Obscure Religious Cults as Background of Bengali Literature c5.22

c5.22

In the Nāth cult, which seems to be synchronous with the Buddhist Sahajiyā movement (though the origin of the cult may be much earlier), the two aspects of the absolute reality are represented by the Sun and the Moon, where the Sun represents the principle of destruction (*kālāgni*) through the process of change and decay,—and the Moon represents the principle of immutability. The final aim of the Nāth Siddhas is the attainment of a non-dual state through the attainment of immortality in a perfect or divine body. This non-dual state of immortality can be attained only through the union or rather the commingling of the Sun and the Moon. In its speculations on the attainment of an immutable and divine body through psycho-chemical process of Haṭha-yoga involving the theory of the Sun and the Moon, the Nāth cult seems to be akin to the Rasāyana school of Indian thought, the main difference being that the medical and chemical science of the Rasāyana school became transformed into a psycho-chemical yogic science with the Nāth Siddhas.