Yantra

Yantra is the visual form of mantra, a prayer. A tantric text states, ‘Yantra has mantra as its soul. The deity is the soul of the mantra. The difference between mantra and deity is similar to that between a body and its soul’. Though two— dimensional, yantras are conceived of as having depth and full dimension. Yantras may be drawn or painted on any material, out of any substance. However, the human body is often called by tantrics the best of all yantras. There is no parallel for the term in English, but yantra may be summarized as a two- dimensional diagram where visualized energies are concentrated, or simply, a field of energy.

With its mantra, a yantra is a complex of stored imagery of sight and sound and psychic and mystical content. Many yantras seem to be nothing more than an interwoven complex of geometrical designs centred upon a point (hindu). Triangles, sign of the you, may predominate, enclosing the point. The whole may be enclosed by a square, signifying the cosmic dynamics and the four corners of the universe. Yantras are thus worshipped as containing the divine presence. The yantra is often confused with a mandala but the former is appropriate to a specific deity only, while the latter may enclose an infinite number of deities. It is an image of the universe, a receptacle of the gods.

There are innumerable yantras of them the one illustrated here is the most famous and is known as the Sri Chakra or Sri Yantra.