The eternal mysteries,
clearly told.
Temples, texts, deities, philosophy, yoga, tantra and practice, sourced to tradition, written for the sincere seeker, free of distortion.
Independent · Sourced to Classical Texts · No Guru Funnel
Latest from the journal · Myth-busting Does the Hanuman Chalisa give the distance to the sun? 26 Sept 2026 → From the journal · Myth-busting Is Sanskrit the mother of all languages? 24 Aug 2026 → From the journal · Research Who was allowed to learn Sanskrit? 24 Aug 2026 → From the journal · Myth-busting When will Kalki come, and what will he look like? 24 Jul 2026 → From the journal · Myth-busting Why is a coconut broken in Hindu ceremonies? 24 Jul 2026 → From the journal · Myth-busting Why is Om chanted at the start and end of prayers and yoga? 24 Jul 2026 → From the journal · Myth-busting Do Aghoris really eat human flesh? 23 Jul 2026 → From the journal · Myth-busting Why is Krishna blue? 23 Jul 2026 → From the journal · Myth-busting What the bindi actually means 10 Jul 2026 → From the journal · Essay Why Hindus touch elders' feet (charan sparsh) 10 Jul 2026 → From the journal · Myth-busting Brahma, Brahman, Brahmin: one root, three worlds 4 Jul 2026 → From the journal · Myth-busting Satan in Hinduism: the asuras are not what you think 4 Jul 2026 →
The Treatises
Our long-form, book-length works. The deepest study on the site.
The City of Light Kashi, the one city Hindus travel to in order to die. Its ghats, its burning grounds, and the history beneath the myth. Open → The Unwritten Library How India kept its scripture for three thousand years without paper, and what happened when the word finally met the page. Open → The Coiled Power The chakras before the twentieth century rewrote them. What the tantric texts actually drew, and where the rainbow poster came from. Open →
The path of power
Tantra
Enter Tantra →The tradition's most guarded path: fierce goddesses, the science of mantra, and the serpent power that sleeps at the base of the spine.
Explore by tradition
The nine great domains of the tradition, each a world of its own.
The Essentials Start here: the core ideas the whole tradition rests on 27 articles → 
Philosophy & Darshanas The six schools, the great teachers and saints 39 articles → 
Deities & Symbolism Gods, goddesses, iconography 75 articles → 
Scriptures Vedas, Upanishads, Gita, Puranas 56 articles → 
Yoga & Meditation The paths of yoga, meditation, kundalini 22 articles → 
Worship & Devotion Puja, mantra, festivals & daily devotion 42 articles → 
Temples & Sacred Geography History, architecture & pilgrimage 38 articles → 
History The tradition in time 16 articles → 
Journal Essays & myth-busting 34 articles → From the journal
Essays, commentary and myth-busting.
Myth-busting
Does the Hanuman Chalisa give the distance to the sun?
A famous sum says one line of the Chalisa encodes the earth-sun distance. It does not, and the reasons are more interesting than the claim.26 Sep 2026Myth-bustingIs Sanskrit the mother of all languages?
The claim is traced to one sentence written in Calcutta in 1786, and that sentence says the opposite of what it is quoted for. The idea it is used to support belongs to a different man, in 1808, and comparative linguistics spent the next seventy years dismantling it.24 Aug 2026ResearchWho was allowed to learn Sanskrit?
A Jain logician was expelled for twelve years for wanting the scriptures in Sanskrit. The Buddha made it a punishable offence to put his teaching into the brahminical register. The law books prescribed molten tin for a Shudra who listened to the Veda. And the language crossed Asia to Java anyway.24 Aug 2026The reference layer
Browse the whole corpus — Sanskrit terms, source texts, verses, deities, temples and the sacred year.
Begin your study
A free introduction, with source-text references. One email when something worth your time goes up.