A hymn from Atharavaveda is dedicated to an object that closely resembles this . These smaller triangles are supposed to form the abodes of different gods, whose names are sometimes entered in their respective places. In common with many depictions of the sriyantra , the one shown here has outer rings consisting of an eight-petalled lotus, enclosed by a sixteen petalled lotus, girdled in turn by three circles, all enclosed in a square with four doors, one on each side. The square represents the boundaries within which the deities reside, protected from the chaos and disorder of the outside world.
Tantric tradition suggests that there are two ways of using the sriyantra for meditation.
In the 'outward approach' , one begins by contemplating the bindu and proceeds outwards by stages to take in the smallest triangle in which it is enclosed, then the next two triangles, and so on, slowly expanding outwards through a sequence of shapes to the outer shapes in which the whole object is contained. This outward contemplation is associated with an evolutionary view of the development of the universe where, starting with primordial matter represented by the dot, the meditator concentrates on increasingly complex organisms, as indicated by increasingly complex shapes, until reaching the very boundaries of the universe from where escape is possible only through one of the four doors into chaos. The 'inward' approach to meditation, which starts from a circle and then moves inwards, is known in tantric literature as the process of destruction . The mathematical interest in the sriyantra lies in the construction of the central nine triangles, which is a more difficult problem than might first appear. A line here may have three, four, five or six intersections with other lines.