In my earlier blog post on Kuṇḍalinī, I explained that the modern practice that goes by the name ‘Kundalini Yoga’, created by the now-deceased cult leader ‘Yogi Bhajan’, is entirely an invention of the 20th century. As is well documented by the scholar Philip Deslippe (in his groundbreaking article “From Maharaj to Mahan Tantric: The Construction of Yogi Bhajan's Kundalini Yoga”), the so-called Yogi Bhajan didn’t inherit, but rather fabricated, most of the practice(s) that he transmitted to his students under the name ‘Kundalini Yoga’. Therefore the practice taught as ‘Kundalini Yoga’ in Western yoga studios today, whenever it derives from Yogi Bhajan (which it nearly always does), has no relation to what is taught as kuṇḍalinī-yoga in the original Sanskrit sources.
But in that earlier blog post, which looked only at sources for Kuṇḍalinī in the classical period of Tantra (800-1100 CE), I didn’t attempt to explain kuṇḍalinī yoga, nor did I look at the early modern sources (1500-1800 CE) which are important for understanding the evolution of the teachings on kuṇḍalinī into the modern period. Here I rectify that omission, however briefly.
We don’t find the phrase kuṇḍalinī-yoga in the classical sources, but we do find it in early modern sources. One of these is the unpublished “Remembrance of the Principle of Mortality” (Mṛti-tattva-anusmaraṇa), composed around 1600 or a little earlier in Kashmīr. This text, which was much copied and studied in early modern Kashmīr, teaches rituals around death & dying, and also describes various possible after-death scenarios (none of them permanent). When teaching how to avoid unpleasant afterlife experiences, the text explains that liberation from such undesirable after-death states, as well as liberation from suffering in this very life, can be attained through three methods: 1) correctly done complex rituals that dissolve karma to an extent (kriyā), 2) spiritual realization through insight (jñāna), and 3) yoga. The type of yoga envisaged here is precisely a kuṇḍalinī-yoga. Unfortunately, not as much detail of this is given as we would like, but the teaching is nonetheless intriguing. Here is a translation of the relevant passage, done by myself and my Sanskrit students who just completed two years of intensive Sanskrit study with me (yay! go team!):
“One should restrain and focus the vital energy (prāṇa) through this method: cast out the sullied wind from the right channel (piṅgalā-nāḍī) through an upward exhale, O Goddess. Then one should fill [it with] the purified wind from the left (iḍā) channel. Subsequently one should retain the [prāṇa] in the central channel (suṣumnā) in the correct way. [Finally,] one should perform the uccāra of the praṇava (i.e., OṂ, or one of its Tantrik variations such as HAUṂ) repeatedly. (9.60-62b)
One must firmly join oneself to yoga by means of filling, retaining, and exhaling [repeatedly], until awakening (bodha) of the Kuṇḍalinī occurs, O beloved. Reaching and passing beyond the six cakras in sequence, beginning from mūlādhāra, as also the Great Elements situated within [five of] them, beginning with Earth, one will [as a result] attain their respective siddhis. Then, upon reaching the aperture of space [in the crown of the head], one will attain oneness with Śiva in accordance with the rite: [then] one should drink the extraordinary immortal nectar (amṛta) produced by union with Him. Having drunk that nectar, one ultimately becomes Shiva embodied in very little time.” (9.64-67b)
Respecting traditional guidelines, I will not attempt to explicate this passage with the written word. Such explanation is supposed to be received orally, in a live practice environment with a proper container. (Furthermore, there are many others better qualified than I to give such instruction.) However, it will be instructive to compare this passage with a passage found in the Siddha-siddhānta-paddhati, composed probably around 1700:
By means of the awakening of the central goddess-power (madhya-śakti) as a result of the clenching [or compression] of the lower goddess-power [and] by means of the descent of the upper goddess-power (ūrdhva-śakti) the supreme level [of realization/liberation] is attained. She is only one [but] by being classified as central, upper and lower she has three names. . . . Contracting [the lower goddess-power] is perfected by locking the Base-support (mūlādhāra), from which this universe, moving and unmoving, conscious and unconscious, is produced. The Base-support is well known as the source of consciousness. [quoting from the Rulaka-tantra] . . . She who is always inherently able to hold in the middle of her light the individual self…is celebrated as the central goddess [manifestation of] Kuṇḍalinī. [quoting from Śivānandācārya] . . . The supreme subtle Kuṇḍalinī, the central goddess, whose own form is consciousness, is to be awoken when she is in her own natural state by yogis who have learnt [how to do so] from the mouth of a true guru. Now the descent of the upper goddess-power is taught: . . . She whose nature is to reveal and point to various objects by means of self-perception is called the upper goddess-power. Her descent is not merely the extinction of the fallacy that one’s true nature is twofold; on the contrary, it happens because of the indivisibility of one’s own true nature. . . . the great adept yogis attain the supreme level by means of the descent of the upper goddess. (trans. Mallinson, slightly modified; see Roots of Yoga pp. 216-18)
Notice that this text represents a Tantrik tradition not much influenced by developments in Haṭha-yoga, which exclusively envisioned a single Kuṇḍalinī which always moves upward from the base of the body to the crown. The Siddha-siddhānta-paddhati, like a number of other earlier texts (such as the Amaraugha-śāsana), has a more nuanced vision of things, which, one could argue, better matches the varieties of spontaneous experiences of Kuṇḍalinī described by modern practitioners.
Finally, let’s compare the passage above with a twentieth-century passage written (in Sanskrit) by Swami Lakshman Joo, the last living Trika Guru of Kashmīr (1907-1991), who also teaches three forms of Kuṇḍalinī, drawing on the work of Abhinavagupta (950-1020): Shakti-Kuṇḍalinī, Prāṇa-Kuṇḍalinī, and Parā-Kuṇḍalinī. (As far as I know, SLJ did not know the Siddha-siddhānta-paddhati, which was composed in south India. This may indicate that the teaching on the triple Kuṇḍalinī was widespread in various forms at one time.) The following is translated from SLJ’s original Sanskrit writing (the Kuṇḍalinī-vijñāna-rahasya):
“Kuṇḍalinī is the power which manifests the universe. She causes the six cakras to vibrate, arousing in awareness the sweet resonance produced by her passage. . . . The term Kuṇḍalinī refers to Śiva’s power of emission (visarga-śakti) which, inasmuch as it is universal, is identical with I-ness (ahaṃtā) in its fullest expansion.
The nature of Śakti-Kuṇḍalinī is described in the Tantrasadbhāva as follows: “The ultimate and subtle power rests introverted enveloping—like a sleeping serpent—the subjective centre of awareness in the heart (hṛdaya-bindu).”
The same goddess Śakti-Kuṇḍalinī has been described in the Tantrāloka (chapter 3) . . . “This [Power] is the light of all things; when bereft of the [actual] emission of all the entities which she will subsequently make manifest, she Śakti-Kuṇḍalinī, whose nature is Parāparā, and she is likewise Prāṇa-Kuṇḍalinī [whose nature is Aparā], and in the region of final emission [at the crown], she is Parā-Kuṇḍalinī. She is also called the Sky of Śiva and the Abode of the absolute Self.” (quoting more of that passage than SLJ did; cf. Dyczkowski’s TĀ, vol. 2, pp. 242-51)
The Kaula yogi also realises this Śakti-Kuṇḍalinī as Kāmatattva (‘the essence of desire’) through the contemplation of the power of desire (kāmakalā) during the secret [sexual] rite (caryā-krama) at that moment of immersion (samāveśa) which is the co-penetration (saṅghaṭṭa) of siddha and yoginī. The master Vātūlanātha too has mentioned this Śakti-Kuṇḍalinī in the following sūtra: “Through the co-penetration of the siddha(s) and yoginī(s), the great celebratory unification (mahā-melāpa) arises.”(5) If a Kaula yogin establishes himself or herself therein even for an instant, s/he experiences through the melting away of the duality of Śiva and Śakti as subject and object of awareness an equilibrium (sthiti) which is the supreme fusion in identity (mahā-sāmarasya) of the two. Thus it should be clearly understood that only the Kaula yogin who experiences the state of Śakti-Kuṇḍalinī within the great celebratory unification (mahā-melāpa) of the co-penetration of siddha and yoginī during the secret [sexual] rite is entitled to undertake it, and nobody else. Therefore none but those of the highest spiritual development, who are fully established in the recognition of their all-inclusive identity (paripūrṇa-svātma) are qualified for this secret [sexual] rite, the source of the ultimate penetration & immersion (samāveśa).
Now I shall explain the nature of Prāṇa-Kuṇḍalinī. The power of emission, its nature the blissful aesthetic relish (camatkāra) is described in our revealed texts as Prāṇa-Kuṇḍalinī when it cognizes emission’s emergence (unmeṣa-daśā) within its own identity, in accordance with the teaching in Tantrāloka 3.141 (‘The state of emission is the projection of one’s own nature from itself into itself’). That same power of consciousness, in its Prāṇa-Kuṇḍalinī aspect, is experienced by Kaula yogins flashing forth in that reality which is the first instant of ejaculation (visarga, in a triple meaning here, including also the exhale and the emission of phenomenal experience of any kind). But here I shall add something on the basis of my own understanding. The Stanzas on Pulsation say: “Taking their stand on that [thought-free centre] both moon and sun (inhale and exhale / object and cognition) dissolve into the path of Suṣumnā and leave behind the sphere of Brahmā (the objective world), rising beyond it. Then in that great void within which sun and moon have utterly dissolved, the unaware remains as if immersed in dreamless sleep; but the awareness of one who is awake remains unshrouded.” (24-25; for an alternate translation see here.) When, in the manner described in these verses, a Śaiva yogin, not allowing his awareness to slacken even for a moment, contemplating his identity with Śiva, draws near to the state of penetration & immersion (samāveśa), then, by virtue of his unbroken self-awareness, both his outgoing and ingoing breaths dissolve into the path of Suṣumnā. As soon as this happens, his vital energy (prāṇa-śakti) descends to the perineal centre at the pelvic floor (mūlādhāra). Then in radiant expansion it flows up from there through the central channel and as it does so the yogin experiences the state of Prāṇa-Kuṇḍalinī.
There are here two possible ways for yogis. The first is as follows. For some, when the outgoing and ingoing breaths dissolve into the central channel, they first turn downwards and, [united,] having broken through the lambikā-centre, producing a sound like the roar one hears when one [partially] blocks one’s ears with one’s fingers, [they] penetrate the perineal centre. First the yogin experiences this centre spinning at great speed and emitting the sound I have described. Then the vital energy ascends therefrom and flowing up through the central channel pierces the second cakra which is located [in this system] in the region of the navel, so that it too begins to revolve and resonate. At this stage the yogin experiences both centres spinning simultaneously. Then the yogin’s vital energy, rising from the navel-centre darts upwards and penetrates the heart-centre. The yogin experiences it rotating the same way. Then the vital energy, continuing to rise through the central channel and reaching the throat, penetrates in a flash both the centre in the throat and that located between the eyebrows, so that these too begin to spin at high speed. Such is the experiences of yogis alone. When the [kuṇḍalinī of the] yogin has pierced the centre in the in the abode of bindu (between the brows), he experiences, within the pulsation of Prāṇa-Kuṇḍalinī, the rapid simultaneous rotation of all the centres from the perineal to that between the eyebrows.” (translation: Alexis Sanderson, heavily edited and lightly modified by myself)
Swamiji’s fascinating teaching on the third aspect of kuṇḍalinī, Parā-Kuṇḍalinī, has not yet been translated. I will translate it for a subsequent blog post.
The above passage from Swami Lakshman Joo is deeply interesting and important in a number of ways. I will not attempt its explication here, saving that for a later date—please attend my UK retreat in July 2024 if you want to learn more about this!
Suffice to say, reading these passages (and I advise you to read them several times) allows us to better understand what the tradition of Śaiva Tantra means by the term kuṇḍalinī (and let’s remember that it was this tradition that originated the term in the first place), and how different it is, in some cases, from the modern usage of the term.