This essay is a cross-cultural comparison of subtle body theory and practice, as expressed in the Trika Śaiva tradition of Abhinavagupta (c. 975–1025 C.E.) and the Tibetan Buddhist Great Perfection (rdzogs pa chen po) tradition of Longchenpa (Klong chen pa; 1308–1364 C.E.). I am interested in the body that is activated by means of visualization and full-bodied contemplative practices.1 Abhinavagupta and Longchenpa are perfect candidates for such a comparative study. Both provide us with grand syntheses of their lifeworlds while articulating the subtle body in relation to Being (gzhi; anuttara) and its penetrating and pervading grounding of human development. Abhinavagupta focuses on contemplative practices of the subtle body in the fifth chapter of the Light on the Tantra (Tantrāloka), on the topic of “the embodied way [to liberation]” (āṇava-upāya); Longchenpa focuses on contemplative practices of the subtle body in the eighth chapter of the Precious Treasury of Words and Meanings (Tshig don rin po che’i mdzod), on the topic of “the pathways of primordial gnosis (ye shes) (in the human body).”2
The pioneering scholarship of Lilian Silburn on Abhinavagupta3 and David Germano on Longchenpa4 aid me in this task. Both take the subtle body seriously, interpreting it as connected—yet irreducible—to the physical body and as resonant with Being or Consciousness. At the same time, because of the complexity and profundity of the subject, further interpretation is necessary. Standing on their shoulders, however, I go beyond their initial translations and interpretations to practice “comparative religious studies.” My primary model here is Jeffrey Kripal.5 Kripal’s work is significant in creating a robust model for comparison and in assessing and critiquing the discipline of Religious Studies. Taking a panoramic view of our field, he suggests that one of its purposes is to learn more about Consciousness, defining “Humanities” as the study of Consciousness coded in Culture.6 I take this to mean, echoing Paul Ricoeur,7 that the primary purpose should be to learn more about ourselves, our realities.
When we study Abhinavagupta and Longchenpa, of course, we should study the cultural matrices in which they find themselves—always giving rise to complex differences. Ironically, such differences also reveal similar patterns underlying Consciousness. Thus, we need to also ask, “How do such cultural expressions evoke something beyond culture?” In this chapter, instead of focusing on culture, I turn my vision in order to focus on Consciousness or Being itself. Thus, I compare Abhinavagupta and Longchenpa in order to find that which eludes contextualist studies, a common pattern in how Consciousness manifests in, through, and as our own bodies. I begin with Abhinavagupta, tapping into the scholarship of Silburn and others and integrating my own translations and interpretations, as entry into comparative religious studies. I will then turn to Longchenpa, drawing on both the translations and interpretations of David Germano to set up my examples for comparison.
In particular, I am focusing on the “subtle body of vital presence.” This is the body that attains a peak state of flow, energy, and vitality by recovering its connection to Consciousness. I am signaling that such a body is remarkably similar to what has been called “Soul” in other places and times, if we focus on its corresponding connection to Being and the wonderful implications of such connecting for this very life, bracketing any notions of transmigration or life after death. A.H. Almaas notes that, even in our own “Western” lineages, for most of history we have allowed for the existence of Soul,8 and have understood that Soul is able to know both Being and Universe; that these three are interrelated aspects of one Reality.9 The same problems that we have understanding Soul are transferable to the understanding of subtle body. Theories—as well as our language, hermeneutics, and understanding—about souls and subtle bodies need to be correspondingly subtle. Following Abhinavagupta’s and Longchenpa’s leads, I suggest that the subtle body is where Reality enfolds at once both Consciousness and matter.10 Notably, Germano makes similar connections, also calling for a comparative study focused on the subtle body. He notes the cross-cultural significance of “spiritual breath” and “inner winds” (rlung; prāṇa) of subtle body practice and the cross-cultural identification of this notion with notions of life and soul. Inspired by various other thinkers, including the psychologist Harry T. Hunt,11 I will show how these various notions are gathered together in the notion of “vital presence.”
Abhinavagupta’s dazzling bright and spinning wheel of fire
I now describe three examples of contemplative practices related to the subtle body. My first example is from Abhinavagupta’s fifth chapter of the Tantrāloka, in which he focuses on using the breath, mind, and body as objective supports for the contemplation, and thus as the means by which the practitioner is able to access Ultimate Reality, or Consciousness. Abhinavagupta first introduces the subtle body practices:
Ultimate Reality lights up, in our intellect-vital breath-body complex. These are not separate from the Light, which is only Consciousness. Because of Consciousness’s freedom, It has two qualities: the body of Consciousness, and insentience.12
For Abhinavagupta, Reality is made of both Consciousness and matter, yet not in any simple dualistic way. These, in fact, intertwine—most precisely in the human being, who may use their breath, mind, and body to access Consciousness. Reality enfolds both Consciousness and matter. This enfolding takes its most complex shape in the human individual, in the Self or Soul.
The first of five practices described by Abhinavagupta is contemplative visualization (dhyāna). Abhinavagupta, master of both religion and aesthetics, is certainly aware of the rich history of dhyāna in India, beginning with the ṛṣis and continuing with all creative artists and visionaries, up to Abhinavagupta himself.13 Abhinavagupta’s actual presentation, as always, is dense, and was meant to be used with the guidance of a lineage teacher. I will rely on the brilliant guide Christopher Wallis provides. Wallis has translated parts of the corresponding chapter of Abhinavagupta’s summary text, Essence of the Tantra (Tantrasāra), supplemented with his own extra-textual guide to the contemplative practices.14 Here is my paraphrased summary of the essential parts of Walllis’ meditative guide that will allow us to make more sense of Abhinavagupta’s descriptions in the Tantrāloka:
First, center one’s awareness in the Heart. Second, visualize the subtle body, i.e., visualize one’s body as containing three channels. One breathes in through the top of the head to the Heart through the left channel, which is imagined as glowing as the breath-energy flows through. One retains the breath, being centered in the Heart. Then one breathes out starting at the Heart through the right channel and out through the top of the head. One continues, slowly extending length of pause, until a bodily-felt energy, the Fire of Mahābhairava, suddenly flashes forth in the Heart. Third, one visualizes the energy as a fire wheel with twelve spokes, pulsing and spinning in the Heart, exiting through one of the sense openings (eye, ear, or another opening). The wheel leaves the body and rests on a sense object, corresponding to the sense opening (a visual object; for example, if the wheel exited through the eyes, and so on). Fourth, as the pulsating, spinning wheel rests on the object, the practitioner imagines that the object is an emission of their own consciousness and is being filled with divine energy. Then, dissolve the object in the fire wheel as it reenters the body through same sense opening as before and then rises through central channel to dissolve in Void at the top of the head as one exhales. Fifth, after the wheel has rested into the silence of the space at the top of the head, one rests there in complete stillness of the Void. Sixth, repeat process, now using the memory of the object instead of a real object.
Returning to Abhinavagupta’s description of contemplative visualization, the practice traditionally involves gathering one’s awareness in the Heart, and then making contact with Being. Abhinavagupta begins his description by stating that to know Reality is to know what is inside one’s Heart. This is not the physical Heart, but nonetheless accessible to the practitioner through their own body. Abhinavagupta continues:
Moon-Sun-Fire, one should contemplate on their fusion, thinking nothing else. From the rubbing together of the firesticks of this contemplation, the oblation-eating fire of Mahābhairava, in the great sacrificial pit of the Heart, intensely setting aflame, one should make it flourish. One should meditate on the abodes of knower, known, and the knowing, indivisible with the radiant presence of Bhairava and his expansive power.15
This practice involves breathing both in and out for successively longer periods of time and then the fusing together of these two different breaths; finding the perfect still-point or balance.16 The reference to moon and sun and fire tells us that Abhinavagupta is referring to subtle body visualization.17 The terms “sun,” “moon,” and “fire” refer to the three channels, the three phases of knowing, the three breaths (inward, outward, and their fusion), and the three goddesses of Abhinavagupta’s Trika tradition (Parā, Parā-Aparā, and Aparā).
The practitioner is visualizing the Self as a hollow container of channels, while also feeling movement. Three channels, well known in subtle body discourses, are most important: the light of the moon channel, on the left; the light of the sun channel, on the right; and the light of the fire channel, the central channel. Significantly, the practitioner transcends their former body image and self-identity, now seeing and feeling themselves as a body of light.18 The practitioner evokes the cycle of Consciousness, the processes of knowing and perception, and the various types of breaths or wind energies. Finally, Lilian Silburn notes that the practitioner “reunite[s] all the energies of body, thought, and speech in order to blend them into a single current of intense vibrations,” gathering them together into one center.19 The bodily energies of the practitioner—the subtlest levels of how they breathe and, therefore, how they perceive, know, and are conscious—tend to be chaotically distributed throughout the body; the process involves moving from a chaotic fragmented state to a unitary state.
Abhinavagupta continues:
This No-Thing-Higher Cakra, from the Heart, flows out through the spaces of the eyes [and the other senses],20 into the various fields of sense-objectivity. Thus, onto the sensory field of sound and so forth, through the pathway of the space of the sensory organ of hearing and so forth, through this Cakra falling, [the practitioner] recognizes [the field and the Cakra] as identical [to Bhairava]. Like a powerful lord, the universal emperor, this [Dazzling Bright Spinning Wheel, the Cakra which has become the Fiery Bhairava, the Great Tremendum], the nature of all, wherever it falls through this process [is followed by its senses, just as the emperor is followed by his subjects].21
We see here a practice of energy leaving through or entering one of the sense openings, cr...
