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In August 1975, I was standing in front of the entrance to the Amarnath Cave 12500ft up in the Kashmiri Himalayas watching, as my fellow pilgrims, numbering about 13000, struggled in the rarified air up the final snow-fringed slope to the cave after a 4 day hike past glaciers. The goal of their exertions was the ice stalagmite in the cave, revered as the lingam of Lord Shiva. As I waited, I distinctly remember someone pointing out to me a man with long tousled hair, wrapped in a blanket. He looked similar, but with a more western face, to a lot of the sadhus or holy men sitting or standing around, many naked. I was told he was French.
Thirty years later I am wondering whether it could have been Daniel Odier, the author of 'Tantric Quest' as he certainly would have been familiar with the cave and the events he describes in his book probably took place in the same year. 'Tantric Quest' is the account of the author's initiation into the deepest levels of Tantrism which is a way of total love leading to the freedom to be.
Odier set out for India from France while in his early 20s and after much searching for a master, he had settled in a small Indian village having more or less given up his search. But, as often happens in life, he then discovered that in the forests above the village there was living a yogini. She eventually accepted him as a disciple and the major part of the book deals with his initiation and her teachings on the subject of Tantra. Her name was Devi and she had previously worked as a teacher and been married before abandoning both to explore Shivaic Tantrism.
In Shivaism many of the masters were, and still are women. The texts clearly state: "What the male tantrika realises in one year, a female adept attains in one day." The period described in the book probably lasted over several weeks. It starts with some basic teaching. She tells him that he is fundamentally already Shiva and that when he bows to her, he should bow deeply before the divine which is in both of them at that very moment; to do otherwise is to embark on a lengthy wandering without an end. She introduces him to the basis of Shivaism, the thirty-six tattvas, the first five being earth, water, air, ether and fire stretching all the way to the final five which are; the consciousness taking on its true nature, subjectivity invested with power, the universal I, Shakti and finally Shiva. She tells him that, "permanent contact with the thirty-six tattvas in full consciousness is the Tantric experience." Tantrism rejects nothing and there's no border between the absolute and the phenomenal.
The culmination of Odier's time with Devi is participation in the maithuna ritual or the Great Union. This is soon followed by the inevitable parting but Devi encourages him by saying, "You don't belong to me; I don't belong to you. We belong to the world, to the divine.....Our bond isn't subject to time or space. I will be everywhere you look.....We are a divine waterfall for each other where we can bathe ourselves in light and quench our absolute thirst."
This book is essential reading for anyone interested in Tantrism and is a classic in its own field.
Contributed by NH.
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