Written originally in Sanskrit by Vatsyayana, the
Kamasutra is accepted as a science of love. Looked into deeply it is an attitude towards life with it's three guiding principles of the Indian way of living: dharma, artha and kama that is, duty, meaning and action. It emphasizes the importance of singing, dancing, conversation and living well. It talks about Sexual Union.
Marriage, Wives, Lovers and Means of Attracting Others to One's Self.
One of the most popular chapter in
Kamasutra is titled Sixty-Four. This chapter deals with eight subjects that is embracing, kissing, scratching, biting, lying down, making various sounds, playing the part of a man and the mouth congress. Each of these subjects is of eight types and therefore covers sixty-four topics which also gave the chapter it's name. We can also describe
Kamasutra as an art with sexual content to stimulate sexual thought and feelings and more importantly to arouse such desires almost by the way. At the most basic level a simple gesture like touching, pressing or rubbing are classified as an embrace. Like when a male gets closer to the female and brushes his body lightly against hers or a woman on pretext of reaching out for something touches the male with her breast or just the act of a couple walking very close to each other, their bodies rubbing against each other.
Sexuality and religion were closely inter-linked and sexual desire was considered to be a positive religious duty. Eroticism in art came to a turning point with the coalescence of sex and religion, shown in portraitures of Krishna and Radha especially in the Rajasthani art. This gave sex a whole new meaning, one attached closely to religion through the union of the human-self with the divine. The erotic symbols and images, especially in temples in India, particularly the
Khajuraho temples are adorned with great many sculptures which are vividly erotic. The splash of sexual symbolism on the walls of the temples contributed greatly to the sudden rise of Khajuraho's fame. Devi Jagdamba Temple seem to be devoted entirely to the art of love making. In this temple there is hardly any conceivable posture of the union which is not portrayed. The erotic figures meet the eyes all over the place and not concealed away in the dark corners of the temple. In the words of Charles Fabri "on the temple walls the sculptures of
Khajuraho celebrate the beauty of human figures, extol the loveliness of the slander grace of women, dwell lovingly on well-developed hips and shapely bosoms, on the charm of creeper like arms intended to embrace and praise the excitement of beautiful legs".
The presence of these images on the walls of the temples is not without controversy.One of the explanations given was that erotic figures were carved on the temple walls to attract devotees to these temples with a belief that once the people came to see these loose-love images they might stay at the temple to offer prayers. It is also said that on the analogy of the Buddhist temples in Tibet, where sexual images on the temples were used to test the concentration of the monks.
The better explanation appears to be that the erotic and loose-love sculptures on the walls of temples depict the life of the age to which they belong. Indian literature is full of sexual allusion and symbolism and passages full of eroticism.
