Magicians, Sorcerers and Witches: Considering Pretantric, Non-sectarian Sources of Tantric Practices
Document Type
Article
Article Version
Publisher's PDF
Publication Date
2017
Abstract
Most models on the origins of tantrism have been either inattentive to or dismissive of non-literate, non-sectarian ritual systems. Groups of magicians, sorcerers or witches operated in India since before the advent of tantrism and continued to perform ritual, entertainment and curative functions down to the present. There is no evidence that they were tantric in any significant way, and it is not clear that they were concerned with any of the liberation ideologies that are a hallmark of the sectarian systems, even while they had their own separate identities and specific divinities. This paper provides evidence for the durability of these systems and their continuation as sources for some of the ritual and nomenclature of the sectarian tantric traditions, including the predisposition to ritual creativity and bricolage.
Publication Title
Religions
Repository Citation
Davidson, Ronald M., "Magicians, Sorcerers and Witches: Considering Pretantric, Non-sectarian Sources of Tantric Practices" (2017). Religious Studies Faculty Publications. 128.
https://digitalcommons.fairfield.edu/religiousstudies-facultypubs/128
Published Citation
Davidson, Ronald M., “Magicians, Sorcerers and Witches: Considering Pretantric, Non-sectarian Sources of Tantric Practices,” Religions (Special Issue on Society for Tantric Studies) 8(9), 2017,188. doi:10.3390/rel8090188.
DOI
10.3390/rel8090188
Peer Reviewed
Comments
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited (CC BY 4.0).