I. VAMA MARGA Foundations Of The Left-Hand Path - staticfly.net

transplant the exact practices of the Eastern left-hand path to a Western
environment, it would not be magically desirable to do so. Many of the outer
manifestations of the Eastern Vama Marga are simply not relevant to a
magician working in the modern Western world, although the eternal esoteric
principles are relevant to all times and places.
This is why this book urges the way of creative synthesis rather than
strict observance of archaic tradition for its own sake. It would be foolish for
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the modern left-hand path sex magician to act without first gaining a sound
understanding of the basic principles that inform the left-hand path tradition.
But one should not fall prey to the common magical error of assuming that
just because some practice is condoned by tradition, it must be just as valid
today.
Ancient is not a synonym for good; much that is ancient is worthless
in a contemporary context, save for historical interest. Separating the
effective from the irrelevant is the discerning task of each individual
magician. Thankfully, left-hand path Tantra lends itself to individual
application; few esoteric methods are so free of dogma. Despite the
sometimes forbidding esoteric terminology of the Tantric Vama Marga, its
actual teachings are primarily of a practical and experimental nature, rather
than the rigid agglomeration of regulations common to many initiatory
schools.
Furthermore, even though India provides us with the richest, most
intact and continuous model of left-hand path initiation to study, it would be
a mistake to imagine that the sinister current itself is of exclusively Indian
provenance. In fact, the left-hand path is actually located in your own brain,
spinal column and genitals, waiting to be switched on. Many magicians have
activated this current within themselves entirely by accident, with no
knowledge whatsoever of the historical left-handed tradition. Those who
have stumbled upon this power spontaneously, usually through an
experience of intense sexual ecstasy, certainly have an advantage in having
inadvertently come to this realization. The fact that this event has occurred
at all would indicate a great deal of potential – many humans are never able
to awaken the sinister current that can be made to flow through the bodymindsoul
complex.
But calling oneself a traveler on the left-hand path without first
attaining a solid understanding of its long-established methods and
principles is somewhat like saying you're an astronaut because you once saw
a space shuttle on TV. Similarly, simply reading through this (or any) book
on a strictly intellectual level will not place you on the left-hand path; that
can only occur when you've applied the theoretical postulates to the many
aspects of your being, directing sexual ecstasy towards alteration of those
deceptive phenomena most readily categorized as inner self and outer
reality.
A very common misunderstanding that we have come across among
Westerners eager to learn the ways of left-hand path sex magic, is an
assumption that in "enlightened" India its practice is surely widely known
and accepted. This imagined openness is pitted against what is assumed to
be Western ignorance. It is true that Hinduism allows for a different degree
of dissent and heresy than Westerners might be accustomed to observing in
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their own society regarding sex-magical practices. Nevertheless, the Vama
Marga remains little known and little understood even in India. When it is
mentioned, it is usually in a disdainful and uninformed manner. M.
Krishnamacharya in his History Of Classical And Tantric Literature, typifies
this ignorance, when he writes: "It is a licentious worship, and leads to
cruelty, self-indulgence, and sensual gratification. Hence it is a blot upon the
'Modern Hinduism'. The sect goes under the name of the Bahm Marges (sic),