Our great musicians do not concentrate on creating compositionsi they create new musicians to maintain the progression of the artistry.”
How can one then transmit Vimalananda’s artistry to anyone who has not seen it at work? The use of his words is transmission of his art, but only alert readers will be able to detect the subtlety of his artistry at work there beneath.
Vimalananda could learn from anyone and would make whatever he learned more artistic. He put the stamp of his personality on everything he said, did, and created, and it is my hope that this stamp appears on these pages as well. He was charming and profound, and sometimes it may seem that he was in awe of himself. In a way, he was. He was not conceited; he was in awe of what was within him. Chapter Eight on Avishkara explains this more fully.
He could be egotistical, and some of that ego is reflected in these pages. He maintained that death of the ego meant certain death of the organism and so never tried to expunge his ego, preferring to keep it tightly under his control. He equated the ego, the individual’s power of self-identification, with the much misunderstood Kundalini Shakti. His control of his Kundalini enabled him to disengage his consciousness from his own limited (if versatile) personality so that he could self-identify with unlimited, divine personalities. Often when he spoke it was with the awesome confidence of divinity speaking through him, and this sometimes seemed arrogant to those humans who heard but could not or would not comprehend it.
He could be maddening to deal with when he thought he was right but happened to be mistaken. There were times I found it difficult to respect Vimalananda, and other times when it was difficult to like him very much. But it was never difficult to love him. When first we met I analyzed him, dissected his opinions, and attempted to preserve the objective aloofness I felt was appropriate for a Western scientist. All in vain, for the current of warmth which flowed continuously over whoever he took into his circle of “children” was irresistible. My distrustful Western nature balked at first but eventually my doubt dissolved in spite of itself, and he and I settled into the seemingly preordained role of father and son. Or perhaps I should say “father and mother” and son, for never did his love lose its motherliness.
Two principles guided his teaching: compassion for all beings, including the seemingly insentient such as rocks; and perpetual awareness of rnanubandhana, the bondage of karmic debt. His compassion for his friends led him to ruin his health and exhaust his wealth to insulate them as far as possible from their own karmic debts. His shoulders were unusually wide, perhaps from his wrestling, and he used to say, “Since Nature has given me such broad shoulders I should support whomever I can. Why should any child worry about rnanubandhana when its mother or father is there to repay its debts?” He treated all who came before him, even the buffoons, as a fond and indulgent mother would treat her beloved children. Women found him irresistible because he projected onto every female the same tremendous devotion which he directed in his worship toward the Mother Goddess. Until his dying day Vimalananda’s sole refuge was the Motherhood of God.
He and I selected the name “Vimalananda” for use in his book from the many names he used during this lifetime. Its variety of meanings makes it appropriately representative of who he was. In Sanskrit Vimalananda equals “Vimala” (pure) plus “Ananda” (joy, bliss), or, literally, “the bliss of purity.” “Malam vidvamsayati iti vimalah”: The absolute annihilation of filth is Vimala. “Filth” is here the filth of attribution, the limitations imposed upon pure existence as a result of its incarnation. When the cosmic play of creation, preservation, and destruction is transcended all limitation is transcended, and that state is Vimala.
Or, when an aspirant has gone beyond the ego’s flaws, when the ego is completely naked, cleansed of its accretions of personality and its stains of desire, then it perceives pure consciousness and knows that pure consciousness to be both “Thyself” and “Myself,’ and that is Vimala. Or, the “Ananda” an Aghori receives from his rituals cannot be purer (Vimala) because he sees the face of his beloved deity in everything and everyone.
“Vimalananda” can be derived in many different ways in Sanskrit, but its special significance here is that Vimalananda’s physical mother was named Vimala. Vimala + Nanda = “son of Vimala.” Vimalananda told me, “When I was a wandering ascetic I thought it would be wonderful to appear at my home one day and have the servant announce to my mother, ‘Vimalananda has come.’ What joy it would have given her!”
So ‘Vimalananda’ it was for this book, in lieu of such other names as Aghora Nath (master of Aghora), Shah-e-mauj (king of bliss), or even Bandal-e-aftaab (sun among exaggerators). This last is significant in that Vimalananda was, well, “larger” than life, and some of his stories may seem expanded beyond the bounds of plausibility. We Westerners ordinarily equate truth with the “objective” reality of sense perception. Vimalananda was concerned only that the subjective reality of the stories he told exert specific effects on the subjective realities of his listeners, for he held that objective reality is continuously being altered by our perceptions of it. Thus it is immaterial if, for example, someone really does cut off his limbs and throw them into a blazing fire, only to have them reattach spontaneously after several hours, or whether he merely visualizes the scenario so intensely that he thoroughly convinces himself that the events did indeed occur. The result, increased stability of mind regardless of external irritant, will create increased physical stability as well. For the mind, reality is defined by its perceptions. Aghora is total control of perception.
When Vimalananda felt it essential to make a point to some “child” he would unhesitatingly exaggerate or magnify his stories, just as we might do for real children. Also, Vimalananda spoke mainly for Indians, who often inflate the content of events they report. Indian listeners have learned to automatically compensate for this expansion by mentally scaling down whatever is said. Thus Vimalananda’s exaggeration would be perceived approximately accurately by an Indian listener.
I mention this because I was continuously aware of this cultural trait and have accounted for it. The stories you read here have been calibrated for maximum veracity, at least in the system of reality in which Vimalananda lived. Also, the language of this book has been slightly sanitized at his own request. He used to make regular use of vulgarity, but only when he spoke with people whose normal speech is vulgar, in order to be coherent with them. In addition, each cuss word was spoken with a hidden meaning behind it, a hoary Tantric tradition called Sandhya Bhasha. But that is another story.
No idle tale ever escaped his lips. Each was aimed at a specific listener and might change its form according to the lesson he felt the listener needed to learn, though all his stories were based on incidents which actually “happened” to him, at least subjectively. As noted above, however, he transcended the blase factuality of objective reality and ascended to the mythic. His tales were carefully textured with deep meanings available to the clever pupil who could properly interpret the words and the intonation and emotion with which they were spoken, ignoring the minor detail which Vimalananda himself scorned.
Vimalananda would unveil a story and present it to an assembly of people in his living room when the conversation seemed completely innocuous, and someone in that company would hear it and realize that it referred to a situation about which he had intended to ask Vimalananda but had thus far been unable to do so. There was a thrill in sitting quietly and suddenly realizing that a story was being directed at you. Vimalananda would not often target anyone by name, but a word here or a clue there would give his intention away. Vimalananda loved to play consciously with his “children” just as a mother plays abstractedly with hers, all the while maintaining awareness of the pot on the stove.
Vimalananda likewise manifested “otherness” continually: an eternal sense of other spheres of activity and other levels of awareness which operated in him simultaneously. He acknowledged this and often said, “To be really aware you must be able to know simultaneously what is going on thousands of miles away today, what may have happened here centuries ago, what will happen anywhere in the world decades from now, and what is occurring, has occurred, or will occur on other planes of existence. And you must still act as if you know nothing. You must just sit and talk with other people and play the part which Nature has assigned to you.” In his music, his conversation, his chess, and even his sleep, he was always aware both of what was going on around him and also, effortlessly, of some “other” reality.
Or at least he made it seem effortless, though it surely involved tremendous strain which occasionally showed through. He credited tobacco with his ability to function in several planes of being at once. After close observation of him for years I can state confidently that though he was addicted to cigarettes, a fact he made no attempt to conceal, tobacco certainly did seem to exert a markedly beneficial effect on his consciousness, infinitely more than I have seen in any other smoker. Modern scientific research has demonstrated that small doses of nicotine have a positive influence on brain function, and Vimalananda was such a veteran of intoxicants that he could easily imbibe more nicotine than anyone else without deleterious effect.
Smoking did eventually kill him, or so his doctors said, from cardiac failure. Those of us who knew him knew he decided exactly six months before dying that he intended to die. His excuse was that he had finished everything in this life that he was expected to do, and to live any longer would be to attract new karmas. He also predicted, for years, that the day he gave up smoking would be the day he died. For as long as I knew him he smoked at least one cigarette daily until December 11, 1983, a day on which he refused a cigarette whenever it was offered, fully aware of what he was doing. The next morning he died. At sunset I cremated him.
From the day we met, Vimalananda had been telling me I would cremate him, in spite of his natural son who still lives in Bombay and who, according to Hindu tradition, should have cremated his father. But Vimalananda always said, even eight years before the fact, “My son will not even come to the smashan to watch me burn, nor will my wife.” Indeed, they did not. When once I asked him about this he told me, “There is no escaping the Law of Karma. I have told everyone the truth, that you are destined to cremate me, and all of them have become jealous of you because they think they deserve to be involved themselves somehow. They don’t know what they are talking about or else they wouldn’t act that way. I may have a physical son, but you are my spiritual son, and I will have my death my way. Do you know what is an Aghori’s profoundest expression of love? It is these four words: ‘You will cremate me.’
“You will assist me to return to my Beloved. And when I am burning I only desire one thing: play a tape recording of Jim Reeves singing ‘Precious Lord, Take My Hand.’ I know all the Hindus will think it is a sacrilege, but pay no attention to them. That’s all I desire, no rituals, no phoniness. I only want to go back to where I belong, and to have my Big Daddy take me there by the hand.”
Vimalananda was cremated on the same pyre which had previously hosted his father, his mother, and his young son, Ranu, years before. Jim Reeves’s voice did sing at his funeral to help release him from his “earthly shackles.” Most of his ashes were consigned to the Arabian Sea, whose surf pounds the outer wall of the Banganga Smashan in Bombay; the rest were collected for ritual immersion in India’s sacred rivers.
This has been a difficult book for me to write. I have spent months groping for direction, writing and rewriting, hoping to locate the best angle from which to approach to freeze Vimalananda in prose. Eventually I realized that he cannot be portrayed justly from a single angle, just as it was never possible to capture him definitively on film. He always avoided the camera, and none of his photographs which do exist resemble each other. In fact, it was always difficult to recognize the living Vimalananda from his pictures, because his entire face would change moment by moment according to his state of consciousness at the moment. He was loathe to part with photos of himself, which is why none adorns this book. He would say, “My friends will not like it if you don’t take care of my photo. They will view it as a sign of disrespect. I don’t care; I am just a nobody. But some of my ethereal friends are very orthodox and very strict and will not think twice before they punish for disrespect.’’
He certainly was not confined by the restrictions which confine most mortals. His eyes, for example, refused to remain the same color at all times. Sometimes they were a light blue; often they were light green, the color of the grape known as anab-e-shahi. At some moments they could become nearly colorless. People meeting him for the first time would point it out to him incredulously and he would disclaim in agreement, “How ridiculous! Is it possible for anyone’s eyes to change colors?” At other times when he was feeling playful he would adjust his eye color to match mine and would then call everyone in the room over to see and comment. He loved to watch people react to an out-of-the-ordinary event because he felt he could gauge them better when they were caught off guard.
An enigma, a puzzle, a paradox, a riddle, a “mark of interrogation,” as he himself put it: Who was Vimalananda? The more I remained in his company the less I knew about him. He really was “no-body”: there was no one personality present perpetually in his body which could be pinned down and categorically identified as his. He could be hard and soft by turns, alternately refined and coarse according to his environs. One memorable night we started off dining elegantly at a posh Turf Club party and ended up, as fate would have it, listening to music in the middle of Bombay’s red light district. Vimalananda finally took up an instrument himself and taught the delighted prostitutes a new song, just for fun!
Psychiatrists would probably classify Vimalananda as schizophrenic. Vimalananda himself used to say, “Either I must be mad or everyone else is; there are no two ways about it.” Though no psychiatrist I am a licensed physician, and, in my opinion (an opinion shared by those who lived with him for many years before I met him), he was far saner than the rest of the world. Facile formulae cannot describe him.
I wrote this book knowing well that some of what is written will be offensive or at least incomprehensible to some, and that other passages will impel the curiosity of others to try out some of the more daring procedures. The natural reticence I felt for permitting Vimalananda to be introduced to an unprepared audience would have prevented this material from any publication had I not had clear instructions to do so. It began years ago when a man dressed as a medieval Rajput warrior was invited to Vimalananda’s home in Bombay. After some preliminaries the spirit of a hero centuries dead, Kalaji Rathod, entered this man’s body, broke open coconuts with a cavalry saber, and made predictions from the pieces thus formed. He advised me, when my turn came, to note down everything Vimalananda spoke. Vimalananda, who was not usually impressed with such performances and who had assiduously refused to allow anyone to record any of his words up to this time, mysteriously agreed and even encouraged me in this. He never read any of my writings on him until the first draft of this manuscript was ready. When I presented it to him he turned through a few pages, made a few comments, and lapsed quickly into his former seeming disinterest.
Vimalananda cloaked his meanings more thoroughly than ever before after making this assignment. His asking me from time to time if I had noted down some particularly intricate comment suggested to me that he still expected me to continue in my role as scribe. He continued to engineer situations, a pastime at which he was expert, and he would make use of the situations which developed spontaneously around him in his home, which was a veritable circus. During and after the unfolding of the situation he would test me on what I had learned.
As soon as Vimalananda felt he had dispelled my major doubts on a subject he would usually refuse to talk about it any longer, expecting me to learn more about it from direct experience. He explained that this would preserve the keenness of my spiritual hunger, to prevent me from ever losing my alertness or pausing in my pondering. He never spoon-fed me.
Gradually I accumulated a heap of information, enough to fill at least four books. The writing and rewriting of this book has enabled me to digest Vimalananda’s teachings more efficiently, and I understood that Vimalananda’s real intention in making me write was for the writing to act as a sadhana (spiritual exercise) for me.
Summaries and conclusions are supposed to close the books they serve, but I am listing mine here in the introduction. I cannot summarize Vimalananda, nor can I conclude anything at all about him. During the last visit of the Emperor Akbar’s personality into Vimalananda’s body, His Majesty told us, “Do you think you know the possessor of this body? You know nothing! If he is your friend and loved one, well, we spirits love him too. But don’t be so stupid and insolent to think you can comprehend him. I do not know him, you cannot know him, no one knows him. This is the sort of man who allows you to play about with him, you fools! Apart from knowing him in his entirety you will never, never be able to know a single hair from the head of Vimalananda!’’
Vimalananda himself requested me to compile my notes into this book and publish it now. He wanted Westerners to be exposed to Aghora. In his own words, “I once wanted to go to the West to demonstrate the practical uses of Aghora, the real spiritual science of India. I know I can deliver the goods, but whenever I tried to go my mentors always prevented me. They didn’t want me to be tempted by glamour and power. They knew I could be a better businessman than anyone else — it is in my genes, after all — but they didn’t want to watch me fall so low. I am not destined for commercialization; I am destined for something different.
“It is not necessary to publish this while I am alive. I have not achieved all I have achieved in this life merely to capitalize on it. I don’t want the last years of my life to be spoiled by curiosity-seekers who want to meet me to find out if I am for real. I know who I am and don’t care what anyone else thinks.
“Besides that, if I become too well known I’ll have to sit on a throne and say things like, ‘Blessings be upon you,’ which is bull because you can’t give blessings away like that. I won’t be able to move about freely in society and play about as I do now. No more jokes, no more laughing sprees. I’ll have to become stern and solemn. Why should I give up what little peace and quiet I have now, just to be worshipped by a bunch of people who don’t even know what they are doing? How do all these so-called saints stand it, I wonder?
“Publish this book after I am gone. Let people know the truth. Let them know what is what. Out of the thousands who may read it at least a few will be sincere. They will try to learn more, and then Nature Herself will make arrangements for them to learn just as She did for me, and they will be taught according to their capabilities. The progression will go on; there is nothing to fear.
“I have never gone out and tried to attract anyone to me.
People have come and gone. I don’t ask them to come and I don’t object when they go. What is it to me? I only want a few. If I love one or a few I can love well. If I try to love all I will just be cheating myself. Only Jesus could love all.”
From Vimalananda’s select circle of loved ones I was awarded the commission to try to explain to those who never met him just who and what he was. Hence this book. No one can disturb him now. His story can be told and his privacy will be preserved. I am pleased to offer this volume to those who can read it: I regard it as an offering to him, an offering which is also a promise I have kept, an obligation I have requited, a longstanding desire of his I have finally fulfilled.
Here is Vimalananda as I knew him. Even after hundreds of meetings he could baffle me with the incredible variegation of his knowledge, charm me with his ever-present effluence, and infect me into a smile with his good humor. I even almost got used to his anger. But having charmed and enthralled me and his other listeners he never tired of telling us, “Don’t take anything I say as gospel truth. I am human, I make mistakes. Test on yourselves what I’ve told you. Try it out, experience it, and then you will know whether or not I’m telling you the truth. When you examine a gem you must evaluate it from all its facets before you can decide on its value.”
Here then is Vimalananda, for your evaluation.
GLOSSARY
Adya: Lit. “first, original.” Used as a synonym for the Adishakti, the first or original Shakti which manifests from the absolute and is the Mother of all the worlds.
Aghora/Aghori: Lit. “non-terrifying.” Aghora is the most extreme of all Indian sects, concentrating on forcible conversion of a limited human personality into a divine personality. An Aghori is a practitioner of Aghora.
Apana Vayu: One of the five forces in living beings which cause movements in the body and mind, the other four being Prana, Samana, Vyana and Udana. Apana is the downward-moving force, and is in charge of excretion of urine, feces, flatus, menstrual fluid, and semen, and also delivery of the fetus.
Atma: The soul, the indwelling spirit which animates a living being. The Jivatma is the individual spirit which imagines itself trapped in a physical form, subject to the limitations of embodied existence. The Paramatma is the Universal Soul, the totality of spirit in the cosmos. All Jivas or Jivatmas belong to the Paramatma.
Bhairava/Bhairavi: Lit. “the Terrifier.” A name for Lord Shiva and for his consort. In sexual Tantra the Bhairava is the male, who self-identifies with Lord Shiva, and the Bhairavi is the female, who self-identifies with Parvati, Shiva’s Grand Consort.
Bhang: A preparation of Cannabis leaf paste and milk which is mixed with spices and sugar. Even strictly abstemious Hindus often take bhang on holidays like Diwali and Mahashivaratri, in honor of deities like Lord Shiva who take bhang regularly. Shiva regards bhang as a wonderful tool for spiritual advancement if properly used, and a good way to ruin yourself if misused.
Causal Body: The third of the bodies possessed by an animate being; a warehouse in which all an individual’s karmas are stored. Karmas are projected from the causal body into the subtle body (the mind) and then into the physical body. (See “Subtle Body.”)
Chillum: A pipe used to smoke marijuana or hashish mixed with tobacco. It is three or four inches long and is straight, tapering from a wide bowl to a thin mouth.
Dhuni: The fire tended by a sadhu. A sadhu is said to sit “on” his dhuni, meaning close by it, concentrating on it.
Ethereal Being: A discarnate personality, the quality of whose influence is defined by his or her degree of spiritual advancement.
Fakir: A wandering Muslim holy man.
Gunas: Lit. “qualities” or “attributes.” The Three Gunas are the three fundamental attributes of conditional or limited existence: Sattva (equilibrium), Rajas (activity), and Tamas (inertia). In its purest state the mind is pure Sattva, and the two chief mental disturbances are Rajas (overactivity) and Tamas (inactivity).
Jiva: The individual personality which undergoes rebirth, because the karmas stored in the causal body need a physical body to permit their expression. (see Atma)
Jnana: Transcendent wisdom. Knowledge (Vidya) is an outward projection or objectivization of this innate, living wisdom.
Kali Yuga: The fourth of the four ages through which the cosmos passes in cycles of 4,320,000 years. Kali Yuga is supposed to last 432,000 years, and is characterized by lack of interest in spirituality among the populace, which leads to materialism, atheism, and the perpetration of various cruelties by stronger beings onto weaker ones.
Kilana: Lit. “nailing.” It is the process by which a spirit or other ethereal being is “nailed down” or captured with a mantra, and made to remain in a certain location for a specific purpose.
Lunar Asterism: “Nakshatra” in Sanskrit. One of the 27 or 28 divisions of the sky through which the moon passes in a month and the sun passes in a year. Traditional Vedic astrology uses Nakshatras instead of zodiacal signs for its calculations.
Ma: Vimalananda’s generic term for the Mother Goddess, the cosmic potentiality for creation. All females were to him embodiments of this universal principle of motherhood and motherliness.
Mahapurusha: Lit. “great being.” Vimalananda used this term to mean an ethereal being whose power is unlimited or almost unlimited, who can manipulate the cosmos at will if He so desires.
Nirvikalpa Samadhi: A state of consciousness in which all dualities are finally transcended and only awareness of the Paramatma (Ultimate Reality) remains. No consciousness of body or individuality is left.
Paan: A chaw composed of betel leaf smeared with slaked lime, catechu paste, and spice, into which betel nuts have been added. Paan is chewed after meals as a digestive and is said to have aphrodisiac qualities.
Pitri Tarpana: A ritual performed for a deceased human, usually a father or mother or other progenitor, to satisfy any lingering cravings which that individual might have had. Properly performed, this assures the individual an auspicious rebirth and enables him or her to maintain their spiritual progression.
Prasad: Any substance, usually food, which has been offered to a deity or saint, or to the image of a deity or saint, and which is then partaken of by a disciple or devotee. Prasad is supposed to contain a tiny amount of the deity’s or saint’s Shakti, which can exert a spiritualizing effect on the partaker.
Rishi: Lit. “Seer.” Anything a Rishi sees or perceives becomes reality, because a Rishi is an ethereal being of the highest class, one who is almost totally unlimited, who can travel anywhere in the cosmos and do anything at all. The Rishis “saw” the hymns of the Vedas, from which all the knowledge of ancient India was derived.
Rnanubandhana: The bondage of karmic debt.
Rudra: Lit. “the Crier,” or “He Who makes others cry.” Rudra is the ancient name for Shiva, the god of death, and is so called because he makes everyone cry who comes into contact with Him, because He separates them from their limited existence, to which they are tightly attached.
Sadhana: Any spiritual practice. Aghora Sadhana is designed to replace the Aghori’s personality with his deity’s personality by creation of the deity’s form in the Aghori’s subtle body.
Sarvavidya: The totality of manifested knowledge. This is a Siddhi which involves control of all Shakti in the cosmos.
Shakti: Energy; the ability to perform some action. Shakti is always female in Indian philosophy.
Shava: A corpse.
Siddha: An “accomplished one.” Anyone who has obtained a Siddhi, or supernatural accomplishment, is a Siddha. Vimalananda restricted his use of the word Siddha to indicate those beings who have achieved immortality.
Smashan: A charnel ground; an area in which dead bodies are burned or buried. This word is derived from “ashmashana,” or “place where rocks lie,” which suggests that burial was once more common in India than it now is.
Subtle Body: The astral body; the sheath of existence between the causal and subtle bodies. The mind inhabits the subtle body. Karmas projected from the causal body must first pass through the subtle body before reaching the physical body for their expression.
Tattva: Lit. “thatness.” A category of existence. For example, the Three Gunas are Tattvas because they are attributes, and the category of attribution is a Tattva. The Atma is also a Tattva.
Vajroli: A yogic practice in which a fluid is sucked into the penis or vagina by muscular force. During the sex act Vajroli can be used to suck up the partner’s secretions for both physical and spiritual benefit.
Vasana: A tendency of the individual personality which produces habitual modes of action, often inherited from one’s ancestors. Vasanas make people do what they do in spite of themselves because of the power of the inherent tendency.
Wah: An exclamation of amazement, surprise or revelation.
Yaksha/Yakshini: A Hindu angel (male and female respectively); an ethereal being who was once human and because of his ability in sadhana attained to this status after death.
Yama: Also called Dharmaraja, or King of Righteousness. He is the judge of the dead, evaluating their activities while on Earth and determining which paradise or hell they go to while awaiting rebirth.
Yantra: A diagram which acts as a receptacle for the power of a mantra. Tantra is the ritual by which the Yantra is empowered by the mantra. Any substance can be used for a Yantra, but Vimalananda averred that the best of all possible Yantras is the human body.