The dancer is a figure closely associated with
sexual energy and the female power of initiation.
A mystic song of the Tantric tradition
declares that "The dancing-girl has the
power to initiate the process of sexual rejuvenation."
Many temples of the ancient
world housed dancers, whose dancing conveyed
the very essence of eroticism. Their
presence in the temples of India shocked and
offended the puritanical morality of the British,
who passed laws forbidding such activities.
It is unfortunate that the sexual prowess
of the temple dancers caused the British to
mistake them for prostitutes.
The temple dancers or "Devadasis" (literally
"servants of God") of India were divided
into various categories. The highest
were experts at the different kinds of Yoga
and through years of training developed control
over their body functions. As initiatresses
of Tantric Yoga, they served an important
role. They were considered to be the mistresses
of the temple gods, the embodiments
of the Gopis, and emanations of Lakshmi.
The prosperity of the country was believed
to be related to the rites and activities of the temple dancers.
The courts of Kings and Emperors were
filled with dancing-girls, whose function was
to evoke the erotic sentiment and to engender
a mood of spirituality and love. In ancient
Egypt, the dancing-girls of the court
or temple were believed to have power over
life and death; many became influential as
priestesses, for dance lends itself to expressing
esoteric concepts that cannot be described
by words or static pictures. Dance embodies
the full range of emotions; thus it can reveal
the Subtle Body of Tantra in all its glory.
The following contemporary account by
Allen V. Ross stunningly illustrates the sexual
role of the Indian temple dancer:
The girl entered softly on bare feet. She
knelt before me and kissed my feet. She
was good-looking, about thirty, with a face
that was at once worldly and childlike. Her
body was completely sheathed in a transparent
gold silk sari. Her hands, feet and
head were bare, except for some gold jewelry
that jangled as she moved. She began
to dance without any accompaniment at
all. This Devadasi conveyed sexuality with
every little twitch of her rouged lips, the
gestures of her hands, the movements of
her head, the stamping of her feet, the roll
of her eyes. The opening and shutting of
her nostrils, the sinuous twisting of her firm
but pliable body, was an amazing performance.
I could feel the electrical charges
of the girl's erotic magic and it seemed to
me that she was using only a fraction of
her skills. Her dance, slow and ecstatic,
was highly symbolic, displaying various
sexual moods, from enticement and arousal
to seduction and final rapture. It must have
lasted hours and I was completely taken
with her. Then she possessed me. There
was no vulgar striptease. She daintily
slipped out of her clothes, displaying a
supple body the color of wild cinnamon.
She told me to lie on the mat. After that it
was just my Lingam and her Yoni in cosmic
union. Her intimacies possessed me.
I was devoured. She was what the Hindus
call the "saraotastryan" or "nutcracker"
woman," because of the amazing power
of her sphincter muscles. I was almost out
of my mind. All the while she made murmuring,
humming, drone sounds that put
me into a trance. Suddenly there was an
explosion in my brain and I felt myself in
another dimension. There were amazing
lights and fantastic colors. The walls
seemed to be melting and I felt ecstasy in every cell.
This description is an accurate account of
the potency inherent in the dancer archetype.
A dancer needs to gain considerable
control over normally automatic responses
such as breathing, balance, and emotion. This
control is similar to the control needed to
master the teachings of Tantra. Emotion is
the ultimate key; by consciously evoking and
channeling the emotions, transcendence can
both be achieved personally and transmitted
to another person. The emotion of sex is
easily evoked through dance. When the body
is in a healthy condition and finely tuned,
then dance really can become initiation.
The multifarious forms of dance can explicitly
or unconsciously convey meaning.
All dance forms involving couples present a
ritualized, social reflection of the sexual act.
The art of spiritual dance has almost become
a thing of the past.
A display of dancing brings out the spectator
in everyone. Public dancing and private
dancing have distinctly different
potentialities. This art form can be performed
in solo, for your partner, or improvised together.
Let your inhibitions go and indulge
your creativity and spontaneity to the limit.
Dance can be many things: an individualistic
search for ecstasy, a means of communication,
a social activity, a healthful exercise,
or a courtship ritual. Of the Sixty-four Arts,
dance is one of the most closely related to
the Art of Love. The dance of a woman has
a unique potential for firing the vitality of
man and reviving depleted energies. The
tones and rhythms of music incorporated into
the erotic dance can enhance and sustain the
consummation of love.
An Indian temple dancer. This dance form
makes use of erotic body movements and
tells a story through gesture and mime.
Whole epics were expressed in dance,
serving to initiate people into a non-verbal
level of understanding. The dance form
known as Orissi or "Odissi" is currently
closest to the ancient style of Tantric
mystic dance.
If in joy, songs are sung, let them be the most excellent Eternal songs. If one
dances when joy has arisen, let it be done with release as its object.
- HEVAJRA TANTRA
There are many delights of
visiting dancing-girls. When the
dancing is finished he retires to a
spacious tower, cooled by the
breeze, and there practices the
important methods of the Yellow
Emperor. He takes the tender
hand of a girl as beautiful as Hsishih,
and the white arm of
another one like Mao-shih. Their
bodies are beautiful, supple like
grass moving in the wind; they
put forth all their charms so that
one forgets about life and death.
- PIEN JANG
The dancer: a Yoga posture derived from
dance. It is particularly suitable for toning
up vitality and circulating energy.
