Gnosis and Kalacakratantra

In the Kalacakratantra, gnosis (jnana), which is considered the ultimate reality, is the most crucial concept.

As in other gnostic traditions, the main focus of the Kalacakratantra is on gnosis as the source of the individual's aspiration for enlightenment, as the means leading to the fulfillment of that aspiration, and as the fulfillment of that aspiration.

When this source of aspiration for spiritual awakening is brought forth, or made fully conscious, it liberates one from cyclic existence. But when it is not brought forth, or remains unconscious, it destroys the individual and keeps him in cyclic existence. Therefore, it is said that gnosis is the source of both cyclic existence and nirvana.

In this regard, the Kalacakratantra fully accords with the writings of other gnostic systems, which also sees gnosis as the source of sublime power, the ground of all being, and the potential for liberation or destruction, existing in a latent state within the psyche of all people.

The Gospel of Thomas expresses it in this way:
If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you.
If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.

The Christian gnostic text the Testimony of Truth asserts that the gnostic is a disciple of his own mind, "the father of the truth". Therefore, gnosis is nothing other than self-knowledge, insight into the depths of one's own being. As for all other gnostic traditions, so too for the Kalacakratantra tradition, the individual who lacks this knowledge is driven by impulses that he does not comprehend. One suffers due to ignorance regarding one's own divine nature. Therefore, ignorance of oneself is a form of self-destruction.

In other words, in these gnostic traditions, one becomes the transcendent reality that one perceives at the time of spiritual transformation. Having perceived oneself in this way, one perceives and knows all things in the same way. Likewise, just as in the Kalacakratantra, so too in some Christian gnostic systems, the realization of gnosis entails the transcendence of all differentiations, or dualities, for it is the final integration of the knower and the known. One reads in the Gospel of Thomas:

"When you make the two one, and when you make the inside like the outside and the outside like the inside, and when you make the male and the female one and the same... then you will enter [the Kingdom]."


The Kalacakratantra speaks of this non-dual perception of the world in terms of seeing all things as being of the "same taste" - the taste of gnosis.



The Inner Kalacakratantra by Vesna A. Wallace



Photo Credit: Picture @ Flickr