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As already indicated European usage makes the words Tantra, Tantrism and tantric refer to the worship of goddesses. It would be better to describe this literature and worship as Sâktism and to use Tantrism for a tendency in doctrine and ceremonial which otherwise has no special name.
It would be a poor service to India to palliate the evils and extravagances of Śâktism, but still it must be made clear that it is not a mere survival of barbaric practices. The writers of the Tantras are good Hindus and declare that their object is to teach liberation and union with the Supreme Spirit.
At the beginning of the fifteenth century we hear that the king of the Ahoms summoned Brahmans to his Court and adopted many Hindu rites and beliefs, and from this time onward Śâktism was patronized by most of the Assamese Rajas although after 1550 Vishnuism became the religion of the mass of the people.
Among the Hindu Kashmîris the most prevalent religion has always been the worship of Śiva, especially in the form representing him as half male, half female. This cult is not far from Śâktism and many allusions in the Râjataranginî indicate that left-hand worship was known, though the author satirizes it as a corruption.
No elaborate explanation of this popular religion or of its relation to more intellectual and sacerdotal cults is necessary, for the same thing exists at the present day and the best commentary on the Sîla-vagga is Crooke's Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India. Sâktism and the worship of Râma and Krishna, together with many less conspicuous cults, all entered Brahmanism in this way.
The Prapañcasâra Tantra professes to be a revelation from Nârâyaṇa. Śâktism and the Tantras which teach it are generally condemned by Hindus of other sects.
But countless legends soon sprang up to mar the simplicity of Gautama's ethics. Corruptions crept in. Compromises were made with popular superstitions and with Hindu Saktism. The monastic orders sank into corruption, and by the ninth century of our era the system had been wholly swept from India.
Whereas Christianity is sometimes accused of restricting its higher code to Church and Sundays, the opposite may be said of Tantrism. Outside the temple its morality is excellent. A work like the Mahânirvâṇa Tantra presents a refined form of Śâktism modified, so far as may be, in conformity with ordinary Hindu usage. But other features indubitably connect it with aboriginal cults.
Unfortunately Magadha, which was both the home and last asylum of the faith, was also very near the regions where Śâktism most flourished. It is, as I have often noticed in these pages, a peculiarity of all Indian sects that in matters of belief they are not exclusive nor hostile to novelties.
But however much new tantric literature may be made accessible in future, I doubt if impartial criticism will come to any opinion except that Śâktism and Tantrism collect and emphasize what is superficial, trivial and even bad in Indian religion, omitting or neglecting its higher sides.
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