Tag: Buddhist Tantra

The Trojan Horse of Tibetan Buddhism

mim

This whole emptiness thing is ultimately a red herring. It’s a smokescreen nudging us toward mediumship. The religion of the future is a religion of possession. It’s this neo-shamanic, pagan paradigm centered on emptying oneself. That’s where all this nihilism, all this narcissism, and all the psychedelic nonsense leads. It’s getting people to a place where they feel logically prepared to become comfortable with letting entities in.” (1)

Thomas Millary, Psyop Cinema

The story of Troy offers one of the clearest images of deception ever given to the West. After failing to conquer the city by force, the Greeks constructed an enormous wooden horse, concealed armed men inside it, and left it outside the walls as an apparent offering. The Trojans brought the object into their own city. What appeared peaceful, sacred, and worthy of reverence carried an invading force within it.

Strictly speaking, the horse does not appear in Homer’s Iliad, which ends before Troy falls. It belongs to the wider Trojan cycle and is recalled in Homer’s Odyssey. Yet the metaphor grows directly from the Homeric world: what cannot enter openly enters through deception and misplaced reverence.

This is how I have come to understand the spread of Tibetan Buddhism and related occult religions in the West.

They did not arrive announcing themselves as systems of spirit invocation, ritual transformation, deity possession, and total submission to unseen beings and their human minions. They entered through a much more attractive gateway, one of compassion, mindfulness, and methods for dealing with psychological disorders like anxiety. The public was shown an attractive wooden horse. Few people thought to ask what might be concealed inside it.

The outer presentation is as follows: newcomers learn basic Buddhist ethics, calm-abiding meditation, (shamatha), and insight meditation (vipassana). They learn about compassion, non-attachment, loving-kindness, emptiness, and the Middle Way. They may be introduced to Chenrezig meditation practice–a white, four-armed deity who embodies compassion. The language sounds philosophical and therapeutic. It promises greater self-knowledge, freedom from destructive emotions, and a kinder relationship with the world.

What remains out of view is the destination toward which the system leads. Adjacent to the public meditation halls are advanced teachings restricted by initiation, vows, and secrecy. At some centers there are retreat buildings where selected practitioners undertake the traditional three-year retreat. The curriculum usually includes Vajrayana sadhanas, subtle-body exercises, guru yoga, deity visualization, mantra recitation, and practices in which the practitioner is taught to dissolve ordinary identity and arise as a tantric deity. Such practices are presented internally as sacred methods for attaining realization. I eventually came to see them differently: as training in demonic spirit channeling, concealed beneath theological euphemisms that make the entities and rituals sound safe and beneficent.

This distinction between the outer presentation and inner practice is the heart of the Trojan Horse metaphor. The problem is not that every person teaching awareness of the breath knows what lies at the end of the initiatory road. Many Western instructors may have encountered only the public teachings themselves. Some may sincerely believe that they are offering neutral psychological exercises. A Trojan Horse does not require every person pulling it through the gate to know what it contains.

The Tibetan Buddhist Center Above, The Magickal Childe Below

I first encountered Tibetan Buddhist practices at a center on West 19th Street in New York City. On the ground floor of the building was an infamous occult shop called The Magickal Childe. The Buddhist center was on the fifth floor.

The Magickal Childe was one of New York’s best-known occult shops. Its shelves carried ritual implements, esoteric books, herbs, incense, candles, and magical material drawn from several occult traditions. We were warned to stay away from it because it sold hardcore Satanic literature and paraphernalia.

Upstairs, everything was different, or so it appeared. We learned about buddhas and bodhisattvas, compassion and enlightenment. We were taught practices that seemed morally elevated and spiritually clean. Whatever might have been happening in the shop below appeared to have nothing to do with the meditation and philosophy offered several floors above.

Looking back, I see the arrangement as an almost perfect symbol. The obvious occultism was downstairs, where it could be recognized by its black candles, grimoires, and sinister reputation. The respectable spiritual system was upstairs, wrapped in the language of wisdom and compassion. We assumed that the difference in appearance proved a difference in kind.

What we could not see was the possibility that we, too, were being prepared for spirit channeling, though perhaps involving a different class of demons from those summoned through the grimoires and ritual objects sold downstairs. The preparation was slower, more sophisticated, and protected by an elaborate philosophical structure. What appeared to be a path far removed from overt Satanism eventually led toward identification with beings presented as tantric deities, protectors, and dakinis, all described as enlightened manifestations but ultimately demonic in nature.

The overt occultist seeks an entity. The tantric initiate is taught to visualize one, invoke it, identify with it, and allow it to displace one’s ordinary sense of self. The vocabulary differs, but from a Christian perspective, the spiritual danger does not.

The Empty Man and the Two Faces of Initiation

The film The Empty Man helped me see this pattern more clearly. I found much of the film difficult to sit through, although it has its moments. More rewarding was the discussion of the film by Thomas Millary, his Psyop Cinema co-host Brett Carollo, and Jay Dyer. Millary is a scholar of religion, philosophy, and theology whose conversion to Orthodox Christianity changed his understanding of his earlier interests in paranormal phenomena, mysticism, occultism, psychedelia, and popular culture. His work now examines the spiritual and psychological messages concealed in film.

One sequence in The Empty Man particularly stayed with me. At the Pontifex Institute, ordinary people receive abstract teachings about meditation, identity, and emptiness. In the bowels of the building, secluded initiates participate in a collective ritual centered upon transmitting or incarnating an inhuman entity. The respectable institute and the occult rite are parts of one system. The public teaching creates the intellectual and psychological container necessary for the hidden operation.

That juxtaposition reminded me immediately of the Tibetan Buddhist centers where I lived and studied. The newcomers learn that the self lacks inherent existence and that all phenomena are empty. These teachings initially seem like a superior form of philosophy combined with methods for calming the mind.

Nearby, but largely invisible to the newcomer, are initiates undertaking practices that bear little resemblance to a secular mindfulness class. They make vows with non-human entities whose natures may not have been well understood by the initiates when they first entered.

In The Empty Man, the institute needs an empty vessel. The film’s horror depends on the possibility that a human personality can be weakened, reconstructed, or displaced so that something else can speak and act through it.

That is why Millary’s warning about emptiness deserves serious attention. Emptiness can be presented as an abstract philosophical claim about dependent origination and the absence of inherent existence. It can also function psychologically as a program of self-erasure. When combined with submission to a guru, repetitive ritual, sensory isolation, visualization, breath manipulation, and invocation, the practical question becomes unavoidable: What is expected to occupy the space once the person has been trained to empty himself?

The “Gift” Brought Through the Gates

The people of Troy were not conquered because they lacked intelligence. They were conquered because they misidentified a weapon as a gift.

The Western fascination with Buddhism has been shaped by a similar misidentification. What came from the East was frequently treated as a superior philosophy rather than a religion containing pagan gods and evil spirits, rituals, initiations, demonic hierarchies, indelible vows, and dangerous esoteric practices. Western converts were encouraged to contrast Buddhist rationality with supposedly primitive Christian beliefs about a Creator God, heaven and hell, and the outdated concepts of good and evil.

That contrast made the deception easier. A culture that scoffs at the concept of demons will not recognize an demonic invocation when it is renamed a visualization. A person who would refuse to summon a spirit may agree to “generate” himself as a deity. Someone who would recoil from possession may accept ego dissolution, guru devotion, and the surrender of ordinary identity when those things are presented as advanced methods of awakening.

By the time the nature of the inner system becomes visible, the practitioner may have invested years of diligent work, surrendered moral judgment to a teacher, accepted secrecy vows, and learned to interpret fear or resistance as evidence of spiritual inferiority. The horse is already inside the walls.

The question is therefore much larger than whether meditation can make people feel calmer and more peaceful. It often can. We must judge a religious system by its full initiatory structure, not merely by the introductory practices shown to the public. We must ask where the path ultimately leads, what type of beings are invoked, what vows are demanded, what spiritual realities are concealed, and why the deeper teachings require forms of secrecy that prevent newcomers from giving true informed consent.

The occult did not need to batter down the gates of the post-Christian West. Tibetan monks and lamas entered bearing teachings of compassion and emptiness. Western seekers welcomed the apparent offering with open arms, unaware of what was concealed within.

(1) Thomas Millary, quoted and lightly edited for clarity: “Luciferian Pop Culture: Empty Man, La Femme Nikita & Hardware – PsyOP Cinema + Jay Dyer” discussion with Brett Carollo and Jay Dyer, YouTube video, accessed July 27, 2026, @1:56:48: https://youtu.be/u7CMHjtskXw?si=W86oMv0jDizk_FWP.

Shapeshifting Siddhis in the Chakrasamvara Tantra and Related Traditions

mim

Among the stranger subjects in tantric literature, shapeshifting remains one of the least discussed in modern Buddhist writing. Contemporary presentations of Vajrayana often reduce siddhis (magical powers) to metaphors but the older tantric sources speak in a very different voice. They describe special abilities gained through ritual practice, sexual yoga, cremation-ground rites, mantra recitation, visionary contact with yoginis and dakinis, and mastery over subtle forces in the body. One of those powers was transformation into animals and birds, especially predatory birds associated with flight, hunting, and the crossing of worlds.

The Chakrasamvara Tantra belongs to the Yogini Tantras, a class of Buddhist tantras that emerged in medieval India between the eighth and twelfth centuries. These texts were tied to charnel-ground cults, wandering siddhas, and yogini circles that existed at the edge of settled religious life. David B. Gray notes that the Chakrasamvara system was deeply connected with yogini cults and with rites considered transgressive even within Indian Buddhism.[1] The tantric world described in these texts was not symbolic in the modern literary sense. Spirits, dakinis, flesh-offerings, flight, possession, and bodily transformation were treated as concrete possibilities.

The language surrounding yoginis and dakinis is especially important because these beings were repeatedly linked to shape-changing and aerial movement. Traditional tantric vocabulary uses terms such as khecari, meaning “sky-goer” or “sky-traveler.” The yogini was understood as a being capable of moving between human and nonhuman forms, crossing physical and subtle worlds. Medieval Shaiva and Buddhist tantras describe yoginis with animal heads, bird forms, or hybrid bodies. The scholar Shaman Hatley writes that yoginis were associated with “actual shapeshifting” and with the power of flight.[2] The same literature links them to cremation grounds, nocturnal rites, and transmission of forbidden knowledge.

These themes appear in Buddhist tantric systems connected to Chakrasamvara. The dakini was not simply a poetic figure. In Tibetan commentarial traditions, dakinis could appear as women, animals, spirits, or wrathful beings encountered during ritual practice and visionary states. Judith Simmer-Brown notes that advanced tantric systems described an “outer” dakini attained through completion-stage practices involving the subtle body and its energetic transformations.[3] For advanced siddhas (tantric masters), visionary identification with animal or deity forms could culminate in actual transformation.

The Chakrasamvara cycle itself preserves traces of older tribal and shamanic material absorbed into Buddhist tantra. (For reference see my previous article titled Tantra’s Hidden Origins: Magicians, Sorcerers, and the Non-Literate World of Ancient India). The central deity Heruka stands amid cremation grounds, wearing bone ornaments and trampling Hindu deities beneath his feet. The mandala contains circles of dakinis and yoginis who embody wild and dangerous forces. Several female tantric figures connected to the tradition take animal forms. Vajravarahi herself appears with the head of a sow projecting from her temple. Animal-headed yoginis appear throughout related tantric iconography, especially in the yogini cults that influenced the Yogini Tantras.[4]

What matters here is that medieval tantric practitioners understood bodily identity as fluid. Ritual identification with a deity was already considered a real alteration of consciousness and subtle embodiment. Certain siddhis pushed this much further. Tantric manuals across both Buddhist and Shaiva traditions contain rites for invisibility, flight, entering another body, controlling spirits, and assuming alternate forms. The line between spirit possession and shapeshifting was often thin.

The predatory bird carries special weight in this material. Birds of prey appear in tantric symbolism as beings that move between earth and sky, life and death. Dakinis themselves were frequently linked with vultures, hawks, crows, owls, and carrion birds associated with cremation grounds. Tibetan art and ritual literature preserve many examples of wrathful female spirits with wings, claws, and avian features. The Tibetan term for dakini, khandroma, literally means “sky-goer.” This idea of aerial movement was not seen as fantasy. The ability to leave the body, travel through the sky, or assume bird form were skills that belonged to the siddhas’ reperatoires across India and Tibet.

Accounts surrounding the eighty-four mahasiddhas strengthen this point. These wandering tantric adepts were credited with powers that included levitation, bodily transformation, magical travel, and command over animals. Hagiographies describe siddhas appearing in unexpected forms or vanishing from ordinary sight. Luipa, one of the central figures in the Chakrasamvara transmission lineage, practiced in charnel grounds and was linked with yogini initiations involving antinomian rites.[5] These stories were preserved by tantric communities as records of attainment rather than allegories.

Parallels with indigenous traditions elsewhere are difficult to ignore. Among several Native American nations, especially in the Plains and Subarctic regions, ritual specialists described experiences of animal transformation tied to spirit travel, hunting magic, warfare, and visionary initiation. Eagle and hawk transformations carried particular importance because birds of prey were regarded as mediators between human beings and the upper worlds. Some ceremonial societies taught that a practitioner could spiritually become the animal whose power had entered him. Similar beliefs existed among Siberian shamans, Mongolian spirit-mediums, and Central Asian ecstatic traditions.

There are important differences between these cultures, and they should not be collapsed into a single universal system. Buddhist tantra emerged within the religious environment of India, drawing from Shaiva, tribal, yogic, and cremation-ground traditions. Native American ceremonial systems developed independently within their own spiritual landscapes. Yet the recurrence of animal transformation, flight, spirit embodiment, and predatory bird symbolism across cultures suggests that these experiences belong to a wider stratum of ritual consciousness.

Modern scholars usually interpret shapeshifting language symbolically because the academic world has little room for the supernatural claims made in tantric texts. Yet even cautious historians admit that medieval tantric practitioners themselves believed siddhis were real attainments. The Chakrasamvara Tantra emerged within circles that accepted spirit contact, magical rites, visionary encounters, and bodily transformation as part of advanced practice.[6]

Reports of shapeshifting and animal embodiment did not disappear with the medieval world. In Himalayan regions, parts of Nepal, India, Mongolia, and Tibet, stories about yogis taking animal form still circulate among practitioners and villagers. Similar accounts continue among Indigenous ceremonial traditions in the Americas. Outsiders may dismiss such claims as folklore, hallucination, or symbolic storytelling, but the communities preserving them rarely make such distinctions. For them, the spirit world remains actively dangerous, and immediate.

The modern tendency to sanitize tantra has hidden much of this material. Popular books often frame Vajrayana as a system of abstract psychology wrapped in exotic symbolism. The older texts present something more unsettling. The siddha was expected to cross thresholds ordinary society feared. Cremation grounds, possession states, sexual rites, communion with dakinis and demons, and shape-changing powers formed part of the same ritual landscape. The Chakrasamvara Tantra did not emerge from a polite monastery culture detached from magic. It emerged from circles that believed reality itself could be bent through disciplined contact with forces most people feared and avoided.

Footnotes

[1] David B. Gray, The Cakrasamvara Tantra: The Discourse of Sri Heruka (New York: American Institute of Buddhist Studies, 2007).

[2] Shaman Hatley, cited in “Yogini,” Wikipedia, discussing yogini traditions and shapeshifting associations. (en.wikipedia.org)

[3] Judith Simmer-Brown, discussed in “Dakini,” Wikipedia. (en.wikipedia.org)

[4] “Yogini Temples,” discussion of theriomorphic yoginis and tantric transformation motifs. (en.wikipedia.org)

[5] Alexander Berzin, “What Is Chakrasamvara Practice?” discussing Luipa and Chakrasamvara transmission traditions. (studybuddhism.com)

[6] “Cakrasamvara,” Encyclopedia.com, describing the Yogini Tantras and their transgressive ritual framework. (encyclopedia.com)

Tantra’s Hidden Origins: Magicians, Sorcerers, and the Non-Literate World of Ancient India

mim

Modern scholarship on tantra has often treated it as a sophisticated religious system rooted in elite textual traditions and later integrated into high philosophical frameworks. In Buddhist contexts, especially in Tibetan scholastic traditions, tantric practice is frequently interpreted through the lens of Madhyamaka philosophy and incorporated into systematic doctrinal models. In these settings, tantra is positioned as the highest and most effective form of religious practice, supported and rationalized by philosophical analysis. There is truth in this account, but it reflects a later stage of development, the priorities of literate traditions that preserved texts, not necessarily the conditions under which tantra first emerged.

A growing number of scholars have challenged this retrospective model. Ronald M. Davidson’s study, Magicians, Sorcerers and Witches: Considering Pretantric, Non-sectarian Sources of Tantric Practices, offers a particularly forceful corrective: tantra cannot be adequately explained as the product of elite intellectual systems alone, nor as a simple inversion of orthodox traditions such as the Vedic corpus or the dharmasūtras.¹

Instead, Davidson argues that tantra must be understood within a much broader social and ritual field, one that includes non-literate practitioners whose activities long predate the emergence of tantric traditions as such. These figures, magicians, sorcerers, witches, and seers, were not marginal anomalies. They formed a durable and widespread presence in Indian religious life, operating across ancient, medieval, and even modern periods.² Their repertoire included healing, cursing, divination, spirit invocation, and various forms of ritual manipulation. These were not abstract techniques but effective practices. Some were performed in cremation grounds, involving work with corpses or restless or malevolent spirits: textual sources describe specialists who could animate a corpse or compel it to speak, a practice later associated with so-called vetāla rites. Others performed rituals to harm enemies, cure illness, or divine hidden information by invoking local deities or spirit beings. Such practices circulated widely and were recognized across Buddhist, Jain, and Brahmanical sources, even when criticized or prohibited. Many of these practices including corpse animation, harmful spells, and spirit work, would today be grouped under what is often called ‘witchcraft,’ though they were not understood as a single category in their original context.

Crucially, these practitioners were not “tantric.” They did not articulate soteriological goals of liberation, nor did they belong to the sectarian, lineage-based systems that later came to define tantric traditions.³ Their work was primarily practical rather than philosophically systematized, oriented toward immediate results rather than metaphysical coherence. Yet it is precisely this domain of practice–pragmatic, adaptive, and often non-literate–that Davidson identifies as a significant source for the later development of tantra.

This argument challenges a longstanding assumption in the study of Indian religions that authoritative origins must be found in texts. Much of the scholarship on tantra has privileged literate, intellectual traditions, in part because these are the sources that survive. But this creates a methodological distortion. If literacy rates in premodern India were extremely low, as Davidson notes, perhaps in the range of five percent, then any account of religious development that focuses exclusively on textual production necessarily excludes the overwhelming majority of practitioners.⁴ Tantra, emerging in such a context, cannot be reduced to what its later textualizers said about it.

The alternative Davidson proposes is not a single counter-origin, but a different model altogether. Rather than tracing tantra to one source, whether Vedic, Buddhist, or Śaiva, he describes a “multi-nodal” formation, meaning a network of multiple, overlapping sources in which diverse practices and traditions contribute to its development over time.⁵ Among these, the ritual activities of non-sectarian specialists play a crucial role. These practitioners developed techniques, terminologies, and ritual logics that were later appropriated by tantric communities. The process was neither systematic nor uniform. It was selective and intermittent, shaped by local needs and conditions.

In this light, tantra appears less as a coherent invention and more as a process of accumulation. Davidson characterizes this process in terms of bricolage: the assembling of new systems from pre-existing materials.⁶ Tantric traditions did not create their ritual repertoire out of nothing. They drew upon an already existing pool of practices—many of them associated with figures who operated outside the boundaries of orthodox religion—and recontextualized them within new ideological frameworks.

This perspective also clarifies why attempts to define tantra in purely oppositional terms have limited explanatory power. Some scholars have suggested that tantra emerges as a deliberate inversion of orthodox norms, particularly those codified in the dharmasūtras. Yet Davidson points out that such a model fails to account for the diversity of tantric practices. If inversion were the governing principle, one would expect a consistent pattern of reversal. Instead, the evidence reveals a heterogeneous collection of rituals, many of which do not correspond neatly to any orthodox counterpart.⁷

What this suggests is that tantra is not primarily a reaction against orthodoxy, but a reconfiguration of practices that existed alongside it. This is an important distinction. The categories of “orthodox” and “heterodox” begin to lose their explanatory clarity when we consider the extent to which ritual knowledge circulated outside formal institutions. The activities of magicians, sorcerers, and similar figures were not simply deviations from a normative system; they constituted an alternative domain of religious practice with its own internal logic.

The implications of this shift are quite significant. If tantra is, at least in part, a product of such practices, then its later intellectualization represents a secondary development. The philosophical frameworks that now define tantric traditions, whether in Buddhist or Hindu contexts, may be understood as attempts to systematize and legitimize practices that originated elsewhere.

It also complicates modern efforts to present tantra as a purely elevated or refined system. The desire to align tantra with high philosophy, particularly in contemporary interpretations, risks obscuring the conditions of its formation. Davidson’s analysis suggests that tantra’s roots lie not only in monasteries and scholastic debates, but in cremation grounds, village rituals, and the magical practices of specialists who worked with forces that formal religion often sought to regulate or marginalize.

To acknowledge this is not to reduce tantra to merely “magic,” nor to deny its later philosophical sophistication. It is to recognize that its development cannot be understood without taking seriously the contributions of those who operated outside the textual and institutional frameworks that scholars have traditionally privileged. Tantra, in this view, is not the product of a single tradition or a moment of divine revelation as is often taught. It is the outcome of a long process of interaction, appropriation, and reinterpretation across multiple domains of religious life, many of them outside the philosophical and textual traditions that later claimed to define it. In other words, tantra begins exactly where most scholars have not been looking—in the diverse and often non-literate ritual practices of magicians, sorcerers, and other specialists in ancient India.

Notes

  1. Ronald M. Davidson, “Magicians, Sorcerers and Witches: Considering Pretantric, Non-sectarian Sources of Tantric Practices,” Religions 8, no. 9 (2017): 188.
  2. Davidson, 2017, pp. 1–2.
  3. Davidson, 2017, p. 1.
  4. Davidson, 2017, p. 4.
  5. Davidson, 2017, pp. 2–3.
  6. Davidson, 2017, p. 1.
  7. Davidson, 2017, p. 2.

The “Civilized” Shaman: Geoffrey Samuel and the Tension at the Heart of the Tibetan Religion

mim

In Civilized Shamans: Buddhism in Tibetan Societies, Geoffrey Samuel offers a sweeping anthropology of Tibetan religion that refuses to take Tibetan Buddhism at face value. He finds a living tradition shaped by older and more unruly forces beneath the polished scholastic surface of the monasteries. What emerges is a civilization of monks and magicians, of disciplined philosophers and ecstatic ritualists. His argument is simple but radical: Tibetan Buddhism is the result of Indian Buddhist ethics and philosophy meeting the shamanic substratum of the high plateau.¹

Two orientations: clerical and shamanic

Samuel organizes Tibetan religion around two poles. The first, the clerical or monastic orientation, descends from Indian Buddhism with its monasteries, ethical codes, and scholastic systems of thought. It values restraint, karmic causality, and the gradual cultivation of enlightenment. The second, the shamanic orientation, grows from indigenous Tibetan practices centered on ritual efficacy, spirit interaction, and the manipulation of unseen forces. This orientation values power (dbang) more than purity and treats ritual specialists not as moral exemplars but as technicians of spiritual power.²

These two strands were never simply reconciled. Tibetan civilization attempted to domesticate the shaman. The ecstatic healer and spirit-fighter was refashioned into a lama, wrapped in robes and scriptures yet still capable of commanding spirits, averting misfortune, or destroying an enemy through ritual means. The civilized shaman is not a metaphor. It is a social type, the institutionalized magician of a literate Buddhist society.³

Dark rituals and the question of subjugation

The most uncomfortable continuity between these worlds lies in the domain of ritual violence, what Tibetan sources call drag-po or wrathful rites. These practices are directed not toward enlightenment but toward control: the binding, subduing, or annihilation of obstructing forces, whether demonic, psychic, or human.⁴

Samuel interprets these rites not as moral aberrations but as necessary expressions of the shamanic orientation within a Buddhist frame. Indian Buddhism had long flirted with magical power but kept it at the margins of monastic life. In Tibet, ritual mastery became central. The same lama who taught compassion might also perform a subjugation rite, using effigies, mantras, and visualizations of wrathful deities to annihilate obstacles, whether spiritual or human. Such practices, found in the Nyingma and Kagyu tantric cycles and institutionalized in monastic ritual manuals, embody a logic foreign to classical Indian soteriology yet native to shamanic cosmology, the idea that power must be met with power.⁵

What makes these rites “civilized” is not their ethical domestication but their integration into a bureaucratic religion. The Tibetan monastery became a regulated arena for managing violence and transforming it into ritual performance. The monastic code that forbade killing also licensed symbolic destruction: paper effigies burned, dough figures pierced, and demons tamed through mantras.⁶ This was how a society of monks could still believe in, and even engage in, acts of ritual aggression.

Power and legitimacy

Samuel’s analysis is more about social structure than theology. The clerical orientation secured legitimacy through moral authority and learning, while the shamanic orientation maintained relevance through immediate and pragmatic results. The former built monasteries; the latter kept communities going amid famine, disease, and invasion. Tibetan Buddhism’s durability, he argues, comes from this uneasy synthesis. The scholar-monk and the ritual adept needed each other: the first to lend doctrine and order, the second to command the spirits that haunted every valley and household.⁷

In this light, the dark rituals of subjugation are not aberrations but instruments of governance. They discipline the chaotic powers of the landscape just as the monastery disciplines the passions of the mind. To them, the wrathful deity is not a contradiction of compassion but its shadow: compassion armed.

Rethinking the “Buddhist” in Tibetan Buddhism

Samuel’s greatest contribution may be to unsettle what we think “Buddhist” means. By treating Tibetan religion as a field of interacting orientations rather than a single orthodoxy, he exposes the limits of modern, idealized Buddhism. The vision of Tibet as a purely pacific, philosophical culture depends on forgetting the tantric rites that promise to destroy human enemies or subjugate spirits.⁸ Samuel does not moralize about this tension; he historicizes it. The so-called civilized shaman is a figure born of necessity, mediating between an imported moral system and an indigenous world of volatile gods.⁹

A note on tantra as the mediating field

Samuel does not treat Hindu tantra as a third, independent strand within Tibetan Buddhism. Rather, he presents tantric practice as the meeting ground of the clerical and shamanic orientations. By the time tantra reached Tibet, Indian Buddhism had already absorbed many Śaiva and Śākta elements. What Tibet inherited, therefore, was a fully developed tantric Buddhism rather than a simple blend of Buddhist and Hindu ideas. In Samuel’s account, tantra provided the channel through which shamanic power could operate within a clerical framework. It was the mechanism that allowed ecstatic and ritual techniques to coexist with the disciplines of monastic scholarship.

He also describes tantric Buddhism in Tibet as a two-way exchange. The imported Indian systems of Hevajra, Guhyasamāja, Cakrasaṃvara, and others were reinterpreted through local cosmologies of mountain gods, territorial spirits, and ancestral deities. The result was what he calls “tantricized shamanism” or “shamanized Buddhism.” While Hindu tantra was one historical source, the Tibetan tantric complex became a hybrid formation that expressed shamanic cosmology through Buddhist doctrine.¹⁰

The afterlife of the civilized shaman

Civilized Shamans was published in 1993, before the wave of globalized Tibetan Buddhism tried to reframe lamas as psychologists or humanitarians. Yet its insight remains vital. Beneath every system of enlightenment lies a system of control. The Tibetan synthesis worked precisely because it did not abolish the shamanic element. It incorporated it, turning ecstatic violence into liturgy and spirit warfare into cosmology.¹¹

For those interested in understanding tantric practice, especially the darker currents of subjugation and protection, Samuel’s anthropology is a cautionary mirror. It reminds us that ritual power is never purely symbolic. Even when intellectualized, it retains the logic of coercion: to bind, to summon, to annihilate. Tibet’s civilization was built on mastering such forces. The tension Samuel describes is not an accident of history but a model of how Tibetan religion evolved. Civilized shamans appear wherever doctrine meets magic, wherever ethics must coexist with power. Tibet made that paradox explicit.¹²

Notes

  1. Geoffrey Samuel, Civilized Shamans: Buddhism in Tibetan Societies (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1993), 11–13.
  2. Samuel, Civilized Shamans, 11–12, 134–136.
  3. Ibid., 478–480.
  4. Ibid., 238–240.
  5. Ibid., 259–262.
  6. Ibid., 468–471.
  7. Ibid., 465–469.
  8. Ibid., 244–246, 478.
  9. Ibid., 479–482.
  10. Ibid., 66–74, 242–243, 476–478, 480–481.
  11. Ibid., 476–479.
  12. Ibid., 481–482.

The Slow Dawning: Rethinking Tibetan Tantric Buddhism

mim

It has taken me decades to admit something that began as a faint suspicion, then settled into unease, and now has crystallized into a sober conclusion: Tibetan tantric Buddhism is not what I thought it was. Nor is it what I believed when I first encountered it many years ago, a bit before the time His Holiness the Dalai Lama received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989.

Back then, the first wave of Tibetan lamas and rinpoches were arriving in the West. To many of us, they seemed like emissaries from a lost Shangrila. Coming out of the disillusionment of the Vietnam War years, with trust in government and organized religion badly shaken, we were primed to seek something transcendent and pure. And here were these men, holy men trained in the monasteries of old Tibet, carrying with them an aura of mystery and profound wisdom. Meeting them felt like an unimaginable stroke of good fortune.

The historical Buddha’s teachings struck us as luminous and deeply humane. The philosophical treatises were subtle, the meditation techniques precise and effective. And then there was tantra. We were told, almost in passing, that tantra too came directly from the Buddha. No mention was made of its roots in Shaivism, or its overlaps with the worship of Shiva, Kali, and the other tantric currents in Indian religion. Yes, there were references to the 84 Siddhas, some of whom practiced in Hindu traditions, but it was presented as a kind of colorful backdrop rather than something that demanded careful inquiry. The task, we were told, was to study the dharma, not to ask too many uncomfortable questions.

And yet, the Buddha himself had urged his students to test his words as one tests gold: cutting, burning, hammering to see if it is true. I carried that instruction into Tibetan Buddhism. But the environment I found myself in didn’t encourage such testing. Quite the opposite.

Very quickly, I was drawn into the highest yoga tantras. After a series of initiations that were performed in Tibetan, a language I didn’t understand, I was informed by a lama I scarcely knew that from now on, I had to do whatever he told me. Cognitive dissonance set in immediately. Around me, others spoke of him as a fully enlightened buddha. Terms like samaya and vajra hell were introduced without context, wrapped in a swirl of historical Buddha teachings and cryptic tantric concepts. Critical thought was not just discouraged; it was quietly undermined. The lama was king, and the student’s role was obedience.

For Westerners raised with democratic ideals and an education that stressed inquiry, this was a bewildering fit. Many of us unconsciously overlaid our early religious conditioning onto what was, in fact, a foreign and feudal religious structure with a pantheon of strange and colorful deities. The result of treating the lama as an omniscient god created confusion, sometimes tragedy. I have heard of suicides, psychotic breaks, and lives unmoored. At the same time, I know people who genuinely believe they have benefited from Tibetan Buddhism. For years, I counted myself among them, until my own turn came.

I was privately attacked by my gurus during a tantric ritual for what I considered minor offenses related to situations outside of my control. What followed was worse: a series of what can only be described as black magical assaults. I now look back at those suicides I had once heard about and wonder: had they endured similar attacks, subtle or overt, after questioning or disappointing their teachers? Perhaps. I cannot know for sure. But I do know this: the mask of compassion many lamas wear often drops when they feel challenged or exposed. Not all, certainly. But enough to form a pattern.

That slow dawning that Tibetan tantric Buddhism was not what it was presented to be has been deeply painful. The disillusionment runs far beyond personal disappointment; it speaks to a betrayal of trust, the suppression of critical thought, and the dangers that arise when power is handed to unaccountable gurus who claim authority over hidden magical practices and wield them at will. Brought into a Western culture of sincere but searching seekers, this has created a toxic mix that leaves people vulnerable at the very moment they are most open.

The Grimoire of Secret Gnosis

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A Hidden Side of Tantric Buddhism

Buddhism is usually presented in the West as a religion of mindfulness and compassion. But hidden in its tantric wing is something darker. In the eighteenth century, Sélung Shepa Dorjé (Sle lung Bzhad pa’i rdo rje) compiled a sixteen-volume cycle called Secret Gnosis Dakini (Gsang ba ye shes mkha’ ’gro, or GYCK). This was not just a collection of esoteric philosophy, but also a grimoire filled with magical spells.

According to Cameron Bailey in The Magic of Secret Gnosis: A Theoretical Analysis of a Tibetan Buddhist “Grimoire,” grimoires of spell instructions are common in Tibetan Buddhism. They often appear inside larger tantric cycles like the GYCK or in the collected works of great lamas. As the scholar Berounsky, cited by Bailey, put it, the operations in such texts are “an amalgam of tantric interventions combined with popular magic.” [1]

Volumes four and twelve of the GYCK preserve dozens of rituals for worldly power. The twelfth volume in particular reads like a magician’s handbook. It does not hide its intent; it offers ninety-two spells to heal, protect, enrich, and subjugate.

Rituals of Control

Among these spells are some dedicated to domination. Far from the common image of Buddhism as a purely gentle path of liberation, the Secret Gnosis spells allowed practitioners to bind and control others. One entire text, The Magic Lasso, instructs adepts on capturing their targets through visualization and mantra. Other spells direct them to create talismans and effigies, ritually charged to influence or destroy enemies.

Bailey emphasizes that these rituals work by merging tantric deity yoga with ritual techniques: the practitioner visualizes themselves as a wrathful god, projects light rays at the target, and seals the action with mantra. Your meditation becomes, in effect, a weapon.

The Spellbook as Technology

The grimoire aspect of the Secret Gnosis cycle cannot be overlooked. It contains practical instructions for bending reality to one’s desire. Substances like herbs, turquoise, and even urine or flesh are prescribed as tools of ritual practice.

Bailey notes that these spells are framed within a bodhisattva ethic. They are said to protect the Dharma or defend communities. Yet to modern eyes, they read unmistakably as instructions for control. This is where interpretation diverges. Bailey highlights the philosophical and ritual integration, while a critical lens reveals the coercive logic beneath the compassionate rhetoric.

A Tradition of Ambivalence

Figures like Milarepa warned against sorcery, even though his story is entangled with it. The Buddhist tradition as a whole often drew a line between miracle powers that “arise naturally” from meditation and deliberate ritual magic. But that line was blurred from the beginning. The Secret Gnosis makes clear how deeply magical domination was preserved within the canon.

Conclusion

The Secret Gnosis Dakini cycle exposes a side of tantric Buddhism rarely acknowledged publicly. Bailey shows that its grimoire-like sections are integral to tantric practice, not just marginal curiosities. What I emphasize here is that these spells—especially those of subjugation—show a system where manipulation was not an aberration but an option built into the tradition. What is presented today as a path of compassion was also, sometimes, a path of great harm.

[1] Cameron Bailey, “The Magic of Secret Gnosis: A Theoretical Analysis of a Tibetan Buddhist ‘Grimoire,’” Journal of the Korean Association for Buddhist Studies 93 (2020): 535–570.

Yamantaka and the Truth About Violent Rituals in Tibetan Buddhism

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The following is based on Aleksandra Wenta’s article “Tantric Ritual and Conflict in Tibetan Buddhist Society: The Cult of Yamāntaka” (2022).

Public perception paints Buddhism as the ultimate religion of compassion. The Dalai Lama’s cheerful smile and monks chanting in maroon robes conjure images of peace in the Western imagination. But the historical record tells quite another story, one most Buddhist institutions would prefer to bury. Violent ritual has always had a place in Tibetan Buddhist practice, and the cult of the wrathful deity Yamantaka is one of the clearest examples.

The Deity of Destruction

Yamantaka, whose name means “Ender of Death,” is no serene Buddha. In tantric lore he is a ferocious, multi-headed, weapon-wielding deity invoked to annihilate enemies. These enemies might be inner demons in metaphor, but in many cases they were very real human targets. As Wenta’s research shows, Tibetan Buddhist ritual specialists used Yamantaka rites as deliberate acts of destruction, both spiritual and physical.

Politics and Ritual Warfare

The historical examples are difficult to dismiss. In the ninth century, the Buddhist master Gnubs chen Sangs rgyas yeshes allegedly used Yamantaka magic against King Lang Darma, a ruler seen as hostile to the Dharma. Centuries later, during the political struggles of the seventeenth century, the Fifth Dalai Lama employed Yamantaka rituals to consolidate power over rival factions. These were not fringe experiments, but state-linked religious acts intended to remove opponents.

The reach of these rites went beyond Tibet. The Manchu Qianlong emperor adopted Yamantaka worship to project legitimacy over his subjects, while Mongolian and Japanese traditions incorporated similar ritual violence into their own religious-political frameworks.

Violent Compassion as Justification

Practitioners did not see these rites as morally corrupt. They justified them through the doctrine of “violent compassion,” the belief that killing or harming could liberate an enemy from a worse rebirth. Wenta notes that tantric philosophy, particularly the doctrine of emptiness, was used to argue that concepts like killer or victim do not ultimately exist. In this logic, an enlightened being could commit an act of violence without accruing negative karma.

Ritualized Destruction

From the Mañjuśriyamūlakalpa’s “Ritual Against the Wicked Kings” comes one of the most explicit and brutal examples. The text instructs the practitioner to paint Yamantaka in terrifying form, then perform fire offerings of human blood, flesh, and powdered bone mixed with poisons and toxic plants to unleash plague, famine, storms, and demonic infestations upon the target. The king’s family is to die in sequence: son on the first day, wife and ministers on the second, the king himself on the third, while his court is overrun by flesh-eating spirits and his land struck by drought, fire from the sky, rockfall, and invasion. A human effigy bearing the victim’s birth star in cremation-ground charcoal is trampled during mantric recitation so the enemy dies, goes mad, or is devoured by demons. This is ritualized destruction in its most literal, calculated form.

One section of the same text reads like a manual for calculated devastation. The practitioner is instructed to heap human blood, flesh, powdered bone, poisons, and the roots of deadly plants onto a ritual fire in front of the painted deity. After 1008 offerings, not only is the enemy destroyed, but their family, ministers, and allies are swept away as well. The text promises droughts, plagues, famine, and storms, even fire and rocks falling from the sky, while demonic forces overrun the victim’s court. In some variations, a single datura root is enough to drive the target insane, or a few spoonfuls of spiced offerings can induce fatal fevers within days.

The text also states, “If he wants to kill someone, then having made a puppet (kṛtiṃ) he should write a name: the deity name or a nakṣatra (‘asterism under which the target was born’) using a charcoal of the cremation ground, which should be placed on the ground in front of the paṭa. Standing on [the puppet’s] head with his foot, he should be in a wrathful state, and do the recitation. He (the king) will become overpowered by a major disease, or he will die on the spot. That lord of men will be seized by piercing pains for no apparent reason, or he will be killed by an animal, or he will become crippled. He will be eaten by fierce rākṣasas, and various impure beings that have arisen from non-human birth (kravyādin), pūtanas, piśācas, pretas and the mothers, or he will be killed immediately by his own attendants.” 1

Conflict Inside the Tradition

Even within Tibetan Buddhism, the legitimacy of destructive rituals such as these was contested. Some figures, such as Rwa lo tsā ba, became famous for their wrathful practices but were denounced by peers as frauds or heretics. Reformers like Yeshes ’od tried to curtail the most extreme acts, replacing “live liberation” killings with symbolic substitutes like effigy destruction. But these reforms did not erase the underlying acceptance of ritual violence; they only tamed it for public consumption.

Another Piece of the Puzzle

Wenta’s work adds yet another piece of hard evidence to the growing pile that Tibetan Buddhism has long included practices designed to harm or destroy. These rituals were not simply metaphorical, and they were not limited to obscure sects. They were woven into the political and religious fabric of Tibet and beyond.

For those willing to look past Tibetan Buddhism’s carefully crafted PR image, the cult of Yamantaka exposes a reality in which the language of compassion hid a persistent undercurrent of deliberate harm.

Footnotes

1) Aleksandra Wenta, Tantric Ritual and Conflict in Tibetan Buddhist Society: The Cult of Yamāntaka, in Esimoncini, 19 Wenta CHIUSO, available at https://tibetanbuddhistencyclopedia.com/en/images/0/0b/Esimoncini%2C%2B19_Wenta_CHIUSO.pdf. ↩

How Tantra Masqueraded as Buddhism: the Vajrayāna Deception

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Vajrayana Buddhism, also known as Tibetan Buddhism or Tantric Buddhism, stands out for its rituals, deity worship, and complex esoteric practices. Its mantras, mandalas, and meditations on wrathful and yab/yum deities bear clear resemblance to Hindu Tantra, Vedic ritualism, and indigenous spirit cults.

So how did it convince anyone, especially devout Buddhists, that it was authentically taught by the historical Buddha?

The answer lies in a strategic combination of hidden teaching narratives, scriptural mimicry, ritual power, and imperial patronage. Let’s explore how this transformation occurred and what it means when viewed through the lens of Catholic faith and biblical discernment.

Secret Teachings: “The Buddha Taught It, But in Secret”

Vajrayana scriptures claim that the Buddha did teach tantra, but only in secret, to highly realized disciples. These teachings were said to have been hidden in celestial realms, entrusted to beings like Vajrapani or dakinis, or taught in the Buddha’s “enjoyment body” (sambhogakaya) form in other worlds such as Akanistha.(1)

This tactic mirrored earlier Mahayana developments, where new sutras like the Lotus or Avatamsaka were claimed to be higher revelations spoken by the Buddha, but not understood by his early disciples. The concept of esoteric knowledge reserved for the spiritually mature made these late texts seem like rediscovered treasures, rather than innovations.

Scriptural Mimicry and Retroactive Legitimization

To reinforce their authority, tantric scriptures deliberately mimicked the structure of traditional sutras. They often began with the familiar phrase, “Thus have I heard,” and depicted the Buddha teaching not only in celestial realms surrounded by bodhisattvas, but sometimes in radically transgressive settings such as charnel grounds, encircled by ḍākinīs and wrathful deities. These texts introduced elaborate cosmologies, detailed ritual instructions, and esoteric vows, presenting them as timeless wisdom, even though they were composed many centuries after the Buddha’s death.[2]

Authors also invented lineages, claiming that tantric teachings had been passed down secretly from Vajrapani to Nagarjuna, or from Padmasambhava to Tibetan kings.

Syncretism with Hindu and Folk Traditions

Instead of denying its similarities with Hindu Tantra, Vajrayana reinterpreted them. Wrathful deities were said to be enlightened Buddhas. Sexual rituals were described as a symbolic means to transform desire into wisdom. Offerings of blood, bones, and taboo substances were spiritualized as purifications of dualistic perception.

By repackaging Vedic and folk practices into a Buddhist framework, Vajrayana could absorb local traditions and declare them “Buddhist skillful means.”

Imperial Support and Monastic Integration

Tantra spread rapidly through the support of kings and monasteries. In Tibet, tantric masters were invited to subdue native spirits, secure political power, and perform rituals for prosperity. At Indian centers like Nalanda and Vikramashila, tantric scholars and monks practiced Mahayana logic by day and tantric visualization by night.

With the backing of the state and the academic establishment, Vajrayana was not seen as a fringe practice but as the “highest vehicle” of Buddhism.

Ritual Power and Psychological Experience

For the average practitioner, tantra “worked.” It offered visions, emotional catharsis, ritual protection, and the promise of fast-track enlightenment. The experiential pull of mantra, deity yoga, and initiation ceremonies gave people tangible results even if the doctrinal basis was historically shaky.

In the end, many believed not because of historical evidence, but because the system delivered experiences of spiritual intensity.

How Christianity Views This: The Domain of the Second Heaven

From a biblical and Catholic perspective, this raises serious concerns. The spiritual beings Vajrayana practitioners encounter, wrathful deities, dakinis, yidams, do not proclaim Christ as Lord and Savior. They do not point to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They offer power and enlightenment through self-transformation, not redemption.

The Bible is clear: Satan is the prince of the power of the air, ruling the spiritual domain between heaven and earth until Christ returns (Ephesians 2:2). What some refer to as the “second heaven” is where fallen angels operate, deceiving through false light, hidden knowledge, and seductive spiritual experiences.

Teachers like Derek Prince and Dr. Michael Heiser have explained how fallen entities inhabit unseen realms and impersonate divine figures such gods, ascended masters, or beings of light. Applying this view, the Buddhist realm of Akanistha, where the Buddha is said to teach in his sambhogakaya form, may not be a divine domain at all, but a carefully constructed counterfeit, orchestrated by spiritual powers aligned against the Kingdom of God.

This helps explain how a system like Vajrayana could emerge long after the Buddha’s time, imbued with supernatural power, spiritual visions, and doctrinal sophistication, yet still operate in direct opposition to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Final Reflection: What About the Historical Buddha Himself?

This raises a deeper question: What about the historical Gautama Buddha?

His teachings, centered on renunciation, ethical conduct, and insight, seem far removed from tantric fire offerings, deity visualizations, and magical spells. He did not claim to be a god. He emphasized detachment from craving and moral clarity. So, was he simply a wise man? Or was he also deceived?

From a Catholic and biblical perspective, any system that does not point to Christ as the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6) must be seen as incomplete at best, and spiritually dangerous at worst. Even teachings that emphasize compassion and morality can become a snare if they direct people away from the living God.

It is possible that the historical Buddha, though perhaps sincere and ethically inclined, encountered spiritual influences he did not fully understand. If he received his insights through meditation without divine revelation, then he may have opened himself to guidance from fallen beings presenting themselves as enlightened or falsely divine. This is a sobering possibility, but one that must be considered if we are to remain faithful to biblical truth.

The gospel does not offer esoteric techniques. It offers a person, Jesus, who does not ask you to awaken into the realization of emptiness. He calls you by name into communion with him, into truth, and finally, into eternal life.

Footnotes:

(1) Akanistha, also spelled Akaniṣṭha, is considered in Mahayana and Vajrayāna cosmology to be the highest of the seventeen or eighteen heavens in the form realm (rūpadhātu), and specifically the realm where Buddhas in their “enjoyment body” (sambhogakāya) manifest and teach advanced bodhisattvas. It is portrayed as a pure, radiant dimension beyond ordinary perception, where tantra and esoteric teachings are said to be revealed. From a Christian perspective, such realms existing in the unseen spiritual domain, may correspond to what theologians like Derek Prince and Michael Heiser describe as the “second heaven,” a sphere under temporary dominion of fallen angelic beings capable of impersonating divine figures (see Ephesians 6:12, Daniel 10:13).

[2] Alexis Sanderson, “The Śaiva Age: The Rise and Dominance of Śaivism during the Early Medieval Period,” in Genesis and Development of Tantrism, edited by Shingo Einoo (Tokyo: Institute of Oriental Culture, University of Tokyo, 2009), pp. 124–126. Sanderson provides detailed evidence that Buddhist tantras were modeled after Śaiva texts and appeared centuries after the Buddha’s life.

David B. Gray, The Cakrasamvara Tantra: The Discourse of Śrī Heruka, (New York: American Institute of Buddhist Studies, 2007), Introduction, pp. 18–25. Gray discusses the charnel ground setting and the structure of tantric texts, including the invocation of ḍākinīs and wrathful deities, and their divergence from earlier Buddhist sūtra literature.

The Lie of Non-Duality: How Tantra Disguises Possession as Enlightenment

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For years, I followed the path of Tibetan Buddhism and tantric practice. I studied its rituals, visualizations, deities, and especially its central concept of “non-dual realization,” considered the highest goal in Mahayana and Vajrayana philosophy.[1]

I chanted the mantras, invoked the buddhas, bodhisattvas and dakinis, and merged myself with yidams, believing I was on the path to ultimate truth or enlightenment.

But the truth I’ve realized now is very different. It was only after leaving the system and encountering Christ again that I saw what I had actually opened myself up to. What was presented to me as wisdom was, in reality, a surrender of my soul to dark powers wearing radiant masks.

What Is “Non-Dual Realization”?

In Mahayana and Vajrayana Buddhism, “non-dual realization” is taught as the highest goal. It means transcending the conceptual distinctions of self vs. other, good vs. evil, sacred vs. profane, based on the belief that these opposites are mental constructs and ultimately empty. It means realizing that everything is empty of inherent existence, that distinctions are illusions, and that even the self is not truly existent.

In Tibetan Buddhist tantric practice, this realization is pursued through deity yoga: one visualizes an external deity like a dakini, peaceful bodhisattva, or wrathful buddha, visualizes oneself as the deity, merges with the external form, and dissolves the sense of a separate self into that visualization. The goal is to transcend the sense of individual self and merge into what is presented as enlightened awareness.

This sounds beautiful on the surface. But what is actually happening behind the scenes?

Possession Disguised as Enlightenment

From a Christian perspective, this practice can lead to spiritual possession.

The moment you invite a being to take over your mind, body, or spirit, especially one that does not proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord (1 John 4:1-3), you are offering your soul to a power that is not of God.

Tantric practices train you to dissolve your boundaries. They break down your identity and present a being who is radiant, powerful, and loving, and invite you to unite with it.

In reality, this is surrender to a counterfeit. It is a deceptively woven net, spiritually binding, and ruthlessly enforced.

The Dakini’s Magical Net: A Trap, Not a Blessing

In Tibetan Buddhism, dakinis are presented as enlightened feminine energies, guides to wisdom, and protectors of the dharma. But now, I see clearly that the “net” of the dakinis isn’t a web of wisdom, but a spiritual snare.

These magical nets are said to catch the mind stream of those who violate tantric vows. They bind, dismantle, and destroy the consciousness of the practitioner who steps out of line. That is not divine justice but spiritual murder. It is demonic.

The Hidden Power Structure Behind Vajrayana

It’s important to add a caveat here: Tibetan Buddhists often shield themselves from criticism by appealing to the ethical and philosophical framework of early Buddhism, the so-called first and second turnings of the wheel. They claim that Vajrayana is inseparably bound to the moral and philosophical teachings of Hinayana and Mahayana.

However, in practice, it is the tantric laws that prevail. When push comes to shove, tantric expediency overrides all. What you get is a kind of spiritual gangsterism, a mafia-like code of silence, loyalty, and fear, all cloaked in the sanctity of Buddhist language and lineage.

But this never felt right to me. True love does not coerce and true wisdom does not enslave. The Holy Spirit convicts, but He never violates the soul’s freedom.

The Blood of Jesus Dissolves Every Net

The day I returned to Jesus Christ, after being spiritually attacked and nearly destroyed by the tantric Buddhist forces I once invoked, I renounced all former vows, empowerments, and deities. I asked God to set me free from every magical net and every spiritual power that claimed me. So many years before, after I had left the Catholic Church, I had gone through a long period of agnosticism before I took refuge in Tibetan Buddhism. I didn’t know if God existed or not. This left me open to deception by occult systems such as Tibetan Buddhism.

What I found in trying to break free from tantric occultism is that God is real and the blood of Jesus Christ is stronger than any tantric empowerment. It dissolves all bindings and shatters and severs every demonic contract.

We Are Not an Illusion

We are not empty. We are not reducible to pure awareness or dismissed as illusion. On the contrary, our existence is real, grounded, and full of meaning.

We are persons, created in the image of God (Genesis 1:27), with eternal souls, essential wills, and a purpose that cannot be replaced.

Jesus did not ask us to dissolve into Him. He calls us to relationship, not dissolution and especially not annihilation. He redeems, restores, and makes whole. In Christ, our identity is not erased but fulfilled. If you’ve been entangled in the deceptive beauty of tantric non-duality doublespeak, know this: it is not too late; there is a way out.

[1] Note on “Non-Dual Realization” in Tibetan Buddhism:
In Mahayana and Vajrayana Buddhism, particularly within Madhyamaka philosophy and the Mahamudra tradition of the Karma Kagyu lineage, “non-dual realization” refers to the direct experiential understanding that all phenomena, including the perceiving mind and external objects, are empty of inherent existence. This does not mean merging into a single cosmic entity, but rather realizing that the distinction between subject and object is conceptually constructed and ultimately illusory.
In Mahamudra practice, this is described as the union of clarity (luminosity) and emptiness, a non-conceptual awareness that is self-liberated and ungraspable. The practitioner seeks to transcend dualistic fixation and abide in the natural state of mind, free from elaboration.
However, while this view is upheld within the tradition as a path to enlightenment, my experience revealed it as a spiritual vulnerability. Furthermore, the process of dissolving self-boundaries and engaging in deity identification opened the door to oppressive spiritual influences disguised as wisdom. What is framed as “non-dual realization” can, in practice, become the annihilation of personal agency and discernment and leave one open to possession by demonic entities.

Ritual Violence: the Bairaṇa Rites of Vajrayana Buddhism

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In the hidden corners of Vajrayana Buddhism lies a strand of practice that few dare to discuss openly: bairaṇa (Sanskrit: vairana) rituals. These are wrathful rites aimed at the destruction of enemies, both spiritual and human.

Often sanitized or dismissed as purely symbolic by modern interpreters, the historical and textual record suggests something more visceral, more deadly: these rituals were, and in some cases, still are, performed with the explicit intention to eliminate human beings. This underscores the urgent need for transparency in the study and transmission of Vajrayana practices, especially as many naive spiritual seekers are drawn to Tibetan Buddhism by its outward promise of peace, compassion, and enlightenment, often without awareness of its esoteric and potentially violent dimensions.

What Is a Bairaṇa Ritual?

The term bairaṇa appears in the tantric classification of the four karmas: four magical functions that a Vajrayana practitioner may perform:

  • Pacifying (śānti)
  • Enriching (puṣṭi or vaśya)
  • Subjugating (stambhana)
  • Destroying (bairaṇa)

The purpose of the fourth category, “subjugating,” is unambiguous: obliteration. Within Tibetan Buddhist traditions, especially in the rites of wrathful deities such as Vajrakīla, Yamantaka, and Mahākāla, bairaṇa rituals are used to eliminate:

  • Samaya breakers: Those who violate sacred tantric vows
  • Enemies: Individuals perceived to be actively working against the practitioner
  • Obstructive spirits: Demonic forces, ghosts, or elemental energies believed to cause illness, insanity, or misfortune
  • Political enemies: In historical contexts, entire state-level rituals were conducted against rival kings or invading armies

Ritual Actions: Effigy Creation and Destruction

Texts such as The Cult of the Deity Vajrakīla describe in detail the creation of effigies to represent obstructive forces. These are crafted using materials such as cloth taken from the target, filled with charnel substances, and inscribed with mantras.(1) The effigy is then subjected to violent ritual acts such as stabbing with ritual daggers (phurba), binding, burning, or drowning.

Example: Vajrakīla Tantras (summary from Boord, The Cult of the Deity Vajrakīla)

“Fashion a figure of the enemy from black wool… fill it with the five meats and five nectars. Tie it with red thread, place it beneath the kīla (ritual dagger). Stab it while reciting the mantra… Then, place it in the fire, imagining flames consuming the soul of the enemy.”

This is not metaphor. The rite involves constructing a magical double of the target and ritually executing it. The “enemy” may be a real, named person.

Fire Offerings and Mantra Recitation

Often, the effigy is placed in a consecrated fire pit and incinerated while wrathful mantras are recited, invoking deities to consume and destroy the obstacle.

Example: From the Dujum Namchok Putri Ritual

“To receive these five aggregates of the malefactors who are our hostile enemies and obstructing spirits (causing harm)! We now feed them into your (wide open) mouths; may you accept (these morsels and devour them)—Kharam Khahi!”

This passage metaphorically frames the act of feeding the enemy to wrathful deities, representing a kind of karmic annihilation. In tantric contexts, this has often been interpreted as a sanctioned form of ritual killing.

Another Example: From the Rituals of the Secret Assembly Tantra

“Bind the name and essence of the breaker of samaya into the effigy… May his limbs be broken, his breath cease, and his karmic stains be consumed in fire.”

How Were These Used Historically?

Scholars like Ronald Davidson and Martin Boord have documented numerous instances where wrathful rites were used to eliminate perceived threats, including human beings. These were not fringe practices. They were part of the institutionalized ritual life of powerful lamas and state-sponsored religion.

For example:

  • In the 17th century, the Gelugpa used wrathful rites against rival schools.
  • The Fifth Dalai Lama reportedly employed Vajrakīla rituals to eliminate political enemies and to legitimize military campaigns.
  • In the Nyingma tradition, terma (revealed teachings) include instructions for magical actions against sorcerers and heretics.

Ethics of Wrathful Means

Here lies the uncomfortable truth: Vajrayana Buddhism is not a pacifist tradition. It is a path of power, and power is always ambiguous.

Proponents argue that wrathful actions arise from compassion, a fierce compassion that liberates by force when necessary. Critics, both within and outside the tradition, question whether such acts truly serve liberation or whether they reveal the manipulation of tantric power for worldly gain.

Conclusion: A Tradition of Dangerous Possibilities

The bairaṇa rituals of Vajrayana are not relics of a mythic past. They are living technologies, still transmitted under specific conditions to qualified initiates.

Yet when removed from their sacred context, or cloaked in euphemism, they reveal a deeper concern: the boundary between symbolic and literal violence in Tibetan Buddhism has often been porous. The image of Tibetan Buddhism as purely peaceful and benevolent does not survive close scrutiny.

(1) In Tantric practice, particularly within cremation-ground or charnel-ground rituals, practitioners engage directly with “charnel substances.” These substances include human bones (such as skulls and femurs), cremation ashes, decomposed flesh, fat, blood, and bodily fluids, as well as soil and items saturated with the energy of death. Some rituals involve the use of skull cups (kapalas) for offerings, bone ornaments worn on the body, or the smearing of ash.

Sources and Suggested Reading

  • Boord, Martin. The Cult of the Deity Vajrakīla: According to the Texts of the Northern Treasures Tradition of Tibet. Tring: The Institute of Buddhist Studies, 1993.
  • Davidson, Ronald M. Indian Esoteric Buddhism: A Social History of the Tantric Movement. Columbia University Press, 2002.
  • Dalton, Jacob. The Taming of the Demons: Violence and Liberation in Tibetan Buddhism. Yale University Press, 2011.
  • Hirshberg, Daniel. Remembering the Lotus-Born: Padmasambhava in the History of Tibet’s Golden Age. Wisdom Publications, 2016.
  • Samuel, Geoffrey. Civilized Shamans: Buddhism in Tibetan Societies. Smithsonian Institution Press, 1993.
  • Snellgrove, David L. The Hevajra Tantra: A Critical Study. Oxford University Press, 1959.
  • Cantwell, Cathy & Mayer, Rob. Early Tibetan Documents on Phur pa from Dunhuang. Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2008.