Sacred Sexuality: The Erotic Spirit in the World's Great Religions

by
Edition: 1st
Format: Paperback
Pub. Date: 2003-11-01
Publisher(s): INNER TRADITIONS INTERNATIONAL
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Summary

A historical, cross-cultural survey of sexuality as a sacred spiritual practice

• Examines sacred sexuality in the world’s religious and mystery traditions

• Explores contemporary “sexual stress syndrome” resulting from the absence of the sacred in sexual practice

• Reveals how to find the sacred in the ordinary

This book examines the history of sexuality as a sacramental act. In spite of our culture’s recent sexual liberalizations, sexual intimacy often remains unfulfilling. Georg Feuerstein instructs that the fulfillment we long for in our sex lives can only be attained once we have explored the spiritual depths of our erotic natures.

Feuerstein delves into a wide variety of spiritual traditions--including Christianity, Judaism, goddess worship, Taoism, and Hinduism--in search of sacred truths regarding sexuality. He reveals that all of these great teachings share the hidden message that spirituality is, in essence, erotic and that sexuality is inherently spiritual. From the erotic cult of the Great Mother and the archaic ritual of hieros gamos (sacred marriage) to the institution of sacred prostitution and the erotic spirituality practiced in the mystery traditions, Feuerstein offers a wealth of historical practices and perspectives that serve as the bases for a positive sexual spirituality suited to our contemporary needs.

Author Biography

<p> This book examines the history of sexuality as a sacramental act. Georg Feuerstein instructs that the fulfillment we long for in our sex lives can be attained when we explore the spiritual depths of our erotic natures. Feuerstein delves into a wide variety of spiritual traditions and reveals that all of these great teachings share the hidden message that spirituality is, in essence, erotic and that sexuality is inherently spiritual. </p>

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments ix
Preface xi
Part I. Contemporary Sexuality: Its Failures and Possibilities
1(42)
Taking Stock: The Sexual Wasteland
3(8)
The Age of Sexual Bewilderment
3(2)
The Sexual Stress Syndrome
5(6)
Tracing the Roots of the Modern Sexual Dilemma
11(16)
Guilt: The Feeling of Being Found Out
11(1)
Shame: The Feeling of Being Unworhy
12(1)
Our Heritage of Sexual Guilt and Shame
13(2)
The Denial of the Body
15(2)
Guilt, Shame, and Ecstasy
17(4)
Sexual Addiction as Avoidance of Bliss
21(1)
The Quest for Transcendence
22(3)
From Sexual Malaise to the Loss of the Sacred
25(2)
The Hidden Window: Spiritual Breakthroughs in Sex
27(16)
Sex, Love, and Transcendence
27(3)
The Power of Love: Erotic and Spritual Breakthroughs
30(9)
Sex: The Hidden Window
39(4)
Part II. Sacred Sex Through the Ages
43(144)
Sacred Sex and the Goddess: Ancestral Wisdom
45(12)
The Erotic Cult of the Great Mother
45(4)
An Erotic Flashback to 20,000 B.C.
49(2)
Sex, Magic, and the Life-Force
51(1)
The Sexual Tragedy of Agriculture
52(1)
The Goddess and Her Lover
53(4)
Sacred Marriage and Sacred Prostitution
57(20)
Hieros Gamos: The Sacred Marriage
57(4)
The Phallic Principle
61(1)
Phallic Worship
62(2)
The Rule of the Phallus in Greece
64(2)
Sacred Prostitution in Ancient Greece
66(3)
The Sexual Servants of Mesopotamia and Egypt
69(2)
The Temple Prostitutes of India
71(1)
The Story of Sunita
72(3)
The Contemporary Reappraisal of Sacred Prostitution
75(2)
Erotic Spirituality in the Mystery Traditions
77(16)
The Mystery Cults of the Ancient World
77(2)
The Corn Mother Demeter and Her Votaries
79(3)
Dionysos: God of Wine and Ecstasy
82(4)
The Phallic Orpheus
86(1)
Pan: The Lusty Goat-God
87(1)
Cybele and Attis
88(2)
The Mystery Cult of Isis and Osiris
90(3)
Spiritual Eroticism in Judaism
93(8)
Sex, Power, and the Goddess Among the Ancient Hebrews
93(3)
The Hebrew Sexual Heritage
96(5)
The Eclipse of Eros in the Christian Tradition
101(12)
The Christian Sexual Heritage
101(4)
Mary: Virginal Mother and Bride of Christ
105(3)
Eve, the First Man, and Guilt
108(5)
The Medieval Love Mystics, East and West
113(18)
The Resurgence of Eros in the Middle Ages
113(2)
The Troubadours: Erotic Idolators
115(1)
The Lover Within: Bridal Mysticism
116(6)
The Mystical Eros in Islam and Judaism
122(2)
On the Nuptial Couch with Krishna: The Hindu Version of Bridal Mysticism
124(7)
The Jewel in the Lotus: The Lessons of Tantrism
131(24)
The Secret Circle: A Story Set in India Around 1200 A.D.
131(3)
Tantrism: The Historical and Cultural Context
134(6)
Maithuna: The Love-Play of God and Goddess
140(6)
The Serpent Power and the Transmutation of Sexual Energy
146(4)
Tantric Eroticism and Freudian Sublimation
150(5)
The Sexual Tao: The Chinese Way of Circulating Life-Energy
155(14)
Tao: The Nameless Way Beyond God and Goddess
155(3)
The Tao of Sex: White Tiger and Green Dragon
158(11)
Sexual Magic and Neo-Paganism
169(10)
Sex Magic and the Magic of Sex
169(3)
The Magical Power of Semen
172(3)
The Reawakening of the Goddess in Neo-Paganism
175(4)
The New Erotic Christianity
179(8)
Alan Watts and Incarnational Theology
179(1)
Toward a Nonpuritan Christianity
180(5)
Matthew Fox and the Erotic Christ
185(2)
Part III. The Challenge of Sacred Sex Today
187(28)
Sex As Energy and Communion
189(12)
The Sexual Threshold Between the Secular and the Sacred
189(1)
The Erotic Implications of Einstein's Theorem
190(2)
Psychiatric Interlude: From Fredian Libido to Reichian Orgone
192(3)
Sex and Evolutionary Energy
195(1)
Spiritual Work with the Psychocosmic Energy
196(2)
Sexual Communion
198(3)
Toward an Erotic Spirituality for Today
201(14)
Coming Down to Earth
201(4)
Finding the Sacred in the Ordinary
205(2)
God, Goddess, and Intimacy
207(5)
Ritual Beyond Neurosis
212(3)
Notes 215(14)
Recommended Reading 229(4)
Index 233

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