Shakti and Shâkta : essays and addresses on the Shâkta Tantrashâstra

SHAKTI AND SHAKTA

man has complete Brahman-consciousness he will not, otherwise than unconsciously, do an act which if done consciously would be wrong. He is ex hypothesi beyond lust, gluttony and all other passions. A theoretical statement of fact that a Brahmajnani is beyond good and evil is not a statement that he may will to do, and is permitted to do, evil. Statements as regards the position of a Jivanmukta are mere praise or Stuti. In Svechchhach4ara there is theoretical freedom but it is not consciously availed of to do what is known to be wrong without fall and pollution. Svechchhacharini is a name of the Devi, for She does what She pleases since She is the Lord ofall. But of others the Shaktisanggama Tantra (Part LV) says

Vadyapyasti trikdlajnastrailokyadkarshana-kshamah Tatha'pi laukikacharam manasa ‘pi na langhayet (“Though a man be a knower of the Three Times, past, present, and future, and though he be a Controller of the three worlds, even then he should not transgress the rules of conduct for men in the world, were it only in his mind").

What these rules of conduct are the Shastra provides. Those who wrote this and similar counsels to be found in the Tantra Shastras may have prescribed methods of Sadhana which will not be approved but they were not immoral minded men. Nor, whatever be the actual results of their working (and some have been evil) was their Scripture devised with the intention of sanctioning or promoting what they believed to be immoral. They promoted or countenanced some dangerous practices under certain limitations which they thought to be safeguards. They have led to abuse as might have been thought to be probable.

Let us now distil from the mass of material to which I have only cursorily referred, those principles underlying the practice which are of worth from the standpoint of Indian Monism of which the practice is a remarkable illustration.

The three chief physical appetites of man are eating and drinking whereby his body is sustained, and sexual

356