Tibetan Buddhism Sexuality

19 Jul Tibetan Buddhism Sexuality

Tibetan Tantric Buddhism has long had a reputation of including sexuality as part of its spiritual techniques, whether these practices were literal or imaginary. Because of this, when looking for a tradition that is sex positive and may include techniques that induce transpersonal or sacred sex, it is often in the forefront. However, most if not all of the Tibetan writings about the use of sex for spiritual advancement has been written by and for men (Jacoby, 2015). In what is one of the only accounts of Tibetan Buddhist sexuality written by a woman, Jacoby reports that most if not all accounts of sex between male aspirants and consorts written by men were for the male’s benefit, that the women were considered of lesser value and functioned as pawns in the male game of spiritual ascendance toward enlightenment. There was no love in tantra, no emotion, only the efficacious use of other (lesser) human bodies.

Instead, in Love and Liberation (2015), we have the firsthand autobiography of a woman who functioned as a female consort, and her account is quite different from what we have been led to believe. Sera Khandro was one of the great masters of the early 20^th Century who served as a guru to many lamas, monastics and lay people. She felt herself to be under the tutelage of the original Tantric Tibetan Buddhist female master, Yeshe Tsogyal, who was the famous consort of Padmasambhava, who brought Buddhism to Tibet in 749 CE. Jacoby comments

Although they [Sera Khandro and Yeshe Tsogyl] sought to lead independent religious lives, neither chose to become a celibate nun. Instead, they engaged in multiple consort relationships for the benefit of male and female partner’s spiritual insight. Even though theirs were not monogamous relationships, both dakinis formed especially close bonds with their male spiritual gurus (p,89).

In Tibetan Buddhism, the sexual consort function was seen as having three purposes: curing illness and prolonging life, helping the partner achieve enlightenment, and revealing Treasures or the teachings. Either men or women could function as consorts. Sera Khandro appears to have had some sense of agency because she refused certain monks and teachers who requested her to serve as their consort. In other cases, she appears to have consented against her will.

Although the majority of the writings about the sexual consort path to advancement were written by men and appear to have been unemotional, unloving, and non-relational, that is not how the one woman writing about the subject describes it. She writes of having feelings for her partners and enjoying nourishing connections. Although she had a variety of partners, she had one root consort with whom she was mutually in love.

This Guru Couple, Sera Khandro and Trimé Ōzer,  describe their relationship as both the path to and the goal of complete Buddhahood, and that theirs was an indestructible union, many lifetimes past and forever into the future. Even though they had other partners, she describes them as an exclusive yab yum dyad, or two hands of one body. They saw their relationship as a mutual enlightenment of a tantric couple, a joint awakening which depicts the path to Buddhahood not as a distant, detached, and solitary venture but one characterized by a great love between male and female practitioners (p. 315).

© 2023 Catherine Auman

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