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Tantra, (Sanskrit: “Loom”) any of numerous texts dealing with the

esoteric practices of some Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain sects. In the
orthodox classification of Hindu religious literature, Tantra refers to a
class of post-Vedic Sanskrit treatises similar to the Puranas (medieval
encyclopaedic collections of myths, legends, and other topics). In this
usage Tantras are, theoretically, considered to treat of theology, Yoga,
construction of temples and images, and religious practices; in reality,
they tend to deal with such aspects of popular Hinduism as spells, rituals,
and symbols. They are distinguished along Hindu sectarian lines between
the Shaiva Agamas, the Vaishnava Samhitas, and the Shakta Tantras.

The lists of the Shakta Tantras differ considerably from one another but
suggest that the earliest manuscripts date from about the 7th century.
They emphasize the goddess Shakti as the female personification of the
creative power or energy of the god Shiva. This view taken to its extreme
holds that Shiva without his Shakti is like a corpse. In the Tantras that
deal with Yoga, Shakti is identified with the kundalini, or the energy that
lies coiled at the base of the spine until brought up through the body by
yogic disciplines. The Tantras also stress the efficacy of yantras and
mandalas (ritual diagrams) and of mantras (mystic syllables or sacred
formulas). Among the major Shakta Tantras are the Kularnava-tantra,
which treats of “left-hand” practices, such as ritual copulation; the
Kulacudamani-tantra, which discusses ritual; and the Sharadatilaka-
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tantra, which deals almost exclusively with magic.

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Hinduism: Shakta Tantras
Shaktism in one form or another has been known since Bana (c. 650) wrote his
Hundred Couplets to Chandi (Chandi-shataka)...

The Buddhist Tantras are traced to the 7th century or earlier, the
Tathagataguhyaka being an early and extreme work. They were
translated into Tibetan and Chinese from about the 9th century onward,
and some texts have been preserved only in those languages, the Sanskrit
originals having been lost. Among the Buddhist Tantras an important text
is the Kalacakra-tantra.

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This article was most recently revised and updated by Matt Stefon.

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Bu-ston more_vert Actions

Tibetan Buddhist scholar
By The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica • Edit History

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Born: 1290
Died: 1364 (aged 74)
S bj t Of St d Ch
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t t Mh T t Tib t B ddhi Y 3/9
 Subjects Of Study: Charya-tantra • Mahayana • Tantra • Tibetan Buddhism • Yoga
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Bu-ston, (born 1290—died 1364), , Tibetan Buddhist scholar who was a

member of the Saskya-pa sect and for many years served as the head of
the Zwa-lu monastery. Bu-ston formulated a notion of the “Three
Turnings of the Buddhist Law” (Hīnayāna, Māhayāna, and Vajrayāna)
which he employed in the organization of his important History of
Buddhism and in his highly influential classification of texts considered to
be “canonical” in the Tibetan tradition. He also generated what became
the standard classification of Tantric texts into four groups: the Korya
(Sanskrit: Kriyā) tantras, the Carya (Sanskrit: Caryā) Tantras, the Yoga
Tantras, and the Asvattavayoga (Sanskrit: Anuttarayoga) Tantras.

Bu-ston was active as a translater and interpreter for many Vajrayāna

texts and was recognized as master of Vaj-rayāna/Tantric ritual practice.
In addition, he was a student of Buddhist architecture who both wrote
about Buddhist stupas and oversaw the construction of an important
stupa in the Zwa-lu area.

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religious literature
Alternate titles: sacred literature, sacred scripture
By The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica • Edit History

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Shiva and his family

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Summary
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scripture, also called sacred scripture, the revered texts, or Holy

Writ, of the world’s religions. Scriptures comprise a large part of the
literature of the world They vary greatly in form volume age and degree
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literature of the world. They vary greatly in form, volume, age, and degree
of sacredness, but their common attribute is that their words are regarded
by the devout as sacred. Sacred words differ from ordinary words in that
they are believed either to possess and convey spiritual and magical
powers or to be the means through which a divine being or other sacred
reality is revealed in phrases and sentences full of power and truth.

Characteristics
Most sacred scriptures were originally oral and were passed down
through memorization from generation to generation until they were
finally committed to writing. A few are still preserved orally, such as the
hymns of Native Americans. Many bear the unmistakable marks of their
oral origin and can best be understood when recited aloud; in fact, it is
still held by many Hindus and Buddhists that their scriptures lack, when
read silently, the meaning and significance they have when recited aloud,
for the human voice is believed to add to the recited texts dimensions of
truth and power not readily grasped by the solitary reader.

Not all scriptures, however, were originally oral, nor were they in all parts
directly effectual in rituals that sought the granting of magical and
spiritual powers. The greater part of recorded scripture has either a
narrative or an expository character. The types of sacred and semisacred
texts are, in fact, many and varied. Besides magical runes (ancient
Germanic alphabet characters) and spells from primitive and ancient
sources, they include hymns, prayers, chants, myths, stories about gods
and heroes, epics, fables, sacred laws, directions for the conduct of rituals,
the original teachings of major religious figures, expositions of these
teachings, moral anecdotes, dialogues of seers and sages, and
philosophical discussions. In fact, scriptures include every form of
literature capable of expressing religious feeling or conviction.

Types of sacred literature vary in authority and degree of sacredness. The

t ll i t t d
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centrally important and most holy of the sacred texts have in many

instances been gathered into canons (standard works of the faith), which,
after being determined either by general agreement or by official religious
bodies, become fixed—i.e., limited to certain works that are alone viewed
as fully authoritative and truly beyond all further change or alteration.
The works not admitted to the canons (those of a semisacred or
semicanonical character) may still be quite valuable as supplementary
texts.

Scriptures in non-Western religions

A striking instance of making a distinction between canonical and
semicanonical scriptures occurs in Hinduism. The Hindu sacred literature
is voluminous and varied; it contains ancient elements and every type of
religious literature that has been listed, except historical details on the
lives of the seers and sages who produced it. Its earliest portions, namely
the four ancient Vedas (hymns), seem to have been provided by Indo-
European families in northwestern India in the 2nd millennium BCE.
These and the supplements to them composed after 1000 BCE—the
Brahmanas (commentaries and instruction in ritual), the Aranyakas
(forest books of ascetics), and the Upanishads (philosophical treatises)—
are considered more sacred than any later writings. They are collectively
referred to as Shruti (“Heard”; i.e., communicated by revelation), whereas
the later writings are labeled Smriti (“Remembered”; i.e., recollected and
reinterpreted at some distance in time from the original revelations). The
former are canonical and completed, not to be added to nor altered, but
the latter are semicanonical and semisacred.

Buddhist sacred literature recollects Gautama Buddha’s life and teaching

in the 6th century BCE and first appeared in the dialect called Pali, allied
to the Magadhi that he spoke. As time passed and his movement spread
beyond India, Buddhism adopted as its medium Sanskrit, the Indian
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classical language that was widely used in ancient Asia. A distinction

arose between the Theravada (“Way of the Elders”), preserved in Pali and
regarded as canonical, and the vast number of works written in Sanskrit
within the more widely dispersed Buddhism called by its adherents
Mahayana (“Greater Vehicle”). The Mahayana works were later translated
and further expanded in Tibetan, Chinese, and Japanese.

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Buddha
Seated Buddha with attendants, carved ivory sculpture from Kashmir, c. 8th century CE;
in the Prince of Wales Museum of Western India, Mumbai. Height 10 cm.
Image: P. Chandra

Whether the basic texts of indigenous Chinese religion should be called

sacred, in the sense of Holy Writ, is open to question. Neither classical
Daoism nor Confucianism can be said to have been based on revelation;
the texts of these faiths were originally viewed as human wisdom, books
written by humans for humans. They acquired authority, actually a
canonical status, however, that caused them to be regarded with profound
reverence and thus, in effect, as sacred. This certainly was true of the
revered Daoist book, the Daodejing (“Classic of the Way of Power”), and
of the Wujing (“Five Classics”) and the Sishu (“Four Books”) of
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of the Wujing ( Five Classics ) and the Sishu ( Four Books ) of
Confucianism.

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Confucius
Confucius, illustration in E.T.C. Werner's Myths and Legends of China, 1922.

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