2.4 Action Tantras > 2.1.2.2.1.2.2.2.3 The Eight Body Tantras > 2.6 Ancient Tantras > 2.1.2.2.1.2.2.2 Thirty-two Rali Explanatory Tantras Of Cakrasaṃvara > Collected Spells Doxcat > 2.2 Tantras Of Esoteric Practice

Tibetan Texts > Bka’ ’gyur > Bka’ ’gyur Master Doxographical Categories > Tantras of Esoteric Practice

(2.2) Yoga Tantra

By Steven Neal Weinberger

This section is devoted to the third (and second-highest) of the four classes of tantra – Yoga Tantra (རྣལ་འབྱོར་རྒྱུད་, rnal ’byor rgyud, yogatantra) – and begins with the root tantra of this class, the Compendium of Reality of all Thus-Gone Ones (དེ་བཞིན་གཤེགས་པ་ཐམས་ཅད་ཀྱི་དེ་ཁོ་ན་ཉིད་བསྡུས་པ་, de bzhin gshegs pa thams cad kyi de kho na nyid bsdus pa, Sarva-tathāgata-tattva-saṃgraha) (D.481). Much like the preceding Highest Yoga Tantra section, Situ’s catalog divides the texts here between works that focus primarily on “methods” (ཐབས་, thabs, upāya) and those that focus primarily on “wisdom” or “insight” (ཤེས་རབ་, shes rab, prajñā).

In terms of the historical development of Buddhist tantra in India, Yoga Tantra represents the first true cycle of tantras, with texts related in varying degrees, often through the central deity of Vairocana (རྣམ་པར་སྣང་མཛད་, rnam par snang mdzad). Butön Rinchendrup (བུ་སྟོན་རིན་ཆེན་གྲུབ་, bu ston rin chen grub, 1290-1364), arguably the foremost Tibetan scholar of Yoga Tantra, describes the structure of this cycle of texts as consisting of the following three types:

  1. Root tantras (རྩ་རྒྱུད་, rtsa rgyud, mūlatantra)
  2. Explanatory tantras (བཤད་རྒྱུད་, bshad rgyud, ākhyāna-tantra)
  3. Concordant tantras (ཆ་མཐུན་གྱི་རྒྱུད་, cha mthun pa'i rgyud, *bhāgīya-tantra).

Situ’s catalog uses these categories in the “methods” section.

Literature:

  • Dalton, Jacob. “A Crisis of Doxography: How Tibetans Organized Tantra During the 8th-12th Centuries.” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 28:1 (2005): 115–181.
  • Hopkins, Jeffrey. Yoga Tantra: Paths to Magical Feats. Ithaca: Snow Lion Publications, 2005.
  • Mkhas-grub Dge-legs-dpal-bzang-po. Mkhas Grub Rje’s Fundamentals of the Buddhist Tantras: Rgyud Sde Spyiḥi Rnam Par Gźag Pa Rgyas Par Brjod. Translated by F. D. Lessing and Alex Wayman. Indo-Iranian Monographs 8. The Hague: Mouton, 1968.
  • Snellgrove, David L. Indo-Tibetan Buddhism: Indian Buddhists and Their Tibetan Successors, 2 vols. Boston: Shambhala, 1987.
  • Tadeusz Skorupski, “external link: The Canonical Tantras of the New Schools.” In external link: Tibetan Literature: Studies in Genre, edited by José Ignacio Cabezón and Roger R. Jackson, 95-110. Ithaca: Snow Lion Publications, 1996.
  • Weinberger, Steven Neal. “The Significance of Yoga Tantra and the Compendium of Principles (Tattvasaṃgraha Tantra) within Tantric Buddhism in India and Tibet.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Virginia, 2003.
  • Weinberger, Steven Neal. “The Yoga Tantras and the Social Context of Their Transmission to Tibet.” Chung-hwa Buddhist Journal, no. 23 (2010): 131-66.
  • Williams, Paul and Anthony Tribe. “Tantric Texts: Classification and Characteristics.” In Buddhist Thought: A Complete Introduction to the Indian Tradition, 202–217. New York: Routledge, 2000.