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In all this region we hear of no ancient Brahmanic settlements, no ancient centres of Vedic or even Puranic learning and when Buddhism decayed no body of Brahmanic tradition such as existed in other parts of India imposed its authority on the writers of the Tantras.
But in India such things form part of the common literary stock and do not entitle the author to the praise which he would win elsewhere, unless his language or thoughts show originality. Such originality I have not found in those Tantras which are accessible.
Sometimes the first three are contrasted with the fourth and sometimes the first two are described as lower, the third and fourth as higher. But the Anuttara-yoga is always considered the highest and most mysterious. Târanâtha says that the Tantras began to appear simultaneously with the Mahayana sûtras but adds that the Anuttara-yoga tantras appeared gradually.
It worships a goddess of many names and forms, who is adored with sexual rites and the sacrifice of animals, or, when the law permits, of men. It asserts even more plainly than Vishnuism that the teaching of the Vedas is too difficult for these latter days and even useless, and it offers to its followers new scriptures called Tantras and new ceremonies as all-sufficient.
But many tantric treatises are chiefly concerned with charms, spells, amulets and other magical methods of obtaining wealth, causing or averting disease and destroying enemies, processes which even if efficacious have nothing to do with the better side of religion. The religious life prescribed in the Tantras commences with initiation and requires the supervision of the Guru.
XXII seems also to assign a late origin to the Tantras though his remarks are neither clear nor consistent with what he says in other passages. Lalitavajra, Lîlâvajra, Buddhaśânti, Ratnavajra. It is also noticeable, as Grünwedel has pointed out, that many of the siddhas or sorcerers bear names which have no meaning in Aryan languages: Bir-va-pa, Na-ro-pa, Lui-pa, etc.
Yet this was matched by the influence of the Sankhya philosophy, which assigned to Siva a male and female dualism, a doctrine which finally plunged Hinduism into deepest degradation. It brought about a new development known as Saktism, and the still later and grosser literature of the Tantras. In these, Hinduism reached its lowest depths.
Various lists of Tantras are given and it is generally admitted that many have been lost. The most complete, but somewhat theoretical enumeration divides India and the adjoining lands into three regions to each of which sixty-four Tantras are assigned. The best known names are perhaps Mahânirvâṇa, Sâradâtilaka, Yoginî, Kulârṇava and Rudra-Yâmala.
By bathing in the sacred stream of the Ganges he will wash away his sins. All who die at Benares are sure to go to heaven. "A brahman who holds the Veda in his memory is not culpable though he should destroy the three worlds" so says the Code of Manu. The Tantras, or ritual works of modern Hinduism, abound in such prescriptions for sinners.
They are the wild legends of the Puranas, and inane dialogues and lying incantations of the Tantras two classes of works which are both the most popular and are lowest in the range of their ideas and most demoralizing in the cults which they present. These books were ostensibly written for the common people and for women.
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