One area that is somewhat ignored in Integral Theory to date is the significance of the psychosexual stream to overall development. One thing I appreciate Wilber for is in pointing out the difference between the Ascender and Descender biases and his argument that an Integral approach must balance these two tendancies.
So what is the place of psychosexual development in Integral Theory and practice?
We have two sources to examine. The Western strand which begins with the early sexologists, such as Havelock Ellis, and the enormous breakthrough that occured in Germany, which began with Freud and Reich. Here it is worth noting that both Freud and Reich belonged to an organisation founded by Magnus Hirschfeld, the World League for Sexual Reform. There is a famous photo of Nazis burning books – apparently it was taken as the Nazis were destroying Hirscfeld’s Institute for Sexology in Berlin. Wilhelm Reich was in Berlin at the time as well and his two books ‘The Function of the Orgasm’ and ‘The Mass Psychology of Fascism’ had created an interesting debate about sexual repression. Reich had argued that sexual repression caused both psychological and physical body armouring and that this led to several pathologies. He then argued that the cure was sexual release through a full body orgasm. I won’t go into a full description here other than to say that many orgasms are only partial and contained orgasms.
The Reichian strand is the root of a number of modern therapies, primal scream, etc and Neo-Reichian therapies played an important part in the sexual revolution and human potential movements of the 60’s and 70’s.
At the same time Western intellectuals were discovering Tantra and trying to reconcile the very frank connection between sex and spirituality, particularly of varma marga (left-hand) and shakta Tantra.
Some of you may not know that Hatha Yoga was allegedly developed by Goraknath, the disciple of Matsyendranath, the founder of the Nath sect, a varma marga Tantra path. This sect (connected to the 84 mahasiddhas also found in Buddhist Tantra) advocated mastery of all body functions. I’ll go right to the really challenging stuff, the stuff usually left out by modern Hatha Yoga schools so as not to upset delicate Western sensibilities. One of the original Hatha yoga skills was regular enemas and one technique was to stand in a river and suck water into the anus and draw it up into the lower colon, and then expel it. A similar technique was used to flush the urinary tract. After years of practice the yogi can suck water up his penis (vajroli mudra). The whole point was to develop the pubococcygeus muscles (pelvic floor, as in Kegel exercises). Once control of these muscles was attained they could be used to control ejaculation in urdhvareta kriya. A trained yogi can take himself to the point of ejaculation, release, but then immediately draw the ejaculate back. There are several stages to urdhvareta, the highest is the ability to experience full orgasm whilst containing the ejaculate. It was thought that the spiritual essence (tejas) was separated from the physical substance (ojas). When the white tejas of semen was united with the red tejas of menstrual blood a unification of Shiva/Shakti occured that lead to ecstacy and realization. There were similar exercises for women adepts, the difference however, was that women were encouraged to have orgasms, multiple if they could. The whole idea was to try and extend the momentary bliss of orgasm, control it and consciously transmute it to a higher, spiritual energy.
To achieve this adepts had to pay very close attention to the yoga of intercourse. This was helped because at the time of the Nath yogis parts of India were very open to frank sexual experimentation. I have already mentioned the tradition of the Devidasi, part of their original function was to act as consorts for Tantric yogis and many of them were high adepts in their own right. They did not marry, but instead dedicated themselves to a life of sexual spirituality.
Under the Judeo-Christians the West was taken in quite the opposite direction. Suffice to say that under their control the West lost all vestiges of sexual spirituality found amongst the goddess traditions of the ancients (Hathor, Artemis, Astarte) and was plunged into complete ignorance where all knowledge of sex was lost. We are talking about polar extremes. Under the Judeo-Christians the genital region was regarded as filthy and literally satan’s playground. I mentioned that some Orthodox Jews have intercourse through a hole in a sheet to avoid too much contact. In varna marga the genitals are intentionally worshipped as divine. In yoni puja the vulva is worshipped as a symbol of Shakti. The woman (usually a young adolescent, but sometimes in the past, a kumari, or virgin – in some Shakta cults a kumari of a particular age is given a specific name, ie Bhairavi if she is 12, etc, each age being a particular form of the goddess) is dressed in fine silks, but her yoni is exposed. Mantras are chanted and her yoni is treated as a murti and the five sacred substances are rubbed on and poured over her yoni. There is also a form of lingam puja. The yoni and lingam pujas are always performed before an act of sacred sex, but can also be performed on auspicious occasions. Some Shakta temples have separate stone yonis and lingams, but the most common representation is the ubiquitous shivalingam.
The point I want to make here is that under the Judeo-Christians the West became profoundly ignorant of sex and orgasms were actively discouraged. At the height of Tantric practice in India in the Middle Ages, the knowledge of sexuality and orgasm had become highly detailed and sophisticated (but still dressed up in mythic obscurantism).
There is a connection between Reich and Tantra. The Tantric Yogis had developed the theory of samskaras, blocks in the psycho-sexual-spiritual system that prevented the free flow of prana and shakti. I do not know if Reich borrowed the idea from the East (many Tantric texts had been translated and studied by German academics), but his theories correlate quite well – except he does not go as far as Tantra. It is my contention that there is an important psycho-sexual-spiritual line of development that unlocks considerable developmental potential. It involves learning how to recognise and develop psycho-sexual ecstacy in the body from basic physical orgasm to emotional, mental and supramental orgasms.
I can personally attest to their existance. In one chanting session my body experienced a rolling series of full body orgasms. I had an erection but the sensations were not localised. I stopped them because I was feeling overwhelmed by what was without a doubt, a spontaneous, non-genital, multiple orgasm. This experience made me realise that humans are capable of experiencing high levels of psycho-sexual ecstacy.
However, it is difficult to teach the public about such things. There are now so many taboos around sex that it is almost impossible to get the message out. Under the control of the Orthodox Aryan Brahmins India has become hyper-conservative and turned its back on the Tantric tradition (the Tantric tradition was radically opposed to the Orthodox Aryans). And in the West Tantra is often dumbed down to become a New Age fad. The problem is that the West and Westerners (and now Indians) have been loaded up with so many inhibitions and samskaras that it is difficult to see how psycho-sexual energy can be released. It is necessary to be totally unashamed of the body and of sex. One of the most powerful Tantric rituals was the Chakra Puja in which twelve couples sat in a circle and performed tantric sex, starting with yoni and lingam puja. In the West sex is regarded as personal and private and many people could not have sex in front of other people. How many women would allow a congregation to perform yoni puja on her? Too many women would be mortally embarrassed and many believe their yonis to be unclean. One of the highest forms of yoni puja was performed on menstruating girls and the blood was mixed with sacred substances and sipped as a sacrement. In Leviticus there are many injunctions about unclean bodily fluids and Orthodox Jewish women still face a number of prohibitions during their period.
All this leads me back to Reich and his book ‘The Mass Psychology of Fascism’. I think Reich was partially right, the totalitarian pathology functions through sexual repression. The totalitarian is threatened by liberated psycho-sexual expression.
The question for Integral Theory is how much of Reich was right, how much of Tantra? Reich certainly went off the rails later in life (although Orgone looks a lot like Prana) and Tantra was corrupted and the varna marga indulged in some unnecessary and revolting practices (including, it has to be admitted, cannabalism and human sacrifice). So what should be included and what should be transcended? What parts were right and what parts were wrong?
I also want to make it quite clear that when I talk about reaching one’s full potential on the psycho-sexual line I am talking about the type of control the Tantric yogis developed. In men this is the ability to control ejaculation and amplify orgasm from a localised sensation to a full body ecstatic experience. In women it is the ability to experience uninhibited multiple orgasm and a similar yogic control. To achieve this the individual must remove all vestiges of Judeo-Christian and bourgeois shame and guilt. I also think that in such a society highly sophisticated psycho-sexual techniques can start to be taught to young adolescents – yep, Tantra for teens – that is, if you are serious about reaching one’s ‘full’ potential. Now that last statement ought to tickle those vestiges of Judeo-Christian shame and guilt.
I should add that the idea of Tantra for teens was first canvassed in the novel ‘Island’ by Aldous Huxley, who was a member of The World League for Sexual Reform. The novel is of course, utopian, but it is an early attempt that I think presages how an Integral society might function. Of course we are a long way from Tantra for teens, particularly in the US, which still can’t stomach the thought of teaching even basic sex ed to tens (stuff that should be taught at elementary/primary level). But yes, I envisage going to Tantra classes in High School – why not? Really, why not? I think it’s a logical suggestion once you recognize the importance of the psycho-sexual line to reaching one’s ‘full’ potential. To deny this possibility is to say that we shouldn’t try and reach our full potential. What really is the moral objection? That sex is somehow bad and harmful? Is it? (of course there are issues of appropriate times and places, but is sex as such bad and harmful?).
Forgot to add – in Mira Nair’s film ‘Kama Sutra’ she attempts to reveal the tradition of the ‘tawaif’ or courtesan. There is a scene where the female students are taught sexual techniques. The film shocked Hindus for its full frontal nudity and frank depiction of sex, but Nair had to pull back on much of the real detail. Firstly the students were much older than they would have been. Tawaif and Devidasi training started young, traditionally at age 5. They started their profession when they were 12 and were considered at their peak when they were 16. All of the women in the film were conveniently above the age of 18 to satisfy modern sensibilities. Secondly, at the time the film was set most of the women would likely have been topless. The choli, which now covers the breasts, was introduced after Muslim incursion. Pre-Islamic India did not have a tradition of sewn garments. The girls would have worn a single piece of cloth around their waist. Thirdly, the Rani (queen) often chose the tawaifs and sexual activity occured quite openly as part of courtly entertainment. The tawaif was usually also a dancer, singer, musician and reciter of poetry, as well as a sexual artesan. India has the tradition of the sixty-four arts of Saraswati, which included the erotic arts.
Of course all of this has been subjected to the historical and cultural revisionism of puritanical Orthodox Aryans who are determined to deny India’s rich erotic tradition.
PS – you find this kind of revisionism rampant in Bollywood.
[It was by learning and applying the intimate secrets of this Will-in-Power, its method, its Tantra, that the Tantric Yogin pursued the aims of his discipline, -- mastery, perfection, liberation, beatitude. Instead of drawing back from manifested Nature and its difficulties, he confronted them, seized and conquered. But in the end, as is the general tendency of Prakriti, Tantric Yoga largely lost its principle in its machinery and became a thing of formulae and occult mechanism still powerful when rightly used but fallen from the clarity of their original intention.
In the Tantra the centres are opened and Kundalini is awakened by a special process, its action of ascent is felt through the spine. Here it is a pressure of the Force from above that awakens it and opens the centres. There is an ascension of the consciousness going up till it joins the higher consciousness above. This repeats itself (sometimes a descent also is felt) until all the centres are open and the consciousness rises above the body. At a later stage it remains above and widens out into the cosmic consciousness and the universal self. This is a usual course, but sometimes the process is more rapid and there is a sudden and definite opening above.
Oneness with all would then mean satisfying the sex instinct with all -- that would be a rather startling siddhanta , though there is something like it in the practice of Tantra of the left hand. But the left hand Tantriks are more logical than you -- for why should oneness, if it is to justify sex-expression, support only the lighter and not the cruder forms of love-expression? But is sex really based on love or sex-love based on sex-instinct? and is sex-instinct an expression of the spiritual feeling of the One in all? Is it not really based on duality, except when it simply seeks satisfaction and pleasure where there is no question of love at all? Is one attracted to a woman by the sense that she is oneself or by the fact that she is somebody else attracting one by some charm or beauty which one wants to enjoy or possess or simply by the fact of the difference from oneself, the fact of her being a female and not a male so that the sex-instinct can find a full field there?
The sex-impulse is certainly the greatest force in the vital plane; if it can be sublimated and turned upwards, ojas is created which is a great help to the attainment of higher consciousness. But mere restraint is not sufficient.
Tantra would call the hero-seekers and the divine-seekers and which may now be nearing the point of readiness for its full revelation and experience. Then whatever be the heavy weight of strife and suffering and darkness in the world, yet if there is this as its high result awaiting us, all that has gone before may not be counted too great a price by the strong and adventurous for the glory that is to come. At any rate the shadow lifts; there is a Divine Light that leans over the world and is not only a far-off incommunicable Lustre.] TANTRA IN SRI AUROBINDO Fri, June 8, 2007 – 2:11 AM
http://people.tribe.net/transformation_s_8/blog/585d063f-1a80-4ace-810b-a3d53a5f8fac
I’d suggest that Ken and I-I are heavily invested in sexology via David Deida: http://www.deida.info.
Tusar,
The quote from Aurobindo does not address my main concern, which is that Tantra cannot be practiced when there is shame, guilt or embarrassment, or puritanism of any kind. But then, I always thought Aurobindo had an Ascender bias. There’s nothing wrong with being in the world. I’m sure you enjoy a good meal and appreciate the culinary arts – or do you only eat rice and plain vegetables?
Edward,
I’m aware of Deida – let’s say he’s part of the solution, although I’m not sure about some of his teachings.
Here we are more concerned with the Shreya (good) than the Preya (pleasant). What you label as enjoyment is nothing but a distortion of the Ananda (bliss) and hence all our effort should be directed to access the real thing. The Mother and Sri Aurobindo have offered complete guidance to reach such a goal.
This is not asceticism or puritanism. Rather it arises from the most existential concerns. If one simply learns to be prudent enough to guard his self-interest in all situations, then there is no better way than this. By pandering to one’s own whims and pining, one patently harms himself but refuses to acknowledge.
This is the human predicament and therefore the urgency to transcend our present limits. No glory would come by endlessly wallowing in the mud. Following a Jonathan Livingstone Seagull would rather bring us emancipation as well as enlightenment.
Again you entirely miss my point. The only problem with Preya is if it distracts from Shreya. You can have both Preya and Shreya. The Ascender bias creates a false dichotomy. And is enjoying the world ‘wallowing’ in the ‘mud’, rather than enjoying the fruits of the godess’s garden?
I am not sure of the model of ontology that you have in mind by which you harmonize both Preya and Shreya, but in the scheme of The Mother and Sri Aurobindo, sex doesn’t gel with Sadhana. Absolutely no elbow room there. Even the Vaishnavic/Platonic love and emotion is also disallowed.
You are one of the rare Westerners in the blogosphere who has some awareness of and inclination towards the Indian tradition. But the glorified notion of Tantra celebrating sex is a little bit misplaced. Millions of people like me have absolutely no direct interface with Tantra as it operates in the margin in dubious manner. So, the legitimacy that you are proposing linking it with a politically correct/libertarian view of sex doesn’t match with the ground situation obtaining in India.
Further, the idea of sex has already been stretched from “The Pleasure of the Text†to “History of Sexuality.†An astute investigator like Foucault, who embarked upon an ambitious adventure to unravel the mystery of sex (in Vol. I), subsequently backed out and wrote just commentaries on the theme of sex as available in the Classical literature (in Vol. II & III). So, the way you venture to tackle a complex phenomenon like sex across cultures is too hazardous.
May I clarify that I am not objecting on moral grounds; rather my concerns are of method and informed debate so that unbiased scholarship emerges.
Hi Ray,
The similarities between Reich’s theories and tantristic sex (or taoistic sex for that matter) have been of interest for me as well.
But, apart from the similarities, the differences are also very big.
The main function of sexuality for Reich is the mutual regulation of the energy system through the charge and discharge process leading to physical and psychological health and growth.
The main function for tantritistic sex is the building up of Shakti with the purpose of moving up the Kundalini through the spine and the opening and cleaning of the chakra’s. The ending of this process is the opening of the crown chakra which should deliver enlightenment.
With Reich orgasmic potency is required in order to be able to discharge energy. In tantristic (and again taoistic) sex the postponing of the orgasm is required for the building up of Shakti.
By the way, David Deida was a student of a Hawaiian student of Adi Da. So his lineage can be traced back to Muktananda and further back to the Kaula tradition. What I have read of his teachings, he seems to have a nicely done Westernized package of Kashmir Shaivism. But also there appear to be a lot of the essential parts of this teachings missing or not communicated in his teachings.
Tusar, are you saying that in the Aurobindo tradition, one is “not allowed” to feel romantic love, sexual pleasure, etc? Which is tantamount to saying one should be single and celibate. I may be misunderstanding you here, maybe all you’re saying is that these emotions should not be confused with the state of higher consciousness.
In case this is of help or general interest, Agehananda Bharati described meeting a woman in India in the 1950s who was a Tantrika. Her name was Siddhimata. He describes meeting her at one of the Kumbmelas and he later met her again at a secret center where authentic tantra was practiced. This is in his memoir The Ochre Robe. Siddhimata sounded remarkable. If she had survived to this day, it is to be feared that she would have had some difficulty fending off pressure from sensation seekers and she would have had to work very carefully to pre-screen
prospective students.
Here is Agehananda Bharati’s description of the woman tantric master Siddhimata, whom he met at the Kumbmela in 1954. He later met her at a secret tantric center in Assam, where he was initiated.
Bharati is silent about the details, but it is pleasant to hope that it was the splendid and powerful Siddhimata who was his tantric teacher.
According to Bharati, the story on Siddhimata was that she was born into a princely household in Northern India. So the story goes, she ran away from home at age 13, the night before she was to be married and avoided all efforts to find her. In the forest, she spent the following ten years, living with the animals. When she emerged, she was a guru in her own right. And she did NOT have ‘eyes beautiful like a fawns in fear’. (a phrase from a tantric text by Abvinagupta describing attributes of the ideal femal partner for tantric ritual)
Instead, Siddhimata had long wild hair, a brilliant mind, and carried a three pronged spear. Not someone easily dominated.
‘She was about thirty five,’ wrote Bharati, ‘ though she looked younger, and of fair complexion; her buxom figure was draped in a deep red robe, with a leopard-skin around the upper portion. The nun’s hair hung loose and very black, it was mat and dry, but it gave the appearance that she had some trouble in preventing it from shining lustrously. It hung down to her waist, its lowest part showing beneath her leopard skin.
‘She wore a huge, large bead rosary around her neck and held a crude, iron trident, the emblem of Shakti, the divine feminine primeval power, the dynamic of the universe…Siddhimata is known all over Northern India as one of the most learned and spiritually advanced women saints of the day.’
Bharati added, that despite this scary, wild appearance, Siddhimata was famed for her learning, her beauty and her spiritual powers. Bharati was able to assess the extent of Siddhimata’s scholastic attainments. He had advanced training in both Sanskrit and textual studies, and was a very tough judge in these matters.
Siddhimata gave him a run for his money.
‘She chanted in perfect Vedic Sanskrit for at least five minutes..then she spoke for one hour and a half in a melodic but stressless voice. There was absolute silence, a thing which I had never before encountered in pious meetings of this size.
‘The strange thing..was this, it was unthinkable that the majority of the people understood what Siddhimata was talking about. For in the first place she used such a highly Sanskritized Hindi that even the schoolmasters of the place would find it hard to follow. And in addition her theme was well over the heads of all the laymen present…it was the place of discursive reasoning in ritualistic pursuits.’
Bharati, The Ochre Robe, pp 245â€â€247.
Bharati wrote another book that I think is entitled The Tantric Tradition. I could barely get through it, because I lack the necessary scholarly background, but it might be a resource for those interested.
Tusar,
Foucault wrote ‘The History of Sexuality’ over 20 years ago and the study of sexuality has progressed somewhat. Integral theory neeeds to integrate all the strands of sexology – a big task, including recent offshoots of Foucauldian interrogation, queer theory.
In regard to Tantra in India, again a complex subject. All I will say at this point is that there has been considerable revisionism of Indian attitudes to sex by what I describe as orthodox Aryans, those who introduced the Vedas and the Caste system. In writing my novel I did some considerable research into this issue and what seems evident to me is that prior to Muslim and British colonialism India wa far more sexually enlightened and permissive, particularly in those areas where Aryan control was weak.
I will note two examples of Aryan revisionism.
1. The insistence that lesbianism does not exist in India and that it is a Western disease. The scholar Giti Thadani has written two books that refute this.
2. The belief that Hinduism requires modesty in terms of exposing the body. There is substantial evidence to show that prior to colonialism nudity and semi-nudity was extremely common and normative. The common person, including women, only wore a single piece of cloth around their waist, as did royalty. There is an account from a Portugese adventurer that describes how the local Rani received him topless.
Pre-colonialism India had a sophisticated erotic culture which included sex as pleasure, art and as a spiritual technique. The colonial period allowed the Aryans to consolidate their power. Now they have a hegemony and they are shameless in rewriting history. One of the victims of this was Tantra, which actually attempted to challenge Aryan ideology.
What I am suggesting here is that Tantra cannot be separated from a pre-colonial India that had a much more permissive attitude to sex in general.
In regard to Aurobindo – as I said, he has an Ascender bias and seems to me to be somewhat Aryan in his approach.
Hi Marko,
I agree, similarities but significant differences.
Hi Marko,
This may be of interest regarding Muktananda, the Kaula tradition and Kashmir Shaivism:
“The Heart of the Secret: A Personal and Scholarly Encounter with Shakta Tantrism in Siddha Yoga” by Sarah Caldwell
http://www.leavingsiddhayoga.net/caldwell.sarah.pdf
ABSTRACT: This article suggests two apparently contradictory theses:
namely that Swami Muktananda (1908-1982) was an enlightened teacher
and practitioner of an esoteric form of Tantric sexual yoga, and that he
also engaged in actions that were not ethical, legal, or liberatory with
many disciples. These two theses are brought into creative tension
through a developing Tantric hermeneutic. In discussing secrecy and
power, the article addresses critical cultural, feminist, and psychological
issues about sexual abuse and the importation of Asian religious tradi-
tions into contemporary American society, and argues that what has hap-
pened in the recent history of Siddha Yoga arises directly out of Tantra’s
long history of dissimulation and secrecy. I suggest that a hybrid schol-
arly sensibility might emerge out of the secret heart of the Tantric teach-
ings, itself offering a way forward in the study of such traditions.
Hi Tom,
I could only look at it shortly because of a lack of time. I knew there was a link between Muktananda and the Kaula tradition and look forward to reading the whole piece later since it seems to flash out the details of this link.
Read that Caldwell article. It is there that she writes how she discovered a text recommended by Muktananda, written by Abvinagupta, who wrote it for the Kashmiri Shivite/kaula practitioners.
The Abvinagupta test lists the ideal attributes of the woman who is to be the ‘mudra’ consort in tantric practice, and what I found interesting was that the list of very sexy attributes listed by Abvinagupta included this item:
‘Eyes beautiful like a fawn in fear’—which to my unapologetic feminist mind hints that Abvinagupta was recommending a girl would pose no anxiety for the male, someone easily led and dominated, and thus quite different from the splendid, confident Siddhimata described above by Agehananda Bharati.
Abvinagupta could have eroticised and then canonized confidence as a desirable attribute for the ‘mudra’ partner, but did not.
And, Caldwell tells us that it was precisely these inexperienced nonconfident girls whom Muktananda selected, who were not experienced enough as yoginis to really understand tantra at all.
It may be that part of the way tantra became subverted was that the males who produced and transmitted the texts gradually began to select women who were gorgeous, but who lacked self confidence, and did not choose to list ‘eyes beautiful like a tigers’ in the job description. So, women like Siddhimata became marginalized, because of their true power and resemblence to the Goddess, while girls lacking confidence and who did not arouse awe or anxiety in the male became the preferred
types.
This possible ‘Jailbait bias’ (my term) would, IMO be part of the subversion of tantra.
I question whether what AK says above is “subversion” at all but is inherent to tantra from the beginning. Ray laid out that tantra arose from the shamanistic practices of northern India, of which Padmasambhava carried with him to Tibet, where this branch of Buddhism then merged with the indiginous, shamanistic Bon traditions. It seems inherent in ethnocentric, shamanistic cultures to value men over women along with a host of other “pre-rational” endeavors. Sex itself is pre-rational, arising from the most basic human drive, just above survival. So sex itself is not “the answer” but must be “included” and not supressed or repressed in an “integral” theory/praxis. So for me one line of integral inquiry is de-mytholgizing tantra itself, from its origins, what is “merely” animal sex from what is “spiritual” sex, and also demystifying the pre-rational elements of the “spiritual” in such sexual practices. Tantra by itself is not some “magical” answer to the integration of sex and spirituality.
I think AK is partially right, but I caution against assuming Abhinavagupta meant docile. Muktananda also spoke highly of female adepts, particularly Mirabai and Lalleshwari. Lalleshwari is noted for becoming an ascetic and wandering around naked and for being quite independent and brilliant. Similarly, not all the women Mukatananda had tantric sex with were young and compliant. The oldest was fourteen as far as I know, and before people gasp at how outrageous that is, might I remind people that the age of consent is 14 in Canada and Italy, and 13 in Spain and that the Tantric texts clearly state that one should worship any woman who is menstruating, typically 12-60 (as stated in the Yoni Tantra).
The term jailbait is misapplied because throughout India and Asia women have always been available as wives or consorts from the onset of puberty. We should not judge the past from the present in this regard, especially given that the idea that sex should only start during late teens is only historically very recent and largely an Anglo-American moral belief.
Having said that, Tantra was corrupted and misused, especially by patriarchal Aryans. The Devidasi system has been corrupted so that today it is just an excuse for high caste males to exploit lower caste girls. In the past the devidasi was an honoured jati, or profession.
The reason Tantra was so secretive was to prevent it being misused.
On Muktananda’s case – I don’t defend his actions. He should have known better, but he was a strange mix of Aryan and Tantric. He was a Saraswati monk of the Shankara Advaita Vedanta system, which demanded celibacy. He discovered Abhinavagupta later and I doubt that he learnt from a genuine Tantric master. The thing is that the Tantric system has broken down nearly completely. The new puritanism of India means that there are no suitable men or women for authentic Tantric practice. Therefore Muktananda experimented with what he had – and this has to be understood in the context that in India a guru can expect total surrender from a disciple, a notion that offends Western sensibilities. Muktananda would have rationalised his actions from the pov that these women wanted to be his disciples – and I might add that he chose from women who were living in the ashram. I’m not aware of him cherry picking from the long lines of visitors, something his successor Nityananda was accused of.