|
YantrachintamaniThe worship of images of stone, metal, jewels, or clay leads the seeker of liberation to rebirth. Hence the man who wishes to renounce the world should worship only in his own heart and fear external forms of worship so he may not have to live again - Shilpa Shastra, quoted in Alain Danielou's Hindu PolytheismThis book is related to abhichara, or sorcery and deals with the shatkarma or six acts often found in tantrik texts. Sorcery is an aspect of tantra which makes people uncomfortable, but it's directly embedded in most of the texts. Practically every tantra prescribes different methods by which a sadhaka can achieve certain results. For example, in the English abstract of the Tantrarajatantra, Sir John Woodroffe outlines the nature of each of the 15 Nityas, but omits the prayogas associated with each and which are exercised to deliver effects for the sadhaka. The Yantrachintamani is far from being the only manual of this type. There are probably hundreds of others. One I've seen is called Kautukaratna Bhandagar, subtitled Bara Indrajala, a lengthy 12 chapter work in Hindi packed with magical prescriptions and containing tables and yantras such as the Shatkarma Chakra, the Shani (Saturn) chakra, the rulers of the 27 nakshatras, the directions the Yoginis move in, etc. As well as yantras similar to those in the Yantrachintamani, this work contains a large number of magical squares. An example shown here is a yantra which makes a person fearless. It's to be prepared on a Monday and worn on the body. There are hundreds of other examples, many of which have far more sinister objects than this. (Note: Sanskrit 98 font needs to be installed.)
The Yantrachintamani, published by Khemaraj Shrikrishnadas, is divided into nine sections and illustrated throughout with yantras used for magical purposes. The six acts, according to this text and to many others, are vashikarana (subjugation), akarshana (attraction), stambhana (paralysing), vidveshana (causing enmity), marana (causing death), ucchatana (driving away), shantikarana (causing peace, nourishment). However, at the end of the Yantrachintamani there is a section called moksha (liberation) - presumably to remind would-be tantriks that one of the goals of sadhana is supposed to be just that. The first chapter deals with some preliminaries including an invocation, how to draw yantras, the materials that should be used and the like.
Subjugation (vashikarana)
Attraction (akarshana)
Paralysis (stambhana)
Creating Enmity (Vidveshana)
Death Dealing (Marana)
Driving Away/Uprooting (Uccatana)
Pacifying/Nourishing (Shanti)
Liberation (Moksha)
Artwork is © Jan Bailey, 1996-2018. Translations are © Mike Magee 1996-2018. Questions or comments to mike.magee@btinternet.com Home Page |