. esoteric buddhism and magic in china 207
Although the Esoteric Buddhist literature in China abounds in pre-
scriptions for the performance of sexually-related magic, it would be
prudent not to take such data as evidence that such practices were
popular or common. Incidentally, most of the material on sex and
ritual sexuality that appears in the works of Chinese Esoteric Bud-
dhism derives from the Indian cultural context. It remains an open
question how much of this was actually being practiced within the
confines of traditional Chinese society, which has always been prohibi-
tive and moralistic in its outlook on what would have been perceived
as perverse and deviant practices, at least in the public sphere, but
probably also in the private sphere. This is not to say that sexual magic
was not being practiced in medieval Chinese society, but that it was
done privately and in any case not as openly as it is known to have
been done in India where yogīs commonly frequented charnel grounds
and other “power” places.
While there can be no doubt that the Esoteric Buddhist rituals were
performed with the aim of securing spiritual insight and benefits for
the practitioner, and by extension to his community including the
ruler, the vast majority of the siddhis described in the literature were
meant to bring super-powers, material wealth, and command over
the beings of the unseen world. Under the umbrella of non-dualism,
universal emptiness, and identification with the divinity, the well-
defined line between mundane and the supra-mundane practices as
found in traditional Mahāyāna Buddhism was consciously obfuscated
if not obliterated. The adepts of Esoteric Buddhism, in particular the
tantrikas, solved this inherent problem by creating their own code of
conduct, in effect an “esoteric vinaya.” This extra- or supra-ethical
doctrine was partly meant to justify the antinomian aspects of Eso-
teric Buddhist practice and belief, the use of the more bizarre forms of
magic included, and partly to establish them as orthodox. Through this
hermeneutical strategy the Esoteric Buddhists succeeded in upgrading
the use of magic to a higher spiritual level.