Introduction to Tantra Sastra - Aghori

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INTRODUCTION TO TANTRA ŚĀSTRA
Kaula’s own inner life; it is everything in the sense that
knowledge may infuse its apparent limitations with an
universal meaning. So understood, form is never a
bond. The Visva-sāra Tantra says 1 of the Kaula that “for
him there is neither rule of time nor place. His actions
are unaffected either by the phases of the moon or the
position of the stars. The Kaula roams the earth in
differing forms. At times adhering to social rules (śiṣṭ a),
he at others appears, according to their standard, to be
fallen (bhraṣṭ a). At times, again, he seems to be as
unearthly as a ghost (bhūta or piśācā). To him no
difference is there between mud and sandal paste, his
son and an enemy, home and the cremation ground.”
At this stage the sādhaka attains to Brahma-jñāna,
which is the true gnosis in its perfect form. On receiving
mahāpūrṇ a-dikṣa he performs his own funeral rites and
is dead to the saṃsara. Seated alone in some quiet
place, he remains in constant samadhi, and attains its
nirvikalpa form. The great Mother, the Supreme
Prakṛ ti Mahāśakti, dwells in the heart of the sādhaka
which is now the cremation ground wherein all passions
have been burnt away. He becomes a Parama-haṃsa,
who is liberated whilst yet living (jīvan-mukta).
It must not, however, be supposed that each of
these stages must necessarily be passed through by
each jīva in a single life. On the contrary, they are
ordinarily traversed in the course of a multitude of
births. The weaving of the spiritual garment is recommenced
where, in a previous birth, it was dropped, on
death. In the present life a sādhaka may commence at
any stage. If he is born into Kaulācāra, and so is a
1 Chapter XXIV.