How to Realize the Four Goals of Life by Means of mantra?
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.12797/CIS.16.2014.16.05Keywords:
Sātvatasaṃhitā, Pāñcarātra, siddhis, kalpa, puruṣārthasādhana, caturvargaAbstract
The purpose of the present paper is to discuss a specific conceptualization of the four goals of human life, namely dharma, artha, kāma and mokṣa, known under the collective term puruṣārtha, in the terms of magical rites. Such conceptualization appears in the Sātvatasaṃhitā, which, together with the Jayākhyasaṃhitā and the Pauṣkarasaṃhitā, is classified as the oldest available text of the Tantric Vaiṣṇava Pāñcarātra. It seems that the reason of such a strategy might be not, as it happens in the case of later saṃhitās, to refer simply to the orthodoxy for the sake of proving that the Pāñcarātra belongs to the religious mainstream, but, in a sense, to adjust the way of realization of the four goals of life to the requirements of a particular Tantric practice. Obviously, the manner of presenting consecutive puruṣārthas in the Sātvatasaṃhitā aims at securing a quick and purely ritualistic method of their fulfillment to the people who were not able to realize them in the traditional way, obediently passing through the successive stages of their life.
PlumX Metrics of this article
References
Primary Sources:
AhS = Ahirbudhnyasaṃhitā = Ahirbudhnya-Saṃhitā of Pāñcarātrāgama. Ed. by M. D. Ramanujacharya, under the supervision of F. Otto Schrader, revised by V. Krishnacharya. 2 vols. The Adyar Library Series, 4. Adyar: Adyar Library and Research Centre. 1966.
JayS = Jayākhyasaṃhitā = Jayākhyasaṃhitā. Crit. Ed. with an Introduction in Sanskrit, Indices, etc. by Embar Krishnamacharya. Gaekwad’s Oriental Series, 54. Baroda: Oriental Institute. 1934.
SātS = Sātvatasaṃhitā = Sātvatasaṃhitā Alaśiṅgabhaṭṭaviracitabhāṣyopetā. Ed. by V. Dwivedī. Library Rare Texts Publication Series, 2. Banaras: Sampurnananda Sanskrit University. 1982.
SātSB = Sātvatasaṃhitābhāṣya = SātS.
Secondary Sources:
Bronkhorst, J. 2007. Greater Mahadha: Studies in the Culture of Early India. Leiden-Boston: Brill.
Czerniak-Drożdżowicz, M. 2007. The Notion of Dharma in The Pāñca-rātra Tradition. In: M. Nowakowska and J. Woźniak (Eds) Rocznik Orientalistyczny 60: 198–2011.
Dębicka-Borek, E. 2013. Ritual Worship of the Narasiṃhamantra as depicted in the Sātvatasaṃhitā. In: L. Sudyka and A. Nitecka (Eds) Cracow Indological Studies 15: 167–207.
Dębicka-Borek, E. 2014. To Borrow or not to Borrow? Some Remarks on Vaibhavīyanarasiṃhakalpa of Sātvatasaṃhitā. In: E. Freschi (Ed.) Journal of Indian Philosophy. (DOI) 10.1007/s10781-014-9248-1.
Hikita, H. 1990. Sāttvata Saṃhitā. An Annotated Translation. Chapter 17 (1). In: Sōtō-shū kenkyū kiyō 21: 190–137.
Oberhammer, G. 2010. The Forgotten Secret of Human Love. An Attempt of an Approach. In: H. Marlewicz (Ed.) Cracow Indological Studies 12: 51–81.
Rastelli, M. 2000. The Religious practice of the Sādhaka according to the Jayākyasaṃhitā. In: Indo-Iranian Journal 43: 319–395.
Sanderson, A. 2001. History through Textual Criticism in the Study of Śaivism, the Pāñcarātra and the Buddhist Yoginītantras. In: F. Grimal (Ed.) Les sources et le temps. Sources and Times. A Colloquium. Pondicherry, 11–13 January 1997. Pondicherry: Institut français de Pondichéry; École française d’Extrême-Orient: 1–47.
Schwarz Linder, S. 2014. The Philosophical and Theological Teachings of the Pādmasaṃhitā. Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften.
Vasudeva, S. 2004. The Yoga of the Mālinīvijayottaratantra / Chapters 1–4, 7, 11–17. Crit. ed., Engl. transl., notes by S. Vasudeva. Pondichéry: Institut français de Pondichéry; École française d’Extrême-Orient.
TAK II = Tāntrikābhidhānakośa = Tāntrikābhidhānakośa / A Dictionary of Technical Terms from Hindu Tantric Literature. H. Brunner, G. Oberhammer and A. Padoux (Eds), vol. II. Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. 2000.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
