With an introduction by Yvonne Rand

When I took up the manuscript of Miranda Shaw’s Passionate Enlightenment: Women in Tantric Buddhism, I read it in one long gulp. I found Shaw’s erudite yet delightfully readable work inspiring and challenging. Fascinated by the dazzling array of female imagery in the Tibetan Tantric paintings, and particularly by the passion and freedom of the female enlighteners or dakinis, Shaw did groundbreaking research on women in that tradition. She writes,

The dakinis leap and fly, unfettered by clothing, encircled by billowing hair, their bodies curved in sinuous dance poses. . . . One can almost hear the soft clacking of their intricate bone jewelry and feel the wind stirred by their rainbow-colored scarves. . . . These female figures . . . served as the lodestar of my explorations throughout.

To research her Ph.D. thesis in Buddhist Studies at Harvard University, Shaw went back to the classical sources in Sanskrit and Tibetan, studied with current teachers and practitioners, and emerged with a new perspective on the women of Tantric Buddhism. In contrast to our inherited portrait of Buddhism as a tradition founded and led by men, Shaw discovered a treasure trove of enlightened women whose teachings, practices and visual imagery formed the core of a major international Buddhist movement that still rings with the triumphal tones of their celebrations of female embodiment and ultimate freedom. By studying these women, their writings and their innovations, Shaw also came to a deep understanding of what Tantric relationships are meant to be.

Before conducting her field research, Shaw consulted His Holiness the Dalai Lama and gained his approval for the project. His Holiness felt that the time had come for more accurate information on Tantra to be presented to the West. Other masters, inspired by Shaw’s scholarly approach and motivation, offered her essential Tantric teachings. Since this body of wisdom has been guarded by female spirits and women practitioners through the ages, the Tantric teachers considered it appropriate that a woman should reveal these practices in the West at this time.

When Miranda Shaw came on her recent lecture tour to the San Francisco Bay Area, my husband and I participated in a workshop she offered for men and women interested in the methods of Tantric practice. I was then blessed to have my husband take on the practice of serving me. I felt deeply moved to receive such attention, and beyond this, I found welling up in me such a boundlessness of generosity and attention towards him that I recognized the great wisdom in the Tantric relationship which Miranda Shaw articulates and clarifies so brilliantly.

I am not surprised to learn that Passionate Enlightenment, which first appeared in June 1994, is already in its third printing. Shaw’s appreciation of the strengths of women, along with her affirmation of the role of women adepts and teachers in the Tantric Buddhist tradition, give the book a potent focus which is a gift for both women and men. I find Miranda Shaw’s scholarship and practice deeply encouraging for followers of the Buddhist path, no matter which specific school or lineage.

This interview was conducted by Yvonne Rand, Wes Nisker and Barbara Gates in Muir Beach, California, in June l994.

Inquiring Mind: When people hear the word Tantra, many will immediately think of exotic sexual practices. But doesn’t Tantra concern itself with all of life?

Miranda Shaw: The word Tantra comes from the verbal stem tan meaning “to weave,” and Tantra is a spiritual path that weaves, or integrates, every aspect of life, including all daily activities, intimacy and passion, into the path to enlightenment. According to Tantra, there is one basic energy that courses through the universe and courses through the body. Our embodiment is understood as a dynamic, permeable mind-body continuum without fixed boundaries, the site of energies—inner winds and flames, meltings and flowings—that can bring about dramatic transformations on the path to enlightenment.

The Tantric teachings originated in India and the Himalayas in the 7th through 12th centuries C.E. They represent the pinnacle of a long path of discipline that begins with the basic Buddhist teachings on mindfulness, non-self, impermanence and karma. It progresses through the Bodhisattva path—compassionate motivation, altruistic activity, and the Mahayana philosophy of emptiness—and finally culminates in the Tantric teachings. But those who follow the Tantric path regard it as a voluntary path and thus don’t regard it as skillful or necessary for everyone in the present lifetime.

IM: Who qualifies as a Tantric practitioner? Can you simply decide, “I’ve studied a little vipassana. I think I want to study Tantra now”? Mightn’t a teacher say, “Sorry, go back to square two”?

MS: A Tantric teacher would pick up wherever your Buddhist training left off. So, as a vipassana student, you might work on the cultivation of Bodhisattva motivation and start looking at Mahayana philosophies. Those who are qualified to do Tantric practice will have understood the basic Buddhist doctrines, will have gone through all the Bodhisattva training, and then will have received Tantric initiation and taken Tantric vows.

IM: Is it essential to have a partner to do Tantric practice?

MS: This is a very big question. Tantra arose as a path that men and women could practice together. There is no ambiguity about this. But when Tantra went to Tibet from Nepal and India, it forked into two streams. One of those streams was non-celibate—the yogis and yoginis who practiced together as spiritual companions and, in some cases, as husband and wife. The other stream of Tantra entered the monastic system, but since it is impossible for a celibate person to do the ultimate Tantric practices, Tantra was only included as a topic of study in the educational curriculum. Because of all the preparations for Tantric practice which I described, a monk or nun can practice for many years and call that “The Tantric Path” because they understand that the culmination of their practice will be this practice with another person—the fully embodied practice. Some of them will attain readiness in this lifetime, and at that point they can choose to give up their monastic vows, which is a relatively simple matter, and then practice with a partner. But others openly admit, “I’m not ready for that in this lifetime.” Nonetheless they still can call their practice “Tantric” because their view is that this is the eventual culmination of the spiritual path. In his texts, Tsongkhapa, founder of the Gelugpa order, often reiterates: you may wonder why as monastics you should be studying these practices; it is in preparation for future lifetimes when you will have the good fortune to practice with a partner.

Tsongkhapa himself is a very good case in point. He had studied all of the classical Tantras and knew that the Tantric path, in essence, is meant to be practiced with a partner. But he himself voluntarily decided to maintain his monastic vows throughout his lifetime and to postpone the full attainment of Buddhahood until he could practice with a partner in the visionary state after death.

Tsongkhapa felt that the full establishment of monasticism was essential to Buddhism in Tibet and to Tibetan civilization. By the time Tantra arose in India and the Himalayas, Buddhism had already been developing for about twelve centuries, so the Buddhists there had already integrated a lot of the doctrinal teachings, created wonderful monastic universities, and could pursue an advanced philosophical education. But when Buddhism went to Tibet, all the teachings came more or less simultaneously, so the complete infrastructure was not there to support the Tantric practices. It’s important to have all the Buddhist teachings available in their fullness in order to have a Buddhist civilization. Once the basic doctrines, moral teachings, meditation practices, monastic institutions, artistic and literary traditions, and yogic and ritual training have taken root, Tantra can then blossom as the flower of that civilization.

Knowing this, Tsongkhapa decided to remain a monk so that he personally would set an example of the integrity of the monastic path. He felt perhaps that by giving up his vows to pursue a Tantric relationship he might encourage others who were not ready to do so and thereby undermine the establishment of monasticism in Tibet. He made his point clearly and his followers knew why he made the choice that he did.

IM: So let’s turn now to that Tantric relationship. How would you describe it?

MS: A Tantric relationship is a partnership that two people enter, fully voluntarily and consciously, as part of their path to enlightenment in this lifetime. People who enter into such a relationship will already have prepared for this path by learning mindfulness meditation practices, basic Buddhist teachings, and also a number of advanced philosophical teachings. They both agree that this relationship will be integral to their spiritual practice on their path to enlightenment and thus is not set up to gratify the ego of either person involved. This is one of the overarching principles of the relationship.

IM: So the relationship is explicitly not used for sensual pleasure?

MS: The purpose of the relationship is not sensual pleasure, which is, in fact, a goal of secular life and ordinary relationships. In a Tantric partnership, the intimacy and bliss of the physical union will be channeled toward yogic and meditative ends. The significant difference between Tantra and other Buddhist paths is that it is a fully embodied path. That means that the sensuality, knowledge and power of the body are interwoven into the path. They are not avoided. They are, in fact, cultivated and then channeled in very specific ways.

IM: So motivation is the key!

MS: The motivation is diametrically opposed to what normally propels people into personal relationships. The motivation is not security, and it is not emotional fulfillment of the ordinary kind. The motivation is to gain enlightenment for the sake of all sentient beings, and these practitioners will use every aspect of their embodied being to attain that goal.

IM: What if there is some residual desire for emotional fulfillment or sensual pleasure when one of the partners enters into the relationship?

MS: There will be residual desire. That is called un-enlightenment! But according to Tantric Buddhism, desire, in itself, is not negative. It’s not impure. It causes suffering when we subject it to our self-grasping. When we interpret desire as something that we own, and that we must fulfill—when we do not see that desire arises in emptiness and returns to emptiness—we suffer. That misunderstanding—rather than the desire in itself—is the cause of the suffering. According to Tantric Buddhism, all of the emotions are inherently pure, not intrinsically a cause of suffering or of bondage.

IM: But a Tantric relationship must have its own brand of suffering.

MS: One’s intimate relationship with another person is normally the site of life’s greatest suffering. But in a Tantric partnership, instead of detaching oneself or withdrawing from intimacy, one is actually allowing the energies which arise to become fully manifest and even heightening some of those energies and emotions. Suffering can arise because of the intensity of the energies that one is seeking to transform and channel to one’s spiritual growth.

IM: How might the Tantric partners work with this suffering?

MS: This is where their preparation in early, basic Buddhist teachings on non-self, impermanence and interdependence come into play. Whose suffering is it? Whose desire is it? This is also where the Mahayana emptiness philosophies are crucial, because the emptiness philosophies—and here I am referring to Madhyamika, Yogachara, Tathagatagarbha, and Hua-yen—provide practitioners with tools whereby they can deconstruct the contents of conventional awareness. Suffering is a construct of conventional awareness, so Tantrics work with very specific philosophical tools to deconstruct it.

IM: Can you describe what those tools are and how they are used?

MS: These tools take many years to develop. I have gone into that in some detail in my book, Passionate Enlightenment, but some general principles can be described. For instance, as the Tantric partners enter into physical union, one of their primary goals is to maintain complete mindfulness—to retain mental clarity, remain focused on the present moment, and not give in to the arising of grasping, greed, or egoic attachment. This enables the energies that are brought into play in this activity to be channeled in directions other than toward the reification of the conventional self. As they maintain mindfulness on the present moment, the partners begin to be aware of many levels and subtle gradations of the energies that are circulating through their bodies. Their Tantric training will have provided specific yogic disciplines whereby they can channel that energy toward the attainment and maintenance of very profound states of nondual awareness. Some of these yogic practices involve directing the breath; some involve directing the energy; some involve visualization of Tantric deities and mandalas. The ability to envision Buddhas and mandalas while joined with a partner does presume a great deal of meditative preparation. Finally, meditation upon emptiness is brought to bear, recognizing that what you are experiencing is not intrinsically real, and dissolving all that experience into vast, sky-like awareness. In so doing, one deconstructs the bliss and the visions that one has cultivated. This combination of bliss and emptiness culminates the practice.

IM: In the Theravada tradition, the way to do extreme practice is to close yourself off from conventional sense pleasures. You go to a monastery where you don’t listen to music, you don’t smell perfumes, you don’t eat rich foods. You don’t look at the opposite sex, or sleep under the same roof with a woman, if you are a monk, or with a man, if you are a nun. With Tantra, instead of cutting yourself off from all of this, you enter right into the middle of it and work with it.

MS: But in Tantra there are also periods of seclusion or retreat situations where the companions go together to a cave or retreat house and practice very intensively for many hours a day without interruption. But the energies that they cultivate then have to be integrated back into daily life.

IM: What happens on retreat? Are the partners engaged in coitus, working with these sexual energies for many hours a day?

MS: Practice with a consort is not synonymous with physical union. I prefer to use the word intimacy rather than sexuality because sex is not the essence of the practice. That’s our impoverished Western view of what intimacy entails. There are many other practices that Tantric partners do together. One of these practices is gazing: long sessions where the partners cultivate pure vision by gaining the ability to see one another as divine, as embodied manifestations of Buddhahood and as enlightened in essence. There are other exercises where they simply touch each other’s fingertips or touch the palms of their hands, or they eat and feast together as a practice of cultivating and channeling their bliss.

IM: You have said in your book that during their intimacy, the two partners make a deep imprint on one another’s karma.

MS: By combining their energies and then channeling that energy through their bodies into the subtle yogic anatomy, they are absorbing the quality of their partner’s consciousness and, in fact, absorbing their partner’s karma. They are sharing karma because they are then both working with the same set of pooled karma. Together they generate the energy that enables them to blast through some of the knots created by that karma. In ordinary relationships, you are also creating karma together and sharing in one another’s karma. But it’s like the difference between swimming in the ocean, in the case of an ordinary relationship, and injecting salt water into your veins, in the case of a Tantric relationship. A very intimate communion takes place in a Tantric partnership. That is why the choice of Tantric partner is such a delicate process.

IM: In active sexual Tantra, aren’t the partners merging the male and female energies in an attempt to reach a state before creation, before the division even of male and female, of yin and yang?

MS: The ultimate state of enlightenment can be considered to be a nongendered state. It’s a state that can’t be characterized in any way. However, the original Tantric texts do believe that embodiment is the basis of one’s path to enlightenment and that embodiment is always gendered. The Tantric partners are not specifically seeking to transcend their femaleness or maleness. They are seeking to attain Buddhahood in the present body. In a male body that can take the form of a male Buddha, and in a female body that can take the form of a female Buddha because, in Tantric Buddhism, there are Buddhas of both genders.

In the West a lot of people interested in Buddhism have been students of Jung and have transposed Jungian thought onto Buddhism. Some misinterpretation of Tantra grows out of the Jungian idea that the goal of spiritual growth is to integrate the male and female halves of the self. In Tantra, there is no such belief. Tantrics don’t believe in an inner masculine in the woman or an inner feminine in the man because they don’t identify certain traits or energies as male or female. Rather, they believe that it is important that two real people—a man and a woman—come together and combine their energies in order to generate an energy event of a magnitude that is difficult for one person to achieve in solitary meditation.

IM: Do the Tantric teachings make it explicit that Tantric partners must be a man and a woman? In other words, can Tantric partners be of the same sex?

MS: Many people ask me that question, which leads me to believe that there is a lot of interest in practicing Tantra in the context of same-sex intimacy. I did not find any direct references to same-sex partnerships in my sources, but that does not mean they did not exist. The voices of women, which were so prominent in the origins of the movement, were muted over time in the historical records, and I suspect that non-heterosexual voices might have been suppressed to an even greater degree. It is possible that additional research will uncover some evidence or surviving texts. There is certainly nothing in Tantric theory that specifically disallows or prohibits such a relationship. Some Tantric practices can directly be applied to same-sex relationships and some would require adaptation. Tantra is a path of ongoing revelation and visionary creativity. Therefore, the field is open for someone to explore and to articulate what that would mean in terms of physiology, yoga and visualization.

IM: As you uncovered women’s voices in your research, you uncovered a radically new understanding of the role of women in Tantric Buddhism. The common perception of women in Tibetan Buddhism is that they play a very minor role. As I understand it, they are more or less tolerated, at least in the monastic system. But, outside of the monasteries, you have found that the role of women is significant. Could you discuss this?

MS: I found that in Tibet, outside of the monastic system, women are supremely important as serious practitioners, yoginis, makers of pilgrimage, revealers of sacred teachings, givers of initiation, gurus, and enlightened beings. I even discovered that women were very important in the creation of the Tantric movement, in introducing some of the practices that are now quite prominent in Tibetan Buddhism, even in the monastic context. The smyung-gnas, or fasting practice, comes from women, as well as dream yoga and a number of other practices about which I have written in my book.

IM: And you’ve found that the woman’s role in the Tantric partnership has also been misunderstood?

MS: That’s right. Contrary to the inherited picture, in which women were somehow abused or perhaps exploited in Tantric practice, what I found is that women have a special honor in Tantric Buddhism and Tantric relationships. All of the classical texts say that a man on the Tantric path must join forces with a woman who is also seeking enlightenment on the Tantric path, and he must honor and respect her. There are even ritual practices that enable him to show his respect for her from the very moment of their meeting to the final fruition of the path. For example, when they first meet, he must approach her respectfully, preferably with folded hands. If he immediately recognizes her as a spiritually advanced being, he should prostrate to her and circumambulate her. As he approaches her, he should use secret signs and body language before descending to the verbal level of communication. So, in a variety of ways, he should show that he recognizes her as a spiritual aspirant.

IM: It is widely rumored that in the name of Tantra some Buddhist teachers, especially in the West, have engaged in sexual relationships which have been harmful to students, particularly women students. Could you talk about that?

MS: In the West, we have gathered that Tantra involves sexuality, so when we hear about the sexual activities of a Buddhist teacher, we automatically think that maybe it’s Tantra. Some teachers have hidden behind that label, and they have been able to hide behind it because we Westerners don’t know what Tantra means. But these liaisons, at least the ones that I have known about, violate basic Mahayana Buddhist principles of compassionate motivation and selfless, benevolent activity. It is a gross violation of Bodhisattva motivation to express one’s sexuality in a way that harms another person psychologically or physically—and that includes any kind of coercive relationship, or any relationship in which there is a disparity in the emotional strength of the so-called “partners.” Moreover, such a thing would be unthinkable in the Tantric context of a fully conscious, voluntary, and mutually enlightening relationship.

I’ll give an example from my own experience of how such an abusive teacher might operate. I was once approached by a lama whom I believed to be a monk. I didn’t know him well enough to have occasion to inquire as to which vows he had taken. After a very short acquaintance, he abruptly invited me to have sexual relations with him. He claimed that to do so would be of spiritual benefit to me. He was, in effect, attempting to sexually abuse me.

There was no relationship between us, so I was stunned by the unexpectedness of the approach. I was also astonished at the smoothness of his obviously well-rehearsed lines. He said, “I think it would be good for your meditation. I feel we have a karmic connection that should be expressed in this way.” I was very taken aback, “I thought you were a monk.” He said, “Oh no, no. I just wear these robes to please my mother and to enhance my teaching.” That was a lot to assimilate since he wears the full monastic regalia.Then I asked, “What do you mean by saying that it would help my meditation?” He said, “It will help you to relax.” I said, “I never heard that meditation was relaxation. My lama never taught me that the essence of meditation is to relax.” He said, “In general it will just help you.” And I asked, “In that case, why doesn’t anyone who has sexual relations become enlightened? Why isn’t everyone enlightened?”

I decided to try to find out if, contrary to all appearances, he was a genuine Tantric practitioner. I said, “What Tantric texts have you studied? What Tantric methods were you proposing to employ?” He said, “What texts?” I replied, “Well, for example, the Cakrasamvara-tantra, is that what you’ve studied? Is that what you practice?” He said, “Oh, no, I haven’t done any of that practice. I’m not talking about Tantra. I’m not qualified to do Tantra.” He immediately backed down, his bravado just evaporated and he slunk off.

After my encounter with this practiced predator, I found out that he has left a body count of ruined lives. I feel it is important that we become knowledgeable about Tantra in part so that we have some handle with which to evaluate the behavior of such teachers. This kind of behavior bears not even a remote relationship to Tantric practice. Tantric practice means integrating one’s sexuality into the spiritual path. People like this lama have, in fact, chosen not to integrate their sexual expression into the spiritual path. They are neglecting that aspect of their development. When that happens, the sexuality doesn’t simply lie dormant, but sometimes flourishes in the shadow side of one’s psychological life and takes on a very distorted, selfish and abusive manifestation. We should not hesitate to name such behavior and to withdraw from it the title of “spiritual practice,” “skillful teaching” or “Tantric activity.”

IM: Let’s close by looking at some of the most challenging of the worldly energies, the difficult emotions we’re all plagued by—anger, fear, grief. How does Tantra deal with these energies?

MS: From the perspective of Tantric Buddhism, losing one’s emotional life would be a tremendous loss. Moreover, as Tantrics see it, it’s never possible that one could reach a state where thoughts and emotions would not arise. They arise spontaneously. Therefore, it is important is to learn how to experience them as blissful, how to allow them to arise and to see them as an ephemeral, momentary, dazzling display.

IM: So let’s say anger arises, how does a Tantric work with it?

MS: According to Tantra, there is only one basic energy coursing through the universe, dancing in various patterns and forms. Anger is not a different, impure or negative energy. Regardless of the emotion, you are trying to see it simply as a play of energy. So when anger arises, the process is the same as in the case of attachment or greed or desire, namely, to depersonalize one’s interpretation of the emotion and simply to see it as a play of light that has arisen in empty space, no more substantial and no less beautiful than a rainbow.

IM: Even anger, a rainbow?

MS: Most paradigmatically anger. Anger is a quality that is highly prized on the Tantric path because it is very deep, vivid and biting. According to Tantra, anger actually carries great intelligence and clarity. Often there is a true seeing involved in a moment of anger. So, according to Tantra, you try to preserve the clarity but to separate out any cloudiness that comes from interpreting it in reference to a substantial self. There is ultimately no “you” possessing the anger and suffering “because of” the anger. There is simply, at that moment, anger arising—a dynamic process, rather than a solid emotion with a solid owner.

IM: Then does it dissipate because you recognize that it’s not your anger? What does one do if there is an impulse to act?

MS: When you become sufficiently detached to recognize that you are not the owner of the anger, you can also begin to recognize that the anger itself and the object of the anger—be it a person or a situation—is not the cause of your suffering. You are then not going to strike out at another person in the mistaken belief that to do so will relieve your suffering. The clarity prevents an unskillful response and opens a space for appropriate action. Anger—for example, at injustice—can sometimes lead to constructive behavior. There is nothing in the Tantric teachings that says one should never act on anger, but rather that one should have clear and skillful response.

IM: So there is no moral law or behavioral law about the expression of anger? And what you have learned, hopefully, in your meditation, is to have enough distance from it, and, at the same time, enough connection to it, to decide whether to act or not?

MS: Exactly. You have learned just to stay with it, to ride it, almost as if it were a galloping horse, to remain in the present moment, and possibly even to enjoy it, to think, “what a wonderful entertainment this is!”

IM: So, for the Tantric, does everything in life ultimately become entertainment?

MS: According to Tantric Buddhism, the world is radiant, blissful, and pure. So, the goal of the Tantric path is, on one level, to come to experience the world as inherently joyful. One can come to see all the different energy events in one’s environment and in one’s own experiential stream as ultimately blissful when one doesn’t interpret these energies with reference to a nonexistent self.

∞

From the Fall 1994 issue of Inquiring Mind (Vol. 11, No. 1)

Text © 1994–2020 by Inquiring Mind