India's Body and Soul

Kama Sutra 

Let's start with fun education today. Comedy is a perfect way to get the point 
through without being all serious about it.

And now to the famous book

"The Kama Sutra of Vatsyayana", from 1883, translated from Sir Richard Burton.

Free read: http://www.sacred-texts.com/sex/kama/index.htm

The Kama Sutra is an accient Indian text which is considered the primary 
Sanskrit work on human sexuality. It was written by Mallanaga Vatsyayana 
in the 2nd century CE. The bulk of the translation was performed by an Indian archaeologist, Bhagvanlal Indraji and civil servant Foster Fitzgerald Arbuthnot, 
with the assistance of a student, Shivaram Pashuram Bhide. This is one the 
first systematic studies of human sexual behavior in world literature. it also 
documents the sociology of sex in India eighteen centuries ago.

What does Kama Sutra mean?

It is widely believed that people have been reading the Kama Sutra for thousands 
of years.

Historians have estimated that the Kama Sutra was written by 

Vatsyayana, a Hindu 

philosopher, sometime between 400 B.C. and 200 A.D. 

While many people believe that the 

Kama Sutra is merely a manual for several 

unique 

sexual positions, the Kama Sutra is also a guide for living a virtuous life 

that is filled with love, family and other pleasures.

The Kama Sutra, a guide for living.

The Kama Sutra is a philosophical guide for the three main goals of everyday 
Indian life,

which includes"Dharma," or virtuous living, "Artha," or material 

prosperity and "Kama",

which is aesthetic and erotic pleasure. It is largely in 

prose, with many inserted anustubh 

poetry verses. For many people, it can be 

incredibly liberating to realize that seeking out 

sensual pleasures is actually a 

way you can become a better, more well-rounded human.

The Kama Sutra, when used as it was intended to, can awaken sexual hungers 
and allow 

people to become comfortable with expressing themselves in creative 

ways that can 

amplify the emotions of affection and love.

"Kāma" which is one of the three goals of Hindu life, means sensualor sexual pleasure, and "sūtra" literally means a thread or line that holds things together.

What is it all about Vatsyayana's Kama Sutra book which includes 1250 verses, 

distributed in 36 chapters, which are further organized into 7 parts?

1. General remarks

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.

2. Amorous advances/Sexual union

Chapters on stimulation of desire, 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. 

                                     

Did you know? Kama Sutra did not originally have illustrative images!

3. Acquiring a wife

    Marriage, relaxing the girl, obtaining the girl, managing alone, union by marriage .

      4. Duties and privileges of the wife

    The only wife and conduct of the chief wife and other wives.

      5. Other men's wives

    Behavior of woman and man, how to get acquainted, examination of sentiments,     the task of go-between, the king's pleasures, behavior in the women's quarters.

      6. About courtesans

    Advice of the assistants on the choice of lovers, looking for a steady lover, ways of making money, renewing friendship with a former lover, profits and losses.

      7. Occult practices

    Improving physical attractions, arousing a weakened sexual power.

See you tomorrow - Kal Milenge