THE SADANGA YOGA

worlds, that is, of all the realities as an indistinct whole. With vicfira this
vision is directed towards particular realities, which are seen in their
individuality, but always in a non-conceptual way. Following the phase
characterized by vitarka and view'a, pIiti and sukha correspond
respectively to mental tranquillity and to physical and psychological
relaxation (prasrabdhl)46. The last phase is a non-conceptual and non-dual
kind of concentration on the universal image (vi§vabimba) arisen at the end
of the signs. In it, the polarities of perceiver and perceivable reality vanish.
3) Restraint of the breath (priU;Jayama), the third limb of the yoga,
consists of arresting the left and right courses of the vital breath and
making it enter into the central channel, which in Buddhist tantras is
usually called a vadhatf 7 .
Two methods are described. The first consists of adamantine muttering
(vajrajapa): according to the Kalacakra teachings it consists of the
repetition of the syllable OIp. during inhalation, the syllable haIp. during
retention, and the syllable alJ during exhalation (cf. G, fo1. 12b6_7)48. The
second method consists of hafhayoga: the vital breath is violently pushed
into the central channel once the bodhieitta has been arrested in the lotus of
the wisdom (see below, pp. 270-71).
46 See ADhK VIII, 9 (ed., p. 1142). In the first two dhyiinas, sukha is defined with the
word prasrabdhi. Cf. also Al1haviniscayasiltranibandhana, ed., p. 180. PIiti is called
sallmanasya (see trans. L. de La Vallee Poussin, pp. 150-1). See below G, fol. 15a2_3; cf.
SUT (Gnoli-Orofino 1994: 214).
47 The disposition of the channels (niirji), which are imagined in the human body and in
which the vital breath flows, has recently been the object of study (Gnoli-Orofino 1994;
Orofino 1996; Cicuzza-Sferra 1997: 122-5). The principal concepts that have to be kept in
mind are summarized here: 1) the three principal narjis change position above and below
the navel; 2) the terms pral}a and apiina (in the LKC, HTPT, etc.) sometimes have a
technical meaning and denote respectively the breath that flows above and below the navel;
3) below the navel, the avadhiltI changes name according to the reality that it bears (cf. SU,
50, 56); 4) the channels reflect a microcosm-macrocosm relationship. G. Orofino (1996:
132) writes: "These channels are interconnected in a reiationship of wisdom and means,
related to the male and female essence, semen and menstrual blood, in their tum
differentiated into the standard Tantric Buddhist threefold division of body, voice and mind
(kiiya, vak, citta), that is, from the most tangible to the most subtle level. Moreover,
following a mal}rjaJa pattern, in their sublimated dimension each of them represents a
Tathagata of the six families, related to the six aggregates, the six elements, the six sense
organs, the six sense objects, the six action senses and the six actions. In this way the
representation of the inner channels reflects a universal vision of microcosmic existence
that is symmetrical with the outer macrocosm".
48 On this practice, which is explained differently in the GS, see Dhargyey 1985: 137.
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