Vamakeshvara Tantra

Aus Mahanirvanatantra (Introduction)

The Shabda-Brahman manifests Itself in a triad of energies - knowledge (jhanashakti), will (ichchha- shakti), and action (kriya- shakti), associated with the three gunas of Prakriti, tamas, sattva, and rajas. From the Parang- Vindu, who is both vindvat-maka and kalatma - i.e., Shakti - issued Raudri, Rudra, and his Shakti, whose forms are fire (vahni), and whose activity is knowledge (jfiana); Vama, and Vishnu and his Shakti, whose form is the sun, and whose activity is kriya (action): and Jyeshtha and Brahma and his Shakti, whose form is the Moon and whose activity is desire.

The Vamakeshvara Tantra says that Tri-pura is threefold, as Brahma, Vishnu, and Isha; and as the energies desire, wisdom, and action, the energy of will when Brahman would create; the energy of wisdom when She reminds Him, saying "Let this be thus" ; and when, thus knowing. He acts, She becomes the energy of action. The Devi is thus Ichchha-shakti-jhana-shakti- kriya-shakti-svaru-pini.

Para-shiva exists as a septenary under the form, firstly, of Shambhu, who is the associate of time (kala-bandhu). From Him issues Sada-shiva, Who pervades and manifests all things, and then come Ishana and the triad, Rudra, Vishnu, and Brahma, each with their respective Shakti (without whom they avail nothing) separately and particularly associated with the gunas, tamas, sattva and rajas.

Of these Devas, the last triad, together with Ishana, and Sada-shiva, are the five Shivas who are collectively known as the Mahapreta, whose vija is "Hsauh." Of the Maha-preta, it is said that the last four form the support, and the fifth the seat, of the bed on which the Devi is united with Parama-shiva, in the room of chintamani stone, on the jewelled island clad with clumps of kadamba and heavenly trees set in the ocean of Ambrosia.

Shiva is variously addressed in this work as Shambhu, Sada-shiva, Shankara, Maheshvara, etc., names which indicate particular states, qualities, and manifestations of the One in its descent towards the many; for there are many Rudras. Thus Sada-shiva indicates the predominance of the sattva-guna. His names are many, 1,008 being given in the sixty-ninth chapter of the Shiva Purana, and in the seventeenth chapter of the Anushasana Parvan of the Mahabharata.

Literatur

• Vamakeshvara Tantra, Verlag Londinium : Shambhala Paschima Natha Siddha Mata, 1983.
• amakeshvara Tantra , Verlag Shambhala, 1983

Weblinks

• VamakeshvaraTantra
• Vamakeshvara Tantra's Essence-lalitAchatuHShaShTyupachArasaMgraha
• A Discussion with a Wandering Monk
• Mahanirvana Tantra