Shiva and the Primordial Tradition: From the Tantras to the Science of Dreams
Alain Daniélou
Language: English
Pages: 110
ISBN: 1594771413
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
In Shiva and the Primordial Tradition, Alain Daniélou explores the relationship between Shaivism and the Western world. Shaivite philosophy does not oppose theology, cosmology, and science because it recognizes that their common aim is to seek to understand and explain the nature of the world. In the Western world, the idea of bridging the divide between science and religion is just beginning to touch the edges of mainstream thought.
This rare collection of the late author’s writings, selected and edited by Jean-Louis Gabin, contains several never-before-published articles and offers an extensive examination of the underpinnings of Shaivism. It provides an in-depth look at the many facets of the Samkhya, the cosmologic doctrines of the Shaivite tradition. Daniélou provides important revelations on subjects such as the science of dreams, the role of poetry and sexuality in the sacred, the personality of the great Shankara, and the Shaivite influence on the Scythians and the Parthians (and by extension, the Hellenic world in general). Providing a convincing argument in favor of the polytheistic approach, he explains that monotheism is merely the deification of individualism--the separation of humanity from nature--and that by acknowledging the sacred in everything, we can recognize the imprint of the primordial tradition.
ALAIN DANIÉLOU (1907–1994) spent more than fifteen years in the traditional society of India, using only the Sanskrit and Hindi languages and studying music and philosophy with eminent scholars. He was duly initiated into esoteric Shaivism, which gave him unusual access to texts transmitted through the oral tradition alone. He is the author or translator of more than thirty books on the religion, history, and arts of India and the Mediterranean, including The Complete Kama Sutra, The Myths and Gods of India, and A Brief History of India.
JEAN-LOUIS GABIN, Ph.D., began collecting and editing the various texts in this volume in collaboration with Daniélou while he was still alive. He is working on an additional Ph.D. in Philosophy of Religion and Indology on the subject “Tradition and Modernity in the works of Alain Daniélou.” He also has edited and published five posthumous collections of Alain Daniélou’s work in French as well as serving as editor of the English edition of India: A Civilization of Differences.
however, has assimilated many notions that lie beyond the mental horizon set by Aryan languages, which explains why many Sanskrit words and concepts are so difficult to analyze and translate. Samkhya teaches that any method of investigation must first establish the limits beyond which its conclusions are no longer valid. We find an echo of Samkhya conceptions at all stages of thought and philosophy in India, but as often as not, it is in scientific works that the cosmological theory is most
conceive of an active genetic principle, a manifestation of divine thought in creation, a spirit or deity. These principles can be translated into various images, such as anthropomorphic, zoomorphic, or vegetal representations. Shaivite cosmology seeks to summarize nature in the form of geometric diagrams, codes of proportions linked to certain key numbers. Such diagrams are called yantras. When Einstein suggested that, “in the universe, all is geometry,” he was enunciating a principle that
It is inserted in our visible being and is inverse to it. Its central point is at the base of the spine in the region of our sexual organs, which is the noble, essential part of our being. By a great effort of introspection, after reducing to silence the incessant chattering of our mental apparatus, we can gradually explore this secret part of ourselves. One after the other, we discover the functional centers of this vital being who dwells in our visible body. These centers are called chakras
followed by the principle of protective energy, bearing the attributes of Vishnu. From the word and mind of the primordial being came forth the tortoise, on which the world rests. The tortoise—showing itself openly or withdrawing into its shell—is the symbol of the limit point at which manifestation appears openly or vanishes, closed up within itself. Next the lower world develops, peopled with mythical beings called snakes. Higher up is Vishnu in the form of a wild boar, in which guise he lifts
which he transcribed, which has inspired his whole work. Although some passages simply say in another way—which is also a way of making them clearer—what he has said in The Myths and Gods of India or While the Gods Play, other pages in this book are entirely new: Animals and plants are in some way the visible part of subtle beings, spirits, genies and gods, which govern and inhabit them. We can often make contact with the spirits through their vegetal or animal twin. This is why certain animals