Connecting the ganglia are channels (nadi) through
which flows karmic winds (karmavayu) that are
closely involved with the physiological and psycho-
logical processes. The letters and winds may also be
posited as being the internal representations of exter-
nal phenomena, so that the meditator’s perceptions
are a result of the karmic relationship between the mi-
crocosm and macrocosm. The channels include a cen-
tral channel and a left and right channel, eventually
branching out into seventy-two thousand subsidiary
channels that reach all areas of the body. In different
visualizations, often called the perfecting process
(sampannakrama), the meditator may imagine a flame
below the navel or various lights in the wheels or em-
ploy a female sexual partner as a physical aid to har-
ness the psychophysical process. By manipulating the
winds that control his psychic processes, the medita-
tor seeks eventually to drive these winds into some
area of the central channel, an act that is said to trans-
form the psychophysical winds into the gnostic wind
(jñanava yu). As the process is accomplished, a series
of visions emerges, ending in an awareness of the il-
lusory nature of interior and exterior phenomena,
with all forms finally resolving into the clear light of
ultimate reality.
Central Asia and Tibet
Tantric Buddhism became quickly popular in the areas
immediately contiguous to Northern India—Burma,
Nepal, Tibet, Nanzhao—and spread into Central Asia
and China. Tantric works were eventually translated
into the Central Asian languages of Khotanese, Uighur,
Tangut, and Mongolian, but TIBETbecame the most
important area of tantric development. Three of the
four major Tibetan orders—SA SKYA(SAKYA)-pa, BKA’
BRGYUD(KAGYU)-pa, and Dga’ ldan-pa (Gandenpa)—
maintained a more or less conservative approach, fol-
lowing closely the later Indian tantras and other Indian
scriptures translated in the astonishing efforts of the
eighth through the fifteenth centuries.
The RNYING MA(NYINGMA)-pa order, however,
continued the Indian culture of scriptural composi-
tion rather than the simply the conservation of re-
ceived Indian works. As a result, the production of
tantras in Buddhist Tibet equaled or exceeded the
number and volume produced in Buddhist India, and
these Tibetan works were collected together with a few
important Indian tantras into the Rnying ma rgyud
‘bum (Old Tantric Canon), beginning in the eleventh
century. Most of these texts claim translation from a
non-Tibetan source: from Odiyana, Brusha, India, or
the realm of the goddesses. Many are revealed in the
process of the treasure (gterma) phenomenon in Ti-
bet and are said to have been buried physically or spir-
itually on Tibetan soil by important saints of the
eighth- to ninth-century royal dynastic period of Ti-
betan history.
While the content of many of the works is only be-
ginning to be explored, our catalogues classify the Old
Tantric Canoninto the standard fourfold division ac-
cepted by most Tibetans (kriya,etc.), with the differ-
ence that the Highest Yoga tantras are further divided
into three: mahayoga, anuyoga,and atiyoga.Generally,
it is considered that the first two correspond in con-
tent to the division of Indian tantras into mahayoga
and yoginl-tantras(while the texts themselves are
mostly different) but the atiyogacategory is under-
stood to be a Rnying ma category, even though the
term was used in India to describe a stage of medita-
tive ritual. In Rnying ma parlance, atiyogais generallyTANTRA
Hayagrva, a Buddhist wrathful deity, shown with his consort.
(Tibetan sculpture, bronze, eighteenth century.) The Art
Archive/Musée Guimet Paris/Dagli Orti. Reproduced by per-
mission.