Tibetan Tantric Buddhist Literature

Abstract Tantric Buddhism refers to a particular set of texts and practices that arose in India sometime during the middle of the first millennium ce. with its most prominent literature being produced from the eighth to twelfth centuries only ending with the Muslim invasion of India and the destruction of major centers of learning, after which tantric Buddhist theory and practice became the purview of scholars in Tibet. In general, tantric Buddhism can be distinguished from non-tantric Buddhism in that while the latter focuses on calming of mind and body—and in some traditions, doing so as a basis for subsequently engaging in precise analytical meditations—the former entails the utilization of mental and physical yogas designed to induce specific exalted states of mind declared to be of soteriological efficacy. The exact nature of those states, their textual origins, and their proper production and deployment constitutes the content of Tibetan tantric literature.