were especially dominant in Karnataka during the eleventh to thirteenth
centuries. Indeed they were an important group here, attracting donations and
political patronage for Ka ̄la ̄mukha temples and monastic centers (mat.has)
(Lorenzen 1991: 97–140). The Ka ̄la ̄mukhas’ in turn probably gave rise to the
important Lin.gayat or Vı ̄ras ́aiva tradition, still extant in Karn.a ̄t.aka, famous for
devotional poetry (Ramanujan 1973).
With these groups of the higher path we have the beginnings of a tendency
away from orthodox forms of religion and adherence to the vedic social order.
Although brahmins within the vedic order, the Pa ̄s ́upatas believed their teach-
ings to transcend that order. They went beyond the four stages on life’s way
(a ̄s ́rama) into a fifth stage beyond the fourth vedic order, they also saw themselves
as being within that order. Similarly, the Ka ̄la ̄mukhas in seemingly rejecting the
vedic world, vividly symbolized by their great vow as a consequence of brah-
minicide, were yet at the center of the social order in Karn.a ̄t.aka, supported
by kings, with well-funded centers of practice and learning. The relationship
between these groups and the established hierarchy is therefore complex and
cannot be seen in terms of a simple rejection of vedic values by a heterodox or
excluded community. The issue of the relation of these groups to the wider
society and to vedic orthopraxy becomes even more sharply delineated with the
traditions of the mantrama ̄rga, all of which revered a body of scripture distinct
from the Veda, known as the Tantras.
The Tantras
The Tantras are a vast body of literature in Sanskrit, composed mostly between
the eighth and eleventh centuries ad, claiming to have the status of revelation
and claiming to supercede the Vedas. Some Tantras acknowledged the Vedas
while others rejected them. The Tantras were composed in a number of tradi-
tions where they are sometimes known by the name of A ̄gama in the S ́aiva
Siddha ̄nta and Sam.hita ̄ in the Vais.n.ava tantric tradition or Pa ̄ñcara ̄tra. There are
also a very few Jain Tantras, a vast body of Buddhist Tantras, mostly preserved
in Tibetan and Chinese translations, and Tantras to the Sun, none of which have
survived (Sanderson 1988b: 660–1). As the Buddhist Tantras were translated
into Tibetan, so some of the S ́aiva Tantras were translated into Tamil and are
used as the basis for temple rituals in south India to this day. All of the S ́aiva
traditions of the mantrama ̄rgaaccept the Tantras, or rather different groups of
Tantras, as their textual basis, although some S ́aiva traditions have been more
closely aligned to orthoprax, brahminical practice than others.
While there are specific traditions and the language of the Tantras is often
obscure, partly because these texts would have been accompanied by a living,
oral tradition, and partly because they regarded themselves as secret and heavily
symbolic, they nevertheless share common features. They are concerned with
practice (sa ̄dhana) involving ritual and yoga undertaken after initiation (dı ̄ks.a ̄) by
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