Tantrika: Traveling the Road of Divine LoveA Foreign Correspondent's Search for Her Cultural and Spiritual Identity What began as an assignment from her editor at the Wall Street Journal to investigate "America's hottest new fad," the secrets of sexual ecstasy in Tantra, became a story that would lead reporter Asra Nomani halfway around the world and change forever her life, faith, and self-identity. From a New Age Tantric seminar in Santa Cruz to sitting at the feet of the Dalai Lama in India, from meditation caves in Thailand to crossing the Khyber Pass with Muslim militants and staring down the barrel of an Afghan soldier's AK-47, Nomani's trek unexpectedly climaxes in Pakistan, where she risks great danger in joining the hunt for kidnapped fellow reporter Danny Pearl. She travels the globe in search of this elusive "divine love," but ultimately hers is a journey of self-discovery in which the divine within herself and within all women -- all "tantrikas" -- is revealed. |
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Contents
Learning American Tantra i | 1 |
Leaving My Old Life | 15 |
The Man I Married | 31 |
From the West to the East | 45 |
Worshiping the Lingam | 57 |
A Cremation Ground | 65 |
My Devoted Muslim Family | 72 |
Implosion | 84 |
4 Finding New Shakti | 147 |
5 Durga on Her Tiger | 159 |
7 Morgantown | 164 |
Thirty Days in a Spiritual | 190 |
Riding into the Village 797 | 197 |
Wannabe Goddesses Cry | 207 |
Out of Morgantown | 219 |
Parrots over a Safe House | 235 |
Finding Freedom Again | 95 |
Pilgrimage to the Himalayas | 104 |
From the Bay of Bengal to a Train Berth | 119 |
The Village | 132 |
3 The Sick Man | 144 |
Child of Truth | 256 |
Epilogue | 267 |
Acknowledgments | 283 |
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Common terms and phrases
America asked baby beautiful beside Bhai body boyfriend breath brother called child Danny dark daughter Delhi didn't door energy Esther eyes face father fear feel felt front gave girl give goddess hair hands head heard Hindu husband India inside Islam Khala knew later learned leave light lived looked Lucy Mariane marriage married meaning meant morning mother moved Muslim never night Pakistan parents passed path practice prayer pulled returned ride road Shakti side sister slipped smile spiritual started stay stepped stood stopped Street talked Tantra Tantric taught teachings tell temple thing thought told took train traveled tried trying turned Uncle village walked wanted wedding West wife woman women wondered young
Popular passages
Page 228 - The woman and the man guilty of adultery or fornication, flog each of them with a hundred stripes...
Page 36 - The bride and the groom saw each other for the first time on their wedding day in 1903. On the eve of her wedding, Grandmother was summoned into her father's presence. 'Tomorrow you will belong to the Yen family,
Page 18 - Jerusalem and then taken through the seven heavens, even to the Sublime Throne, and initiated into the spiritual mysteries of the human soul struggling in space and Time. "The...
Page 166 - In the first, the mantra is divided into six parts grounded in the thumbs, index fingers, middle fingers, ring fingers, little fingers, and palms through the power of concentration. This is called kara nyasa, synchronization of the mantra's power with the energies of the hands. Next comes anga nyasa.
Page 107 - India's traffic for fifteen hundred miles — such a river of life as exists nowhere else in the world.
Page 18 - The reference to this great mystic story of the Mi'raj is a fitting prelude to the journey of the human soul in its spiritual growth in life.
Page 58 - If merely by drinking wine, men were to attain fulfillment, all addicted to liquor would reach perfection. . . . If liberation were to be ensured by sexual intercourse with a shakti, all creatures would be liberated by female companionship," says a text called the Kularnava Tantra.
Page 128 - British had just passed a law letting them take over any princely state under their patronage if the ruler died without a male heir.
Page 142 - Candles would burn or, better still, an oil lamp with oil that creates a special red light.
Page 6 - Look upon :i woman as a goddess whose special energy she is, and honor her in that state," wrote the early Tantra texts.
References to this book
War, Media, and Propaganda: A Global Perspective Yahya R. Kamalipour,Nancy Snow Limited preview - 2004 |
Bibliographic information
| Title | Tantrika: Traveling the Road of Divine Love |
| Author | Asra Nomani |
| Publisher | Harper Collins, 2009 |
| ISBN | 006186028X, 9780061860287 |
| Length | 304 pages |
| Subjects | › › Biography & Autobiography / Cultural, Ethnic & Regional / Asian & Asian American Religion / Buddhism / Rituals & Practice Religion / Eastern Religion / Hinduism / Rituals & Practice Social Science / Women's Studies |
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