The Tantric Woo-Woo of Christopher Wallis, Part 2

In Part 1 of this article, I focused on countering the arguments that Tantric scholar Dr. Christopher Wallis makes pertaining to quantum mechanics and idealist monism as they apply to nondual Tantric Shaivism. Wallis articulates these arguments in his book “The Recognition Sutras: Illuminating a 1000-Year-old Spiritual Masterpiece,” and because I find these arguments flawed and incongruent with Tantric Shaivism as I understand it, I responded with my counter-arguments.

In Part 2, I shift my focus to critiquing Wallis’s spiritual exegesis and elaboration of “The Recognition Sutras” (which is a translation and explanation of Ksemaraja’s “Pratyabhijnahrdayam”). As my critique makes clear, I have little regard for Wallis’s spiritual hermeneutics, which I find superficial, imprecise, and, at times, misleading. Because this is just a brief article and not a book, I cannot identify all the “problems” I have with his explanations, nor can I go into extensive detail in my criticisms of the ones that I identify. Nonetheless, I believe that I present sufficient evidence to expose the lack of depth and descriptive accuracy in his book. As in Part 1, I quote Wallis from his book, and then provide my responses. Herewith are the quotes and responses:

WALLIS: If we oversimplify a little bit, we can say that Śakti practices are those dynamic practices that emphasize Energy, such as yoga āsana, energy-body practices, prāṇāyāma, mantra, working with thought-constructs, and so on.

GARDNER: The practices Wallis describes are sakti (and not Sakti) practices because they pertain to stepped-down cosmic energies (including prana) and not to pure Spirit, or Clear-Light Energy, which is Sakti, the Force-flow of Consciousness Itself (Siva). In truth, the only true Sakti practice is that of conducting and merging with the Spirit Power (or Current) of Consciousness. Wallis, however, fails to differentiate between saktis, which are created, or manifest, energies, and Sakti, which is uncreated, or unmanifest, Energy.

WALLIS: Now, citta is a word that we translate as ‘mind’ but is more accurately rendered ‘heart-mind’ in English because it is the locus of both thought and emotion, these being inextricably linked. It is therefore no surprise that Kṣemaraja argues that the citta is the primary locus of our limited sense of self, our sense of our separate, different, and independent identity.

GARDNER: Citta is better defined as one’s individual consciousness than as one’s mind, because it implies the intersection of Cit (universal Consciousness) and manas (the individual mind). Citta is rendered heart-mind because the intersection of universal Consciousness and the “root” of the mind (in the form of samskaras, or subconscious psychical seed tendencies) is located in the Heart-center (Hridayam, as distinct from the anahata, or heart, chakra).

Wallis, in his glossary, defines Citi as Consciousness, or Awareness, when it, more properly, should be defined as Consciousness-Power. Cit (which isn’t even in his glossary) is the Sanskrit equivalent of Consciousness, or Awareness. Wallis knows this, and he knows that Citi means Consciousness-Power—but because attention to detail is lacking in this slovenly-edited text, it is tainted with errors.

WALLIS:  First, he [Ksemaraja] invites you to place your mind in the Heart. In the specific language of the nondual Śaiva Tāntrikas, the Heart is a synonym for bodha, awareness. So to place the mind in the Heart, or entrust the mind to the Heart, is simply to bring reverent attention to awareness itself— to focus on the fact of being aware.

With one’s sense-faculties dissolved in the space of the Heart— in the innermost recess of the Lotus— with one’s attention on nothing else: O blessed Lady, one will obtain blessedness (saubhāgya). Though any of the cakras can be visualized as a lotus, the heart is described as such much more frequently than the others.

GARDNER: What “dooms” Wallis’s exegesis and elaboration of “The Recognition Sutras” to mediocrity (or less) is his failure to “crack the code” of the text. The text’s title in Sanskrit is “Pratyabhijnahrdayam,” which translates into “The Heart of Recognition” –but Wallis doesn’t grok what the Heart (Hridayam) is all about. Hence his exposition never moves beyond the surface level.

The Heart is a synonym for the Self (Divine Being-Awareness), and the Self, in an embodied human, can only be Realized (or Recognized) in, at, and through the Heart-space (or Heart-locus), which is felt-experienced two digits to the right of the center of one’s chest. This is the “place” where universal Consciousness intersects (and outshines) individual consciousness. Hence the immanent Heart (Hridayam) must be distinguished from the heart chakra (anahata)—but Wallis fails to do this.

To reduce the Heart to mere “awareness” (uncapitalized), as Wallis does, is to misrepresent the Heart. And one doesn’t “place one’s mind in the Heart.” What occurs yogically is that the mind and sprouting vasanas or habit-energies (which Wallis mistakenly equates with samskaras (the psychical seed tendencies that concatenate into and “sprout” as vasanas) are literally, via intense Shaktipat, sucked into the Heart-center (or Hridayam-locus).

Wallis is a competent writer--until it comes time to describe, in detail. the esoteric aspects of yoga and Awakening. I made this clear in my four-star Amazon review of his book “Tantra Illuminated,” and it bears emphasis here, because this liability alone undermines this book. And when this liability is coupled with the faulty science and twisted ontological epistemology that permeate this text (see Part 1 of this article), what you have is a recipe for a literary failure.

If Wallis wants to “up his game” as a spiritual writer, he needs to move beyond Adyashanti, Nisargadatta Maharaj, and Byron Katie, all of whom he lauds in this book, and none of whom, IMO, were/are Enlightened (or capable of elaborating the esoteric details of Self-Awakening). He needs to read the esoteric teachings of Adi Da (available in dozens of his books) and Ramana Maharshi (available in “Sri Ramana Gita, “Sat Darshana Bhashya,” and the original, undumbed-down “Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi). Da and Ramana, unlike Adyashanti, Nisargadatta, and Katie, were true Heart masters who describe, in unmatched detail, the Heart and Heart-Awakening.

Finally, Wallis needs to find himself a qualified editor, because the Kindle edition of this book could hardly have been more poorly edited. The spacing mistakes between words and paragraphs are legion, margins are mangled, and capitalization of terms is inconsistent. Most importantly, he needs an editor steeped in Tantric Shaivism to refine his prose. And the ideal choice for this would be Paul Muller-Ortega, a now-retired professor (but still active Kashmir Shaivism teacher) who taught Wallis as an undergrad. Muller-Ortega edited the (now out—of-print, but available as an ebook) “The Doctrine of Recognition” by Jaideva Singh, which, IMO, a provides a much deeper and richer presentation of Ksemaraja’s “Pratyabhijnahrdyam” than does Wallis’s “The Recognition Sutras.”