Kama Sutra
Kama Sutra
of Vatsayayana
PART I,
PART II-V,
PART VI-VII
collection
The Love Temples of Khajuraho
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Kama Sutra (Sanskrit: कामसूत्र),
(alternative spellings: Kamasutram or simply Kamasutra), is an ancient
Indian text widely considered to be the standard work on love in
Sanskrit literature written by the Indian intellectual Vatsyayana. A
portion of the work deals with human sexual behavior.
The Kama Sutra is mostly notable of a group of texts known generically
as Kama Shastra (Sanskrit: Kāma Śhāstra). Traditionally, the first
transmission of Kama Shastra or "Discipline of Kama" is attributed to
Nandi the sacred bull, Shiva's doorkeeper, who was moved to sacred
utterance by overhearing the lovemaking of the god and his wife Parvati
and later recorded his utterances for the benefit of mankind.
Historian John Keay says that the Kama Sutra is
a compendium that was collected into its present form in the second
century CE.
Regarding how the composition became known to
the Western world, Burton's translation says the following in its
introduction:
It may be interesting to some persons to learn
how it came about that Vatsyayana was first brought to light and
translated into the English language. It happened thus. While
translating with the pundits the `Anunga Runga, or the stage of love',
reference was frequently found to be made to one Vatsya. The sage Vatsya
was of this opinion, or of that opinion. The sage Vatsya said this, and
so on. Naturally questions were asked who the sage was, and the pundits
replied that Vatsya was the author of the standard work on love in
Sanskrit literature, that no Sanscrit library was complete without his
work, and that it was most difficult now to obtain in its entire state.
The copy of the manuscript obtained in Bombay was defective, and so the
pundits wrote to Benares, Calcutta and Jaipur for copies of the
manuscript from Sanskrit libraries in those places. Copies having been
obtained, they were then compared with each other, and with the aid of a
Commentary called `Jayamangla' a revised copy of the entire manuscript
was prepared, and from this copy the English translation was made. The
following is the certificate of the chief pundit:
`The accompanying manuscript is corrected by me
after comparing four different copies of the work. I had the assistance
of a Commentary called "Jayamangla" for correcting the portion in the
first five parts, but found great difficulty in correcting the remaining
portion, because, with the exception of one copy thereof which was
tolerably correct, all the other copies I had were far too incorrect.
However, I took that portion as correct in which the majority of the
copies agreed with each other.'
Content
The Mallanaga Vatsyayana's
Kama Sutra has 1250 verses, distributed in 36 chapters, which are
further organized into 7 parts. According to both the Burton and Doniger
translations, the contents of the book are structured into 7 parts like
the following:
1. Introductory
Chapters on contents of the
book, three aims and priorities of life, the acquisition of knowledge,
conduct of the well-bred townsman, reflections on intermediaries who
assist the lover in his enterprises (5 chapters).
2. On sexual union
Chapters on stimulation of desire, types of embraces, caressing and
kisses, marking with nails, biting and marking with teeth, on copulation
(positions), slapping by hand and corresponding moaning, virile behavior
in women, superior coition and oral sex, preludes and conclusions to the
game of love. It describes 64 types of sexual acts (10 chapters).
3.
About the acquisition of a wife
Chapters on forms of marriage, relaxing the girl, obtaining the
girl, managing alone, union by marriage (5 chapters).
4. About a
wife
Chapters on conduct of the only wife and conduct of the chief
wife and other wives (2 chapters).
5. About the wives of other
people
Chapters on behavior of woman and man, encounters to get
acquainted, examination of sentiments, the task of go-between, the
king's pleasures, behavior in the women's quarters (6 chapters).
6.
About courtesans
Chapters on advice of the assistants on the choice
of lovers, looking for a steady lover, ways of making money, renewing
friendship with a former lover, occasional profits, profits and losses
(6 chapters).
7. On the means of attracting others to one's self
Chapters on improving physical attractions, arousing a weakened
sexual power (2 chapters).
Pleasure and spirituality
Some
Indian philosophies following the "four main goals of life", known as
the purusharthas:
1). Dharma: Virtuous living. 2). Artha: Material
prosperity. 3). Kama: Aesthetic and erotic pleasure. 4). Moksha:
Liberation.
Dharma, Artha and Kama are aims of everyday
life, while Moksha is release from the cycle of death and rebirth. The
Kama Sutra (Burton translation) says:
"Dharma is better than Artha, and Artha is
better than Kama. But Artha should always be first practised by the king
for the livelihood of men is to be obtained from it only. Again, Kama
being the occupation of public women, they should prefer it to the other
two, and these are exceptions to the general rule." (Kama Sutra 1.2.14)
Of the first three, virtue is the highest goal,
a secure life the second and pleasure the least important. When motives
conflict, the higher ideal is to be followed. Thus, in making money
virtue must not be compromised, but earning a living should take
precedence over pleasure, but there are exceptions.
In childhood, Vātsyāyana says, a person should
learn how to make a living; youth is the time for pleasure, and as years
pass one should concentrate on living virtuously and hope to escape the
cycle of rebirth.
The Kama Sutra is sometimes wrongly thought of
as a manual for tantric sex. While sexual practices do exist within the
very wide tradition of Hindu tantra, the Kama Sutra is not a tantric
text, and does not touch upon any of the sexual rites associated with
some forms of tantric practice.
Also the Buddha preached a Kama Sutra, which is
located in the Atthakavagga (sutra number 1). This Kama Sutra, however,
is of a very different nature as it warns against the dangers that come
with the search for pleasures of the senses.
Translations
The most widely known
English translation of the Kama Sutra was made by the famous traveler
and author Sir Richard Francis Burton and compiled by his colleague
Forster Fitzgerald Arbuthnot in 1883. Historian Burjor Avari has
criticized Burton's translation as "inadequate," having had the result
that the book gained a reputation in the West of being a pornographic
work.
A recent translation is that of Indra Sinha,
published in 1980. In the early 1990s its chapter on lovemaking
positions began circulating on the internet as an independent text and
today is often assumed to be the whole of the Kama Sutra.
Alain Daniélou contributed a translation called
The Complete Kama Sutra in 1994. This translation featured the original
text attributed to Vatsayana, along with a medieval and modern
commentary. Unlike Burton's version, Alain Danielou's new translation
preserves the numbered verse divisions of the original and includes two
essential commentaries: the Jayamangala commentary, written in Sanskrit
by Yashodhara during the Middle Ages, and a modern Hindi commentary by
Devadatta Shastri. Another noteworthy difference is the preservation of
the full explicitness of the original text. All aspects of sexual life
have been mentioned - including marriage, adultery, prostitution, group
sex, sadomasochism, male and female homosexuality, and transvestism.
It was translated again in 2002 by Wendy
Doniger, the professor of the history of religions at the University of
Chicago, and Sudhir Kakar, the Indian psychoanalyst and senior fellow at
Center for Study of World Religions at Harvard University. Their
translation provides a psychoanalytic interpretation of the text.
