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The online version of this article can be found at:

DOI: 10.1177/00084298100390010816
2010 39: 119 Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses
Patricia A. Dold
Chicago Press, 2003. xix + 372 pp
of South Asian Context David Gordon White Chicago and London: University
Reviews of Books / Comptes Rendus: Kiss of the Yogini: ''Tantric Sex'' in its

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at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on February 8, 2014 sir.sagepub.com Downloaded from at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on February 8, 2014 sir.sagepub.com Downloaded from
millennium was added. Yet concurrently there was a contrary feature of evangelicalism:
its ability to transcend denominational divisions.
Displaying an impressive command of his material, Ward makes apparent the eclectic
mix of traditions and influences that formed early evangelicalism. The book has, in addi-
tion, opened many new lines of inquiry, most intriguingly the parallel developments in
Jewish and Christian thought in the 17th century, a topic deserving of further research.
We have reason, therefore, to be grateful to Professor Ward for identifying these under-
currents and for the bringing the fruits of his scholarship (much of it derived from Ger-
man sources) to us and in the course of doing so reminding historians of evangelicalism
of the diverse origins of that movement outside the Anglo-American axis.
Thomas Power
Wycliffe College
Kiss of the Yogin : Tantric Sex in its South Asian Context
David Gordon White
Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2003. xix 372 pp.
David Gordon Whites central argument in Kiss of the Yogini is that the most distinctive
element within Tantra is sexualized ritual practice and specifically the generation and
consumption of male and female sexual fluids. This, the hard-core of Tantra, is data-
ble to the 9th to 10th centuries. Using textual, art historical, and ethnographic evidence,
White traces the historical development of this core and its sublimation in post-11th-cen-
tury Tantric theory. His intricate examination focuses on the main Kaula participants
(Yogin s, V ras, Siddhas, and kings), and a deliberately literal reading of a number of
Sanskrit terms including kula (family, clan), dravyam (fluid), mukham (mouth), and khe-
cara (flight) (7).
While focused on sexualized ritual practices, White attempts to reconstruct a his-
tory, a religious anthropology, and a political economy of (mainly Hindu) Tantra from
the medieval period to the present day (2). As such, the study addresses broader issues
pertaining to the place of Tantra in South Asian religious history. According to White,
mainstream (soft-core) Tantra can be defined generally as a body of techniques for
the control of multiple, often female, beings and these techniques are of three types:
mantras, techniques of possession, and gratification with offerings (with the supreme
offering consisting of the practitioners bodily constituents) (13). White suggests that
this mainstream Tantra was the predominant religious paradigm, for over a millennium,
of the great majority of inhabitants of the Indian subcontinent (3). As such, Tantra rep-
resents an alternate, even subaltern category that historians of religion could use to coun-
ter the distorting effects of over-privileging elite voices, including those of later orthodox
Vaiava and S

aiva devotional (bhakti) traditions (3-7).

By reconstructing the historical Tantric (and specifically Kaula) sexualized ritual
practices, White aims to discredit New Age Tantric sex for its abusive appropriation
of the adjective Tantric (xiv). Not only do New Age purveyors bypass lineage and not
only are their techniques remarkably unimaginative, their goals of enhancing sexual
stamina and prolonging sexual pleasure are, indeed, a world apart from those of hard-
Reviews of Books / Comptes Rendus 119
at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on February 8, 2014 sir.sagepub.com Downloaded from
core Kaula ritual: acquisition of powers and divine status through initiation and mem-
bership in a Yogin clan and/or the ritual consumption of menstrual blood, semen, and
other substances. It is unfortunate that neither Whites commitment to historical accu-
racy nor his disdain for the bogus claims of New Age Tantric sex do not prevent him
from labeling Kaula sexualized ritual as hard-core Tantra (or, on occasion, hard-core
Tantric sex (14)), while mainstream elements of Tantra are soft-core. The porno-
graphic connotations are inappropriate, especially in a study of the historical forms of
Tantric sex.
White analyses the history of the Yogin , from her Vedic antecedents through a full
range of Tantric interpretations (chapters 2 and 8). He examines South Asian understand-
ings of vital and sexual fluids (chapter 3), techniques for their generation, sharing, and/or
consumption (chapter 4), kings roles and participation in Tantra (chapter 5), the history
of Siddhas (chapter 6), and the varied meanings of flight as a power or ability resulting
from sexualized ritual practice (chapter 7). As well as exploring sexualized ritual, much
of Whites examination establishes that Tantras origins cannot be relegated exclusively
to some non-Vedic (or worse, non-A

ryan) source and that Tantras place in the religious

landscape cannot be reduced to non-A

ryan, tribal, or marginalized settings. Furthermore,

modern Tantrika practitioners (chapter 9), including women Yogin s, and other spe-
cialists who use ritual and/or possession to heal and divine, can be appreciated as the
heirs of what was, and for many South Asians still is, mainstream religious life.
The task of critiquing Whites translations of Tantric texts falls to specialists in that
growing area of scholarship. However, one wonders: does a heavy reliance on the Kau-
lajnananiraya determine Whites identification of sexualized ritual practices as the dis-
tinctive core of Tantra? Are the frequent bracketed additions provided for justification of
one interpretation or simply clarification of a translation? Are Tantras as univocal as he
sometimes makes them appear? Even if Whites claim about sexualized ritual practices
as the distinctive core of Tantra is disputed or his use of texts criticized, his arguments
are brilliant and compelling especially for their potential to transform scholarly under-
standing of Tantra and its place within the mainstream of Indian religious history. As
such, the work will be useful if not indispensable for all academic specialists in South
Asian religions, from senior undergraduates to scholars of Tantra.
Patricia A. Dold
Memorial University of Newfoundland
The Making of a Savior Bodhisattva: Dizang in Medieval China
Zhiru
Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2007. xiii305 pp.
Like the author, my first encounter with Dizang (in my case in a Vietnamese pagoda in
Montreal) was through modern ritual and iconography. Since then, I have had many
encounters with Dizang in pagodas in Canada as well as throughout Vietnam, and have
often been curious about the origins of this bodhisattva, who figures so prominently,
along with Guanyin, Shakyamuni and Amitabha. Dizang is particularly intriguing as a
researcher and particularly important for East Asia Buddhists, because of his role as a
120 Studies in Religion / Sciences Religieuses 39(1)
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