Shakti and Shâkta : essays and addresses on the Shâkta Tantrashâstra

SHAKTI AND SHAKTA

worshippers (SAdhakas) governed by the Agama and its numerous scriptures called Tantras. These Shaktas are to be found all over India, but are largely predominant in Bengal and Assam, in which former Province I have lived for about the last thirty years, and with the belief of whose people therefore [ am closer acquainted than with any other. And this in part accounts for the fact that I deal with their faith. Their doctrine and practice has not hitherto been understood and has been ill-spoken of, due to abuses which have occurred among the members of some sections of the community. If then I have succeeded in giving in this and other works a just account of the Scripture, and in reducing such evil as has been charged against some of its adherents to its right proportions, I shall be glad to have been ina position to make some small return to a Land which, more than any other, has been my home, and to which I am, in manifold ways, indebted.

Though, as I said in the last edition, I rate highly Shakta doctrine and (with some exceptions) Sh&kta rituals, I do not commit myself to the acceptance of everything which any Shaékta may have held or done. And though I have furnished argument in favour of his much-abused faith and practice, I am not here concerned to establish the truth and rightness of either. It is sufficient for my present purpose to show thatit is reasonable, and that neither it nor “the Tantra ” is the absurd and altogether immoral thing which some have supposed it to be. My attitude is an objective one. I have endeavoured to explain my subject as simply and lucidly as the recondite matters treated of allow, from an entirely detached and unprejudiced standpoint.

In giving an account of Indian beliefs and practices, we, who are foreigners, must place ourselves in the skin of the Hindu and must look at their doctrine and ritual through their eyes and not our own. It is difficult | know for most to do this: but until they can, their work lacks real value. And this is why, despite their industry and learning, the

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