User talk:Roccos1

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Yoga and tantra

Hi Roccos1. I reverted your edit at Tantra; see Talk:Tantra#Yoga and tantra for an extensive explanation. If I can be of any help to you, please contact me at my talkpage. Best regards, and heads up, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 05:58, 10 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I've been reading the course summary; it also says "the interplay between expressed religious belief, theological claims, and moral action." How about the aim of tantra for modern practitioners? What is their aim? Does tantra help them to be a better human being, more social, etc.? Or is the main aim one's personal well-being? I'm thinking here of Hakuin; he did use some Tantric techniques, concentrating the breath in the lower belly. Yet, Hakuin is quite outspoken on the "goal" of Zen practice: helping other suffering beings. See Tantra#Western Modern Tantra, Geoffrey Samuel:

"‘Tantra’ as a modern Western sexual and spiritual practice, however complex and contested its origins in Asia, was and is more than a fringe phenomenon of the 1960s and 1970s counterculture. On the contrary, it took up themes of considerable depth and significance within Western culture, and synthesized them creatively with borrowings from Buddhist and Hindu sources. Its slow but steady growth since the 1970s suggests that its potential has not yet been exhausted, and I would contend that to dismiss it as an empty and superficial expression of the “spiritual logic of late capitalism” is to miss the possibility of a development of real value." (Samuel, Geoffrey; Tantric Revisionings, New Understandings of Tibetan Buddhism and Indian Religion, p. 360)

See also Ego death: how do these practices help one to become a better human being? And Neo-Advaita#The Neo Advaita trap:

"The main Neo-Advaita fallacy ignores the fact that there is an occlusion or veiling formed by vasanas, samskaras, bodily sheaths and vrittis, and there is a granthi or knot forming identification between Self and mind, which has to be severed [...] The Maharshi's remedy to this whole trap is persistent effective Self-enquiry, and/or complete unconditional surrender of the 'phantom ego' to Self or God, until the granthi is severed, the vasanas are rendered harmless like a burned out rope." (Jacobs 2004)

That is, people can have great "insights" and "experiences", and still be tied to their own narrow drives and fears. So, any modern tantra practitioner who says that tantra made him/her into a better, more compassionate human being? Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 06:14, 10 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Ah yes, of course: the Dalai Lama. And Lama Yeshe and the like. Now that should be easy. Not a text from the DL himself, but an analysis from soemone else on the DL's influence on contemporary society. Compare Karen Armstrong, "Compassion," and the growing interest int he mindfulness-movement in (self)compassion. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 06:20, 10 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]