Archive for November, 2008

Kama Sutra - a history for your information 211108

Monday, November 24th, 2008

Discovering the Kama Sutra?

Of all the philosophies and ways of life that have filtered from the Far East to western consciousness, the Kama Sutra is perhaps one of the best known, up there with Yoga and Buddhism. Starting in the late 18th century and travelling abroad becoming popular, Europe and Northern America have been flooded with art treasures, ideas, and philosophies from the Far East that have changed, to a certain extent, our way of thinking.

Busy Westerners obsessed with living in the now are fascinated by the attitudes of people who are content to live each day as it comes and are not afraid of what the future holds.

When mentioning Kama Sutra, most people conjure up images of an exotic help book about sexual satisfaction or an ancient porn magazine. The real name of the book is actually “Vatsyayana’s Aphorisms on Love” (“Vatsyayana Kamasutram”) and is comprised of 36 chapters that make up the treaty.

The central tenant behind this collection of aphorisms is to provide a comprehensive guide to sex, courtly etiquette, the courtship of married ! women, marriage itself and, finally, improving one’s sexual prowess through the use of herbs, spells and sex toys. As you can see, the purpose of this book was to become a definitive guide to what love and sex meant to the Indian society around the 4th century AD.

Apart from sex and courtly etiquette “Aphorisms on Love” is a very orthodox book, designed for the society that spawned it. Its purpose was to teach the lover what should be done in order to woo the woman he desires while protecting both of their good names and reputation. Reputation was important throughout the ancient world, not just in! India, and if a person forfeited it for such a trivial thing as sex was considered to be frivolous, making the person not worthy of the esteem of others. Vatsyayana himself, a celibate scholar, believed that sex while not bad in itself; the act of engaging in it was certainly frivolous and sinful.

The 36 chapters are each written by an expert of the issue and cover a wide range of issues, such as observations on the daily life of a citizen, sex positions, personal adornment, how to kiss, gaining the confidence of women and the means by which courtesans get money.

While the best known part of the book, the study of sex and sexual positions, makes up a mere 20 percent of the whole text. Those schoolers who are truly interested in sex should read the book in its entirety. And still after numerous centuries the ancient theisms ! are still surprisingly accurate because people still want the same basic things from one another.

As surprising as it sounds when it comes down to it the central tenants of the Kama Sutra are akin to Machiavelli’s “The Prince”, while the Indian book is much more careful to observe the morals of the time. Both books serve as guides to aspects of their respective societies and deal with them in a frank realistic manner.

Vatsyayana is not fooling himself that men and women are naturally virtuous creatures and so was perfectly willing to give advice on how to seduce married women, just as Machiavelli knew that a prince is bound to do evil things from time to time.

Great Sex Information for you help